Stuff from your old, unfinished games

[FnrrfYgmSchnish]

Today, I was poking through the hard drive of my dad's old computer and found some really, really old stuff from an old OHRRPGCE game that I had started a long time ago but never finished.

Specifically, a bunch of graphics and plot-outline text files from Spuduf Splorchers, which I was working on back around 2002. Unfortunately I wasn't able to find a copy of the RPG file, so this stuff is all that's really left of the game.

These are, not surprisingly, a lot better than the graphics in The Kirby Lands... and some (especially the enemies, and Bug's hero sprites) even turned out better than the graphics in Frankfurter's Quest for Soap... even though I made these almost a full year before QFS.


From left to right: Bug, Mr. Triangle, Señor, Bob, Matsu, Mejuai, Burije, ???????, and Joguo.

The bug (who for some reason was just named "Bug") was the main character. His home in the forest was burned down by the main bad guy, Emperor Zheewguu.

Mr. Triangle was actually made up before I had any idea that someone else also had a character named Mr. Triangle... I can't remember if this was before RMZ's Mr. Triangle games were made, or if some of the earlier ones were already around but I just hadn't seen them yet at the time. Anyway, his entire species were round things with shapes on the front of their bodies, and they were all named after whichever shape they had (so some of the others were named "Mr. X," "Mr. Circle," "Mr. Rectangle," "Mr. Pentagon," and so on.)

Señor was a crazy Spanish teacher who used a spiked club weapon called a "puppywhacker." He was based on an actual teacher I had around the time I was making the game.

Bob was a homeless kid who tried to steal the party's stuff, then joined them after they kicked his slime.

The next three are Matsu, Mejuai, and Burije. At some point in the game, Mr. Triangle leaves/dies (I can't remember which...) and you get to choose one of these three to replace him temporarily.

??????? (yes, that was her name) showed up to save you a few times throughout the game, and would've eventually joined sometime toward the end.

And Joguo was the leader of Matsu, Mejuai, and Burije's group... had I actually gotten this far in the game, he would have died after you got to play as him for a short amount of time (he tries to go up against Emperor Zheewguu alone, and loses.)


From left to right: Master Guisante, Blablargha, Mega Hamster, Middle Finger Ninjas.

Master Guisante was Bug's teacher, who served as the "introduction battle" at the beginning of the game to teach Bug how to fight.

Blablargha was a recurring boss, a zombie who rode a motorcycle (he could transform his gooey lower body into legs to ride it) and thought he was a rock star (even though his singing and guitar-playing were both really awful.) The battle theme every time you fought him was a midi version of "Born to be Wild."

The Mega Hamster and the ninjas were random bosses that popped up out of nowhere. The giant mutated hamster was the first major boss in the game. Apparently, according to some old text files I found describing the game's plot, it smashed through the wall of a school and ate the principal before attacking the party.
The Middle Finger Ninjas, who had somewhat embarrasing names (random combinations of curse words in Japanese), were the next boss after the Mega Hamster... though the Hamster was a lot tougher.

=====

Feel free to post your own ancient stuff from games that you've lost (or just won't ever work on again), too.

[Nathan Karr]

Interesting to see that my little brother isn't the first person to have a hero simply named "Bug" in his game.


The first row: Axe of the Mystics. It was my first attempt at making a retro styled game. Those enemies are Bat, Cloud, Goblin, Slime, Thief, and Evil Snowman(the first boss). Its graphics are like those of the first three RPGs I plaed, minus the personality.

Second row: A Newbie's Quest (n00bg4ym.RPG). My first joke game not to be based on SAMPLE.RPG. The jokes were all basically "The author is lazy and stupid, and the graphics are bad." I did try really hard to get the ballance right, but when I go back to play it now, it's almost as nightmarishly horrible as Arfenhouse. Those monsters are Guard, Drunk(the equivalent of a zombie, including being killed by healing spells), TriDeca(thirtteen small enemies who attack in formation, having 13 HP, 12 Hits, and attacks with damage based on HP), and Guy(even more boring than the game's slime and bubble enemies, but muchj better drawn).

Third Row: Retrospective Role-Playing Game. My second attempt at a retro game; everything is drawn in 4 colors or fewer. The maptiles and backdrops were drawn with OHRPaint. These enemies are ComBat, WarMush, Slime, and Sand Worm.

Fourth Row, Plus Upward Hook: Starrhao Swordsmen. A remake of my true newbie game, the point was to draw everything with details and shading, and make hero graphics for every walkabout(and vice versa). I was planning on giving the graphics to newbies for free after it was finished, but I quickly lost interest and Fenrir eventually did something better anyway. This game is actually older than the other three. Go figure. The enemies are Bat, Fish, Slime, UniBlock, Axeman, Katana Dualist, Guard, and Mage.


The first five are the heroes of A Newbie's Quest. Heman, the hero; Zadok, the warrior; Sarah, the healer; Darkon, the recurring villain who eventually joins your side(he uses katanas and scythes and casts black magic spells, and thus effectively replaces the wizard Adrammelech, not shown); and Ariel, the catgirl(you get her by buying her from a slave trader; I never got around to drawing her walkabout).
Interestingly, a lot of the elements from the Darkon character have resurfaced on my new character, Elmo Gotham(of Behold the Internets).

The next two are Rolf and Kat, the heroes of Retro RPG. Rolf is The Hero; Kat is Staff Chick. 'Nuff said.
A lot of the design for Rolf eventually came out in my character Sirius Furry, the Lancer of Behold the Internets. Images of him seem to have inspired the Rurouni Catholic character in OHRHouse 3, at least in part (only speculating here).

Starrhao Swordsmen's heroes' first quest was to slay the dragon guarding the fourth wall, and then destroy the wall. The king was supposed to reward Adolf with his new costume after this was done. After that, they were meant to go and fulfill as many RPG cliches as possible.
Adolf Langschwert, Adolf Langschwert, Gerard Dagmar, Vivian Morninglory, Gaius Caecilius ("Cecil" to his friends; he's a blind Italian soldier), and Yahiko(a samurai often confused with a ninja, despite his clothes being purple).


Axe of the Mystics:
Eiyu, the hero; Sean, the senshi; Kuro, the negromancer; Sara, the shiromadoshi; normal townswoman; town healer(replaced the concept of "Inn").
A Newbie's Quest:
Heman, Sarah, Zadok, Darkon, an old man, and a guard with no weapons.
Retro RPG:
Rolf, Kat, a normal townie, and a guard.
Starrhao Swordsmen:
Adolf, Gerard, Vivian, Cecil, Yahiko, and amazon, a female guard, a male knight, Jaffar the Grand Vizier, and a wizard. I had about 10 character classes, drawn in male and female versions, with full walkabout and hero graphic sets.

[Baconlabs]

I have no screens, as all of my first game's data is firmly sealed in my old hard drive at home. Most of the concept art has been destroyed, lost, or smudged beyond recognition.

However, the world that I created in words so many years ago has remained intact, and serves as the base world upon which Viridia will take place. It sports two major continents, a flurry of islands, around half a dozen powerful countries, and even a few different sentient races.
Take all of the land that Viridia covers, multiply it by about 10 times, and that is how massive this world is.

These were the first three heroes of that old game - Mist, Victor, and Sarina - with new sprites to match their cameos in Viridia. They are very easily characterized.
Victor was the main character and a Silent Protagonist that lets his actions speak for themselves - though this will be played for humor in Viridia, where it appears he is in fact mute. Mist can understand him just by reading his emotions. The two are happily married by the time Viridia begins.
Mist was the old game's obligatory Staff Chick, though that much hasn't changed. She served as a diplomat in the previous game - naive and childish, but very pure and effective at swaying opinions. This time around she's pulled herself from society to focus on nature, and wants to make the desert green. She is a Lisen, this world's parallel to elves.
Sarina is the least interesting here, but is nonetheless important as the team's Gadgeteer Genius. She's a brilliant engineer and has cooperated with her relatives in the past to bring forth the world's first Zeppelin, which she now uses to ferry the trio from place to place.
These were the first playable heroes in the old game, but are now the very last to appear in Viridia, playing an important role in the last 10-20% of the game.

Viridia will also occasionally bring up stories and rumors of events that transpired in the previous game-that-never-was, the most important of which being an overseas war between two nations. Neither of these places are visited in Viridia, but their influence is felt here and there.

I think the lesson to be learned here is to never completely abandon your old ideas; try to re-invent them or incorporate them into your next great idea, make it greater, give it a rich history that reflects your own experience as a game maker.

=====

Related to the above, I too had a character called Bug (though he was later re-named Bone) that ran a secret weapons shop. I just love how you can pick any old noun and make it a name. Glass from Fire Emblem 7. Lock(e) from FFVI. Light from Death Note. Cooountless others.

[Bob the Hamster]

<img src="http://gilgamesh.hamsterrepublic.com/al ... chivia.png" width="512" height="80">

This is a partial hero sprite set that I drew for my friend Archivis for the game "Pain". I remember playtesting an incomplete version of it, but I don't have a copy of it anymore. I can't remember whether or not it was ever released. This was back around 1999 or so, I think...

[FnrrfYgmSchnish]

Odd how so many people have had characters named "Bug."

Even Sega did it, if I'm remembering this right. There was a game on the Sega Saturn (I think) in the mid-90s titled "Bug!", with a main character being a green bug-thing named... Bug.

[Uncommon]

Marvel Comics also has a character named Bug, if I recall. He was created under a different name, but it was associated with the Micronauts license, so the had to change it when that license ran out.

I think my only unfinished game that had any considerable unreleased portion was my first one, nearly ten years old now, and I'd discussed some of that in another thread we had about old projects.
But I do have this image of unused enemy sprites from there

[Baconlabs]

Random thing:
In my old game, two of the six protagonists had perfectly cylindrical hair. Like, absolutely perfectly cylindrical, you could balance a plate of drinks on them. I really don't know why I decided on that. Incidentally, the two were a mad scientist and an island native.
(I highly doubt either of these loons will appear in Viridia)

[s]Try to imagine[/s] These two combined:


Roughly amounts to THIS:

[FnrrfYgmSchnish]

Not exactly "stuff from unfinished games" this time... but I recently looked through the enemy graphics in The Kirby Lands again and noticed a couple of small enemies that hadn't updated to their default palettes in the newer version of Custom; they still had palette 0.

It turns out that there were three enemies that I had drawn for the game, but ended up never using. Here's a guess at what they would've looked like (using the TKL palettes that looked most likely):


"Bedbugs," "Beer," and "Leg of Lucky Duck."

These were all enemies that were listed in that old notebook where most of TKL's enemies came from, but for some reason I ended up never putting them into the game. I guess I figured that the ducks dropping their legs as a separate enemy was kinda gross and left it out, though the bedbugs and beer could probably have shown up in Barney's House or something (...except that I didn't give that map random encounters, for some reason.)

[Mystic]

Speaking of dudes named "Bug"...

http://shrines.rpgclassics.com/gba/fe7/bug.shtml

[Skullduggery Studios]

That's a sikk portrait.