At long last the game is taking shape into an actual game. Please do not mind the weird circles, x marks and other bizarre looking whatnot in the gifs, those just some leftover development markers.

Can't post any .gifs locally no more, they don't animate properly on the site
itch.io screwed up lol
Here's hoping they'll fix the .gif issue soon, glad you can use external links, for as long as that still works lol

https://giphy.com/gifs/uezHDLWO9YTDqoKHBC

Got a hero selection screen now. You start the game here and pick your first hero. You come back here every time the whole Party gets wiped out in battle or whenever you want to resurrect a dead hero if they’d die and leave behind a ghost.

Every first pick starts out by waking up in bed, little classic JRPG riff there. The beds also function as spots for resting and changing the time of day.

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All other heroes seen on the selection screen are found somewhere in the world and can be recruited into the Party. They don’t get the same boost as the first “Chosen One” hero though and can permanently die in battle without leaving a ghost to be resurrected. The first Chosen One stays with you throughout the whole game. Though you can still lose if you cannot resurrect the Chosen One’s ghost.

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Speaking of ressing, whenever a hero dies, there’s RNG if they‘ll leave behind a ghost or die forever. If they do leave behind a ghost and the Party has enough Virtue points, the ghost can be resurrected by certain persons, such as a mysterious shepherd in a field. 

Virtue will be gained through defeating major bosses and completing side quests.

https://giphy.com/gifs/h5VrDmuyOMjQ3HB4ez

Came a long way with in developing enemies on the world map, something the RPG Maker engine isn’t a huge fan of. Did manage to rig enemy front sight and surround sense, have all kinds of movement options for basic walking or flying around the air randomly. There’s also enemy activation only if Players get too close. Enemies also don’t chase Players ceaselessly, only within certain borders on the map, after which they either keep staring at the Player or turn back and leave. Lots of potential to rig all kinds of enemies and their reactions.

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Of course there’s still plenty of jank with enemy path finding, but for the most part everything works well enough.

And speaking of enemies, bugs hide it tall grass during warm seasons. They’re invisible, so every time you step into some grass, surprises await. Another JRPG riff right there.

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Latest thing done in the game was icy waterfalls. On winter in the outdoors waterfalls freeze up and you can slide down them and through them into other maps. Probably will figure out some secret location shenanigans to use these with, so there’ll be yet more slight map redesigns to come.

It’s still a pretty long stretch to polish the game enough into a proper demo. There is still so much to do with level design, enemy placement and balance, bug fixing, yadda, yadda. But progress is steadily underway and if I can’t get a demo out this year, there’s always the next one. Though I hope to post more updates in shorter gaps.

Next major development will be resource gathering and the crafting system.

See ya.

-Al