Quintessence - The Blighted Venom

[Reives]

Thank you for the detailed feedback! I've been looking forward to it indeed.

Spoiler: Just for organization~

You've actually touched on some topics that hasn't been mentioned before, such as the monotonic conversation style through chapter 3 & 4 - I myself missed that completely, and will certainly see what I can do about it in future revamps. Same thing with the blatantness of Sal vs. Vikon; I hope steering it away a bit toward a side dish would detract some attention to it.

Chapter 2 is certainly a pile of mess as it stands now; I've been paranoid of its existence for a while now with my constant disclaimer of the drowsiness's to be expected from it (and when the author himself is thinking this, something's seriously wrong here). It was mainly stemmed from my initial faulty planning, as I just slapped the story on as if it was written rather than a RPG. It's certainly something that I really need to redo, but due to the fact that it would probably require changing its foundations, I've been sucking it up and putting it off for the sake of not loosing momentum.

Speaking of which, that goes for chapter 1 as well. I have several mini-games and battle enabled scenes planned for it to be done in the future, and hopefully that would spice things up a bit. The battle system is not exactly one that I intended for the player to grind, but rather just to offer some involving interactivity. And given its design, I am looking forward to a great amount of flexibility in it, such as puzzles and etc. (For example, after chapter 7, it is possible to truly transform in battle and swap skill sets, etc.)

Thanks for the heads ups. All in all, the early chapters are in need of major polish to be up to par with the battle-hardened ones later. 6 > 8 ? 7 >>> 5 > 4 ? 3 > 1 > 2 is the order of quality from general consensus, it seems. Speaking of which, I am pretty sure that the version you have is outdated; so upon next play if you get the chance, please download the 1-8 package that has some revamps to the earlier chapters.  :smile:

I'll be waiting on you guys' upcoming new release, then (seriously this time :p )! It'll be the first RPG/demo lengthed over 4 hours that I have played in the past 4 years (commercial or not), literally. By then I'll probably have released chapter 9 here as well, so I can get some slack too for it.

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And just for the sake of having something visual in this post, here're the before and after views of the old Korbin Woods and the new one in Chapter 1-8 package. c:

Before:
http://www.quintessence-tbv.com/images/Click2.jpg[/img]

After:
http://www.quintessence-tbv.com/images/Click2.jpg[/img]

There were also some revamps in the dialogues department for chapter 1 and as such, as well as some complete additions to the intro. But all in all, there are still a lot of work to be done in the future to level the earlier chapters up to par. c:

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[Dinner; will get to the TML response after!]

 

[windsaver]

Well that is a big change to the woods. It looks so much better.

 

[Tenken]

9/10
Man, this is honestly the best game I've seen and played for RM ever. The music is heavenly and gets you really into the whole theme of the game. The mapping is excellent, and the panaromas look so professional. I'm guessing you bought them? I really liked the game but what brought me down was the lack of interactivity for the first 2 chapters especially the first one. I mean you got to walk and talk to animals and things like that (got milk?), but no real action till the little dungeon part. The intro and ending are absolutely astounding along with your ability to event. The horse racing and the carnival? Brilliant!
Maybe add a bit more interactivity into the beginning chapters, but as for know, just keep working on Chapter IX

 

[regi]

Woods look much improved, although there seems to be a slight problem with elevation in the trees toward the top-right of the forest (the leaves look much higher up on the big tree on the cliff than the small trunks to either side of the cliff). But otherwise it's great.

@Tenken: I believe Reives made the panoramas himself (or some of them), they do look pretty sexy :X

 

[Reives]

Aye, point taken. The first 2 chapters really do need to be fixed, especially in the area of interactivity (same with 3 and 4 to be honest, although more so on a general level at that). I am doing a little revamp to them each new release now, as evident in the 1-6 vs 1-8 releases.  :smile: Although the interactivity part would require more effort, so I may hold off on them for another while. I do have things planned out already, though!

The improvement to the woods is expected to be done to some other maps as well, although currently it's mainly a matter of the hassle of redoing cut-scenes on those old maps (Korbin Village is one of them c: ). I am also thinking of putting a little risk-free battle in the intro where you can just blast the hell out of everything with Eshe with little consequences.

And ah, thanks for the heads up on that, Regi. I kinda feel that it would be a good in the sense of easing up dullness to show the tree leaves, but that's true that it looks rather off elevation-wise. I'll see what I can do about it.  :smile:


The panoramas as they stand now are actually a mix. Most are purchased from a Chinese publisher a long while back, and the others are by me. I do have plans to slowly move it to an all-original panoramas by me in the future, though. c: My works atm are toward the fuzzy side, though, like in this over-milked ss:

Spoiler

http://www.quintessence-tbv.com/images/Ss1.jpg[/img]

They look alright for scenes like that, but as a general panorama they are still a bit too fuzzy to match the maps well. Still need some practice on that before I can start the revamp. :smile:

 

[seven]

risk-free battle in the intro where you can just blast the hell out of everything with Eshe with little consequences.

YAY! BAM BAM BAM BAM! WHEEE!! :rock:

Originally I planned to have a choice of bailing with an item at any time, but later dismissed the idea due to being lazy. :p

Do you still plan on doing this? *shows puppy dog eyes and begs*

 

[Reives]

Sure, I certainly will at one point. No guarantee that it'll be in the next release though, since I just know that things are going to pile up. :p In the mean time, just turn off sound and everything'll be fine (and remember to turn it back up).


Looks like the picture intro might come sooner than I thought. :smile: It is now getting help from Rye (thanks!) in the form of linearts, so that should give it a big head start for me. Here's the character WIP sketch of the ocarina scene for the first verse (thighs will be a bit thicker in final version):

http://www.quintessence-tbv.com/images/R_Sketch_Rye.jpg[/img]

Cha~

 

[seven]

Looks cool. Not much I can comment on, I'm no artist.
  -KRoP

 

[regi]

I personally think his legs are too long and he's leaning forward too much (seems like it would be hard to balance with your legs so far behind you). But then again, it's kind of hard to tell. Otherwise, Rye's doin' some great work.

 

[Taylor]

If this game gets Rye's work in cut scenes it will become more awesome. ;o;
But he does seem to lean forward a tad too much, though it's hard to say with the size of the picture.

 

[Reives]

Many thanks for the feedback and suggestions! :smile:

The final version was made on a tilted sketch, so he is leaning at a more suitable angle now. The legs are still that length, but I'll wait after I get the background done to see if a fix is needed - I think it would be a relatively easy fix if that is the case.

Ah, here's a preview of the final lineart:

http://www.quintessence-tbv.com/images/ ... al_Rye.jpg[/img]

I'll be colouring that in the near future; hopefully I don't ruin a nice lineart. :p Would probably be slow progress though, since I'd be juggling between this and chapter 9. Speaking of which, I will post another preview screenshot or the like within the next couple of posts.

[Oh by the way, new fanart by Theufw is now posted on the FA part of the main website - Thanks, Theufw. c: ]

 

[Erichermit]

I think the lineart looks really good! I'm looking forward to seeing what it looks like colored.

Do you perhaps have an estimate for when we can get the next chapter?

 

[Reives]

Probably in a month or so. :smile: Things are a bit slower than planned due to that I got a job recently, and it's eating up my time.
(Working at a game design company now by the way! c': Yay. But tiring.)

I got some good progress done today. Here's another preview screenshot:
[Moved to the post after next~]


As for the picture; I have not really finished seriously colouring it, but in the mean time I made a quick mock-up by doing some on-the-fly shading with the Burn tool.  :P So here it is just for fun, while I work on the real version.

Again, this is not the serious version, but rather just a quick mock-up for fun:
http://www.quintessence-tbv.com/images/ ... MOCKUP.jpg[/img]

 

[Despain]

ahahah rye.

man you should ask her to change her art style for you or something because that is so fucking thin it's seriously disgusting looking. she has like no grasp of anatomy and holds heroin chic waaaay to highly. plus something is VERY OFF with the position of the hands on the ocarina

 

[Reives]

Aye, it is rather thin and I might end up playing around with the lineart a bit; but personally it doesn't really bother me that much, to be honest. I am fine with her style as far as anatomy goes, as many others apparently are; it's partly an issue of preference. But then again, I'm Asian. :p Looking at the WIP on the version with real shadings, though, the symptom seems to be less obvious since it has more of a pop-up feel, so hopefully that'll do something.

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Moved the screenshot to this post instead:

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v385/ ... /C9Ssp.jpg[/img]

Edit:
Oh, and just a bit of an update on the vapour-planning for revamps: I believe I will be inserting a completely voluntary cave/dungeon with some mini-games and puzzles and whatnot into Korbin Woods in hope that it can add some interactivity to the first few chapters.

I've also been seriously planning to redo the main area of Korbin Village completely as well, and adding some interactive objects like a target range for a mini archery game; similar to the one at Chapter 8's carnival, for example. If ya guys have any suggestions and the like, feel free to give me a heads up! c:

 

[seven]

Ooh... Looks cool. Makes me want to finish Chapter 8.
  -KRoP

 

[Reives]

Go ahead; that cave got nothing on you when you turn off the sound (just don't forget to turn it back up). It's just a joke after all. :smile:

~~~

Good news concerning the battle system:
Item implementation as well as "escape" feature are expected to happen, most likely in this upcoming release. Both will function as symbols that appear on the battle ground - The "escape" symbol will appear one square behind the player's starting spot for the first few seconds. To attempt to escape, simply step onto it. Item symbols will randomly spawn on the battle maps, and you will need to get to one and press enter to pop up the item window. Once you exit the item window, the item symbol will despawn and spawn again elsewhere in time. One important achievement of this (besides the fact that you finally get to start getting rid of those once-useless junks in your inventory) is the possibility of reviving fallen team members (e.g. getting Reivier's bow back when you play as the weaksauce Lunair before she gets the shapeshifting ability).


And woo, preview screenshot again. c: Puzzle or something.
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v385/ ... 9Sspps.jpg[/img]

 

[Erichermit]

Yes! ITEM USAGE!

It's about time, getting lots of items without being able to use them was annoying.

 

[seven]

Finally I'll have a use for the throwing egg that had been in production until Chap. 8 (or something like that)

 

[Reives]

Actually I think that one'll take a few more chapters to develop. It's pretty high tech and needs more research funding.