Sonic Next Gen.

I mean that we convince Nintendo, somehow to put Sonic in SSBB. We could direct on Sonic Team on what to do. Why not we at SonicSpot help sonicphc and his Sonic Fantasy game: by the looks of it, it's really good so far. I would like to help. Am I the only one? In DoctorEggman's case, he has a start with creating games.shadow_17705

sonicphc is making a Sonic Fantasy game? a real game?

[QUOTE="shadow_17705"]I mean that we convince Nintendo, somehow to put Sonic in SSBB. We could direct on Sonic Team on what to do. Why not we at SonicSpot help sonicphc and his Sonic Fantasy game: by the looks of it, it's really good so far. I would like to help. Am I the only one? In DoctorEggman's case, he has a start with creating games.DoctorEggman

sonicphc is making a Sonic Fantasy game? a real game?

[QUOTE="DoctorEggman"]

[QUOTE="shadow_17705"]I mean that we convince Nintendo, somehow to put Sonic in SSBB. We could direct on Sonic Team on what to do. Why not we at SonicSpot help sonicphc and his Sonic Fantasy game: by the looks of it, it's really good so far. I would like to help. Am I the only one? In DoctorEggman's case, he has a start with creating games.Platyphyllum

sonicphc is making a Sonic Fantasy game? a real game?

Yes, I am really making it. Those posts on my blog haven't been a joke :) . I've got a staff of about 10 people. I'm doing most of the hard programming, mostly because I'm hte only one who understands it. I've got one on animation, one on concept art, one on writing, one on game design, one on level design, one on in-game artwork, etc etc. Oh, and all 10 of us are doing Voice Acting, too. It makes recording voices a whole lot easier when you based the new characters off of people who are on your staff. It makes all of the voices sound so much more real. When we're arguing in the game, chances are someone was grabbing someone by the throat in the room we were recording in.

It's a lot of fun. I'm hoping that maybe when I get the script, voicing, game engine, and about 1/3 of the game done I can get SEGA to take my concept and develop it into a real console game. If not, I'll be releasing it for free online for your PC.

If I gave away the plot, you'd have no incentive to play, now would you?

This is a Japanese-style RPG we're talking about here. What keeps people playing them is the storyline. They want to find out what happens next, so they spend just one more hour trying to get to the next place they're supposed to go to find out they want to play just one more hour to find out what happens after they beat that boss but then they want to find out what happens next when they go back to their home town and so on and so forth. Exciting gameplay isn't what keeps the player going, because the gameplay in ALL of these kinds of RPGs will get repetitive over time, guaranteed. Of course, the gameplay can't be bad, either. There has to be something about it that makes it different from every other game in it's class, but the novelty of the added/modified features does wear thin over time without fail, even the most innovative.

The other things that keeps people playing besides the story are the animations and sound, too. There's something oddly satisfying about watching as Shadow quickly and efficitently turns your enemy into a crater while all you have to do is sit back and watch. The sound in an RPG needs to be so addictively awesome that it can't be considered repetitive, because if the BGM is not good, then it will begin to grate on the ears of the player who keeps hearing the same song every time they enter a battle.

I am slowly leaking basic plot details out over time, but most of that is just introductions to the new characters and such.

If you're dying for information, however, parts of the plot are based on the first Sonic RPG done on SonicSpot.

Anyhow, despite how I do agree with you in general that Gameplay>Story+Sound+Graphics, in a game like this that's really not the case. It's more like Story=Gameplay>Graphics>Sound. A dull, uninteresting story or a ludicrously confusing story will drive players away from the game, while and interesting and intriguing story will draw them and hook them. Then the nifty gameplay mechanics make the whole package all that much sweeter.

I actually write the entire code for the game in Visual Basic 2005 Express Edition. I believe DoctorEggman uses GameMaker.

Both of them are free for download. Since GameMaker is designed for making games, it is much easier to create games with, where as Visual Basic is a programming language for creating anything and everything you can imagine. The trade off is in that where GameMaker is saves you a whole lot of time by already having done seemingly-simple things (such as collision detection) for you, there's not quite as much freedom woth what you can do.

DoctorEggman's most recent game, Sonic Mini Adventure Revolution, is quite good. You should check it out.

Well it WAS a good game. The best feature compared to all of your other ones: the ablity to kill enemies by jumping at them from any direction.

The battles are going to be somewhat actiony, but still follow the turn-based battle format of a typical J-RPG. There are going to be puzzles ranging from very easy to OMGWHEREISTHESTRATEGYGUIDEFORTHISGAME hard. There are mini-game type sections the require quick reflexes and skill to pass through that are uniqe to each character(s) that perform them.

I should create a fan-games topic... In fact, I think I will!

The PS3 Version is coming out in 23 days... that means it's time to play every GS board user's favorite game:

GUESSTHESCORE

Yes, folks, it is the ultimate question, what will the score be? It is the one thing everybody seems to care about way too much even though they're going to buy the game anyway and completely ignore the reviews regarding the purpose they were intended for.

I'm guessing a 6.4, how about you?

The PS3 Version is coming out in 23 days... that means it's time to play every GS board user's favorite game:

GUESSTHESCORE

Yes, folks, it is the ultimate question, what will the score be? It is the one thing everybody seems to care about way too much even though they're going to buy the game anyway and completely ignore the reviews regarding the purpose they were intended for.

I'm guessing a 6.4, how about you?

sonicphc

There's a new topic for that second part of your post.

So now the average guess is: 5.4!

Any other takers?

Well it WAS a good game. The best feature compared to all of your other ones: the ablity to kill enemies by jumping at them from any direction.

sonicphc

Well, the newly discovered knowledge of how to do that one thing inspired me to make SMA:R.
Yes, it involves using sprite variables, which is VERY useful. I only wish I knew how to put paralax backgrounds in my games. :( I've seen it done before.

The battles are going to be somewhat actiony, but still follow the turn-based battle format of a typical J-RPG. There are going to be puzzles ranging from very easy to OMGWHEREISTHESTRATEGYGUIDEFORTHISGAME hard. There are mini-game type sections the require quick reflexes and skill to pass through that are uniqe to each character(s) that perform them.

sonicphc

LOL! I said "OMGWHEREISTHESTRATEGYGUIDEFORTHISGAME" a few times while beating Mario and Luigi: Super Star Saga. That is the only RPG I ever owned. (Yes, I beat it.)

Yes, it involves using sprite variables, which is VERY useful. I only wish I knew how to put paralax backgrounds in my games. :( I've seen it done before.

[...]

LOL! I said "OMGWHEREISTHESTRATEGYGUIDEFORTHISGAME" a few times while beating Mario and Luigi: Super Star Saga. That is the only RPG I ever owned. (Yes, I beat it.)

DoctorEggman

Superstar Saga was a fantastic game, but I neve found any of the puzzles quite that hard. I'm talking more along the lines of Golden Sun or Wild Arms hard (Both of which are fantastic RPG's, but the puzzles are rediculous.

The average guess is now a 5.3! W00t! Anyone else?

Okay, after playing Sonic's demo of this game, I said: "Man! And I thought SA2 was slow and clunky. The only thing fast about this is the mach speed areas. (without upgrades)"

Yeah, I step on a speed panel and Sonic goes from 7 to 10 MPH. That's fast? Um, h*** no. Sonic Heroes was the Sonic game with the smoothest and fastest gameplay for sure. Still, I'd wanna get this game and give it more of a chance to please me.

He does not feel fast at all, at least not in the demo.

Does it feel like he's going fast because when I look at gameplay he looks fast.Platyphyllum

No, not even when you hit a speed panel or a ramp. It's slower than SA2, which is sad.
The slow-to-respond homing attack felt just as I imagined it would. It wasn't that bad, but it's ridiculous that they slow it down so much. At least it's accurate. :?

When I tried the demo, I started running and said, "Hurry up!". My Sonic instincts told me to do a spin-dash for some good speed, and then jump onto my feet to run very quickly. I spun, I dashed, I tried to jump, but by the time the jump button responded, Sonic was already in the bushes, which is bad for a speedy hedgehog.

I heard that was a problem. In some cases you actually had to let the computer control him because if you moved the analog stick or whatever it's called just a bit, Sonic will swerve to the wrong direction and die.Platyphyllum

Well, if the CPU controls some parts, they should temporarily disable the controller imput so as not to interfere.
The only time I died was once before I figured out that you must dash toward the tight ropes.
On the plus side, running on the sides of walls was alot easier and more fun to do than in the other Sonic games.

If only it was faster...

Oh, and that sliding thing was wierd. I tapped B expecting to do a sommersault and Sonic just started sliding along the ground with his front leg out to kick things. And he kept sliding, and sliding, and sliding, and sliding like there was no such thing as friction. And I could turn him in full circles and stuff too. I'm sorry, but if you slide along the ground you're going to go straight and then come to a stop a few feet in front of you, not magically float an inch above the ground.sonicphc

Sliding is getting worse. :(
It was good in Sonic Heroes, though. You didn't have to greatly reduce your speed to do a sommersault. You could just plow through the enemies with a simple and effective slide attack.