Beath of Flams

[bengrande]

I put up my demo on the Games board! This is my newbie game, but I worked hard to polish it.

I noticed people open up topics on this board afterwards for discussion, so if you have a free half hour or forty-five minutes give it a try! And tell me what you think on this board or by e-mailing me at bengrande@gmail.com

And thanks to everybody who answered my questions on this board while I was working on it!

[Mazin]

I played it for a bit. The graphics are actually not bad, some of the enemies look pretty good and the maptiles are decent. Walkabouts and Heroes animate strangely though.

I didn't find it to be funny really. "Look, RPG cliches!" isn't instant humor. If you want to make fun of cliches, you might try actually using the cliche in an interesting way instead of just pointing at it and saying "lol cliche." And the Kool-Aid Man isn't funny just because he's the Kool-Aid Man. You don't do anything funny with him, he's just there.

Oh, one part that made me laugh a little was at the inn in Noodleheim.

Obviously I got a free night at the inn so I was gonna get attacked, but that they just left after the fight cause I was the wrong guy was a surprise. That's good! Here you used the cliche instead of just having the characters point it out.

But I was actually impressed because the title made me assume it'd just be another "spelling errors = comedy" mistake. I was glad to see I was wrong there.

[bengrande]

Yeah, I realize the whole "Spam" for the sake of spam and having the Kool-Aid Man just for randomness isn't funny in itself, but over the course of the game (beyond the demo) these things play a bigger part, so hopefully in the end it won't read like that.

So I tried to make the NPC dialogue stand out in the meantime, and once the game is longer some of the random seeming stuff will make more sense, or maybe not sense, but will at least have some context.

To make a minor spoiler for the next demo, the Kool-Aid man does return with a bigger part.

[Only One In All]

I played the whole demo and for a newbie game, it's a very good one. Even without saying that, your enemy graphics stand out the most as being the most well drawn, and I think you should build upon that.

I don't know where you got your music, but for the most part they seem to be good selections.

The storyline is not that interesting, but I realize it's supposed to be an RPG parody. So I suppose what is important is the humor.

Nothing about the game stood out to me as being particularly funny, although the game seems to have generally a good sense of humor. If you periodically do your humor/cliches such as the one that Mazin pointed out in the spoiler (which, I also thought was pretty funny), then you could be well on your way to a great RPG parody game. As it stands, I'm looking forward to your next update, and I do hope that you build upon this and everything begins to have more significance. After playing, I can now make sense of way your game title is spelt the way it is.

Keep it up man. As long as you can consider our suggestions and handle our criticisms, your game could get places.

[Mogri]

I played a bit of it. I like it so far. It's not fantastic, but it's polished -- I get the feeling of a finished product, even though you've mentioned that it's a demo.

My favorite part so far: "You may wish to sit down for this--" "I don't have enough frameth of animation."

I don't get the line about taking off the D and the E.

Also, there's a chest in the temple that says it has a weapon, but it doesn't say what and it doesn't give you anything.

Also also, the line is "Follow my rap."

Overall, this is much better than the average first OHR game, and probably a good bit better than the average OHR game.

One last thing -- it's a pain to read dialogue that's crammed into a single text box. It's a lot easier to read if each character's dialogue is in a different box.

[Newbie Newtype]

I am going to sound a little redundant, but it's true that some of the jokes kill themselves. Your naming scheme is generic as the names themselves: Nameless Empire, Generic Resistance Force, etc... I think I can recall an instance where a joke would have actually been funnier without the <generic> adjective.

Also, the enemies on the world map give a bit too much EXP per battle. I was able to get to level 8 without much trouble before going to the train.

Everyone else described criticism in better detail. This game does have pretty solid potential.

[bengrande]

These comments are great and encouraging! And the criticisms are constructive.

I actually have a note in my list of things to fix before releasing the demo to lower the world map enemy xp, somehow I missed that.

I can't really outright change the names of the Generic Resistance or Nameless Empire, but I am going to start not use their entire name every time they are mentioned, which I have a habit of doing. From now on they'll mainly be the "Resistance" or "Empire".

Also, Mogri, I ran through the Temple dungeon again and couldn't find the weapon chest you mentioned. At the end of the dungeon you get Ye Olde Legendarrye Sword from an altar, and in the following scene Russell breaks it. Then you have it as BrokenSd in your inventory but you can't equip it. I'm going to look around in Custom and see if I left any chests in there on accident.

The "take off the d and e" refers to the line above where KAM tells Dullard to "defeat" the forces of Spam. Dumb, I know, I may change it around if I get enough comments.

And the "try this rap" is from Parappa. Beath of Flams was written around the time Parappa came out so there are lots of references, I cut most of them out but am leaving a few in for self-indulgent kicks.

[Mogri]

There are a couple of chests to the right of the sword. One of them has a "weapon."

"Follow my rap" is the correct PaRappa reference. I have the game sitting next to me

[Newbie Newtype]

I want to quote Mazin and add to what he's saying.

I didn't find it to be funny really. "Look, RPG cliches!" isn't instant humor. If you want to make fun of cliches, you might try actually using the cliche in an interesting way instead of just pointing at it and saying "lol cliche."

There are times when a cliche is brought up, but usually it results in Dullard speaking from a player perspective, instead of the character's perspective.

From there, you can actually have characters react to situations in comedic ways a player wouldn't expect, because it's a parody, not a carbon copy.

[bengrande]

Mogri- Those chests contain a potion and 500 nudeln, which is the game's currency.

[Aeth]

I thought it was pretty good, especially for a first attempt. I've always wanted to see that IAQ made into an actual game - it's a classic.

[Fortis]

<strike>The title is really familiar. I'm almost certain someone dumb on the internet called Breath of Fire "Breath of Flams" but I don't think it was in the OHR Community.

EDIT: On second thought you probably posted about it before and told the story of its name.</strike>

Nevermind, read the game entry. Fritz Fraundorf, of course! I might have to play this, Fritz's parody writing was the only stuff I ever read back in my Square.net days.

[bengrande]

Yes! I was hoping at least somebody on this board would know who Fritz Fraundorf was.

As for the origin of the title: back then he wrote lots of FAQs, and some poor sap sent him an e-mail requesting he write a FAQ for "Beath of Flams." He probably meant Breath of Fire III, which had just come out, but Fritz wrote the FAQ for Beath of Flams anyway.

Though, he did write a real Breath of Fire III FAQ as well.

[Aeth]

Yes! I was hoping at least somebody on this board would know who Fritz Fraundorf was.

Oh hell yes. If you look in his Lufia II FAQ, I am credited there as Kevin. :)

[Nathan Karr]

I thought this game was hillarious.

There seems to be a style disagreement between Dullard's walkabout and hero graphics; namely, his walkabout is dark red, while his battle graphic is bright red.

The grass tile seems pretty good, except for the blank areas where the corners meet.