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March 28, 2024, 01:15:29 pm

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My current FFT project. No title yet as I ironically suck at titles.

Started by Philogosten, September 14, 2015, 03:56:23 am

Philogosten

What is this project, and why should I care? you may be asking yourselves, well I will answer this.

First this is a complete overhaul of fft that tries to match a new less magical lore without monsters being common (with the exception of Chocobos and Dragons) with gameplay so if you are a stickler for every battle being challenging and like having access to hiring squires. Then sorry this is not for you. Not every fight is hard. Some will be a pain and others will be a breeze. Most equipment besides one of a kind ones will not have a drastic change in stats from the worst to best. That part I have already like 80% done. Just got to rename a few items and and change the descriptions.
So the plot will be different. I am cutting characters that were in the original. No more Rafa, Malak, Mustadio, Ramza, Reis, Beowulf, Steel Giant. New characters are everywhere in this game. Some you will get to know and others you wont since that's life for you.

Magic is less abundant however it is not absent. The main character is a mage type however it is more of a rare thing. No generics will be on your team. Only special units so you wont get to do much to alter the characters growth paths as it lore wise so it is closer to a regular rpg in that way. However you wont end up with all melee types, mage types or archer type it will be a little more of a balanced team. No random battles either since there are no monsters and bandits are not likely to attack a group of heavily armed people  every couple of days. Deep dungeon will be available for power leveling for you later on for those who really want to grind or just fight a lot of enemies on a map at once. Will make those battles sometimes have the max number of sprites I can fit without issue.

There is one thing I am considering but not sure of yet which is if I should make the level ups not change stats drastically so abilities would become the only advantage besides some rather minor stat variations to add a realistic cap to for instance how much damage a knight can inflict as you can only get so strong so magic is really what will give you an advantage. (inspired by DAO lore) The other option is to leave the level up stats as they were mostly besides the special classes being altered.
The holy stones will still be in it but will not steal the plot, no more resurrecting Ajora subplot.

And more! 

Sound like your thing? Awesome, I hope you'll love it. Not your thing? Well thats cool too as there are great completed projects on this site and at least one of them I bet will appeal to your tastes.

Q:So when can you expect me to post a patch?

A:Well I am being lazy with event editing for now as I suck at using easyvent still even though it is an amazing tool. But that is the biggest thing left to do really and so just to get an alpha ready faster I am not going to make them perfect right now. I am going to fit the story around my limited event editing abilities because
if I exceed my abilities i'd have to hope someone would want to do the events for my story and that would be a lot of work and well
I want to get a playable version done and then I can tinker constantly as needed to make it perfected. Soooooo I would guess by the end of the year knowing how I obsessively work on projects that generally end with me cutting down to like 4 hours of sleep a night to get more done. I know I could be using that time for irl stuff and should I? Probably but this is more fun for me. However it is football season so if the Vikings are playing then I wont be doing any work that day.


Now taking bets on which kills me first. lung cancer or liver failure

3lric

Don't use EasyVent. The commands are outdated. All my eventing is done via the Wiki and Notepad. You'll also need the new config here found at the top of the page here:

http://ffhacktics.com/wiki/Event_Instructions

Download whatever version of EVSP and overwrite the config with the one in this link, and then use the wiki for your commands.
  • Modding version: PSX

Xifanie

I'm just going to say, if you immediately throw out that you're going to half-ass your mod, it's going to be really hard to get people interested. ESPECIALLY if you expect people to get interested so you can keep going to improve your mod. Elric did Dante's intro as one of his first events ever, and it's nothing to laugh at. But god damn did he work hard on it. Of course, now he's gone back and edited JotF Ch1's events to make them go from good/great to excellent/flawless.

I'm not saying this to discourage you. But if you're going to event for your project, unless it's a spoof hack, you can't half-ass this shit. Elric's eventing is what got me, and many others to join his project: because he delivers.

Have a nice day.
  • Modding version: PSX
Love what you're seeing? https://supportus.ffhacktics.com/ 💜 it's really appreciated

Anything is possible as long as it is within the hardware's limits. (ie. disc space, RAM, Video RAM, processor, etc.)
<R999> My target market is not FFT mod players
<Raijinili> remember that? it was awful

Angel

There are people who play FFT and its fan derivative works for the gameplay alone, but they also tend to be the people who don't get enormously excited over projects to begin with. Journey of the Five gathered the largest following because it wasn't released at all until the events were solid publishable work. There's nothing wrong with your approach, just possibly the expectation.

But, if you have a really good story with solid dialogue, AND it's fun to play, it may work out for you. It's just in your best interest to expect that you'll be doing all of the event work yourself, and to familiarize yourself with it as much as possible. None of us will discourage you, but we do tend to push people so that they'll push back.

Now that all the admins have chimed in, surprise us! Blow our minds, it's what we want to see!
  • Modding version: PSX
* Angel should quit being a lazy bitch
<@Elric> I agree to that as well

nyanyame nyanyajuu nyanyado no nyarabide nyakunyaku inyanyaku nyanyahan nyanyadai nyannyaku nyarabete nyaganyagame
At the end of the day, are we not all trapped inside lemons?

Philogosten

I'll take all of that into consideration and Toshiko, I'll try.
Now taking bets on which kills me first. lung cancer or liver failure

3lric

  • Modding version: PSX

Philogosten

Update! Having issues making the black dragon pallet swap that the sprite editor shows as already existing in the games files, it wont show up in game. Long story short that black dragon is needed so this is a bit of a setback as sprites are something I am not good with. (placeholder dragon sprite will be used in the meantime) The story is not quite finished and I want to ask your opinions here for some things.

1. Since Cloud will be a character would you like to see Tifa accompany him?
2. Would you like to see a romance develop between two characters in the game?
3. Would you like bosses or characters to be fought multiple times throughout the plot or do you want to have them dead after 1 fight?
4. Are there any characters from the original game whose roles you'd like expanded?
5. Want me to rush out an alpha or take my time and give you a much more detailed and ambitious project?
Now taking bets on which kills me first. lung cancer or liver failure

Angel

1. Heck, I'd use Tifa while Cloud sat on the sidelines.
2. I'm not adverse to it, I just prefer it have a purpose.
3. I tend to only like recurring enemies to be comic relief, but that's personal preference.
4. Balmafula. Always wanted more from her since she seems like such an afterthought.
5. Take your time, post screenshots/videos to gather interest.
  • Modding version: PSX
* Angel should quit being a lazy bitch
<@Elric> I agree to that as well

nyanyame nyanyajuu nyanyado no nyarabide nyakunyaku inyanyaku nyanyahan nyanyadai nyannyaku nyarabete nyaganyagame
At the end of the day, are we not all trapped inside lemons?

3lric

  • Modding version: PSX

Jumza

Quote from: Philogosten on October 28, 2015, 12:45:40 am
Update! Having issues making the black dragon pallet swap that the sprite editor shows as already existing in the games files, it wont show up in game. Long story short that black dragon is needed so this is a bit of a setback as sprites are something I am not good with. (placeholder dragon sprite will be used in the meantime) The story is not quite finished and I want to ask your opinions here for some things.


If you post an explanation on exactly what you're trying to accomplish either here or in the Help section I bet I could solve your problem :o
  • Modding version: PSX
Nyzer: Alma teleports out of her own possessed body.
Raijinili: Remember that you're telling a modding community that the game they love could use some fixing.

Philogosten

Essentially there is a black dragon sprite in the game files that wont work when I try to use it for a character. I think because it doesn't have it's own portrait maybe? I still havent figured that part out.
Now taking bets on which kills me first. lung cancer or liver failure

Jumza

Whoops, sorry I didn't reply sooner!

So, what I bet is happening (give more info if I get this wrong) is that you're trying to set a generic monster dragon (IE, Blue Dragon) to have a different palette in the ENTD. While this does work for generics, monsters are done a little differently. Their palette is set in the Jobs tab, it can't be changed (without a little extra work) just by assigning it a different one in the ENTD. Go to the dragon job in question in the Jobs tab and look at M. Portrait, M Palette and M Graphic. Every monster has numbers set for these since every monster is coded to have a specific sprite, palette and portrait depending on it's job. Make the palette number the right one for what you want and voila, you get your new colours!
  • Modding version: PSX
Nyzer: Alma teleports out of her own possessed body.
Raijinili: Remember that you're telling a modding community that the game they love could use some fixing.

Philogosten

The black and gold dragon sprites dont have jobs set to them at least ones in patcher. they are pallet 5 and 6 I believe and the patcher only lists 3 dragon jobs.
Now taking bets on which kills me first. lung cancer or liver failure

Jumza

Yeah! So find the job you wish to replace, set their M.Palette to 1 or 2 more than the Red Dragon (if they are the first and second palettes after the third), then set the M.Graphic to the same value as it is for all dragons. That should work!
  • Modding version: PSX
Nyzer: Alma teleports out of her own possessed body.
Raijinili: Remember that you're telling a modding community that the game they love could use some fixing.

3lric

Don't forget palette 6 has an issue. Make sure to skip that one.
  • Modding version: PSX

theultrawolf

  • Modding version: PSX & WotL

Jumza

No he means using palette 6 can crash the game, not that the palette itself looks bad (I think it's all black anyway).
  • Modding version: PSX
Nyzer: Alma teleports out of her own possessed body.
Raijinili: Remember that you're telling a modding community that the game they love could use some fixing.

3lric

Correct, the 6th palettes crystal will crash the game. If you wanna fix that ultrawolf, then go ahead.
  • Modding version: PSX

Philogosten

Ok so I didn't die and neither did my project. Had some setbacks but i'm still working on it.
So you might be wondering what is taking so long, well mostly technical stuff.
So updates
1. Changed weapons and armor all drastically. Not a lot of variety for weapons anymore but a lot more powerful and rare ones that can be obtained. I think it is obvious what I did there. Mostly tried to use famous weapon names and did have to make a Buster Sword since not fond of the whole materia blade thing in general.
2. Equipment increases stats but not health and dodging/blocking is the new way combat goes. Getting hit is devastating
3. Revamped every job and replaced some and created new ones, the non special jobs have no magic of any type to enforce gameplay wise how rare magic is.
4. No healing items because no.
5. Actually found a way to justify the deep dungeon in this and thinking about trying to make a second one somewhere else with another series of levels but that part I have not looked into too deeply.
6. Leveling up doesnt do a lot since base class stats are more important. So far I am liking it that way but im not married to system so it may change.
Now taking bets on which kills me first. lung cancer or liver failure