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[RPG Maker VX Ace] There was a sale, did you buy it? Create a whole new world!

NocrenNocren Lt Futz, Back in ActionNorth CarolinaRegistered User regular
edited July 2013 in Games and Technology
Hey you.
Yes, you.

Do you like to play god? Build your own worlds, populate it people that only do what you tell them to do,
have them say only what you want them to say? Like old school console RPGs but tired of the cliched plots
and two dimensional characters and think you can write better cliches and can draw better pixels?

Take advantage of a Steam sale earlier this month?

Well then, let me introduce you to...

img-06_thum.png


What is RPG Maker VX Ace?
This is the latest from the RPG Maker family which was a big hit in Japan which allows just about anyone to make
16-/32-bit console style RPGs. This version was officially translated and brought to the Steam platform as a part
of their software selection (not games). You may have seen this series before; it did have a PS1 and PS2 release.
Just try and imagine doing all this data/text entry on a DualShock. And of course if you wanted to share your creations
your friends had to have a copy of the software as well as your game data. This isn't a problem anymore as you can now
save your creation as their own executible.


So what can I do with this?
Loading up a new project gives you a blank map, and a bunch of ready-made characters, classes items, skills, enemies,
and animations. All of which you can scrap or modify as you see fit.

rpg_maker_vx_ace_by_novadragon1000-d4zk4vs.jpg
This isn't rocket surgery people.


But learning's hard. And so's programing.
This isn't that difficult. Here's what I made the first night I downloaded the program. Including Q&A it took less than 5 hours total. It's all pretty dang simple, you just need to play around with it and learn how things work together.


What this thread's for?
Thanks to @Stolls from the Steam thread pointing me towards some resources to get started once I bought RMVA, I realized that I'm an introvert, even on the internet and I don't like meeting new people. There was enough of a response in the Steam thread for me to get off my butt and make a thread so that hopefully other PAers can exchange tips, tricks and ideas. Maybe even art and/or music if we're lucky. Like this piece of item art I've cleaned up I wouldn't recommend using it in a commercial product though. There are some sprite rips from Recetear and Guild Wars 1 in there (among other sources).

And of course, ultimately we can start sharing projects.


Starting tips:
"I have a really cool opening text scroll but it never ends! It just loops!"
What you need to do is put a "set internal condition = A" at the end of your action, then put a new page into your
action that is set to fire when it internal condition is 'A' and leave this new page blank.


"How do I use that awesomely large icon list Nocren?"
This one's a little tricky. You'll need to download and save it and then overwrite the current IconSet.png file that your project is currently using. You'll need to do this for EVERY project you wish to use the item list for. The current IconSet.png that your project is using is usually where you save your projects, default Documents/RPGVXAce/<ProjectName>/Graphics/System.

"I bought some DLC during that awesome summer sale, but it's not showing up!!!!"
It's probably in your x:\Program Files\Steam\SteamApps\Common\RPGVXAce\DLC folder.
Take it out of there and put it somewhere else, like Documents\RPGVXAce (where your projects are saved).

Now open the program.

Under Tools, open Resource Manager (or hit F10)
Open up the type of file you're adding (graphics/Tilesets, graphics/Tiles1, Audio/BGM, etc)
Hit Import.
Now located the directory you put your DLC in and then select the items you're adding.

You do the same thing for any other assets you add to your project.
Note that these are techicially assets and not actual DLC, so for each project you want to use your new stuff with you'll have to repeat the process.


We can talk about any RPG Maker software here (VX Ace is only the latest release) however let's limit ourselves to RPG Maker XP and VX as they are the only official English releases (and if you really want to the Playstation versions as well).

Resources:

This is the RMRK site where I got some starting tips and things. Several users have youtube video tutorials to help out new users.

Here's where I got my icon list They also have title screens, backgrounds and more.

And finally the official site

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Nocren on
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    XeddicusXeddicus Registered User regular
    edited March 2013
    First pic is broken. :P

    I'll be following this thread to see what people come up with. I grabbed the demo and piddled around briefly but have too many games made by actual game developers to play to cobble together my own at the moment. But I could be persuaded to play other peoples cobbled together stuff perhaps!

    Xeddicus on
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    DissociaterDissociater Registered User regular
    I'll also follow. I'd also love to see what people are creating.

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    LunysgwenLunysgwen Registered User regular
    I've been waiting for someone to make a thread for this. Glad you finally got around to doing it. Been working on a small project of my own while on deployment.

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    El FantasticoEl Fantastico Toronto, ONRegistered User regular
    I picked this up during the Christmas sale on Steam. I dicked around with it for about 4 hours, made one building interior with two floors, and then realized I had no idea what I was doing (as in setting stairs so characters actually went up and down. Also, setting things so that people who touched buildings in the overworld map would ENTER said building).

    So I think I'm in dire need of serious easy-to-understand tutorials. I don't think I'll be making anything too custom/original for a long time. Everything that pre-exists on the game are what I'll use to make something for now.

    PSN: TheArcadeBear
    Steam: TheArcadeBear

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    LunysgwenLunysgwen Registered User regular
    I picked this up during the Christmas sale on Steam. I dicked around with it for about 4 hours, made one building interior with two floors, and then realized I had no idea what I was doing (as in setting stairs so characters actually went up and down. Also, setting things so that people who touched buildings in the overworld map would ENTER said building).

    So I think I'm in dire need of serious easy-to-understand tutorials. I don't think I'll be making anything too custom/original for a long time. Everything that pre-exists on the game are what I'll use to make something for now.

    Find me on steam sometime and I can help you out with any questions you have. I'm not an expert by any means, but I've been messing around with the RPG Maker series on and off for awhile.

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    NocrenNocren Lt Futz, Back in Action North CarolinaRegistered User regular
    VX Ace has a really handy shortcut for that. When you're in the event mode (has the grid overlay on the map) you can right click to add events.
    Among the shortcuts are transitions which allow you to move between maps.

    newSig.jpg
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    MrBlarneyMrBlarney Registered User regular
    I remember there were a lot of people who picked up RPG Maker VX Ace during the Winter Steam Sale, myself included, so it's kind of surprising that I hadn't seen a thread for the title until now. In my case, I'm more interested in building systems than full RPGs - I'm thinking of trying to implement some sort of action point-like system. But alas, time is the biggest factor in these operations and I just haven't been able to motivate myself to work on the open project. Still, I'll keep an eye on this thread, I'm interested to see what other people come up with.

    4463rwiq7r47.png
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    InkSplatInkSplat 100%ed Bad Rats. Registered User regular
    I grabbed this during the Christmas sale as well, but with a young child having been born in September, I've hardly had time to touch it. The problem especially is that I'd want to go highly custom (in terms of features, not so much art) which makes the whole endeavor that much more daunting.

    Origin for Dragon Age: Inquisition Shenanigans: Inksplat776
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    HugglesHuggles Registered User regular
    Oh wow, I, uh, 'came across' one of the old versions of this when I was younger and spent hours tooling around with projects that never came to anything. I had no idea it was still a thing, let alone a thing with an official English version! Thanks @Nocren, I can see myself getting back into this.

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    Albino BunnyAlbino Bunny Jackie Registered User regular
    This looks great, though fifty pounds seems a bit pricey to me. Is there anywhere other than steam that sells it?

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    InkSplatInkSplat 100%ed Bad Rats. Registered User regular
    This looks great, though fifty pounds seems a bit pricey to me. Is there anywhere other than steam that sells it?

    Your best bet is to catch is on sale on Steam. It dropped to $35 during Christmas, and went on sale recently as well.

    There is, however, a demo that can give you a taste of the stock experience.

    Origin for Dragon Age: Inquisition Shenanigans: Inksplat776
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    NocrenNocren Lt Futz, Back in Action North CarolinaRegistered User regular
    This looks great, though fifty pounds seems a bit pricey to me. Is there anywhere other than steam that sells it?

    I was in the same boat as well ($70 for base is a bit much) then they had it as a mid-week sale on Steam for half off.
    Luckily I had my taxes done at the time.

    newSig.jpg
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    DelzhandDelzhand Hard to miss. Registered User regular
    RPG Maker 95 was what got me into game development. So many memories. It looks like it's come a long way, especially the character creator thingy, but it's still got that default combat system I can't abide. That said, there's always a community behind these things, and someone usually bangs out some combat mods eventually.

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    Albino BunnyAlbino Bunny Jackie Registered User regular
    Kay, downloaded demo and now it's just coming up with an error saying RTP is not installed.

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    NocrenNocren Lt Futz, Back in Action North CarolinaRegistered User regular
    Delzhand wrote: »
    RPG Maker 95 was what got me into game development. So many memories. It looks like it's come a long way, especially the character creator thingy, but it's still got that default combat system I can't abide. That said, there's always a community behind these things, and someone usually bangs out some combat mods eventually.

    Yeah, XP had a new default combat system that was more like Final Fantasy but VX seems to go back to the Dragon Warrior style.

    Looking to modify the combat on my new project, something similar to Phantasy Star style.

    newSig.jpg
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    InkSplatInkSplat 100%ed Bad Rats. Registered User regular
    There are some cool mods out that replicate the Xenogears combat system, which is tempting to mess with.

    Origin for Dragon Age: Inquisition Shenanigans: Inksplat776
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    TayaTaya Registered User regular
    I got this during the Christmas sale but I stopped working on my game while I waited for soneone to convert his srpg battle script from the old program to Ace. Apparently he finished recently so I should probably resume working.

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    InkSplatInkSplat 100%ed Bad Rats. Registered User regular
    edited March 2013
    Taya wrote: »
    I got this during the Christmas sale but I stopped working on my game while I waited for soneone to convert his srpg battle script from the old program to Ace. Apparently he finished recently so I should probably resume working.

    @Taya Can you link to that? I'd like to take a look.

    InkSplat on
    Origin for Dragon Age: Inquisition Shenanigans: Inksplat776
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    TayaTaya Registered User regular
    Checking his site, he released the first beta of the script and is still working on it. You can download beta1 here.

    His old script can be found here.

    I think he has a youtube channel were you can see it in action but probably better to just download the beta and try it for yourself.

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    InkSplatInkSplat 100%ed Bad Rats. Registered User regular
    I really want to do a cover-based shooter transformed into 16-bit rpg combat. But I honestly have no idea how to even start. :P

    Easiest way would just be SRPG-style for an XCOM type of experience. But part of me wants to manage it with a more traditional JRPG-style of combat just for the challenge. But fuck if I know how to make something like that interesting and different from standard "attack, attack, spell, attack" style JRPGs.

    Origin for Dragon Age: Inquisition Shenanigans: Inksplat776
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    MrBlarneyMrBlarney Registered User regular
    edited March 2013
    If you want to marry "cover-based shooter" to the RPG genre (beyond just leveling mechanics), yeah, the Tactical RPG approach makes the most sense (e.g. X-COM, Ghost Recon: Shadow Wars, Valkyria Chronicles). If you want it closer to traditional JRPG, the 'cover' aspect of it still screams to me some sort of tactical gameplay on a grid. Something like the Mega Man Battle Network series perhaps (edit: though I suppose it should be noted that MMBN is an action game series), where movement is free out of combat, but when combat is engaged, battle takes place on a grid. From there, there's a lot of different ways you can play with the system depending on how much you want to discretize actions.

    MrBlarney on
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    NocrenNocren Lt Futz, Back in Action North CarolinaRegistered User regular
    GR:SW and Fire Emblem seem like they would be fairly easy to recreate.

    SEEMS LIKE being the key words.

    One problem I've having is that I want my characters to have unique abilities on the main menu (Attack/Guard/Magic*/Item/Escape), however best I can do is add it to a magic sub-menu (and add multiple magic/technique menus).

    Since my character is using two weapons (not equiping two weapons, I created a second Shield class of items that's entirely offensive weapons) I want him hit with both items.

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    HugglesHuggles Registered User regular
    edited March 2013
    I seem to recall the fashionable way to make custom menus was to add a script to a battle command that flashed up a picture as the menu, but you had to make a new picture for each possible selection to simulate moving a cursor.

    E: ...which I suppose is what happens by default, except the coding is already there.

    Huggles on
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    NocrenNocren Lt Futz, Back in Action North CarolinaRegistered User regular
    That explains how people are doing things like making picture based command menus...

    I need a story idea...
    I scraped my original one (too cliched) but I like the world and characters I'm building.

    newSig.jpg
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    IceBurnerIceBurner It's cold and there are penguins.Registered User regular
    edited March 2013
    No, that's not how menus are typically drawn at all in anything, and certainly not the default ones in RPG Maker XP or VX.

    At the simplest level they're done in layers, with the background graphic drawn first, the cursor drawn over that, and the text last. That's all composited off-screen and then shown via the command to show or refresh that window. It's been a little while since I've touched the Ruby script so I don't recall the function names, but that's how it works in a nutshell.

    Separate complete graphics depicting every possible selection is a hideously inefficient work-around for not coding your own custom menu system.

    IceBurner on
    3DS: 3024-6114-2886 | NNID: Rabites | Steam: IceBurner
    PSN: theIceBurner, IceBurnerEU, IceBurner-JP | X-Link Kai: TheIceBurner
    Dragon's Dogma: 192 Warrior Linty | 80 Strider Alicia | 32 Mage Terra
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    HugglesHuggles Registered User regular
    I could be remembering examples done by bad designers, of course. I loved some of the old custom systems people came up with. Stuff like using store-location, teleports and player-controlled sprites as cursors struck me as an elegant solution since the RPGM design tools made doing complex stuff that way pretty simple.

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    Dark Raven XDark Raven X Laugh hard, run fast, be kindRegistered User regular
    Hm. Is there any official stance on recreating games in this?

    Like if I got this, first thing I'd try to do was demake Final Fantasy VII. :P

    Oh brilliant
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    NocrenNocren Lt Futz, Back in Action North CarolinaRegistered User regular
    Given Square's stance... Probably not a good idea.

    Thought maybe if you rename the characters to Sun Conflict and Bob...

    You're gonna spend a lot of time/money on art assets though, making character sprites and background tiles.

    newSig.jpg
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    C2BC2B SwitzerlandRegistered User regular
    edited March 2013
    Hm. Is there any official stance on recreating games in this?

    Like if I got this, first thing I'd try to do was demake Final Fantasy VII. :P

    Yeah, you are a bit late on that.

    http://www.rpgrevolution.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=49016


    C2B on
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    InkyblotsInkyblots Registered User regular
    Yes RPG Maker has been around for a looong time so every possible demake/remake/reboot/fan sequel has been attempted by now, but I can't think of any that have been close to being finished.

    I guess it depends on what you are trying to accomplish but I say do whatever you want. RPG Maker can be super fun to mess around with but making a full fledged game is hard especially if you are talking 40-70 hour long demake.

    If you're game gains enough attention to get a C&D called on you well shit pat yourself on the back.

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    NocrenNocren Lt Futz, Back in Action North CarolinaRegistered User regular
    Yeah, best idea I've had is something similar to SaGa, except instead of episodes/characters, each is it's own separate game. Easier to design/program and after the initial one, all the groundwork is done.

    Kinda wish I was back in the navy with all that free time I had.

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    Dark Raven XDark Raven X Laugh hard, run fast, be kindRegistered User regular
    C2B wrote: »
    Hm. Is there any official stance on recreating games in this?

    Like if I got this, first thing I'd try to do was demake Final Fantasy VII. :P

    Yeah, you are a bit late on that.

    http://www.rpgrevolution.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=49016


    I figured, but there's always that "I could do better" feeling, when realistically I probably could not do better...

    I've always wanted to run a bbs text adventure, and even got started on a few ideas that I could turn into an original RPG. Sorely tempted to grab it, next Steam Sale.

    Say I did get into this, would you say the experience of learning with RPG Maker could be used elsewhere, stuff like GameMaker, things like that?

    Oh brilliant
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    NocrenNocren Lt Futz, Back in Action North CarolinaRegistered User regular
    Maybe?
    Havent checked GameMaker but it's put out by the same publisher (which likely doesn't mean a whole lot).

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    ZombiemamboZombiemambo Registered User regular
    Gamemaker uses its own scripting language but also has a less powerful drag-and-drop interface. If you want to get into hard coding having a GUI that handles graphics and object placement etc. is really nice and still allows you to do some OOT programming.

    From my experience using GM and RPGMaker, I'd say the latter is really only for RPGs. It's entirely possible to use it for other things, but at that point you're working against the program as opposed to with it so you might as well find something more suited to what you're trying to make.

    JKKaAGp.png
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    OneAngryPossumOneAngryPossum Registered User regular
    My issue with RPG Maker is that there's a weird dichotomy between the incredible ease of quickly creating an environment, character, and even battles, but the code for all that was (best as I could tell) too obfuscated for my tastes. That's probably correctable, and if you dive into it the basics would translate pretty well, but I decided to put my efforts into working on my straight up programming knowledge. I'll probably come back to it, because it's a nifty program, but if you're looking for skills that are transferable your best bet is still going to be learning a programming language.

    Not to dismiss the awesomeness of programs like RPG Maker, I just didn't find that the accessibility gave me the kind of control I wanted over the experience.

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    NocrenNocren Lt Futz, Back in Action North CarolinaRegistered User regular
    Yeah, learning JSP and C# helpped me with how to think in terms of classes of objects, relations, etc.

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    C2BC2B SwitzerlandRegistered User regular
    Inkyblots wrote: »
    Yes RPG Maker has been around for a looong time so every possible demake/remake/reboot/fan sequel has been attempted by now, but I can't think of any that have been close to being finished.

    There are a few, a chrono trigger remaster (Well, its more of a port to rpg maker) as well as Megaman (Yes, seriously). They are very old now though, and somewhat forgotten I think. Also german. There's also a english fire emblem clone.

    There's also remakes of rpg maker games themselves around.

    I haven't informed myself about it as of 4 years ago, though.

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    HugglesHuggles Registered User regular
    A Blurred Line was a great example of what you could put together with the fairly limited tools available. Sadly it ends at the end of Line Narrows since Line's End never got made. Frozen World is also well worth a look.

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    C2BC2B SwitzerlandRegistered User regular
    Found the Megaman *remake*. It's called Megaman Reborn. Was made with the Rmk2k back in the day.

    pic.php?dest=screenshots&id=847

    pic.php?dest=screenshots&id=846

    Did not find better pictures, sorry. There's a youtube playthrough.

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    SweetdaddyGSweetdaddyG Lisburn, Northern IrelandRegistered User regular
    any links to games made using this folks?

    sweetdaddyg on Nintendo Network+Live/sweetdaddyg1 on PSN
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