[Developing] Relics of Creation

[smbmaster99]

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Story:

Spoiler:

Riky Elrond, a young Lucario, has always lived a carefree and peaceful life in the small village of Elkton, which is surrounded by forests and mountains, relatively cut off from the dangers and troubles of the outside world. However, a tragic event brings this to an end. On the 18th anniversary of the day he was rescued, Elkton is attacked by a mysterious group of people. During this attack, Riky loses several friends and the Elronds - the family that adopted Riky - are killed. In an attempt to save her cherished friend, Vanessa Elrond to whom Riky saw as a mother-figure, is also killed, and his best friend Fiona the Braixen goes missing. Heartbroken and furious, Riky sets out on a perilous quest across the largely untamed world of Alto to first find Fiona, and then the murderers and avenge the death of his master. On his journey, he'll make friends, see extraordinary lands, and learn secrets and motives of the likes he couldn't have imagined.

Relics of Creation is a fairly unorthodox Pokemon fangame that I began developing sometime in 2015, using the Game Maker Studio engine, and I've been the sole developer for it since. Rather than playing as trainers who catch and train Pokemon, you play as a Lucario named Riky who is on a quest to avenge the death of his master Vanessa in a fantasy-type crossover world.

Gameplay is kind of a cross between Xenoblade and Final Fantasy, but with Pokemon (this is a style I always would have liked to have seen in an official Pokemon game). The game is still in relatively early stages, mainly due to the fact that i'm a college student who hasn't had a summer off in the past 5 years lol. IDK when it will be finished I regret to say, but it's currently my passion project, so whenever I have large volumes of free time I love dedicating it to working on the game.

Features of the game include:

Spoiler:

1. large, relatively open areas to explore
2. party members that you can swap from the pause menu
3. inventory and collectibles system
4. shop system
5. "elemental ores", which can be harvested and then used to craft gems that power you and your party members up
6. real-time day/night cycles
7. real-time weather changes
8. treasure chests to loot
9. nature stuff, such as butterflies, birds, and sound effects that fade or trigger depending on your
10. distance from the trigger point. This is just to make the world feel more alive and unique
11. a quest/sidequest system
12. music that changes depending on the time of day or battles
13. real-time strategy battle system (work in progress!)
14. simple lighting system

Here are some screenshots and (old) videos/gifs:

The current design of the game world - Alto:

Spoiler:

A really really old video showing off some features:

Spoiler:

Another really really old video, showing off the lighting/day/night stuff, treasure chests, and the shop system:

Spoiler:

old video showing off the current party stats screen, nature sound effects, side quest system, and some buttons

Spoiler:

Video showing the ores system, minimap, and music transitions:

Spoiler:

some old gifs:

Spoiler:

The eye symbol means it will attack you on sight

I don't have any videos or gifs of the battle system unfortunately, but progress (code-wise) for that is going smooth. Sprites however are another beast xP if there's enough interest in this project here, then I'll go into more detail about that, because I need spriters lol

CREDITS:
Nintendo and Game Freak (naturally)
Zeo254
Phyromatical
PeekyChew
ACE+​

 

[juliorain]

Approved

 

[Jewels12180]

woah man this game just...AMAZING so hyped for this game this is exactly what I need

 

[Nick Giang]

This looks like an official game. The music is great too. Good job man! I hope to see this reach fruition.

 

[smbmaster99]

Thanks y'all ^^

I'm continuing work on Fiona's battle sprites and they're nearly done.

 

[smbmaster99]

Excuse the double post, but I believe I've finished Fiona's battle sprites! Here's a new animation:

I'll get to work on Sparx's sprites next

 

[smbmaster99]

Sparx's sprites went a lot smoother than I expected o3o

His battle sprites are done. Now that I have 3 protagonists' battle sprites done, i can get to serious work on the battle system o3o

Here's an animation for Sparx:
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[smbmaster99]

Thanks for your feedback! I'm glad to see people are interested in this project.

No need to worry about the area/level design; all of this is just a test room, which is why there's so little decoration and so much open space with nothing in it.

As for bits of lore, background information, and character development you'll learn more of that through a mixture of flashbacks and optional cutscenes where the main protagonists will talk with each other openly. And I'm also planning for bits of level design to subtly hint at background history as well. We'll still have to see about that one but it's an idea I'd like to try.

In some developmental news....

I completely rewrote the movement logic for the player. The original movement script came from a zelda engine someone else wrote for Game Maker, which i used at the time because up until this project i had no experience with writing my own top-down movement (everything i've done up til now has been a sidescroller). It worked fantastic but was ridiculously convoluted and made adding new features and fixing bugs more difficult, so I decided to replace it with my own. Not only is its execution nearly 1:1 with the original, but my ground-up rewrite is also over 700 lines shorter and a lot easier to follow.

I did this because I'm ready to work on the battle system but it would have been really hard with the old code lol. I still need to rewrite the party members' movement logic too because the old way is kind of inefficient and would also be tricky to add to, but now that I have the player movement code finished the party members will be a lot easier.

 

[MavenTrainer]

This looks awesome :D

 

[smbmaster99]

Little preview of your stats. If you stand still for a little while, then your stats will appear on screen until you move again.

If you're attacking by an enemy then your stats will appear until you either defeat it or successfully escape it. If you begin a battle, then your stats will immediately display until the battle ends or you successfully run away.

You can also of course just pause the game and see your stats there, but this is more for just polish and additional functionality in case you don't want to pause every time you wanna know what your current stats are.

 

[Rakugan]

Love all the work put into this! Can't wait to play it!

 

[smbmaster99]

Finally got the targeting system implemented:

It's point and click based. Click an enemy to target them which will show your stats (and it will bring up your battle options as well once I add that in). Click on another enemy and the target will switch to that enemy instead. Clicking off an enemy will un-target them.

I also finally gave the enemies their basic auto attacks o3o I'm planning to get started on Riky's auto attacks and general battle state tomorrow.

 

[smbmaster99]

Preview of the battle system as it stands right now o3o

i haven't implemented any of Riky's moves outside of his auto attacks, but enemies as you can see do have a few of their techs implemented o3o

upon defeating an enemy your EXP, SP, and TP gained from defeating them is briefly displayed on the characters' mugshots on the left

 

[smbmaster99]

working on implementing party members' techs rn. The first gif shows the tech bar
the second image shows the new death animation

 

[smbmaster99]

The battle system is taking shape at last. I've only got 2 Techs implemented right now for Riky which is why i only used 2 for this demonstration lol

 

[Decagram]

The game looks stunning!

 

[smbmaster99]

I'm still alive! Just been busy, haha

Here's a few more gifs:

Rage gives you a slight damage output boost, but also slightly lowers your defense

Tornado Blade will topple any surrounding enemies suffering Break

 

[smbmaster99]

At long last, all of Riky's Techs are done!

Swords Dance gives a temporary damage buff, and Steel Strike topples an enemy suffering Break

 

[smbmaster99]

I'm not dead o3o I've just been real busy with school xp But i've made a lot of progress! It may not be super apparent from the video below, but lots of stuff has been done internally. I got all of Riky's techs and skills added, and I got the tech upgrade/swapping menu implemented. I added Riky's final tech Aura Storm today, so here's a short demonstration of the battle system with a few of Riky's techs and of course Aura Storm o3o

 

[TheAlmightyBlaziken]

heh heh heh Very interesting yes very interesting indeed I'll be waiting for the release.