FFTOMGTZ BACK FROM THE GRAVE!

[VampragonLord]

This is a patch have recently started. It (attempts) to take the game in a whole new direction. Namely: Horror.
I have already completed the basic battle system. There is no more "attack" command. You have your equipment menu, (which you can change your current equipment in, this will actually have a more vital role than in normal tactics), and your "Slay" commands. Your basic choices are Purify, Reload, and Normal shot.

Purify will instantly crystalize/treasure any zombie, but takes up 4 charges from your gun. Normal shot will kill a zombie, but zombies infinitely resurrect on their turn(and will from then on die at the end of each of their turns). The catch to normal shot? Zombies have 5 move, while you have 2 move. If you are in range of a zombie when they resurrect, they will blood suck you and you will die, if nothing is in range when they resurrect, they will wander off into a corner and die there. Your gun holds differing charges in based on equipment, and can be reloaded at the cost of simply using the reload command (one action). There are other skills but those are the 3 "core" skills to the mechanic. the other skills are simply built off of these.

Those currently working on this project:
Vampragonlord (Me, head of this project) Job:Pretty much everything


What i need to accomplish before this is 100%(will update regularly)
Change all battles (3 so far)
Change events/text (3 so far)
Create/obtain sprites:Still need a good zombie, enjoy shooting algus zombies til i get one. Got just about everything else i need, though if you'd like to throw more sprites my way i won't complain.
abilities(pretty much done)
Battle System, balanced (just about, could use some testers)

IF anyone would like to assist me just let me know, i could always use another hand(mainly cause i only have 2, and this is gonna take a good amount of work.)
any comments, praises, hatemails, confessions of love, spam emails, or the like are more than welcome.

[Dome]

I love you
Just kidding btw...
Do you have a playable demo?

[VampragonLord]

Currently only have the first battle completed, have yet to modify the event(the thief still calls them out and what not), and all the zombies are human st ajoras. If you want me to make a quick ppf of that though ill gladly do it, just giving you the heads up. i can probably have through dortor at the least by tomorrow.

Edit: Getting some sleep, then seeing a movie. I'll post a working demo at some point in the next 24 hours though.

[VampragonLord]

Sorry, no demo quite yet, was out longer than i expected today. Main reason was because i was trying to implement a slightly tweaked reload system, decided to scrap it and add it in later as a "hard mode" if this is successful.   Screen shots to make up for it though. Dome, ill have that demo for you shortly.
Additional info about the patch itself. The bulk of the patch is a new battle system, with the text altered mainly to suite the theme, so dont expect shakespeare.

spoiler

0 hp living unit(aka zombie)


Weapon is damage & element (higher rank enemies will negate most elements except for their weakness) Without this, your range is one and you do miniscule damage
Ammo determines damage dealt (doesnt matter vs basic zombies, will matter vs bosses/higher units.)Boosts different elements, and sometimes give small bonuses
Belt determines max ammo (mp) Without this, you can only fire one shot before reloading
Pouch determines ammo feed rate (most you can reload in a single reload.) Without this, you can only reload one at a time

Purifying shot, makes sure zombies wont come back

Blam head shot

[Kagebunji]

I would help with sprites, but I can't be sure if this patch will be completed, so I think it's not worth my time(at least for now )

[Dome]

I would help with sprites, but I can't be sure if this patch will be completed, so I think it's not worth my time(at least for now )

A well done Zombie could be useful...
We can replace the shitty uribo with a new kind of monster ;P

[boomkick]

behemoths could be zombie dogs
Summoners could be base for zombie lord, or it could be queklain.

[woodenbandman]

This.

Is.

Fucking.

Brilliant.

EDIT: I will sprite for this project. I will sign over my life to this. It's amazing.

[Zaen]

I'm going to infer that by reloading MP recovery is meant, and reload amount is total MA. That's a good idea...


This is very original... and impressive.

[Jon]

Hmmm, you said I couldn't play your patch, oh the irony, now I want to. If you want a spriter/story editor I would volunteer, that is if you will let me VampragonLord. One problem is that I have no idea how to actually change the events (like making characters move about), just the spoken text(I can change this pretty easily and with quality, too). I like the idea with the one hit kill bloodsuck and also that the zombies revive after 1 turn, the idea with the gun reload is cool, too. But listen, in all sincerity, since when do zombies have little icons of angels floating over their heads? You are probably gonna have to hack your way into that and change the little angel sprite to nothing...also, you will need just 1 custom sprite of a zombie, otherwise no one will take this project seriously...I can probably do that (but it might come out like crap, or work well like the Cannoneer hopefully)...I will post something if you lemme work with you and I make a zombie...up to you...

[VampragonLord]

The reason i was hoping for multiple zombies was more so you werent shooting the same exact thing every time. I see the sensibility in only one though (much less time consuming) those goals are simply for the 100% (like trying to 100% x-2 or something)

Note: For anyone who wishes to assist in sprites, please post WHAT you attempt to sprite, so that we dont have 4 people trying to make a full sprite sheet for the same thing.

reloading MP recovery is meant, and reload amount is total MA

truth be spoken
@boomkick, i was thinking panthers for zombie dogs and behemoths for Giant Werewolf. ive added some minor tweaks to elmdor and he is the generic young vampire.
Anything that isnt a zombie will have an actual health gauge (generally only one per battle) and are more
 "boss-like", though the actual boss monsters will be quite different.
@jon & wooden, ill welcome any and all assistance,
@jon in particular, i was simply joking when i said you couldnt play it, anyone who wants to is more than welcome to. The zombies only semi-revive (i made it so they die if they cant get blood) due to a glitch where if you tried to hit them with ANYTHING while they had 0 hp, they just died (unpurifiable). Not sure how to remove the angel at the moment, and it isnt anything TOO horrible, though yes i know what you mean.

Im off to the doctors for now, should be back in a couple hours, then ill get working on mandalia.

[SilvasRuin]

Figure out which sprite sheet has the status effect images on it and remove that status.

This idea has been tossed about already multiple times and in multiple incarnations.  You've made the most progress yet.  Your system is extremely intriguing.  Removing attack is brilliant and makes me wish I had thought of that when jabbering on about a similar system concept for mechs.  In fact, I see a lot of similarities between the two, but you've filled in gaps that I couldn't figure out how to hurdle.  The zombie mechanics... well I have never even heard of such things done.  Very creative.  My one and only complaint about this is that I fear there will be next to no variety.  It looks to me as if all the playable characters will have entirely identical roles and abilities.  I don't care how creative you get with your elemental setups (and you can get pretty damn creative), that is going to wind up getting very stale unless it is a relatively short game.

I would love to assist, but I'm afraid my one and only skill is writing.  I don't even have anything to provide evidence that it is indeed a skill of mine and I'm not just blowing smoke.  I have been toying with element setups in my mind quite a bit recently, so perhaps I can provide some ideas there.  You're going to want to go non-traditional for this I hope?  The more creative, the better.

also, you will need just 1 custom sprite of a zombie, otherwise no one will take this project seriously

This statement has already been proven quite wrong.  Though the sooner you get some awesome sprites, the better...  That's true of virtually everything anyways...

[VampragonLord]

@silvas, as far as the script goes, im looking for something fairly dark, (given the nature of the genre) but still with enough of a comedic kick back / dark humor sort of feel.

Demo is up! Use the save for ramza's abilities.

[SilvasRuin]

What, so you'd be interested in having me write?  Do you have anything in mind already or would you like me to give you a storyboard-esque concept?  I get the impression you at least have something in mind for a werewolf character...

By the way, what are you going to do about generics?  Basically Game Overs somewhat bother me.  Since you don't seem to have any means of revival, being hit by a zombie or something else really should have that character be lost to you.  Are you going to have just one main character that causes a Game Over on reaching 0 hp that the player must protect at all costs?  Are you going to make the player have to keep a core group of characters alive like that?  Or do you think keeping the character alive after the battle so long as three turns haven't passed is justifiable?  Actually this would affect the writing too.  Just what should be able to occur to a character before it is lost to the player forever and about what number of main characters would be the sweet spot for you?  Do you want only main characters and no generics?  Heck, do you want to go with only generics?  I'm sure that's doable.  That might make the writing more of a challenge, but it would make some things more novel and interesting.

Oh, and I could be wrong, but I think it is entirely possible to make other main characters as controllable as Ramza was in vanilla and don't necessarily have to be guests or given the immortal flag if they are intended to be used in the plot again later.  Really, I feel that was a rather lazy approach to them by Square and it really hurt late-game character development.  Unless I'm mistaken, you just have to make them incapable of leaving or being dismissed and add the Game Over flag if crystallized or chest'd to any and all battles that can occur.  Sure, that's going to be really tedious, but it would be nice to be able to keep them from being immortal flagged or a guest and still be able to utilize them for the plot later.

[VampragonLord]

well im trying to keep this generally spoiler free so aim/yahoo/irc

[SilvasRuin]

I didn't think you would reply so soon, so I edited majorly.  XD

Yeah, I was thinking I'd pm you the concept or something and not post it in public.  Hm...  Email might be the best approach to keep a written record of it so I don't forget.  mailto:silvasruin@ffhacktics.com">silvasruin@ffhacktics.com  Yay, I finally have a reason to use it.  

[VampragonLord]

actually there is bless, which all hunters have, it cures bloodsuck/revives. and the guests use it over attacking if theyre in range (saigas was just testing it). the rest i shall email you.

[Dome]

Me playing the demo
Why Ramza can't attack even if he has a gun?
Edit:Fuck I played before the save xD

[VampragonLord]

haha sorry dome >.< saigas had a similar issue, which was why i went ahead and made the save to make sure nobody had those problems.(hopefully)

The battle may or may not actually play out like that in the regular game, this is just to give a feel for how the battle system will work, what to expect from the patch, etc. i may move the vampire itself to later on and make it so you need to learn reload on the map (you and delita each trying to 6shot your way out of the mess.)

[SilvasRuin]

Hilarious dialog, but I hope that is only a placeholder.  Right now it is more of a parody than anything else.  Some humor in the plot is fine, but you lose the dark feel when you start cramming that much inanity into it.  (Too early to discuss specifics yet before the bigger stuff is ironed out, and Dome's vid is hardly spoilerific anyways.)

It looks like Dome would have won if Ramza had a way to attack, so it shouldn't be too bad for an opening fight... depending on how resilient that vampire would have been.  I haven't set ePSXe up on this comp just yet (new comp I built just before the Christmas break) or I would test it myself already.  From what I can see, that fight seems like it is easy enough for the player to figure out what the heck they are doing in time to save their ass, even if they start out completely in the dark about how it all works.  Getting equipment and equipping characters afterwards might be a bit more challenging, but a way could be found around that with REALLY self-explanatory items and descriptions, which you seem to be leaning towards anyways.

Basically... it's a start.