Arena Demo - What To Expect

I'm happy to announce that I'm nearing a point where I can actually release the next demo this coming weekend. There are a few things left to do, such as finish the "ending" for the demo and balance the mechanics for optimal performance, though I am confident I'll be done in time with how I've been working as of late. Thus, here are some things to expect with this demo.

Battle System

As with the previous demo, this demo will continue using the default Turn-Based system that comes with the engine, featuring plug-ins from VisuStella that allow for custom battle sprites, and other obtained assets. Party members will have Basic artes that they can use as much as they have the TP for it, while artes above that will have some kind of cooldown to prevent overuse (all of which I will work to balance overtime). While I will be focusing on developing the main game, I will try to experiment with the other battle system plug-ins to see about providing something more engaging. I may end up sticking to this and refining that, I am holding out for a plug-in based on Moghunter's LMBS Plug-In but for MZ.

Party Members

At present, Aki and Piper are the only playable characters. Aki makes use of mostly single-target attacks while Piper is a mixed attacker/supporter. William is getting close to having all of his basic animations complete, and when that happens I will update the demo to include him. With the current build, naturally you will be able to complete the main objective with just the first two while the eventual third will make things even easier. Of course, as more characters become available, the demo will change to reflect the characters, what they can do and how strong they are when obtained.

The Enemy Selection

Currently, I have 10 regular enemies that are part of a selection list. At the moment, you can face up to three of each enemy at once, with the goal being to beat each group of three to unlock a Boss battle. In the future, as I work on the main game and get a better understanding on how to balance the enemies and playable characters, I will update the demo to allow for different enemies and enemy combinations. I wanted to at least have a demo with an actual goal outside of testing.

Titles and Passive Skills

Using plug-ins by Fomar0153, I decided to use their AP-based systems to allow characters to learn passive skills (and presently, even artes) after earning enough AP to learn them. After some consideration, I decided to tie them to "Titles" that characters can equip like items (until I can find a substitute or whatever) so you aren't stuck to using the same weapon/armor the whole time. This is another thing that will end up changing overtime since I'll have to come up with a lot of different titles with conditions to obtain them. There are already a few the Aki and Piper can collect that for the sake of the demo, they can make use of to learn skills that can inflict different status ailments when attacking. They will also be switched out as the main story is developed so they fit better with where they are story-wise.

Picnic Basket

Like the previous demo, the Picnic Basket will be used to help in battle. It will start with a capacity of 400, making it easier to increase to 500 and receive the first upgrade, letting you equip up to five tags at once. There is also more tags available for dealing with certain magical enemies and their attacks.

Wrap-Up

I'm going to make it my goal to do enough of the main story that I can put out one more demo that you can play through the prologue, before the year's end. I feel that it will be a long time before this game will see completion; but I feel this year will be good for production now that I'm close to getting the story going. So please look forward to the next post, when I release the Arena Demo.