NOX AETERNA (Demo size decreased)

[Daxis]

Nox Aeterna: The Eternal Night

Spoiler: About

Nox Aeterna is a darkly dramatic rpg game that details the various travels of Ravus, a mysterious individual. Ravus traverses many lands, throughout the entire known world of Aesikoru... and beyond.

In the end, he will learn that innocence is only an ideal of man.

Spoiler: Characters

Ravus
Age:???
Race: Fallen
The main protaganist of Nox Aeterna. A mysterious youth, he is constantly wandering to wherever, for purposes unknown. He is a pure-blooded Fallen, his eyes and hair distinguishing him from the rest. Past, present and future unknown, it is unclear who he is, what he intends to do, and why he has such a freaking huge sword.

Zogue
Age: ???
Race: Fallen
Zogue is quite the charismatic guy. Silent, he wanders around just like Ravus. However, his wanderings aren't meaningless... It seems there is a clear path for him to tread, a clear reason why he sharpens his spear...

Kaiser:
Age: 20
Race: Human(?)
Kaiser is somewhat a shy, easily embarrassed girl. Although deadly with a katana, she is rather clumsy without. Her best friend in the world is Ziegfried, and joins with Ravus purely because Ziegfried did. However, maybe she isn't who you think she is...

Celes
Age: 26
Race: Human
Celes is a specialized knight, her rapier enchanted by the most poweful magicks. A bit silent and melancholy, she would rather act than talk. She seems to know Rydia.

Rydia
Age: ???
Race: Human-Fallen
Rydia is a very fun loving character. When the occasion calls for it, she can be seductive and mature, but otherwise, she would much rather have fun. She is rather adept at magic. She seems to know Celes. Despite her fun nature, she can often get serious, especially when it comes to issues with the Fallen...

Ziegfried
Age: 20
Race: Human
Ziegfried is Kaiser's Best friend. He travels with Zogue and Ravus for vengeance on those that killed his parents, and, despite his protests, Kaiser comes along with him. Nice but serious, he is rather smart. Somewhat of a thief.

Gladiator:
Age: 23
Race: Human
A fun guy, really. Tries to joke around a little too much. Caring, he'll do anything for the greater good, to protect the ones he love. Also, for some reason, never wears a shirt.

Spoiler: Story

Aesikoru is the world in which Nox Aeterna exists in. It is composed of two main continents, Ademna and Haspione. The ruling country of Ademna is called Ademna itself, and Haspione is split into two countries, Hesperitia and Bel-Sent.

There are two main races of Aesikoru. Humans are the Majority, and the race of the Fallen. Fallen are those with silver hair or eyes, the pure-blooded having both.

It is said that the Fallen come from three fallen angel, that bred with humans to create the fallen known today. Whether this is true or not, Fallen are typically stronger, faster, and generally have much more magical abilities.

Bel-Sent is the fallen word for "Fallen."


There also may be a third evanescent race. These people are generally described in myths and legends.

They are called Descenders, those with heavenly wings on their backs.


The Fallen are highly prosecuted in this world. About 250 years ago, the continent of Haspione had a great split, due to the many prosecutions on the Fallen, and thus Haspione harbored two countries, Bel-Sent and Hesperitia. Although tensions had cooled in the following 200 years, a great Fallen leader, Razial, had rallied up the Fallen people, and fought to take back the homeland of the Fallen, located in Hesperitia.

They lost.

Tensions built up again. The Fallen now dye their hair and hide their eyes, for fear of what people might do. The homeland of the Fallen is violated by the touch of the humans. And a great new leader of the Fallen are arising, Markus, and he is rallying everyone up again. Hesperitia is getting agitated, and minor border skirmishes are breaking out.

Meanwhile, in Ademna, the democratic kingdom does not know exactly what to do. Do they help the Fallen? Do they ignore any incoming war? Hesperitia is dangerously close and large... If the Hesperities won, would they be satisfied with just Bel-Sent?

And, even as these events go on, an organization in the shadow slowly arises, unknown to the world until it is too late. To them, the incoming war is the same as ants scurrying around. Their mission is so much greater...

And for some reason, everyone wants to join Ravus on his travels. Go figure.

Spoiler: Screenshots

Spoiler: Downloads

http://www.megaupload.com/?d=OF4GXRD5
Demo v.4, at least an hour of solid gameplay

http://www.megaupload.com/?d=UNAL3KIW
Intro demo, no gameplay. Make sure you get the font Black Chancery

http://www.megaupload.com/?d=4O4KJABB
Black chancery font file

Spoiler: features

Animated Battlers
Extended cutscenes
Cutscene for title
Cutscene battles
Full MP3 Soundtrack
Screen Capture(F8)
8 Directional pixel movement plus dashing
Animated boss deaths
Completely customated battlebacks
Limit Breaks
Literally hundreds of weapons, items, armors, and skills
Custom Messaging System
New items/weapons/menu/shop screen
Party changing system
Individual battle commands
Light effects
remodeled damage display
Deep storyline and dark storytelling
More to be added

Spoiler: Author's note

Author's note:
At least hour of quality gameplay
The features show is what the final project will be, not the demo.
Press spacebar in order to dash

Forgot in credits:
Kylelee1234 for the rydia/celes battlers

Spoiler: Forum signaturebar

Well, I was bored, and who cares? When I get a chance, I'll do it over.

 

[moog]

Why is it so dark? @_@ Way too much contrast on those screens, imo.

 

[Daxis]

Seriously? That's dark?...
Okay, the first couple of screenshots are a bit dark, but it's part of the cutscene. Dramatic effect or whatever.
I could lighten it up in future demoes.

 

[Nachos]

I like your mapping and the contrast of the game. It makes a better gaming atmosphere. The last map is a little empty.
As for the battle style, great.

:Much better now. :straightthumb:

 

[Daxis]

The last map?

Dang! I forgot about that one... The events sidetracked me, and... whatever. I should have used another screenshot, shouldn't I?

Thanks for reminding me. I'll finish it now(Not that I'll upload another demo.)

EDIT: Wait no, I mean I'll upload another screenshot

EDIt: Uploaded new screenshot.

 

[SorcerGamble2]

ya.. i was thinking... arg, i'm blind...

i once bought an x-box just so i could play the elder scrolls game... it was so friggin dark at night time that i really couldn't tell what was even attacking me.  i took the game and the x-box back to the store.  (there was no way to adjust the brightness in-game on the x-box.)  i later played it on cpu (with the ability to adjust brightness) and it was a really good game.

as long as the whole game isn't that dark... it might be alright, but if you're having a hard time seeing, that gets very frustrating very quickly if it lasts for very long.

looks alright... my biggest concern is whenever i see things that are way out of proportion, like the fight seen with the god sized chick and the little guy with the big sword.  i think she could pick him up and (ahem) use him to pleasure herself.

:D

 

[Daxis]

Whoa... didn't expect a comment like that :D
Anyways, fixing the contrast of the screens is easy. However, I'll do it after I'm finished with the game or when I just  don't feel like mapping and eventing anymore. I'll edit and fix the contrast if people complain about it too much, but I personally feel like it does the drama in the demo good with that contrast. Easily fixed.

Well, for some reason, this game is turning out way more final-fantasy-ish than I had originally imagined. The battlers even look the part. It keeps reminding me of ff1-6, when the battlers are really small and the enemies are really large.
Again, easily fixed. AFTER I'M DONE WITH THE GAME, I'll just go back and resize the enemies if people want. However, for now, I'm not resizing them, because it's just too much annoying and repetitive work.(like mapping)
I won't be the rising the actor battlers. They won't fit the screen, and it'd just look weird.

 

[Nachos]

Well, I've downloaded the demo and It pretty good. It is true that you must fix the contrast, but it doesn't bother that much.
The first cutscene is a little long and annoying which makes it boring to play it. Keep up the good job.

I don't know if it is a priority to you, but you could change the titlescreen and the one that says "Nox Aeterna" to a more datailed one. Maybe for the next demo :straightthumb:

 

[Daxis]

I can't sprite or draw anything. At all. The title was meant to be really simple. I just wrote a couple of things in Paint dot net and saved it in the picture's folder. There are ways to enhance it, but it'll be really tough, and I just don't feel like it's worth doing. Besides, the idea I have in mind requires a script that gets RMXP to play GIF files, which I don't know where to find.

I also sort of suck at eventing. I'm trying to make it so that when one of the pictures comes up in the title, you have the option to press the cancel button and skip the title, rather than a simple "Play intro" or don't play intro thing. It's really hard to do, and after half an hour with no progress, I just decided to do something easy.

Ps: If I can make a title scene, I'll have to add it ad the main menu, where you have that new game/continue/end game thing. Panorama background and all that.

 

[Injury]

Nice work Daxis! I hope that you can complete this whole thing!

 

[Nachos]

GIFs scripts:

http://www.66rpg.com/htm/news748.htm

http://www.rmxp.org/forums/index.php?topic=25393

Spoiler: Quick titlescreen for you

http://img363.imageshack.us/img363/7804/nowaeternalei4.png[/img]

 

[Sapphire]

I tried to play this, but after the Intro there was just a black screen, where i couldnt do anything... i dont know, whether it was just black or a VERY dark map... the intro is pretty good though.

 

[Nachos]

That reminds me, add and Autosave after the intro.

 

[Daxis]

Sapphire: After the intro, you have to wait a couple seconds(I think 5) for the menu screen to come up. Don't worry about that right now, that'll be easily fixed in any future demoes. Either that, or there are some compatibility problems somehow. Make sure you have the black chancery font installed.

nahchito: Eternal Night. Nox Aeterna is latin(I'm 90% sure one this) The eternal light is Lux Aeterna.
Anyways, thanks for the title, but I'll need a screen that I can connect to my story somehow. Because I'm using dollmage battlers, I don't have any basic default battler pictures out there, so I'm pretty limited to the title. I'll try to find some battlers later, so then I'll be able to think of a title screen.

I might have mentioned this before, but I'll use the titlescreen(whether it be animated gif or something else) as a panorama for the intro menu(s). I'm trying to upload the title screen I'm currently thinking of, even though there's currently no connection to the story(yet. I'm a writer at heart)

Oh yeah, here's the title screen idea

http://i411.photobucket.com/albums/pp20 ... rt/1-1.gif[/img]

It looks cool, and that's the only reason I'm thinking of using it.

DO NOT EXPECT this game to be finished ANY TIME SOON. I mean it. I'm not doing a short 2-3 hour game, I'm doing a long game with an engaging storyline. I'm aiming for at least 10 hours of gameplay at minimum, and not just grinding. There will be various quests, I'm trying to learn how to event puzzles correctly. I can't script or sprite, so most everything will be other's scripts and my own eventing. I'll try to recruit artists for the whatever later.

Well, anyways, thanks, Injury, I hope I can finish it as well. I'm working on the various people of the first town you'll be in. There'll already be some quests there, two short ones, a simple half-boss battle, a monster hunt, and a quest that's going to take the entire game to complete. Of course, you won't know this since it's just a demo... but I think long terms, not short.

Nahchito: autosave? Got it. I can either do a simple call save menu, or I'll search for a force save script. Simple enough.


EDIt: Yeah, I know the screenshot is weird. It's not complete, like I said. I still have several more frames to complete, several. I'm using unfreeze to compose it, by the way.

EDIT: I forgot to mention, I'm about the add a new feature.

EDIT: I totally forgot to mention in the "It'll be a long game and take forever" rant: One of the reasons I was able to pump out the demo in the first place during the break was because I had five days straight to work with it. Now that I have school, I'll take a lot longer to get demoes out. I'll be updating the author's not on about how the demo stuff will come out.

ANOTHER EDIT: I uploaded the title screen using photobucket. I really don't like photbucket, because I see photobucket stuff being removed all the time. However, since image shacks can't use pictures that are too large in size(MB), I have to resort to this...

 

[Daxis]

Hello.
Progress on the game during my christmas break had not staunched. However, because my FUCKING DAD smash the computer monitor in a fucking fit of rage, the game will be postponed indefinitely.

I'm writing this on my sister's shitty vista hp laptop(sorry to those of you that use a vista hp laptop

...

I want to burn my house down right now.

 

[Bridgeman]

So it's a game but you can't play? :-/

Seriously where are all these RMXP "movie" type games coming from. If I wanna see a movie I'll go to the cinema. I'm not really amazed by long ass movies made with RMXP sprites and RTP.

But hey whatever the hell floats your boat I guess

Edit: Uhhh after reading a bit more I think I got some things messed up. Oh well now you know my opinion on RMXP movies anyway.

I'll edit this to something more useful after I get a chance to play. Apologies for the misjudgement, I spotted the word "cinematic" and thought you were making a movie. Go figure.

 

[Harrybo21]

looks good. lovin the valkyrie profile styled guy (eg massive sword)

keep it up

 

[Daxis]

Okay, I'm back, new monitor and... still slowly working on the game. Very slowly.
Still want to burn down the house.

Anyways, the cinematic basically means that the game will be pretty dramatic. Opinion, but I'm pretty sure that recently my writings have been pretty dark and complex and stuff.

Anyways, I planned demo v.4 for the end of the christmas break for me... but code geass, chobits, veritas, sekirei, D.gray man, case closed: detective conan, Dean Koontz books, and about a millions things got in my way. I have mapped a whole lot of stuff and evented lots of stuff, though. The upcoming demo will be at least 40 minutes long(and that's if you freaking rushed it beyond belief), maybe at least an hour long. I think I'm making the demo too long, adding a bit too many maps for the story telling, but who cares.

My science project... due in six days... dear god, I'm going to fail biology.

Demo in 1-2 weeks if I finish my science project and stop reading manga.

Harrybo21: Strangely enough, I have never played valkyrie profile. I should, Shouldn't I? Anyways, I simply used cool looking battlers(Dollmage)

 

[HavanaAffair08]

im 2 lazy 2 read the story but picturs look good i am goin 2 download it n play it later

 

[Daxis]

Finally, it's out. After weeks and months of procrastination, the next demo is out.

Damn, the final product is going to be long... What's out right now is only about 5% of what I have in mind.

Anyways, yay, the next demo is out.

About 3~5 quests or so, I'm not sure, I've made it so that every NPC has a name(I'm so totally going to regret this late), the next character joins your party and dramatically makes the battling look so much better (play and you'll find out why(buggy cbs)), the demo ends relatively slow, I think, I probably should have added more fight scenes. I took out several scenes from the demo v.3, because they wouldn't have had made any sense if they stayed in.

I should have added some extra NPC to explain and prelude some more things, but I'll do that in future Demoes.

This game is not completely tested(or, should I say, not tested at all). Most likely, you will find lots of bugs in playing it, I'm too lazy right now to check over(I mean, and hour or gaming? I've just spent my afternoon on this with two mistaken uploads...) I'll check over it later, and if anyone wants to betatest, just PM me.

I do realize that the 120 MB file is freaking huge for a 1 hour game. Sorry, blame the audio file and some of the graphics folder. Also, blame me. Normally, I'd clean up a bit, take out what isn't really needed, but I'm WAY TOO LAZY to do that right now(I'm reading so much freaking manga and watching way too much anime to do that).

Anyways, test out the game. It's pretty cool, and lots of extra scripts were implemented from the features spoiler that wasn't used in the last demo. Also, after you get the next party member, the battling is so much better.

EDIT: Fuck, I messed it up. Give me an hour or two to fix and upload the demo. Sorry.

EDIT: Fixed