RPG Maker

[Loftus24]

I mostly wanted to know wich versien is the best. I want to be able to make a Active battle time thing if at all posible... And (this is a nessescity) i want to be able to make people who can dual weild weapons and use a weapon and sheild combo.

Thank you for any and all forms of assistince.

[Bells]

Honestly? you might get more help in a RPG Maker Forum. as far as i know, nobody around here is a avid or pro user. You won't get much help for it around here.

Of the little i know, it seems that the best version is either XP or VX depending on which one feels more natural to you.

[bluestarultor]

I've dabbled a bit. RPG Maker 2003 comes with an ATB built right in and is the only one whose default battle system has a third-person perspective.

I also know you can set up individual characters to either dual-wield or use a weapon and shield, but I don't know if there's a way to make shields count as weaponry and still add to your defense instead of your attack or whether setting a character to dual-wield actually prevents you from equipping a shield. There also is no default shield graphic, but from my personal experience, the weapon sprite sheets are easy enough to modify and import. Just use MS Paint or maybe GraphicsGale Free Edition. Other stuff seems to mess with the palette, but I know Paint works and I'll assume GG does because it's specifically made for spriting.


If you know or are willing to learn Ruby for scripting, XP and I think VX allow you to write or download your own battle systems and I've seen some really great examples of a side-view battle from a friend's projects. It's complicated to set up the graphics, though. On the other hand, you can set your own maximum party size.

[A Zarkin' Frood]

Yeah, the RPG Maker 2003 is the best one if you wanna go ATB and side view.
It's also best if you prefer SNES-era style graphics. Also, there's a ton of existing resources because RPG Maker 2000 sprite sheets, tilesets and I think battle animations to some degree too can be used in RM2003

I haven't checked out any maker after XP, but as far as I know they all support dual wielding weapons, though I was more into the 2000 and 2003 (which definitely do that).

I should get back to working on my game or something some time soon. But that damn scene is so boring to program.

[bluestarultor]

To get back to you on allowing shields as weaponry, it's possible. The only issue is that while there are ways to ensure it doesn't just do unarmed damage (either set its accuracy to zero or make a new damage attribute that does 0% damage to all levels of resistance), there isn't any way to kill the animation. The character will still punch no matter what you try for attack animations and if you instead set it to a blank battle animation, the character blips out.

I guess the best workaround would be to suck it up and just make a shield graphic, make a Shield damage attribute and set all levels to zero, and live with the characters punching with it, but being a programmer, I can't help but feel there should have been a better solution built in.

[Kim]

I DEMAND THAT CHARACTERS DUAL WIELD SHIELDS.

In fact, make a class built entirely around dual wielding shields.

[Daimo Mac, The Blue Light of Hope]

I DEMAND THAT CHARACTERS DUAL WIELD SHIELDS.

In fact, make a class built entirely around dual wielding shields.

Defender Class
Weapon: Shields
Armour: Plate Mail
HP: High
MP: Low
Speed: Low
Attack: Med
Defence: High
Magic: Low

Skills to include things that draw attention to one person and abilities that can resist elemental damage.

[A Zarkin' Frood]

and if you instead set it to a blank battle animation, the character blips out.

Good idea actually, only make it the regular standing animation. I don't know if that's possible because I was/am more into rm2k than 2k3, but I thought you could set individual character animations for each weapon type.

I'm so tempted to make a whole game centered around that idea.

[Magic_Marker]

Ah rpg maker, so many memories. So much coding forgotten.

I'd go with XP. Play some games with custom battle systems and open them up in the editor and understand the code.

[bluestarultor]

Good idea actually, only make it the regular standing animation. I don't know if that's possible because I was/am more into rm2k than 2k3, but I thought you could set individual character animations for each weapon type.

I'm so tempted to make a whole game centered around that idea.

Unfortunately, there's no way to do that automagically. Animations are fixed, you see. You'd have to make an animation for every different character and then assign them all to a single item or line of items that only that character can equip.

[Loftus24]

Let me rephrase best. Wich one of those suggestions is easy to use? Thank you for the Help. By the way do any of you know where i can find some sprites for rpg maker?

[bluestarultor]

2000 and 2003 are basically the same in terms of writing events. 2003 is basically an upgrade of 2000 and I can vouch that it's not that hard to use because there's no actual programming involved. It's all built in.

XP and later have bits and pieces built in, but the emphasis is on learning Ruby and coding your own stuff. You can do much, much more with it, but the learning curve is higher.

Honestly, I'll say to stick with 2003. It's the only one with a side-view battle system built in and it isn't hard to set up. If you hear people complaining about it being difficult to work with, they're either lazy, stupid, or trying to find reasons to bitch. Everything is drag and drop and all the physical attack animations are pre-calculated. There are also plenty of pre-made spells for you to work with and making new ones is also drag and drop. It's a bit more work than the first-person battle systems of the rest of the series, but it looks much nicer, the graphics are rich and colorful unlike the utter crap XP has by default, and the whole thing offers you an easy way to set up all the values while also offering a boatload of depth for those willing to work with it.

[Loftus24]

Do any of you know where I can find a rpg maker forum in english. Sience it is for this kind of stuff.

[Aldurin]

Any military weapons facility should have blueprints. You could even steal one of the machines.

[Loftus24]

What?

[bluestarultor]

What?

I think he means Google is your friend. Or maybe he got the wrong thread. I'm not quite sure, myself. :ohdear:

[Fenris]

He's talking about rocket propelled grenades.