Quote:

Well, that's the biggest problem with Aveyond series, really. There's just very little to no interactions between the party members- unless you buy a house (which is optional).

Anyway, in AP, Devin and Alicia did have one banter, but that was all. Other than that, nothing goes on between them- not even another playful bicker like Vance & Fayette from Three The Hard Way. There's also this fact that Alicia is an OPTIONAL party member- who, if you didn't complete a certain side quest, cannot be recruited at all because she is married to the Candar prince. The last time I finished the game, I didn't even use her at all because Jack and the shapeshifter were more useful party members.

Talia and Devin, on the other hand, have the dynamic of the typical male-female lead of an RPG. The heroine destined to save the world and the childhood friend sworn to protect her. Their situation is really similar to Ean and Iya (canon pairing) from AV2.

--------------------------------------------

To be honest, though, I rarely see an RPG-Maker game with good romance/interactions. The only exception is Romancing Walker- where attraction points is added when a girl is fighting in your party for an extended period of time, and at a certain level of point, you can unlock a special interaction scene with them.

Romancing Walker can be a fun romance game if you don't mind the butchered Engrish.

The problem with romance is that people will always link it to 'endings' (like VN types). Can they be together in the end? Can I marry them?

TTHW has none of those typical + points + scenes thingy; the story develops itself naturally. But it's kinda a stretch to call it a romance though. The 'romance' leans more on comedy actually (and why can't boys and girls have a platonic relationship?)

The Way is also a great game that romance is the driven force of the protagonist, but the story itself doesn't revolve at romance AT ALL.

I think we've beaten the "lack of interaction, woe!!" topic to death and into pulp. It's the same in AP, Av1 and AV3's. Most fans think the canon pairings, when given a choice, are derpfail. Dameon-Rhen had some sappy interactions. Edward-Stella had some cute interactions too. HOWEVER, the fan-preferred pairings have even MORE interaction, which makes them trump over the canon.

@Ivana: What's so wrong about VN-style romance endings?

Anyways, I'd say Aldorlea's Book of Legends is another example of good use of branching event system. You have lord-knows-how-many potential party members, but you can't take them all. You'll have to dump someone to make room for a new member. And to get someone to join you, there's a set of requirements you have to fulfill that may or may not be obvious. Who is in the active party changes the way events play out. E.g: there is a hole in the ground. If you have a dog, dog will dig up the hole and find something awesome. If not, your character will simply say "Look, there is a hole, derp." If you want to date girl A, you have to earn x attraction points by making the right choices when given the option. And to get those choices to show up, you have to meet another set of conditions or else you won't even see the event.

It's so complicated that it's making my eyes spin. And yet, THAT is how I want branching events to work out. That game proves that you can too make complex games with RPG Maker. This doesn't even need to be romance-related. The branching path affects what items you get and how the story plays out. The romance matter is, as stated above, filling up attraction points. If you don't fill up the attraction points the people will just part ways as friends. And then you don't even know which choice is romance-related or not. There's some that are just quest-related, or even pointless choice that only affect what someone says and nothing else. And that is GOOD.

@D_A
Because RPGs focuses more on 'saving the world' while VNs usually are about getting yourself a gf/bf. Are you seriously telling me to woo someone when there's a big baddie out there? Love is a huge distraction, so the characters shouldn't be flirting around or 'marry' in that matter.

And LOL Book of Legends' got NOTHING on TTHW when it comes to branching haha. The branches on TTHW is insanely huge that you'll probably have to open the game itself if you really want to know the secrets.

VNs aren't usually about getting a gf/bf. But what a VN does specialize in which RPGs cannot is that it has plenty of text available to set up a plot, and thus dramatic stories can occur, while for RPGs, you can't really do that without risking other people calling your game wordy and boring.

@Ivana: Oh wow, have you had the misfortune of ONLY encountering otome games and galge? Yes, otome and galge are also visual novels, but visual novels who focus on romance pretty much has their own genre. There are visual novels that isn't about romance, like Kansei and Jisei.

Also, some nicely-done romance VNs are actually more like "adventure/action story that happens to contain romance". Like those action movies that at some point end up with the hero and heroine hook up. There's an issue going on, they solve issue, and romance happens without them ditching the issue in favour of the romance.

I haven't tried TTHW (and probably never will) so I can't judge, but the way you describe it sounds like the two games are about on par with each other. Don't start having fan-myopia just because TTHW happened to impress you so much

Quote:
It IS called visual novel after all.

@Kirroha
Nope, they aren't usually but they are mostly.


@D_A
Puh-lease. If the 23353463% of dating VNs out there doesn't tell you something, then I don't know what. The VNs that aren't about dating probably can be counted in both hands.

Yeah there are some games that you can still hook up but not ditch the main quest, but how realistic is that? Stop by and marrying (like srsly?) when Ahriman's out there? What, is he gonna wait for you or something?

Lol and what fan-myopia? Fan-myopia happens only for crappy things. That chick who posted the game here in AM? She only signed up in here because she wanted to share the game with us. And many people have stated it is better than any commercial games out there *cough*aveyond*cough*(before I've played it). If you are going to judge a book by it's cover without even trying it at least and miss a classic because of that, then sure, go ahead.


Edited to remove profanity.
~Mopiece

Fan-myopia happens to include "not wanting to admit that any other work is just as good or better than the particular work they're fans of". Your insistence that BOL is definitely lesser than TTHW still counts as fan-myopia

Quote:
The creator made an account only to advertise the game in Amaranthia. Okay. And this matters why?

Quote:
Who's the judgemental person now? I never said why I "probably never would" try TTHW ever. See, you can't find out just how many branches ARE there without playing it over many times to see how your choices affect your gameplay. If you were indeed right about it being way more complex than Book of Legends, then I might as well not even begin to try it. I don't have the time for that. Time issue =/= "judge book by cover". I mean, I ditched Book of Legends before the trial ran out and I only knew how crazy the branching went because I knew people who could crack it open (Yay for having computer geek friends).

Quote:
Oi, read the post properly. I was talking about visual novels where the timeline is actually clear, unlike Aveyond where there's no such thing as day and night and you have no idea how much time has passed In the VNs I was talking about, they don't sit around making out while problem is still out there. The characters fall in love during the progression of the story, but only after big bad is KO'd do they go out on dates/get married/whatever.
-----------------------------------------------
I have more to say that is not just rebuttal to previous posts, but my mind is incoherent right now. Will return when I'm less of a rambling mess.

Do you see people making an account just to share Aveyond, or, any other games on other websites? No. If someone's that dedicated to a game that much, it must have mean something at least. (One would still wonder how the heck Laxius Power's got band of worshipers.)

Ok, shoulda mention you didn't have time. I must ask, how did you find BoL? Is the story mediocre or good? If you've stopped playing just because you don't want to play a gazillion hours for the story and prefer to jump straight at the events, that'll take out the fun factor of gaming.

Oops, didn't see the 'solve issue first then hook up after' line

Eh, it's not like I want to purposely jump at the events. If I know there's going to be a bajillion branching paths, then I'd rather not play unless there's something I'm particularly interested in. Then I'll go find a walkthrough and make sure I get whatever I wanted. I'm someone who won't rest until I find all the paths and I'd rather not do that.

Do you mean how I stumbled across Book of Legends or how good do I find the story to be? For the first one, I subscribe to Amaranth and Aldorlea's newsletters, so I got notification about the game. About the story... well, it's very reminiscent of Drunken Paladin. Guy sets off to do something, then at some point finds that he's got himself tangled in something bigger than what he signed up for. Except it's far more crazy-complicated. DP is pretty much linear. BoL... I haven't gotten far enough to see how the choices affect what goes on in the story. I know a lot of hidden events involve choosing party members wisely and you can't get/access certain things without having a certain someone with you and/or have done a certain thing correctly.

Contains crude humour and somewhat lame jokes because the main hero-guy is a big jerk. It feels almost like Indy played Drunken Paladin, loved the concept so much but thought it could be made better, didn't feel like straight-out remaking the game and set out to make a similar game himself with different characters and plot. I was most iffy with the art because everything was taken straight out of RMVX's samurai RTP with the exception of one or two illustrations. Geh.

Now that I think of it, BoL is more like the adventure/romance VN. Plot happens, but it's ultimately a galge game (you play a guy chasing girls). If there were any difference in how you end the story at all, it's minor (or so I gathered from the talk in the forums). You'll have to explain to me how the branching paths in TTHW went.
---------------------------------------------
Annnnnd this post has spiralled into a "branching paths" discussion.

Back on pairings.

For an RPG, well, developers have to be willing to create many cutscene/conversation events so that the romance can happen in a natural way. And setting up events to "fake" time passing if implementing an actual timer is not possible.

For other stuff... it depends. So long as the progression is natural, I'm good.

On that note, I notice that most VNs, especially the Japanese one, use a path system. Which I don't particularly like. I like point system more, like what Hanako Games' stuff do. With path system, if you landed yourself in path X, you can't go away from that particular storyline. The only difference you'd make is whether you get a good pr bad end. With points, there's so many possibilities of what could happen to the story.

I'm kinda the same as you about not resting until finding all the secrets, but my first play always is gonna be without walkthroughs (unless I'm stuck).

I mean the latter one. A commercial game that has crude humor? That's... interesting. I might check it out if I'm done with tests. (Interesting fact, TTHW's protagonist is a BIG jerk and anti-hero )

Iunno, probably that your path will be different but the ending is always the same (except some few minor scenes).

---

Why is it not possible?

I just wish some gamemakers would realize that it's perfectly fine to make the game wordy just to deliver the romance correctly in RPGs. Also it might be good for a change for once.

Huh? Was there even a branching events in TTHW? Been a while since I last played, and then I only finished half-way before I changed my laptop and did not bother to transfer my old files, but replayed the game several times (up until the point in which I abandoned it) and don't remember encountering branch events.

Speaking of which, the romance attraction points in Aveyond really needs improvements. The events usually goes like: guy give girl gifts -> girl says "thank you" -> girl is happy -> ATTRACTION! Then it becomes somewhat meaningless when you realize most of the other interactions (outside those so-called attraction point events- which we don't much either, by the way) between the characters is not affected by how much attraction points you have between the characters.

Maybe in a future game we could have the girl buy the guy stuff for attraction points instead.

@Ivana: I don't know how timers are implemented in-game, so there may or may not be issues that prevent timers from being implemented. I mean, Aveyond haven't been using timers forever. Either it's too much of a hassle or it'll make the game lag, I have no idea. And IF it's somehow not possible, then developers need to be creative!

@Esme: How is THAT any better? It's just switching the giver-receiver roles between the genders

What's the deal on timers? Aveyond uses them a lot for different things, but not the default timer - we created our own timer system. Maybe you're talking about something other than general timers, as our uses have nothing to do with romantic interactions.

@ DA, well it DOES give variety. All the attraction points in the AV series so far have involved the boy charming the girl - why can't the girl give the boy some gifts for once?

Because last time the female characters went after the male ones, one guy got a love potion dumped on his head and the other got his soul stolen. ;P

And didn't everyone love that? It sure made for some good entertainment!

Yes, everyone did! I adored both of those couples.

~

I've noticed I have loved every side character pairing in Aveyond, but I'm not pleased with the main characters.

Meaning I don't like Rhen/Dameon or Rhen/Lars, but I adore Elini/John and Te'ijal/Galahad. Or Ean/Iya is meh to me, but I loved Emma/Rye and Ava/Gavin...

So maybe have an option again where the main character doesn't end up with someone/make the side characters pairable? That was always nice. (I didn't mind the lack of side characters being paired in Av3 because Te'ijal and Galahad returned as leads, but I was disappointed that Mel and Edward ended up with someone no matter what.)

@Elemental: Well, to be fair, those "side pairings" are more interactive than the main ones, so they actually make more sense.

@Esme: I'd rather see the interactions between the main pairing fixed first than playing around with trial-and-error variations I may not like.