Heart of the OHR Contest

msw188 · Post by **msw188** » Sat Dec 18, 2010 8:18 am

Okay, first off, the background music going during the Tales 2 reading is awesome. Secondly, thanks to both of you guys (JSH and Newbie Power) for taking the time to do this. I'm certain everyone appreciates it very much. Thirdly, to Newbie Power, "You're welcome!" for helping you clear out your shortcut to C:/, haha.

The World Map on the table near the beginning (it reappears in many places throughout the game) will not be the same as the map outside - it will contain the names and locations of all the towns, and the names of the 'kingdoms'. This should be very helpful for the player.

And hey, Anym, Avin, and Apono are introduced soon, but Anym was just a quick way of typing "no-name" that sounds vaguely like a name, if someone chooses to keep it. And yeah, we get Zeniq with the 'Z', but Mavel is introduced at the same time, so we've got some middle ground there! Haha, that part made me laugh.

And just in case you were wondering, I had the basis of this story before ever playing DQV. But DQV IS probably my favorite RPG story of all time, despite some flaws towards the end.

Baconlabs · Post by **Baconlabs** » Sat Dec 18, 2010 10:08 am

Pepsi, would you mind adding the Voting time frame to the first post? I can't find or remember it at all.
I can only assume it's 'till the end of the month.

msw188 · Post by **msw188** » Sat Dec 18, 2010 6:00 pm

It is the 31st. It is in JSH's directory post.

Pepsi Ranger · Post by **Pepsi Ranger** » Sat Dec 18, 2010 7:45 pm

Baconlabs wrote:Pepsi, would you mind adding the Voting time frame to the first post? I can't find or remember it at all.
I can only assume it's 'till the end of the month.

Main post has been modified to include voting information (in bold). There is also a hyperlink in the post dedicated to voting for those who need additional information on voting procedure.

JSH357 · Post by **JSH357** » Sat Dec 18, 2010 9:10 pm

Audio #2 - Okedoke Part 5

I have absolutely no idea where to go in this game at this point. I wonder if anyone else has run in to this problem in the past? To me, it just isn't clear at all because I have looked around the city for information several times now and not found the alleged police officer that tells me what to do next.

Pepsi Ranger · Post by **Pepsi Ranger** » Sun Dec 19, 2010 12:55 am

jsh357 wrote:I have absolutely no idea where to go in this game at this point. I wonder if anyone else has run in to this problem in the past? To me, it just isn't clear at all because I have looked around the city for information several times now and not found the alleged police officer that tells me what to do next.

Hey, I haven't really listened to the whole Okedoke audio file, but I'm listening to part 5 a bit, and I have to wonder: did you ever try to take the car in the back parking lot? You have to either jack the car or pay for a rental at the dealership in order to leave the town.

Also, about having difficulty locating a cop: I think there was a time long ago when the game had a tag corruption problem and one of the cops didn't appear like he was supposed to. Last I heard, Fnrrf fixed all of that. But I seem to recall having a similar problem when I reviewed it last year. Maybe you should check custom and make sure all the cops are accounted for and that nothing's corrupted again. I know that the game file has random corruptions plaguing it from time to time.

FnrrfYgmSchnish · Post by **FnrrfYgmSchnish** » Sun Dec 19, 2010 1:08 am

I have absolutely no idea where to go in this game at this point. I wonder if anyone else has run in to this problem in the past? To me, it just isn't clear at all because I have looked around the city for information several times now and not found the alleged police officer that tells me what to do next.

Haven't listened to part 5 yet, but...

If you've talked to the guy who mentions that El Garbanzo's dad found out something about the government (in one of the bars) and also the guy who mentions that he saw someone who looked almost exactly like El Garbanzo twenty years ago when he was a kid (in the red building behind the rent-a-car place), the cop should show up.

He'll be in the lower-right corner of the map, standing behind a fence next to a red building and some crates.

I've checked for tag/NPC problems, but everything seems to be working right. So I'm guessing you either haven't talked to the guy behind the rent-a-car place yet, or you have but just overlooked the cop's place in the lower-right section of the map.

JSH357 · Post by **JSH357** » Sun Dec 19, 2010 3:02 am

Audio #2 - Okedoke Part 6
Audio #9 - Tales of the New World 2 (Part 2) featuring Newbie Power

msw188 · Post by **msw188** » Sun Dec 19, 2010 9:21 am

Haha, again, great choice of background song. I don't know if you played Tales 1 or not, but I use the main line of that song in that game, and so I started laughing as soon as I heard it in the background.

I'm VERY glad Newbie mentioned the thing about death costing less than returning to town. I don't die too much when I playtest; clearly I have to rethink the revival fee formula. I don't know how I'll handle it just yet. Maybe take my entire formula and cut it in half? I'll have to look into it.

About the dialogue, I've thought about it a bit. I'm not sure what to do about it. I usually have a lot of stuff to get through in any given cutscene; lots of back and forth between the various characters present might just lengthen everything.

Oh and by the way, there's a small bit of explanation on why no one in Asfidel knew about the necessary NPC after you beat the boss and go back, but I'll agree that I need to think of another way to clue the player in to finding her. The problem is making that make sense within the plot.

The area still blocked off is going to take some time before the player can go that way anyway. I wanted to get that done for this release, but it was too much. I'm still scared of tackling those maptile graphics, haha.

Baconlabs · Post by **Baconlabs** » Sun Dec 19, 2010 10:12 am

OH MY PORK, I just noticed that I accidentally left an infinite text box loop in the game!
If you've downloaded Viridia version 2 already, please download it again as I have reuploaded it after fixing this horrible bug. As a bonus, I made it so that you can't hurt teammates by accident, as was suggested earlier.

JSH357 · Post by **JSH357** » Sun Dec 19, 2010 6:45 pm

Audio #2 - Okedoke Part 7

I am done with this game. I feel bad about abandoning it before getting to the new content, but I really don't find the content that I've played engaging, and the thought of having to explore this entire city kind of scares me. That's just my opinion, and I hope you can find someone else who's more suited to testing this, Fnnrf.

On that note, after playing this far I am feeling VERY confused about the whole issue of judging new content in older games. I just can't wrap my head around an accurate way of doing it. Some people will have played the old demo, so their votes will be biased in that regard, and some people are playing it fresh. It's all very complex when you get right down to it. I am tempted to not vote on ANY of the "updated" entries, which is technically fair game, but seems to be against the spirit of the contest.

Audio #10 - Viridia

I mention this in the audio, and maybe it's just me, but I am pretty sure this game is bugged to hell. I can't target any of the enemies at all with either of my characters, so once all my units are dead and I am out of MP recovery, it's basically over. Is that intentional? I cannot get past the battle with 2 wolves this way.

Baconlabs · Post by **Baconlabs** » Sun Dec 19, 2010 10:11 pm

Aigh! I know exactly what happened, I turned on the wrong enemy slot bitsets! That's what I get for rushing and not testing.

Switching the bitsets and reuploading. God, I feel like a moron.

I am noticing that three people downloaded this bugged version, including JSH. So sorry! Sorry! Sorry!

Pepsi Ranger · Post by **Pepsi Ranger** » Sun Dec 19, 2010 11:23 pm

JSH357 wrote:On that note, after playing this far I am feeling VERY confused about the whole issue of judging new content in older games. I just can't wrap my head around an accurate way of doing it.

For anyone else having this problem, I should probably reiterate (and I apologize if I hadn't made it clear the first time) that you should really just play the whole game and judge it as a complete entry (as you would for the newer titles). The new content stipulation is for people who have played the first seven worlds of Do You Want to Be a Hero and remember it, and thus need to play through World 8 in order to see the new stuff and, in effect, vote on the game's new total presentation (either World 8 will make the game better, worse, or maintain the status quo).

Maybe I should post past experience to help paint a picture for the many people who have yet to vote:

When the original Walthros demo was released in 2000, it stopped just before Super Walrus Man entered the Mad World. Up to that time, I thought it was an incredible game, lots of fun, and left me with much to anticipate.

Fast forward a couple of years to the finished Walthros. The plot eventually became chaotic with all the new characters making appearances, Super Walrus Man transformed from a hyper oddball to a dark, depressed emo mammal, and it just wasn't the same game for me anymore.

The original demo might've earned an 8 or a 9 from me on a contest like this. It was lighthearted fun that touched on a fantastical world that sparked some imagination in me. Worth every point. The completed game, however, with all of its new, depressed ideas, its rapidly forgettable second half cast of characters, and its out of control plot (while still more enjoyable than almost anything else on the engine at the time) would've decreased the overall score down to a 7 or 6. I just didn't enjoy it as much when all the fun was obliterated by serious, semiconvoluted philosophy.

I still played the game from beginning to end. And it took me awhile. But I judged the game as a whole, and that was what I had hoped voters would do for this contest. However, I know how unrealistic that could be for the longer games, so I am willing to let voters base new votes against the old stuff they've already played. However, if the player had never played the previous demos, then he or she needs to start from the beginning for the vote to have any credibility.

I'm not sure if I can make this clearer, so there you go.

The Wobbler · Post by **The Wobbler** » Mon Dec 20, 2010 3:13 am

Walthros pre-White Shrine is barely a game and there's no story or gameplay options and barely characters at that point, guess I should have kept that going.

Pepsi Ranger · Post by **Pepsi Ranger** » Mon Dec 20, 2010 6:31 am

Walthros pre-White Shrine is barely a game and there's no story or gameplay options and barely characters at that point, guess I should have kept that going.

I may have said the wrong thing here...

Off-topic from HotOHR, but to clarify my memory of Walthros: I recall the story going downhill for me when Super Walrus Man went emo. It was a drastic turn that I wasn't ready for. I think my reviews reflected this, but I recall that emotional turn involving a lot of philosophical stuff that seemed out of place to the story at the time. It's been a long time since I've played it, so I don't remember the events around the White Shrine. In all, I still, and always will like the game. Sorry if my example made it seem like I didn't. But again, the downward spiral of Super Walrus Man was new content that affected my opinion of the overall game, even though my first impression of the original demo saw little fault in it. And that's what I want players to consider prior to voting. Consider the game for what it is today, not for what it was during its last release.

Surlaw, I still thought the mouse wars were great, and that came later. And the stuff on the moon. And I'm hazy about the Sky Flyers stuff, but I recall it being handled well. The burden fell heavily on Super Walrus Man's character shift. I just didn't know where it came from, and it bothered my experience a little.

I don't intend to rag on your game here. Sorry if it came across that way. If there were more complete RPGs in this community, I'd probably pick one of them to illustrate my example instead. But Walthros is one of the only complete games in the community that most players here would have any kind of memory of.