GESPENST

[Personigo de la Ĉefo]

"...Eons before recorded history began, in the days following the Maker’s birthing of the universe, the Allfather did create man to tame the land, and the Gepensts to guard man and guide him through the Everafter.
When man’s hubris and power led him to violate the Everafter while he yet lived, poisoning the holy after life in pursuit of power, the Gespensts forsake their inherent task, for they realized they could not guide man, only contain him.
They sealed those responsible under the wall that never bent, and watched the innocent to guide his way..."

- Amisad Lowel, the World Records


Welcome to GESPENT, a classic-style JRPG. You know, I always liked these games, and i also always prefer JRPG's to WRPG's for their colorful characters, creative designs and strategic battle systems. So I am not trying to make something action-related, or RTS, or a rhytm game or something... No, what I want to make is what Maker exists for. But please, don't expect a clichéd by the book JRPG, no. I am fixing what I feel is wrong with that genre (and please don't come to my door with burning pitchforks for not liking some classic JRPG elements like overobundance of grinding and random encounters). I just want to make a game which I, and by extent you all, can play and have fun with.
The game is free and open, you can get all resources from it w/o my permission and do everything you want with it.

Well, that was kinda jousy, wasn't it? I'm not very good at those "intro" things. Let me just to map out the features that await you in the upcoming game and in the demo itself:

Features:

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- Sideview battle system with animated battlers. Most battles depends on smart use of skills and states, you can rarely win even small battles by mashing that enter.
- A LOT of custom graphics: nearly all battlers, charsets and icons are custom. Also busts! Yeah, and cut-ins too!
- Unique characters. Both personality and gameplay wise. There is no clones, and each party member plays differently.
- A lot of unique abilities. Again, no ability clones.
- No random encounters. All enemies are visible and behave differently.

Upcoming features:

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- Streamlined level gain: your party gains levels, not character. But-
- Unorthodox ability learning system: Skill Web. Inspiration comes from FF X's sphere grid, but you are free to go. You will gain points by doing certain things with certain characters, and you can use those to move trough the grid. Once you learn a basic ability, you will get a card, with which you can later fill the empty space of other character's Skill Web in order for that character to learn it.
- Branching, route-based storyline with multiple endings.

Game shall be released in episodic format.



KNOWN BUGS:

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These are bugs we know about. If any of you can fix them - we'll be eternally grateful.
- Weird death: character die weirdly when killed by refleced damage or slip damage. Something to do with CAN_COLLAPSE. People are looking into it, but if they'll fail to fix it, i will remove all slip damage states.
- Double pop: if Slip HP and slip MP are afflicted simultaneousely, clone of Slip Mp indicator will appear and will kinda stand there for a while.
- Sometime character's "Limit Break" will not empty the gauge and can be used many times over. Causes and solutions are currently unknown.

People and gratitudes:
- Indimion & Hosse for their amazing music.
- undergroundjin & LexusX For their outstanding animations
- caveman, Ren310, Cornered Cosmos & Anthyny Murphy for testing.


Characters:

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Unit 8: Daughter of Unit 1 and educated in a prestigious academy, Unit 8 displays high marks in close combat and magical vitality aptitudes.


Unit 17: Though technically a failed prototype of a the theoretical next-gen warrior, the mutations he retains from that, although rendering him blind and mute, did make for an extremely strong individual. Hence why he was spared extermination and moved to further tests and field operations, pending further investigation.


Unit 27: Despite his lowborn caste, Unit 27 scored such high marks due to his great intelligence that he was brought into the research field regarding sonic technology. Recommend keeping a close eye on his, for though he is a titanic asset, he remains overly sympathetic to the plight of the lower castes.

Screenshots:

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Download Demo

[Anthyny]

This project is pretty well put together as I would've expected from you.


Here's an official review after playing it though.
-- First and foremost, the way you ended it left me bitter. Lol --


The mapping is solid, and even though the "Hey follow me" idea is obvious its relatively easy to get distracted with the small little details of the temple (I believe they said temple, although I get a pretty heavy sewer vibe from it)
The immersion is pretty strong with everything as well with the customized character sprites for actions instead of the usual "jump and spin" that other RM games use. The monster sprites that are wandering about also add a very nice touch and is nice in giving you a notice on what baddie you'll be facing if it gets ya, helps with planning as well since the game is a tad on the harder side for an introduction for anyone that doesn't know how to think. (So you've kept that promise about not being able to just press enter, which is nice. Lol)


Dialogue is a bit rough around the edges, but pretty enjoyable for the most part.
- I was pretty pleased to find out that Unit 8 was a girl. The tough image that she portrays like she has something to prove is all right, but it gets better as you progress as she seems to .. loosen up a bit. I grinned when she got grossed out after stepping in the slime after trying to sound like a badass.
- Unit 27 was all right, but he annoyed me mostly at his self-martyrdom. I suppose that is the point of his personality though, which means he's doing his mob
- Unit 17 was a bit boring, I suppose he doesn't get much of a chance to show off who he is though in the time frame of the demo.


Music is nicely composed by whoever you said had done it for you. The boss themes didn't make the fights seem like they were... boss fights though. A bit too light hearted. Battle theme seems well suited though.


Gameplay is rough at first. I suppose you do learn best when you have to read and try everything on your own at first, but I can see how this might be a bit frustrating for more casual players that try it. The skills do mostly have their uses, but as with all games, the ones that shine show up relatively quickly.
- Unit 17 was used mainly as a Healer since his speed let him go first in the turn order, also since his other skills and attack tended to miss even with Spider Sight activated
- Unit 8 spammed Charge to shockbolt and her magic since they always landed and did high damage
- Unity 27 just kinda spammed CC moves that would miss alot or was used as a meatshield really. He could be used as back up damage though after Calibrating.


Outside of battle the game plays like a normal jrpg does though as of now it seems.


-- Aside from that here are a few things of note to possibly look at/improve though
A few grammar/dialogue mistakes. These hit me pretty hard when I see them, even small ones.
Skill descriptions for commands that have their own command section in battle. (Charge, Calibrate, Spider Sight)
Full screen frequency skills are off by a few pixels to the left, leaving uncovered screen.
The characters on the save screen are facing different directions, not a big deal though.
Unit 17's damage taken when reflected back at him seems to be much higher then the other two.
That blue guy in the hallway confused me for awhile. I saw that he gave the 99% damage items later though after staring at him for a few minutes.
Unit 17's skill "KILL!" crashes the game.
The title screen menu font doesn't show up
The "Onlooker" enemies - Still haven't figured out what they do. lol


Even with the few bugs I found, I would definitely give the game a whole play through once it was released.




Also for anyone else that plays this you'll know what I mean by this

"F**K"


Lol. Good game, can definitely see work was put into it.