Game Development Team (Thread 2)

Some of my favorite characters (just for analysis perhaps -- to try and decide what makes a good character):

Tellah - FF4 - Badass wizard but old and can't remember most of his spells. He remind me a LOT of Fizban from the Dragonlance series. I love this character.

Shadow - FF6 - "He would slit his mother's throat for a nickel." Hardened, ruthless. Awesome dog.

Frog - Chrono Trigger - Valliant. Proud. Too proud sometimes. Unique... I mean, he's a damn frog after all.

Palom and Parom - FF4 - Spellcasting twins. Opposites of each other. (Much more character in the Japanese version. Damn you, American translators.) Rambunctous. Funny.

Cyan - FF6 - Expert swordsman. Compasionate man compelled to ruthless action and lust for vengeance.

Rightyho then. I can finish off the list of characters......


Member #5 (Male) - Red mage as BC said.

The Red Mage would be able to do some of everything (fighting, healing, magic attack) but not really specialized ... A 'real' Red Mage doesn't just have all the paths open to him from the start, he takes all of them at once, so he could be a good attacker and heal a bit and do some random Bolt 2 spells.

Member #6 - I'm a going with the Tamer idea Mr. Bob put forward in GMT Thrd 3. His basic attacks are with a whip...and as he levels up he gets better whip attacks, and gets attacks with animals...

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So, recap on the party:

Raphael/Jason - Black Mage
Cecily/Emilia - White Mage
Azrael/???? - Fighter
Member #4 - Thief
Member #5 - Red Mage
Member #6 - Tamer

Those in blue are male, those in red are female...

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Gimme a day or so and I will compile a word doc. of all the attacks etc.

So Aurv., take it easy for a few days, putcha feet up, watch some TV, drink a few pints......but be warned, I'm a gonna give you lots of work to be doing in a couple of days......

Wait a minute...you may have to get Wed to give the yes to all the attacks etc. first so...

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Whilst I'm a new-posting, any ideas for the names of Members #4, 5 and 6???

- They've got to be names that fit in with the story...for example, Raphael and Azrael are from the continent of Monterassat and have the weird "ael" type names, think Italian names during the kind of Renaissance period (???). The tamer (male) is also from Monterassat so must alos have a name like that...maybe he can be Leonardo...
- Some of the people from the continent of Iuirlas have everyday names that aren't widely used IRL...such as Cecily. The thief (female) will have one of these names...such as....erm...Kara???
- As for our Red Mage...erm...well, he's from Ascalarth, a peaceful, sophisticated continent...so he must have a itelligent name...no???

(If you want to know where I'm getting these continents from - Monterassat, Iuirlas, Ascalarth - then you can find them in a word doc in my Worlds of Muldrum thread in the literature part of the interests forum...I think)...

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I think that next time I post about the characters I'm gonna have to post a bit about them...if I've got them worked out by the end of the day, then I'll try and give you descriptions of them...

I've just remembered about this thing...sorry Aurv., you're still waiting......I've decided on the names btw...though as for the Raphael/Jason and Cecily/Emilia ones we can vote for them...hell, let's vote on all of them.

Everyone involved in this put forward the names you think people should have (you too Wed, if you're reading this), and we'll have a vote on them.

The names I've got are:

- Raphael (main guy; Black Mage)
- Cecily (main gal; White Mage)
- Azrael (second main guy; Swordsman)

- Kirma (party member; Red Mage)
- Kara (party member; Thief)
- Leonardo (party member; Animal Tamer/Trainer)

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A sidethought, what do people think about having party members that aren't permanent but appear as the game goes on. A good example of this is (from Kingdom Hearts 1) Aladdin in Agrabah, or Tarzan in Deep Jungle, or Jack Skellington in Halloween Town etc.

The thing we'll have to do then though is make it the game so that it can happen...which is where our scripter would come in. He or she would take the thing I'm writing, and add to it ideas from everyone else, and put it into script form. For example (quick 30 second job here, but it puts across what I mean)

Tutorial: On boat, how to move etc. (- in game tutorial guy = BlueCube???)
Intro scene: Boat wrecked in storm, Raph. awakes on land.
[Short play modey bit: (Could be used as a tutorial instead of the boat tutorial) move about, ends when you stumble upon pack of wolves]
Cutscene: Raphael running from wolves and killing them with magic. Ends when he slumps against the gates.
Cutscene: Guard on top of wall looks down and sees Raphael against gate.
Play time: Control guard. Pick up Raphael and carry him through town to the Inn.

And so on. The cutscenes will have to be scripted like a film script or play script. If no-one wants to do that then I can do it (scripting the cutscenes), but we really need someone to script the story and ideas into a script to be turned into the game.

On the names, some of them I like.

I would suggest Sylian (pronounced Sill-Ian) instead of Cecily.

Also, I don't really like the combination of Kirma and Kara. They both start with K and sound very much alike for characters that aren't related or something.

I quite like Cecily...but that's just me......everyone likes different things...

Sylian could definately be used though...change Kara to Sylian...

As I've said, we'll get everyone to vote...

Sounds good to me. That satisfies both of my ideas.

I like the names, like the idea and I think we shouldn't play out the game as one character, but as several. Like Lenny's idea about play as a guard at one point. You can help him, or you can't. Either way Raphael ends up in the castle room resting.

The game should play out as several characters during cutscenes. But you can play them. Very open ended... Damm, now I wish I was still the leader.

Edit: I read the part about Raphael being a mage... hmmm... I've never heard of the main character as a mage. But, its a good idea. But also, why don't we make a job system, sort of. Like (FF5?) and FFX-2 where you put on different clothes and you have different abilities.

If you like this idea'o'mine, then tell me and give me a list of things to add to our game like, for ex.

Raphael(Mage) abilities:
LV1: Fire, Water, Lightning, Ice
LV2: etc...

Raphael(Lancer) abilities:
LV1: Joust
LV2: Lance Spin
LV3: etc...

This way we could make it alot easier with the menu. For ex. If you equip Raphael with a Lance and he is LV4 with the Lance outfit, than a certain lance is equipped to him. He can now do certain abilities and has certain skills.

Man... this is cool... I HAVE FOUND INSPIRATION AGAIN!

You can still be the leader...all it takes is a "Lenny, you're fired!"......

Minor thing...he ends up in an Inn room...but who cares about the minor things at this point???

The playing out as different characters idea will need some working. Unless...he he he...you can play as each party member for a bit before they join the group...for example...Cecily could...fetch the groceries??? (Yawn!), Azrael fights Raph. (Should be fun), the thief has to do a skilly bit and try to steal from the characters (idea for this...the better you do it, the better the thief is when they join the party??), the Red Mage has to...do something or other...and so does the animal tamer...

I'm gonna make a new reply for the jobs idea...

I was supposed to make a list of all the different abilities the characters learn a few days ago...but I forgot, and am gonna have to do it asap. If you could give me a list of different possible jobs now then I can write the abilities thingy with all the different jobs, instead of editting it later...

If we can get the idea to work in the game then we will definitely use it. We want this game to be as good as we can make it. Anything such as different jobs improves the game.

Anyone else with ideas, however minor or major, post them, and we will try and get them into the game...if we can't, then we'll modify them until we can...

I like the job idea, but I didn't like how it was executed in FF5. Effectively, every character was the same but with different names. I think each character should only have a few choices of jobs that correspond with their background and initial class. This is so they don't all end up having the same ultimate abilities and being, generally, the same character.

For example, and I like this, but the titles may need some rewording:

- Raphael (main guy; Black Mage) - Elemental Mage (fire, water, lightning, earth type spells), Undead Mage ("summons," poison, decay type spells), Death Mage (doom, death, vanish type spells)

- Cecily (main gal; White Mage) - Holy Mage (damage to evil or undead spells), Cleric (heal spells), Augmentor (buff spells)

- Azrael (second main guy; Swordsman) - Knight, Samurai, Ninja

- Kirma (party member; Red Mage) - Time Mage (stop, slow, haste type spells), Destruction Mage (damage spells), Heal Mage (heal spells)

- Kara (party member; Thief) - Assassin (knife specialty, throw, etc), Super Thief (specialty in stealing rather than damage)

- Leonardo (party member; Animal Tamer/Trainer) - Water Tamer (water creatures), Earth Tamer (earth creatures), Wind Tamer (air creatures)

Sub Kara for Sylian if I get my way.

Okay, sorry I haven't been on in a while, but i've had some other important issues (money) and have gotten that pretty much squared away. I am going to try to still be the Animator, and am going to start the opening thing.

The job system is going to be like in FF Tactics? For those of you who don't know how that goes, let me explain. You start out with only 2 or 3 classes, and as you "level-up" the class, more become available. Such as, Ninja, which you need to have level 8 of 3 other classes that related to that class. The 3 were Thief, and 2 others I don't remember right now.

The playing of each sepereate character, from the way it was described, would be like that of Dragon Warrior 4 (NES). I know many of you have never played that game so let me give a brief summary. You first start as the hero. You get orders from the king to handle some evil dude in a tower, and so you go handle it. I mean, you are the hero. But, in Chapter 2, you play as a princess and must do something for her. Then you play as a merchant (best part in the entire game) and you do a little shopkeeping, then you need to get supplies from another town, and so starts his journey. Eventually, all the characters meet up, and find that they have to help each other to complete the BIG journey. Anyways, yeah. It kinda sounds like that.

I have just gotten Yahoo! Messenger thingy, and my SN is NeoDraco2K3, because Draco2003 was already taken. DAMN YOU OTHER PEOPLE WHO TAKE MY NAME ON PURPOSE!!!!

And finally, I heard that Wed-G is no longer the head honcho. Then he gets the inspiration again. I think maybe he just needed to relieve some of the stress. As for the new master of bladestar, I jes wanna say, CONGRATULATIONS!!!


P.S. Character Names! I almost forgot. I have worked some on my ability to come up with names. I ain't perfect, but here's what I got: Kura-san-Gurimai, Hiroriku, Rygerth, Gertanma, Byth, Retunmus, Veritus, Yeligur, Kolminar, Kergull, Vutirael, Nikogasa, Asynber, and lastly Hakusage. If you decide to use some, ask me how they are pronounced. Some of these could also be names of towns, or whatever. That's 14 names, so hope you could use at least one....hopefully......

You are gonna get your way...Kara is now Sylian. I like the idea of each person having their own jobs. And I like Draco's idea that as the person levels up they are able to "access" new job types (which become available as you level up).

I've gotta start writing all this down, my printer is on it's last legs now......

As for Khirma's jobs, Red Mages are supposed to do a bit of everything (I haven't the faintest idea, I'm a going with what BC said), so Khirma must have jobs from each of the three main classes - Black Mage, White Mage and Swordsman.

Which level-up-to-get-jobs thingy is gonna be used? I read your (Draco's) post as being when the characters level goes up, but on re-reading I found it actually said when the character gets to a certain level in a job...I have no idea which one we are gonna use...anyone??

Edit:

Another idea...instead of getting new jobs as you level up, you get new attacks and abilities within each job...but only when you level up that job...take the job system in FFX-2...something like that...and maybe you can get a new job when your character reaches a certain level...

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As for Yahoo!Messenger, good to see you've joined up Draco. A little proble I've found with the online version of it (e-messenger), it won't allow you (or at least me) to add any new buddies...I'll have a few more tries on it today, if it still doesn't work, then I'm sorry, but those without it will have to download the Yahoo! Messenger program...

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Right, where was I...oh yes, notebook to write everything down...

Right, screw editting an old post and making it too full of detail, here's a brand new post...

Another idea, to do with jobs etc. Each member starts off with a basic job thingy (Eg Raphael - Basic Mage; Cecily - Basic Heal; Azrael - Basic Swords skills) and as they level up then the other three or two jobs become available...let's try and make it 3 other jobs, then each character has 4 jobs to choose from...

Also, each member who isn't really a weapon-weildr can have their own weapon (excludes Azrael) to start off with that they can upgrade (Eg Cecily - Staff; Leonardo - Whip; Sylian - Knives; Kirma - Spear??; Raphael - Hand type things -- such as Iron Fist, or Brass Knuckles)...