Dead Content The Secular Anthem

[Xephyr]

http://i282.photobucket.com/albums/kk26 ... hemsig.jpg[/img]


Luther, General of the Razyian Army;
Cedric, Upper Sentinel of the Razyian Army;
Ike, Co-General of the Razyian Army;
In the middle of what seems to be an ordinary battle in the war against the non-human Verkians;
Discover a century-old cult of vigilante assasins, bent on creating total peace in the world;
And how their plan takes an unexpected turn;
Uncovering an ancient secret that may change the world.


The land of Kirvion was once ruled by magic, until it was banished many years ago. 
However, a world without magic would be chaos, so all magic was forever sentenced into seven necklaces, known as the Cadences.
Whoever wore the Cadences around their neck would gain the ability to use magic.
The seven Cadence Bearers are all connected, mystical, spiritually, and physically.  Nobody knows how.
The Cadence Bearers have the ability to speak with each other at any time,
and they transfer gained items between each other.
If one were to destroy all the Cadences but just one, they would single-handedly
be able to conquer the world.

Spoiler: The Cadence Bearers

http://i282.photobucket.com/albums/kk266/xephyr14/Luther.png[/img]
Luther
Age: 26
A very laid-back guy.  Ever since his childhood he has longed to be in the Razyian army.  Countless years of training with a blade gained him the ability to join the army the day he earned 18.  He's kept it a secret how he obtained his Cadence, and he doesn't show signs of telling anyone either.  A reputation in the army and ties with the king through his father got him the position as a General in the army.


http://i282.photobucket.com/albums/kk26 ... Cedric.png[/img]
Cedric
Age: 25
A good friend of Luther's.  He was always a small, weak boy during his childhood.  He trained to be a scholar for the Great Libraries in Razyia Castle, but Luther referred Cedric to the army and trained him.  Cedric has gained an uncanny ability to wield a spear, and he has mastered the way of magic through his Cadence.  He recieved his Cadence from his grandfather the day he turned 18.


http://i282.photobucket.com/albums/kk26 ... 14/Ike.png[/img]
Ike
Age: 21
Ike spent many years of his childhood in the schoolyards, swinging around sticks and throwing heavy stones.  Over the years he developed muscles and was known as the strongest kid in the school.  He dropped out of school at around age 13 to join his father in the blacksmithing business, which further developed his strength and his ability to wield heavy weaponry.  His father's blacksmithing business was shut down a few years later after recieving very little business.  His father couldn't afford to keep Ike, so Ike was given to an orphanage near the castle, where the army took him in immediately.  He was one of the few Cadence Bearers who recieved his Cadence out of sheer luck, as he found it in a pond one day while gathering mushrooms for his father.


http://i282.photobucket.com/albums/kk26 ... Silvia.png[/img]
Silvia
Age: 22
One of the typical "nice blonde girls".  She hates mostly anything involving violence, but after being recruited as a Blademage, she had to get accustomed to it.  Blademages are people that work to improve weaponry, but Silvia is a special breed of Blademage, as she owns a Cadence, and can augment weaponry at any time, making her a powerful ally.  She recieved her Cadence from her brother, who wanted nothing to do with being a Cadence Bearer. 


http://i282.photobucket.com/albums/kk26 ... r14/l1.png[/img]
Damon
Age: 31
An Elite Commander of the Razyian army.  For some unknown reason he refuses to fight in battles, but regardless, he is the best tactical war advisor the army has.  He's very quiet and mysterious and everyone that meets him wishes they hadn't. Nobody knows how he obtained his Cadence, or anything else about his past, for that matter.


http://i282.photobucket.com/albums/kk26 ... Matteo.png[/img]
Matteo
Age: 38
He was very recently a regular man, living a regular life as a farmer.  He owned a Cadence but wishes to have nothing to do with the magic business.  However one fateful night his farm was overrun by vampire bats, and he was bitten in an attempt to save his family.  He became a vampire later the next day, and since then the power of the vampire has corrupted him, turning him into a power-hungry vampire.  He is in the running to become next king of the Verkians.  He is Silvia's uncle, who recieved his Cadence as a gift from an old friend.


http://i282.photobucket.com/albums/kk26 ... Rafael.png[/img]
Rafael
Age: 20
The least relevant Cadence Bearer.  He wears his Cadence only as a bragging right and believes owning it makes him all powerful.  He is a noble and very wealthy member of the Razyian Senate.  He joined the Senate at such an early age due to his uncanny ability to lead groups of people.  He recieved his Cadence from his father, who is now dead.

Spoiler: The World (Under Construction)

So far, only about two cities have been made and backstory written for them.  The game's gonna be real big though so there's gonna be more.


The Henvoy Continent
Conquered by: Verkians
Cities: Henvoy Village
The Henvoy Continent is a rather small group of islands mainly used for resources such as growing food and mining.  The only real place where more than one person lives is the small mining town Henvoy Village.  The most notable thing of the Henvoy Continent is Mount Nuluk, a great volcano that rises up above the entire continent.  For many years it's been silent but for some unknown reason the volcano recently erupted and destroyed a lot of the continent.  Ever since most of the residents of Henvoy Village moved out, leaving it mostly empty except for the small group of people working to restore the Henvoy Mines and the rest of the continent.




The Revenell Continent
Conquered by: Razyians
Cities: Redwell City, Revenell City, Harvall Village
The Revenell continent is about a 40 mile trip across the Revenell Sea from the Henvoy Continent.  Significantly bigger than the Henvoy continent, and home to Razyian Castle, the Revenell Continent is well armed and the Verkians haven't even attempted an assault on this continent.  In the middle of the continent is the great Redwell Desert, vast and more or less empty besides Redwell City.  Redwell City is home to the infamous Cavarak Institution, but the Institution was closed down for enclosed reasons.  The other cities of this continent have not been planned out yet (sorry).

Spoiler: SCREENSHOTS

http://i282.photobucket.com/albums/kk266/xephyr14/screen1.jpg[/img]
The title screen, thanks to Edwards!

http://i282.photobucket.com/albums/kk26 ... creen2.png[/img]
Some...battlefield, I guess.

http://i282.photobucket.com/albums/kk26 ... creen3.png[/img]
A "minigame" where your a vampire and you press W to turn into a bat and fly around.

http://i282.photobucket.com/albums/kk26 ... creen4.png[/img]
A devilish puzzle involving flipping switches to make little bridges move around.

http://i282.photobucket.com/albums/kk26 ... creen5.png[/img]
A mountainous area. With big birds!!

http://i282.photobucket.com/albums/kk26 ... creen6.png[/img]
A battle against Kobolds.

http://i282.photobucket.com/albums/kk26 ... creen7.png[/img]
Another puzzle, inside Mount Nuluk.

Okay, that's about it.  C&C are NEEDED.  I want this game to be as good as it can be.  I can't think of anything else to put.  There will be more extensive credits in the end credits, by the way, in case you were wondering.




Demo #1
Estimated Play Time: 1:30
Download Link: http://www.mediafire.com/?tmydym2vmlh


Also, if you happen to find the Secret Ending item (unlikely), when you come to the black screen at the end, press Left, Up, Space to unlock the secret ending.  I'm evil, and made the last map black, when I said you could explore it.  So good luck finding that Secret Ending.





Also x2, this part is an introduction, really, so this part is very linear.  The next part of the game takes place in Redwell City, and is very non-linear, with side-quests, optional dungeons, etc.

Spoiler: Bugs, Mess-ups, etc.

I am currently aware of the following bugs/mess-ups:


1. Grant calls Silvia "Sylvia" in his conversations.

2. In the scene after Silvia's bit, where the Elite Kobold harasses Luther's group from atop the fort, Ike and Cedric have completely different sprites.  These are their old sprites from when the game was in early development.


These have been fixed.


3. In the  Henvoy Mines on the bridge moving puzzle, the bridges can fly off the map.

This has not been fixed.  Any help?

 

[Neverplayd]

Well, I see some issues with your screens right off the bat.

Spoiler: Screens

http://img524.imageshack.us/img524/4535/tsasn1bx5.png[/img]

Red: What is that thing on the bottom of the bridge? Is it just part of the background that was not made transparent by accident? If it is supposed to be a support(which I doubt it is), i would extend it and make it so it looks like it touches the ground.

Blue: Too many grass inconsistencies. It looks like the bridge is connecting to nothing and the hill is connected to the ground.

Orange: The hill that is connected to this bridge has several problems. First, like the blue circles, the hill doesn't look connected to the bridge. Second, it isn't as tall as th other parts of the hill, and one side of the hill(look at the bottom) is smaller than on the other side.

The paths here are very randomly placed and the map seems pretty empty and unnatural.

http://img208.imageshack.us/img208/3149/tsasn2fl3.png[/img]

Orange: At first glance, I really had no idea where you were going with this bridge. It looks like you were trying to make is so the bridge is blocked off and either erased part of the bridge when doing your hill or messed up in your layers. The bridge must be on the hill for someone to be able to cross it and if you are going to keep that barrier, make sure the player knows what it is. Maybe sprite a sign real quick and have it say "NO ENTRY".

Blue: This isn't natural. There would never be a random lake of water on the top of a desolate hill. It kind of looks like you were adding things just for filler.

Red: Ok, you should know what is wrong with this...

The tree on the bottom has a its shading cut off and you put a random path on the top and left hills.
---
The fourth screen is okay. Maybe put a border around those tiles so it seems like they are on top of the lava and not connected to it.
---
The lakes seem unnatural in the fifth screen. They can't just start at an edge and trickle down. Connect them to the lake on top and add some bridges and it'll look much better. The grass on the bottom right has the wrong tiles for the two top edges. You should probably use a grass autotile for this:
http://img46.imageshack.us/img46/3436/atilekusab7rk.png[/img]

Your caves are alright(although slightly bland...maybe the rtp), but your mountains need some work. Try this mapping process to make your maps a little less empty and unnatural and combine a few tilesets so you have more to work with (try combining the mountains with a woods/forest tileset).

 

[Xephyr]

Yeah my biggest weakness is definitely my mapping, but I'm working really hard to make em better.


The red is definitely a support.  I got rid of it.  Looks a lot better.
Thanks for the other tips.  I'll work on that map.





The obvious tree mess-up is fixed -_-'
Yeah I was trying to make the bridge blocked off and that's all I could think of.
And good point with the water :P

Also I try to fix the fifth screen, but there's no room left really to put the water out farther.


Also, I have that autotile, I'll use it there.


Thanks for some criticism.

 

[Shingu]

Omfg what happened to your other project? And isnt that picture from a already-made Mmorpg? And yah, your mapping isn't "Great" however it is okay. It would be nice if the main character looked like the character on the titlescreen...or some sort of enemy, and I don't like default monsters. Maybe use Inquistor's tileset?

 

[Xephyr]

Omfg what happened to your other project? And isnt that picture from a already-made Mmorpg? And yah, your mapping isn't "Great" however it is okay. It would be nice if the main character looked like the character on the titlescreen...or some sort of enemy, and I don't like default monsters. Maybe use Inquistor's tileset?

Uh...already made MMO?  wtf?

The character on the title screen is an important character that you haven't met yet. 

It doesn't use all default monsters.  Play the game and you'll see I use Naramura and some spiders from some guy.  Or something along those lines.

Also, I don't really think Inquisitor's tileset is all that great.  It's nice, but not as great as everyone says.  And I don't feel like setting up all the priorities and passibility.  If someone's already set-up those things, I'll work with it.  I'm in the process of trying to find new tilesets to use instead of RTP.  Not going well.

 

[Shingu]

I have inquistor's Tilesets, however they don't have many of the priority's set up, and im working on a Mini-Project right now. :|. I was saying the knight looked like a knight I'd seen on an mmorpg before, thats what I meant. ^,,^

 

[Xephyr]

Oh, well you might be right, I found it on a render site on the internet, so I don't know.

Yeah the Inquisitor tilesets are big I really don't want to set up ALL those priorities.  If someone's already done it I'll take em and start practicing some mapping with them and possibly incorporate them in the project. 

 

[katastrephi]

Omfg what happened to your other project? And isnt that picture from a already-made Mmorpg? And yah, your mapping isn't "Great" however it is okay. It would be nice if the main character looked like the character on the titlescreen...or some sort of enemy, and I don't like default monsters. Maybe use Inquistor's tileset?

Uh...already made MMO?  wtf?

The character on the title screen is an important character that you haven't met yet. 

It doesn't use all default monsters.  Play the game and you'll see I use Naramura and some spiders from some guy.  Or something along those lines.

Also, I don't really think Inquisitor's tileset is all that great.  It's nice, but not as great as everyone says.  And I don't feel like setting up all the priorities and passibility.  If someone's already set-up those things, I'll work with it.  I'm in the process of trying to find new tilesets to use instead of RTP.  Not going well.

Dude, no he means that is artwork from Dekaron... it's an Azure knight xD
You might wanna look into it... i mean "copy write".

 

[Xephyr]

Omfg what happened to your other project? And isnt that picture from a already-made Mmorpg? And yah, your mapping isn't "Great" however it is okay. It would be nice if the main character looked like the character on the titlescreen...or some sort of enemy, and I don't like default monsters. Maybe use Inquistor's tileset?

Uh...already made MMO?  wtf?

The character on the title screen is an important character that you haven't met yet. 

It doesn't use all default monsters.  Play the game and you'll see I use Naramura and some spiders from some guy.  Or something along those lines.

Also, I don't really think Inquisitor's tileset is all that great.  It's nice, but not as great as everyone says.  And I don't feel like setting up all the priorities and passibility.  If someone's already set-up those things, I'll work with it.  I'm in the process of trying to find new tilesets to use instead of RTP.  Not going well.

Dude, no he means that is artwork from Dekaron... it's an Azure knight xD
You might wanna look into it... i mean "copy write".

For the love of god I've gone through this before.



If it's on a render site that's completely legal, used by millions of people, and I'm a member, I can use renders on that site.  This isn't a commercial game, so nobody has a valid reason to sue me so shut up about it.