korvo game dev

A BLOG FOR ALL OF KORVO'S GAME RELATED CREATIONS I follow from my main blog ko2vo.tumblr.com

[korvio]

Just wanted to give a small notice that I’m still around! 

Went through a really rough summer, school’s started back up now too. I’m still determined to continue on my game projects but I’m taking it easy. Every time I’ve jumped back in, I stress myself out too much hah. 

I’ve gotten a handful more followers since the last post I made months ago so I wanted to show that the blog isn’t abandoned or anything. Also! Wanted to express appreciation to everyone that’s followed! It’s always a surprise to see that people are still noticing this quiet place but I’m grateful nonetheless~

[choko-flan]

How does one get started in making rpg games? What do you do first? Also could you recommend some rpg maker devs to follow?

۹(ÒvÓ)۶ Thankyou for this ask btw!For how to get started in making rpg games there’s many factors to take accountwhich are: 

Are you new to rpg maker? 

If you never use rpg maker I strongly say thatyou 

SHOULDN’T go head first and make a super long game. Youcan, but just note that you are going to get stuck on everything. Just making asmall test project to get to know the engine really helps you to know how tobasically use the engine. 

USE YOUTUBE ITS YOUR FRIEND. 

Whattype of story do you want to make?

Try to write down the basic ideas of thetype of game you want to make. For example: a game about a young elf girl istrying to find the shard pieces for a star she broke. Just something basic, fora concept it doesn’t have to have a million endings and everything the fullgame is going to have.

Demon Tea’s concept idea was basically ademon girl that ran from home and found a village where she met a happy golucky person. 

Concepts =/= the final game, your concept is just the foundation/ plan ofthe game. Like how you draw guide lines for a drawing, the guide lines aren’tgoing to be in the final picture but its there to help you.

Don’t go crazy on your game: Don’t get trap in remake hell [PERFECTIONISM]

We all want to make our games amazing and the bestthing ever, but please take in account that nothing can be perfect. Its not abad thing it’s the truth, there is no such thing as a perfect game. Every gamehas flaws but even if a game isn’t perfect it can still be enjoyable. Perfect=/= enjoyable.

Enjoyable= how a person felt about a certain thing. I enjoy sonic adventure 2 and it’s avery flaw game but I still enjoy it. Like how people enjoy the movie the room, it’sa very flaw movie but people love it because of the flaws since it makes themovie.

Thoughjust because the game isn’t perfect =/= not to care how you made the game, youshould put effort and care into the game. Just remember that the game is somethingyou are doing for fun and enjoyment. Don’t go crazy over wanting to make thebest game in the world, since this is a subjective term. Meaning what peopleview as the best is different from you.

Justdo your best and the work will pay off for sure.

Whatis the reason you want to create the game?

Understand your true motive on why youwant to create the game you are making the game and make sure you always rememberwhy you are making the game.

But please note: that you should be makingthe game for fun and because you want to do it, making a game just to be popularcan be a reason but it would be something that drives perfectionist since youare trying to make a game people like rather than a game you care about. This would lead to self-doubt andredoing things over and over never making progress. You can dream about seeingpopular lets players playing your game and having a bunch of people playing it.BUT DON’T think its going to be the next Undertale and get ahuge fanbase of people all around you go crazy about things. Don’t expect yourgame to go off the day you release it, don’t get upset that you only got 10downloads on day one. Be happy that you did it, that you let your game out inthe world.Everything will pay off but don’t justthink you’ll get super popular, popularity takes time and just happens. Don’tgo crazy on being popular, rather think of the main reason you want to createthat story.

 Popular =/= happiness, it’s nice to havepeople caring about your work, just don’t have it all go to your head andstress yourself out into a perfectionist cycle.  

Trynot to compare yourself to others:

This is something I’m familiar with, comparingyourself to other devs or games and bashing yourself because “why can’t I bethat good”.  Please understand this: 

YOU ARE YOU!

I mean this you are you, don’t look at othersand put yourself down since what I learn is that there always someone behindyou looking up to you. You think you are the worst but there’s people who findyour work amazing. Your work is blind to yourself because you see it every day,but to someone else its amazing.

You must be you, not like dev x and devy. You can be inspired by them but don’t doubt yourself on how you can’t do thingslike them.

 EVERYONE CAN DRAW AND CAN-DO THINGS.  It’s the matter of learning the skill to getbetter at it. Art is a skill not a talent, its something you master and keepgetting better at. Same with being a dev you get exp points and you level up.Like a rpg tbh since you get exp and level up the more you practice a skill.

Learnto take feedback:

When someone gives you feedback on yourgame there are different types which I won’t cover all of them. Just know youare letting your game out in the public eye, you will have people who tell youthey like your game and others who tell you they didn’t enjoy it. If its civilthat’s A-Okay, since its their opinion.

 You will get feedback that is critiques whichisn’t a bad thing, just understand if it’s someone who is just saying “Yourgame sucks” or “The protag looks weird” without context, this isn’t a critique.Don’t censor critiques btw, like if people are pointing out things like thegame has plot holes or things that are feedback that can help your work. Don’tyell at them or shut them down, take the advice. Just because the player doesn’tmake games don’t mean they can’t give you feedback. 

Feedback is free and helpful so take all you can get from it.

Justdo it:

I canlist everything about being a dev, but this is what I can say to you, just doit. If you are passionate about wanting to create a game just do it. Once Iheard about rpg maker games I didn’t ask anyone I just dive head first into it.OvO/ It’s amazing now that people can ask other devs things like this about howto get into making games.

 Beinga dev =/= an alien. No, we are just people who have a huge passionate in storytelling,art, music, games, etc. Making games is a media that lets a person get to seethe world in the eyes of the character.

 Withrpg maker it makes it easier for people to get into game making which helpsthem get into another engine. It doesn’t matter if you are making a rpg makerbattle system, a spooky horror game, a walking simulator, etc. Make the gameyou dream of making and just do it.

 Everythingin the world has been done before, but just take your spin at it, make a gameyou enjoy and don’t let others put you down since you want to make a game abouta young sweet female protag that wakes up in a strange world but can’t rememberwho they are. Just make the game you want to make.

Amazing Devs to Follow:Here’s some amazing devs to follow, who all haveamazing games.

ClockworkPrince 

@rukomura-games

@zmakesgames

@akademia-project

@toxicshroomswamp

@virgovsthezodiac

@blinking4soup

@lonestargame

@land-sea-entropy

@living-playground

@pannacotta1

@plueschkatzeart

@overcast-rpg

@arcadea-rpg

@blackcrystalsrpg

@teal-crown

@midnighttrain-project @teamstellaria

@pakilusin

@akuinome

@purple-game

I do hope this was helpful in some way,I drop what dev work I was doing to answer this since it just made my day. Ihope this helps anon, and if you need anything just ask. I hope this informationwas helpful, I tried my best not to make a text wall. In the future I’ll make agoogle document about things I took and learn from being a game dev. ( I really hope this text wall was okay)

(≧∇≦*) I hope you have a wonderful day btw.

[teal-crown]

（＾ω＾）❤ For those of you who really want to start! Or just needed to be reminded of a few of these points

Thank you Choko for taking the time to write all of that!(●´∀｀●) ❤

[rpgmconfessions-deactivated2021]

I'm an artist working alone on my game. I wish I had more artists to share ideas and concept art but everyone refuses to help because they are busy..I feel lonely and like it's not as fun anymore.

05/10/18

[korvio]

I know I’m not super active yet but I felt like I should let it be known that I’m definitely not going to be active any time soon. Up until now, I’ve been able to do a bit of work on the game but I recently returned to work (seasonal job at a greenhouse) and have been working about six days a week...

May-June is the busiest season and its a lot of physical labour (as well as customer service) so I’m pretty exhausted at the end of the day. I’ll do my best to maintain consistency but since I got some more followers here, I wanted to give a small update. Thank you for your support!

[dreamdiaryjam]

Dream Diary Jam 2 -Yume Nikki Jam- is coming May 14th!

And you can follow us on Twitter this year!  Header art this year by the wonderful @nyrator​.

It’s back, dreamers!  Welcome old and new to Dream Diary Jam, a game Jam all about creating fangames for the cult classic RPG Maker 2003 game Yume Nikki - and for the new YUME NIKKI ~Dream Diary~ as well.  The goal of this jam is to make a Yume Nikki fangame or demo of a fangame within 6 weeks time, starting on May 15th and ending on June 26th, the original Yume Nikki’s 14th birthday. Your host this year are @pinkuboa & @pancakeproductions.

Here are the currently accepted types of entries:

A Traditional Yume Nikki Fangames - These games are just like Yume Nikki, except with different protagonist & worlds and sometimes a few game mechanics changed up. They’re like sequels or spiritual successors to the original game in lieu of an actual Yume Nikki update. Get as experimental as you’d like. Examples of these games include .flow, Yume 2kki, Lcd Dem, and Answered Prayers.

An Actual Fangame of Yume Nikki - These games use the characters and setting of the original game and make a new game with them in it. They’re like fanfiction, except with a lot more programming. You can make anything from a JRPG to a dating sim for this one, as long as it features the cast of Yume Nikki. Examples of these games include NASU Plus, Memories of Replica, Dream Kombat, and Yume Nikki Hazard.

A Fangame of YUME NIKKI ~~Dream Diary~~ - As of the time of this writing, YNDD is less than a year old, so if you make a fangame for it, you’re in uncharted territory.  Your goal would be to make an adventure-platformer with surreal and/or dreamlike things, and have a few items the player can collect and use to solve puzzles. See the itch.io page for details.

Your goal is is to make a full game, demo, or v0.00 (see “Completion Goals” for more details). Whatever you decide to make, do your best to complete it and have as much fun as you can!  There’s no competition and no prizes, so there’s no pressure for participants to make the best game ever.  Only gentle, encouraging pressure to get your game finished here.  If you’d like to take a look at last year’s entries for inspiration and ideas, you can find them here: https://itch.io/jam/dream-diary-jam  

If you participated last year, you can use your idea from last year or update your entry from last year if you have barely touched it from last Jam.  Contact the jam via twitter, tumblr, or discord chat if you would like to try that.

Jam Basics

Jam runs from May 14th, 12:00am EST to June 26th, 12:00am EST. You can plan out your game all you’d like before then, but you can’t work on it until May 14th hits. 

 Late entries are accepted up to 5 days after the jam, however, you must contact the jam so they can be added to the jam page properly.

You can work by yourself or on a team, and you can make as many games as you can participate in.

The game can be a demo or a full game. For traditional Yume Nikki Fangames, it has to fall under the requirements of a v0.00 (see “Completion Goals” for more details). Yume Nikki is still in v0.10!

You can make your fangame any genre you’d like, don’t feel constrained to horror.

You can use any engine you’d like. The RPG Maker series is suggested for a traditional fangame, but traditional Yume Nikki fangames have been made on other engines as well.  Unity is suggested for YUME NIKKI ~Dream Diary~ Fangames as it was the engine the game was made in, but feel free to use any 2D or 3D engine you’re comfortable with.

Check us out on itch.io below for more details.

Come join the jam with us here on itch.io!

[bluwiikoon-archive]

If you create things (drawings, writing, music, pixels, crafts, anything!) you’re superb and I’m so proud of you!

If you’re struggling to create right now, I hope you have a good rest and feel better soon. I’m proud of you for trying your best! You’re so amazing for getting this far!

You’re all doing such a great job!!

[korvio]

Visit Original Link

This is the music I’ve been using for Hazy’s title screen for a while now. Haven’t decided if it’ll stick through to the final release, but it’s got a really nice feeling that I like for setting up the game so I wanted to share it. A little sad and a little anxious.

It’s called Nostalgia by Setuniman on Freesound. It’s under a CC attribution non-commercial license. 

[korvio]

Progress slightly halted as I work through end of school year essays and exams for the next month but here’s a quick banner I added to my projects page.

I showed a CG to one of my friends and they said the colour scheme reminded them of film noir, which is a pleasant surprise.

[thesatiremonster]

[amymel86]

SOMEONE DESCRIBED ME IN MEME FORM AND I FEEL ATTACKED!!

[spicedpeacheszine]

This is unfortunately spot on.

[a---------------hiatus------a-a]

Y’all, you won’t beLIEVE.

There’s a bot or something going around itch.io, which takes screenshots of our community’s current projects (mostly the ongoing ones, as far as I know), in order to make themselves look like an actual download page.

Don’t download it. It’s a virus. From what I can tell, you can easily identify it by looking at its size: 11MB.

But you should recognize it with the sheer fact that the developer didn’t announce the game yet.

If you see one of these for any of our projects, for your own sake, please message us before downloading. Be safe! Those things do nothing but give us a bad name, and we’re gonna stomp those to the ground! 🥊

[korvio]

Little update.

Been stuck struggling with a tileset for a while, but shifted focus to events that don’t need that tileset. Almost finished the first bad end you can get as a result! Neato.

[rpgmconfessions-deactivated2021]

Im starting to dislike characters with amnesia because it's used so often with horror protags and the twist is always something like "Protag was actually dead or evil!"

02/17/18

[princekarkat]

art takes hours to produce and seconds to consume so dont act suprised when artists get upset when their posts only get likes and no reblogs

similarly a piece of writing that takes a few minutes to read could have weeks of work behind it… dont take creativity for granted when ur getting it for free

[bookofmirth]

[korvio]

hazy has kept my interest peaked since you announced it for the pixel horror jam! im so so excited that youre picking it back up again and i wish you so much luck in completing it <3!!! from what i can see the color scheme and art look stellar!

YOUR ASK IS TOO NICE??? im smiling so much, this cant be legal

Thank you so much !! It feels good to be working on it again honestly and its so cool to hear you’ve been curious about it this long aaaaaa thank you for the kind words !!

[korvio]

Testing some visual ideas and cropping out an empty house haaah

Half the experience of RPG making is going “Oh, that’s something? Can I do something with that something?” and getting distracted playing with that idea.

[misc-rpg-blogs]

Any tips on being motivated to actually work on/stick to the same project?

@Everyone: What do ya’ll do?

[defeatthedarkness]

Having just finished a project, allow me to rant a bit. OUTLINE IT

Know what you’re making before you start programming. Commit an outline to paper. Stick to the outline. Make small adjustments if need-be. This helps you with AVOIDING SCOPE CREEP Don’t let the scope of your game get too large. Yanfly has over 100 scripts available for RPG Maker MV. I’m sure 50 of them will directly improve your game. Skip ‘em. Learning how to use them all will take years. Done is better than perfect. Nothing is perfect. IF YOU HAVE A GREAT IDEA FOR SOMETHING ELSE, WRITE IT DOWN FOR LATER

Ideas have no expiration date (as long as you write them down). You’ll get to it later. Finish what you have. Finishing is your incentive to work on your next big idea. HAVE A SCHEDULE

Commit an hour a day to gamedev. Just an hour. Commit yourself to thinking about and advancing your idea for an hour a day. That’s reasonable and sustainable for a new dev. Only an hour, though. If you’re new to this, you need to realize this is a marathon, not a race. DON’T BURN YOURSELF OUT

Or you’ll get nothing done and instinctively avoid the project. My webseries took several hiatuses because I worked really really REALLY hard and then my body never wanted to work like that again, so it avoided doing any more.  Four months of stable work got me the last 3 episodes. They could’ve been done way sooner if I paced myself, instead of waiting for a week where I felt I could crunch it all out. If all else fails,

GET OTHER PEOPLE INVOLVED

You can’t afford to let your friends/your art guy/your voice actors down, can you? Even if they can’t help you program, they’ll help you emotionally and keep you balanced/motivated. A strong support network can help you achieve any goal. Lastly, REMEMBER WHY YOU STARTED

Only you can tell the story you’re telling. Nobody else could make Defeat the Darkness. I had to do it. I felt it needed to exist, and by God I was going to fulfill that need. Are you passionate about what you’re making? Does it need to exist? Are you a bad enough dude to take a pile of code and make SOMETHING OF BEAUTY out of PURE CHAOS? Start believing that you are. Start putting aside that hour a day. Soon enough, you’ll prove that you are.

[ko2vo]

Antemortem