Postmortem (Jam Version)

Hey! I decided a while back to make a postmortem for the Game Jam version of this game, since I've never made an official postmortem before, and since this jam does somewhat encourage them.

So I'll start by talking about my general process.

To start... to be honest, while I was in the mood for a game jam right about when I first saw this jam, I wasn't sure about joining this one. Not until I saw this was the host--Human's-- last jam and final hurrah to the RPGM community (for the most part?). Then I thought, I may not know much about this guy, but I know a bit. It'd be nice to make a game for this guy's goodbye!

And so, I began to plot and scheme.

Characters:

Due to optional rule to have a character other than Harold as the protagonist, I decided on the whole "characters from other RPG makers rescue Harold" story pretty early on. I knew I wanted at least one of the other RPG Maker protags to be the main character, and so I chose Eric, (which i kept misspelling as Erik until the final week) the Silver Reaper! From VXAce!

After that, I knew I wanted at least one playable character from MV in the demo, since the game takes place in its world. After thinking about it, my favorite MV design, Nina (from MV's Cover Art) joined the party!

Canary (Angel 03 from RPG Maker XP's RTP) wasn't initially planned to be playable at all. He was only going to be the heal & shop guy. I didn't change my mind until there was a little over a week left, and it's a good thing I did. He became a party member once I decided that I wanted more than just 4 playable characters, meaning that I could now give more specific roles to certain characters (like Canary's primary role of healing), instead of giving 4 character a bunch of skills to juggle.

And about the "4 characters"... Around the first week--this demo was meant to be a completed game with 4 playable characters. The scope for the "completed" game was about the same as Seeking J:USTICE, a completed game made for a different game jam, so I figured I could pull it off again.

About one week in, I realized I couldn't without a lot of unnecessary stress (somehow I forgot how much work J:USTICE took me), and quickly course-corrected so hard that this ended up being the least stressful game I've ever made for a jam. And EVERY game I've made so far has been a jam game.

So despite my plans for this game to be a complete, one-and-done game for a game jam, making this a demo was actually a move I'm proud of myself for. A less experienced me would either try and push himself to finish the complete version, or give up on the jam, thinking "that amount of work isn't worth it". So while this project has become more than planned, I don't really mind! I think there's a lot I can learn by making a smaller, complete game like this that'll require less custom assets than one of my "dream games".

Concept sketches for the 4 characters in the "completed" version I planned early on. Recognize the middle two RPG Maker characters? Don't worry, they'll still be in the full version!

As for Harold, he has a bigger role in the full story, but only has a short appearance in the demo. As a character, I wanted him to be a selfless, overly-curious hero who makes friends easily. Because of those traits, the crossover aspect worked pretty naturally. Harold's the kinda guy who sends letters to characters from various RPG Maker Worlds, asking if they want to explore some odd place or help someone in MV/Emvi.

Concept sketches for Harold's outfit, as seen in the final scene of the Jam demo.

Well, characters are always an important part to me when making things, so that section ended up a lot longer. As for the categories that were judged, here's how I tackled each one:

-Therese Award for Technique: Gameplay

I wanted the gameplay to be entertaining enough, even if I knew the node style might not be everyone's cup of tea. This dungeon navigation style's one I've used on and off ever since my first published game in 2017.  I've only ever used it two other times (including this time), but I try new things with it each time. I might make a bigger change for any future releases of TNS, though.

I was glad to see an overall positive reception to the battle system. There's things I physically can't change about it (like the rest of the combo being skipped if you don't have enough resources), unless I decide to event the combo system instead of use a plugin, like I did in Seeking J:USTICE. But that has its own set of problems. There's pros and cons to both styles that I'll have to figure out.

The gameplay did end up just a rank or two lower than I was planning. Ah, well.

- Marsha Award for Melodies: Music

Since I mainly used paid music packs, or free music that's free to use commercially (due to the cash prize. Whether this sort of event with a potential cash-prize counts as commercial or not is debatable, but I wanted to play it safe), I wasn't expecting much here in terms of rating anyway!

The placement was expected! At the least, I'm glad the music didn't come across as unfitting.

- Lucius Award for Laughs: Comedy

I like the games & stories I make to have a little humor, but I don't aim for my stuff to be comedies, where the humor is what you're here for. I do like the stories I make to be more focused on characters, so I like having a lot of banter. And I like goofy + hammy antagonists. The comedy overall seemed to land with people.

The placement it got is actually a few ranks higher than what I expected! Nice!

- Oldhar Award for Literature: Story

Unfortunately I couldn't get much shown here. Like I said, this was planned to be a short jam game with a full story, but early on I realized I wasn't gonna be able to complete it unless I crunched & sacrificed A LOT of quality, balance, future character moments, you name it. It may seem like unnecessary scope creep to stretch the story out beyond what it was gonna be for the jam, but I don't think the game would've been satisfying to myself if I kept the story as "quick" as I initially planned it.

After realizing I wasn't gonna complete the game, I at least wanted to get the main plot points set up in the demo. I wanted the demo to end with enough mystery to wonder how the team's gonna find & rescue Harold, and wonder what exactly Harold is gonna do on his own...

The placement was about expected! Nothing much to report here.

- Hrld Award for Visual Arts: Graphics

🧍

Oh, graphics. Just the category I put everything into.

I'm especially happy with the reception on my art from people who provided comments and feedback! I'd just started trying a few things with my art style around the time I decided to join this jam (like the lineart style I used, and giving more detail to eyes), so it really felt nice to get a good reception on the art.

Also, I think at least one person has called each playable character in the demo attractive. Thanks yall. Anyone who knows me knows I generally work hard on that aspect in my art lmao🫡.

The graphics is one of my proudest achievements in this game, since I haven't fully put my own character graphics in a game since my 2017 prototype of Grand Core Release. I draw & post my art all the time, I just slowly became too much of a perfectionist to consider my art "game-worthy" until around 2022. The idea of whatever art I make for a game being something that people could see five, ten, or more years into the future kinda scared me, cause I'd think "whatever art I make is fine now, but in a year or two I'll look back and think it won't be up to my personal standard anymore!!! SHIT!!!" It feels entirely different from whatever art I post on social media.

...But yall's reception of my art inside a game definitely gave me a big boost in breaking this "perfectionist" barrier that only came up when I thought of putting my art in games.

To make the art quick enough for a jam, I cut back on shading (except for the eyes). The lineart was what I wanted to focus on for my art in this game, anyway. I also told myself I'd properly shade the rest after the jam. Now that I'm looking at it afterwards though... I just might keep the lack of shading.

This category was the one I put the most into, so the rating here was the most personal. With that said, the placement was... about expected. TNS doesn't feature all custom graphics, so that was probably one shot in my foot. Some devs made basically ALL custom art, from characters to backgrounds, and animated sprites with flashy battle sequences!

I personally ranked the games that ended up scoring above me highly in graphics during judging, not gonna lie. I expected to be competing for the top spot for graphics with them! The results are tentative as of writing this, but top 5* is no joke!

* = EDIT, 5/19/2023: My graphics placement has dropped a bit after nearly 200 fraudulent votes were taken out of the jam itself. Gotta say, I was hoping I'd stay in top 5 at least, but oh well. Seems I'll need to try harder next time I enter one of these.

My ratings for other categories have possibly risen or fallen, though I can't remember what the other ratings were for sure.

"What's Next?"

Well, I'm planning to have The Null Slumber complete by this year. Q1 2024, if not. Fortunately it's a pretty low-tensity game to develop, with the most time-consuming parts being the graphic making and cutscene choreography. Though I won't be able to do much in May since I want to complete a different game jam project first, which will be uploaded here on itch once it's complete.

I've applied most feedback I've been given for TNS, and one of the first things I'll likely work on in June will be the battles. Not just gameplay, but the presentation. Things are a bit cluttered and confusing in battle, I've noticed. Updates and progress will be posted on the Dev Twitter.

Speaking of battles, you may notice on the game page that there will be 9 total characters. I'm hoping to give each character their own "main" role, along with another thing or two they can do (ex: Eric is a fast attacker who doesn't deal the highest damage, but also excels at dodging & helping his teammates do the same). My hope is that players have fun mixing and matching these 9 characters distinct playstyles in different battles! Or just finding their perfect team of 3.

Anyway, that's about it! Thanks for reading, and thanks for playing if you did! Big thanks to everyone who gave feedback! I want this game to be a short, sweet, and polished experienced, so all feedback helps!

And huge thanks for hosting this jam, Human! It was cool to see so many other great projects made for this jam! Have fun in rpgmaker retirement!