Dev Log #8 – Mapping

Waterfalls always feel tricky when it comes to parallax mapping. However, it isn’t really that hard once you get the hang of it.

By utilizing transparent waterfall sprites, you can place a waterfall regardless of what the wall is like behind the waterfall!

You can find transparent waterfall sprites here.

The end result would be something similar to this

You can see here that the wall behind the waterfall is the same as the rest of the parallax mapped hill. With this method, you don’t need to find a specific waterfall sprites everytime you have a different wall! This doesn’t only apply to parallel mapping of course, as the same concept can be applied with waterfall events over regular tilesets.

This link teaches you step by step how to create animated water, which is the tutorial I used to create the animated water texture in Event Horizon.

That’s it for now! Thank you for reading and I hope to see you again soon!

~anDai

Dev Log #7 – Script Corner #1

Going to start a mini-segment in our daily dev logs that specifically covers a script featured in Event Horizon.

Today, we’ll be talking about Himeworks’ Random Event Positions!

As I have covered in the past, this game does not use the generic “step encounter” employed in traditional JRPGs. Instead, for an encounter to start, the monster must made some form of contact with the players. In the case of more passive and peaceful monsters, combat is engaged when the players interact with them.

A problem with this system is that by default, there is no good way of placing the monsters in random locations. The monsters would always be in a specific location and every time the players leave and come back to the same map, the monster would always be at the exact X and Y coordinates. There are ways to use parallel processing and randomized variable to move these monster events but the process is honestly way too tedious to do for every single event.

The Random Event Positions script fixes this problem in the simplest way possible.

By putting the comment : <random position region: x page>, where x is the region tiles, the event will automatically be moved to one of the tiles that is specified as that particular region whenever that page is active.

There are other options in the script that allows for randomizing position at different time frames such as when the event is created or only on the first time the event is loaded.

It is a convenient script that works wonders not only for the monsters spawn locations, but also for other randomized events such as treasure chests, NPCs, etc etc.

I personally find this script to be highly compatible with my other scripts and so far, have had no issues running it with my other scripts. But don’t take my words for it, try it yourself!

You may find more about this particular script as well as other Himeworks scripts at http://www.himeworks.com/

This script corner will be my way of sharing these wonderful scripts with everyone as well as my personal take and usage on the scripts.

Also, there will be no Dev’s Log in the weekends, so I guess I’ll see you all on Monday!

Once again, thank you for reading!

~anDai

Dev Log #6

Today let’s take a look at a couple of the maps of the first forest encountered in the game.

This is the entrance map to the forest. Some of the trees here are scattered to provide room for players to navigate through. Hiding loots and monsters under the trees would be a definitely possibility! Players will still know that there are monsters and items when they are close enough due to the proximity alert I have in place.

Deeper into the forest, there is an abandoned mine. I admit it may be a little cliché but in the context of the overall plot, this mine is actually quite important! Also, I think the presence of the mine might be a welcome sight to the players since by this time, I’d assume they would be bored of the color green.

Deeper into the jungle, there is a flower bed. What is it for? Hmm, hard to say. It can be utilized as a variety of things. Shrine/grave to a fallen hero? Dwelling of a magical beast? Or a place where treasures are hidden? We are limited only by our imaginations when it comes to game development.

The forest is of course, a lot bigger than just these 3 maps. These are just a preview of the forest. The actual forest is probably at least 3x bigger than what is shown here.

Credit goes to Ayene, IceDragon and Celianna for the wonderful tiles!

That’s it today. Thank you for reading and I hope to see you around soon!

~anDai

Dev Log #5

Spent most of my time lately on overhauling maps and learning new techniques for parallel mapping. It has a lot of potential to improve the graphics of the default editor and it is a process that will gradually shorten as you get better at it.

Here, you’ll notice a pond and 2 turtles. The water of the pond is animated with 3 frames and made as an event that has stepping animation turned on. I think it looks decent, maybe not perfect but it’s honestly not too bad. I’ll probably spend some more time with these mapping to convert all the exterior contents into this sort of art style.

If you have any suggestion with regards to these mappings or have a technique or two to share, please let me know in the comments!

Once again, thank you for reading and I hope to see you again soon!

~anDai

P.S. The turtles are awesome.

Dev Log #4

I’d like to quickly go over the title of the project today.

Awhile ago, I’ve decided to start a Rpg Maker project, and decided to name it Project Helix, named after a certain fossilized Pokemon.

My interest with it quickly grew to a point where I simply must finish the game I envision it to be. After a few months, It occurred to me that it needed an actual name.

Naming a game is relatively difficult and a lot went into the thought process for this particular name. Eventually, I’ve reached the decision of naming this game Event Horizon.

This is a WIP design of the title logo by yolichan and I think she did a fabulous job capturing the essence of the project.

A rather short post today because I am feeling unwell, I’ll try to post more tomorrow. And I hope no one is offended by these dev log spam.

Thanks for reading and I hope to see you again!

~anDai

Dev Log #3

Awhile ago, I posted images of an overlay mapping that is being utilized in Event Horizon. Recently however, I’ve came to the conclusion that square tiles simply will not do.

To address this concern, I have decided to change my mapping style to using parallax mapping wherever I can. Below are the comparisons.

Before:

After:

It’s still a WIP but I feel that it already looks much better than the original. I am not the best artist around when it comes to designing graphics but I will try to learn what I can to make the game look better.

Hopefully I will be able to improve at drawing these maps to give this game the environment graphics it deserves.

That’s it for now, thanks for reading!

~anDai

Dev Log #2

I’ve always felt it was unfortunate that 2D characters doesn’t get as much love as their 3D counterparts.

Why do I say this? Well, most 3D RPGs would have weapons or armors change visually based on what you have equipped.

Most of the time, the same could not be said for 2D counterparts, and this is something I am aiming to change.

Thanks to modern algebra’s Composite Equipment script, Event Horizon is now able properly change the character’s sprite graphics based on what the character have equipped!

That being said, this would require a lot more additional sprite sheets that represent various different armors. I am in the process of commissioning the sprites to be done but if you feel like you have the interest or knows somebody that does, please let me know, I would love to hear from you! You can reach me at andytlin@hotmail.com.

Thanks for reading and I hope to see you again soon!

~anDai

Dev Log #1

I am going to start these mini dev logs where I talk about any new features and updates that have been added to the game. These will mainly be short and concise, but will be made available more frequently than my regular updates.

For today, I would like to showcase the skit system.

This system provides the basis of a lot of character developments in the game. Those who have played the Tales series of Final Fantasy IX would be familiar with this concept. Basically, various events and progressions in the game would trigger a skit event prompt. When the prompt appears on the top right side of the screen, the player can opt to press [S] to enter the skit scene. There would then be a cutscene that details the interaction between party members among other things. The skits loading screen would have the name of the skit on it. In the future, I plan on changing the generic loading screen of each skit to something that might have the chibi version of the characters taking place in the skit to prance around. Would be pretty cute.

One challenge I had implementing this system is disabling the prompt when changing map and keeping the prompt when saving/loading while the prompt is still active. Although challenging for someone with limited experience, I was able to fully realize the system that I envisioned in the beginning. I am fairly happy with the results.

Hopefully, the players will think the same way as well!

That’s it for today, I hope to be doing these dev logs on a daily basis.

Thank you for reading, hope to see you again soon!

~anDai