Sprite RPGs?

Shepsus · Mon 12/10/2015 10:57:31

Hey everyone!
I had a question for all of the game developers here.
I've been playing some old school RPG's on my phone. And I marveled how some of the games that run on my Playstation now runs digitally on my phone. Here comes my question:

How difficult is it to create the sprite RPG games like Legend of Mana, Saga Frontier 2, Chrono Trigger and/or Final Fantasy 4 (before the 3d remake)

And by difficulty, I mean programming wise. The transistions between walking and a turn base battle, walking and world map, and changes between completing one chapter into another.

I understand the artwork is a whole different set of difficulties with the matte paintings and multiple sprites per character.
I also understand the difficulty of text and story is another hurdle.

But if you had the artwork and story, what would it take to put it together and start a working RPG? What programs would be used? I know it wouldn't be an easy process, Im just looking for an idea.

Thank you for any insight into these questions.

Slasher · Mon 12/10/2015 12:04:14

Quotewhat would it take to put it together and start a working RPG? What programs would be used? I know it wouldn't be an easy process, I'm just looking for an idea.

AGS has its own scripting. It is fully documented. Most default scripts can be amended to suit and you can build your own functions and events. You can also use conditions. Much like other scripting languages really, like C. There is a built-in help file within the editor itself to assist as well as having wiki and these forums to help. I must say that AGS is very user friendly.

It really depends on what you hope to achieve. AGS can do most things but some things may not be so easy to achieve.

Combat games can be made but tend to be rather complex in the making.

Many people do in fact make rgp games.

It should be noted that the main platform is windows.

Best of luck

Retro Wolf · Mon 12/10/2015 12:32:19

It all depends on your level of programming I suppose. If you are completely new to it you're going to have a hard time. Start small, make a bunch of crappy projects to get to grips with the software.

I used to challenge myself by making little example projects that would do one thing. One might be just a guy that runs around the screen and jumps. Another might be a basic pathfinding system. Eventually you can bring these examples together to make something more interesting.

Shepsus · Mon 12/10/2015 23:10:19

Thank you both for the answers. I appreciate it. I don't know any programming knowledge, just the other two skills noted above. Thank you!

xil · Tue 13/10/2015 00:01:54

AGS is probably easier for a complete beginner to start programming with, but arguably it's not the best if you are choosing not to create a standard adventure game using one of the templates provided.

You might want to take a look a RPG Maker: http://www.rpgmakerweb.com/ (worth noting that it only has a free version, so if you are choosing AGS because it's completely free, then ignore RPG Maker!

)

I wouldn't say one was better than the other or one is easier to learn because it's really 6 of one, half a dozen of the other, there is no right and wrong if you are starting out. One thing I would say though is that you should aim small to start off with, even with RPG Maker, you'll still need a good knowledge of programming to create a full game with battles, stats, items etc.

Personally, I would start very, very small - I'd simply try RPG Maker and do some prototyping, and then I'd try AGS - again, with a prototype. I'd take one small element of the genre 'RPG' say for example the stats, and apply that to a puzzle. Let's have Strength, Agility and Intellect. If the player chooses strength then they can move a big object to proceed, if they choose agility they can jump over big chasm to proceed, or if they have enough intellect they can talk someone around to helping them proceed. Keep it simple!

selmiak · Tue 13/10/2015 01:11:59

what everyone else is saying!
It is possible to code an RPG in AGS but it's complicated as AGS is an adventure game engine and not tailored for RPGs. As the name might imply it is rather tailored for adventure games and there are better engines for beginners to make an RPG. Like xil mentioned, try RPG maker. Or use AGS and make an adventure game

Sslaxx · Tue 13/10/2015 11:06:30

Depends. You could use it for QFG-style hybrids ala Quest for Infamy, Heroine's Quest or Mage's Initiation (all made in AGS).

If you're not interested in that type of RPG and are looking at AGS simply because it's free, then you may also want to consider other engines too. Unity and Unreal are not entirely free (pro license needed after earning $10k for the former, 5% royalties on the latter on sales over $3k) but there are entirely free and/or Open Source engines out there, like Godot. http://www.godotengine.org/projects/godot-engine These engines may all be lower level than AGS, but may also be more suitable for your needs.

Snarky · Tue 13/10/2015 11:52:35

Quote from: Sslaxx on Tue 13/10/2015 11:06:30
Depends. You could use it for QFG-style hybrids ala Quest for Infamy, Heroine's Quest or Mage's Initiation (all made in AGS).

Yes, but all of those (well, at least the first two â€" don't yet know about Mage's Initiation) required some serious coding in order to build the battle systems. It's not something I'd recommend to a novice coder.

Basically, AGS is an adventure engine, and it offers good support for traditional 2D, 3rd-person point-and-click adventure games. It's possible to do a whole lot of other things with it, but in most cases you will have to program it all yourself, from scratch. I would expect it to be significantly easier to build a tile-based RPG in an engine created for that purpose, like RPG Maker.

Shepsus · Tue 13/10/2015 12:40:33

Xil - Thank you for the insight in the different engines. To be honest, I didn't realize that this forum was dedicated to an engine called AGS, i just thought it was a forum for the adventure fans. Now that you guys have talked about it, I may have to look into the engine further.

Selmiak and Sslaxx -
I will definitely take your ideas into account. I had no idea Unity and Unreal were available for free use for people to play with.
Seeing as I'm just looking into the idea for an RPG, I will probably look into RPG maker first, just to get an idea of what some people have nade with it.

Thank you all for your help.
I am a writer creating an anime series and eventually a comic. Seeing as I've built the world fairly vast, I wanted to see the possibilities of creating a game similar to Saga Frontier 2 (fantastic PlayStation game). After talking to all of you, it sounds very possible with the right amount of enthusiasm and dedication. Just another project to add to the list while I toil away in my office.
Any other ideas or Sprite RPGs that you guys can recommend, ket me know!

Mouth for war · Tue 13/10/2015 15:16:12

I am making a rpg right now but to me personally ags felt difficult so i switched to clickteam's multimedia fusion 2.5 and it works great there. I am making a postapocalyptic, free roaming rpg with turnbased battles...i built a crafting system and i have included a lot of different stuff and i don't think i would be able to make this in ags. Of course it can be done but i could not achieve all this in ags without a massive amount of help. In mmf...i almost never asked for any help. I'm not bashing ags because i love it for adventure making (that would be more difficult to make in mmf) just saying that there are other options. Feel free to pm me if you want to know any details :-)

Monsieur OUXX · Tue 13/10/2015 16:29:59

Naive answer : if you don't know how to script, it's rather difficult, if you know how to script, it's not too difficult (but it's very long and many people will give up before completion).

Educated answer: the whole difficulty by then (in the 90's) was to optimize the rendering of all the layers of sprites, and the scrolling. the core of such games is "how do I hold a large map in memory AND how do I draw all the tiles in the viewport AND in the right order AND who do I manage the walk-behins (e.g. character walks behind a tree) etc.".
In the 90's you would need to go to quite a low level of programming to prevent the game from lagging. You would use tons of C and even assembly. This kind of problems is not a big concern nowadays, except a few specific situations: 1) if you use an out-of-the-box engine that is not meant to render tons of sprites (namely: AGS) 2) If you use a system that doesn't have a lot of computing/graphical power in comparison with modern PCs and consoles (namely: mobile phones).

Retro Wolf · Tue 13/10/2015 18:01:27

RPG's aside; if you're a story teller, I'd recommend taking a look at Twine: http://twinery.org/ for making text based games (you can add pictures too), It's very easy to use.

Slasher · Tue 13/10/2015 18:40:07

i remember when Clickteam's multimedia fusion 2.5 was simply called klik n play back in the early nineties

Mouth for war · Tue 13/10/2015 18:40:18

Yes i admit i am not a strong scripter but in mmf everything works for me so...it's better for me

Haha yeah good old klik and play. It has improved since then ;-)

Sslaxx · Tue 13/10/2015 18:51:12

Always found KnP and its ilk interesting, but less suited for the way my brain works.

Mouth for war · Tue 13/10/2015 19:08:33

It has its advantages for sure but can be frustrating sometimes too but i am really satisfied with it for what i am doing :-)

Retro Wolf · Tue 13/10/2015 19:58:21

There's Game Maker and Construct too. Was never too keen on Construct, I always felt I could type code faster in other software than I could drag and drop in Construct.

Ghost · Wed 14/10/2015 02:38:18

Another engine well suited for RPGs is 001 Game Maker (http://www.engine001.com). It has a free version, exports to mobile, and is geared towards 2D RPGs. Think "RPG Maker" for free. A full-fledged commercial version (GG Maker) is also available, and supports 3D.

Snarky · Wed 21/10/2015 21:12:18

Quote from: Snarky on Tue 13/10/2015 11:52:35
Quote from: Sslaxx on Tue 13/10/2015 11:06:30
Depends. You could use it for QFG-style hybrids ala Quest for Infamy, Heroine's Quest or Mage's Initiation (all made in AGS).

Yes, but all of those (well, at least the first two â€" don't yet know about Mage's Initiation) required some serious coding in order to build the battle systems. It's not something I'd recommend to a novice coder.

Just to add to my point, Mage's Initiation just posted another update, and it's all about how hard they've been working on getting all the bugs out of the combat code. If you look back to past updates, you'll see that this has been their main focus since at least June. It's not an easy job!

Sslaxx · Wed 21/10/2015 21:21:31

Quote from: Snarky on Wed 21/10/2015 21:12:18
Quote from: Snarky on Tue 13/10/2015 11:52:35
Quote from: Sslaxx on Tue 13/10/2015 11:06:30
Depends. You could use it for QFG-style hybrids ala Quest for Infamy, Heroine's Quest or Mage's Initiation (all made in AGS).

Yes, but all of those (well, at least the first two â€" don't yet know about Mage's Initiation) required some serious coding in order to build the battle systems. It's not something I'd recommend to a novice coder.

Just to add to my point, Mage's Initiation just posted another update, and it's all about how hard they've been working on getting all the bugs out of the combat code. If you look back to past updates, you'll see that this has been their main focus since at least June. It's not an easy job!

Wasn't making any comment on how easy they are to do - I know full well they're not (witness Hero6) - just commenting that they are possible.