now THIS is something inspired by fire emblem!
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still better than furuki yoki jidai no boukentan
It’s perfectly fine to like a game. No one would ever try to argue with you on it being fun (hopefully).
The problem here is that the game had no effort put into it, despite being fundraised, and barely works in some respects (like map objectives being suggestions rather than actual win conditions).
(unrelated to your comment) I think I saw someone mention earlier that they immediately knew the game was bad, because it’s made in Game Maker, and I don’t know where they were coming from with that. GM is long past the era of hosting barely functioning games on their own website, and is now another fully-fledged game engine that requires very little programming knowledge. The DD devs just don’t know how to use it properly lol.
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Saying the game had no effort into it is a completely idiotic thing to say. It’s pretty obvious this game had a lot of effort put into it, it’s a 28 chapter game with a single programmer. The weapon system combined with the class system is a breath of fresh air and honestly the class customisation is better than Three Houses, it encourages variety due to how armour and weapons work as opposed to Three Houses which is just “if it flies, it wins”.
Also, the characters, at least the playable cast, aren’t cardboard cut-outs. The characterisation they get in the bond conversations are great and their dialogue is genuinely really well written, they speak like real people and each has their own way of expressing themselves or making their identity known (I’m not entirely sure how to phrase this but hopefully you get the point).
The grave wounds system is also really nice as it doesn’t eat up my time like permadeath does and actually has an effect on the run.
I’ve got issues with the game, like how the map design is mediocre at best, the story isn’t that great and the maps don’t look the best aesthetically, but, frankly this thread has just become an echo chamber piling on negativity towards this game by a fair amount of people who haven’t even played it.
If you want an actual well-rounded review, I highly encourage people to watch this video.
Also, on the Game Maker point, Undertale was made in Game Maker, which is a phenomenal game whether you like it or not. An engine is only as good as the programmer using it, so saying a game is bad based purely from the engine is also an extremely unfair judgement to make just because someone is able to make games using it at the beginner level. I’m not going to pretend the Dark Deity programmer properly knew how to use the engine to its fullest extent, they clearly didn’t, it’s their first game and it definitely would have been nice to have a better finished product which had much more polish.
I’m not going to fault people for refunding the game, if you tried it and didn’t like it, fair enough, we don’t all have money to throw around at every indie SRPG project we see as slightly-more-than-casual FE fans and it definitely needed more polish in a lot of areas. But, there is no need to keep dogging on this game without acknowledging its strong-points because it has a lot of them, and frankly it does a lot of things BETTER than some Fire Emblem games.
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I do have to give credit to him for playing that game all the way. specially the map sizes.
Permadeath doesn’t have an effect on your run?
The fact that you choose to reset is, in fact, your choice.
Fire emblem was created with no resets in mind, sorta like iron manning, so it’s your choice if to “waste time” resetting or not.
Yet sadly the game just dumps 10+ conversations per chapter on you, and even if you start with the idea of reading them all, you’ll just get frustrated and it’ll eventually feel like a slog, or even worse, a chore.
I wonder how much the game is going to get rescued by updates. Because Updates can be very powerful, they can reshape everything if it needs to happen.
The issue with that is that it both requires development resources and developer-willingness to rework major aspects.
I tend to avoid posting in these kinds of threads because my opinion is hardly ever worth sharing but oh my god.
Yeah there are threads that get really echo chamber-y but this isn’t one of those times. You just have the unpopular opinion, you even said
I find it strange that an echo chamber would even let you get away with that. Btw I hate defending this site.
Secondly even if I pretended like I didn’t watch a guy play the whole game. The game got 75k and literally isn’t worth 20$. It was such a mishandled development with a lack of focus and proper scope. That worth being mad over.
You can like the game. Your opinion of the game is personally inconsequential to me. If you think something is good that’s great. However the core mechanisms of the game are unpolished, untested and a chore. I don’t have to acknowledge anything if the game itself is bad.
I have more issues.
You reset after unit deaths. It only take up time because you’d rather restart the map than continue without that unit. With how high the numbers can get in Dark Deity losing stat(if you even do, because you don’t always) doesn’t matter. This statement show that you either don’t understand permadeath or you’re deliberately trying make this game look better. Either way it’s a filthy argument.
Worst part about this is I’m probably not even going to keep this here. I’ll just delete it like I always do but man you made me angry.
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Just because something was intended doesn’t mean that’s always how it’s going to play out. The vast majority of players reset and as a result there are a good amount of players with the opinion that permadeath doesn’t really add anything to the game other than possibly resetting. I’m not saying permadeath is bad, I’m saying grave wounds is a creative and nice alternative.
Sorry, are we talking about Dark Deity or Three Houses?
Joking aside, that’s completely valid, but the character writing is still good.
This is frankly untrue, the combat system, and general game balance is very good in this game as well as the class and weapon system which add to it. I’ve found no issue with the game balance so far and I’m playing on the hardest difficulty preset (deity mode), even though the game was balanced around the middle difficulty preset (normal mode).
…wow. What was the intention of this game before this was changed?
I guess designs were just thrown at the board to see if it worked or not, though I could very well be wrong.
… If general game balance is good, I wouldn’t see people sweeping the maps with mages who apparently has innate Nosferatu. Balanced, right?
The class and weapon system are refreshing ideas, but the execution for that is very lacking imo. Also, I somehow remember people saying that fliers don’t exist because the devs couldn’t think of how to balance them. Sure, it’s kinda hard since there’s no terrains on the map, which made them rather obsolete since they’re just gonna be a high-movement unit with nothing special attached to them, I guess.
Mhm. Yet one thing that concerns me that they chose to release a game in such state, you know. I couldn’t even say if they actually knew this is gonna happen or not, but who actually cares since the cash are flowing in, though?
Also yes it’s their first game, yet they also need to know how high people’s expectation to the game, especially after it got hyped a lot, and they got into E3 too! And don’t forget that there were no news regarding Fire Emblem, which made this as a perfect chance for them to gain more spotlight!
Yeah… That’s why they really should hire an art director in the first place rather than… idk focusing on things that won’t be noticed as much…?
Don’t get me wrong, there are some good things in the game and I really appreciate it. One programmer for the game is both amazing and terrifying in the same time though. Yet these good things are being overshadowed by myriads of crucial problems that weighs heavier and has greater impact than the good things. Like the maps, which you will see like 85% of the time vs. the battle sprites or the character portraits.
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I could be wrong but none of my acolytes/phantoms have actually swept any maps so far, it could be related to the difficulty but I don’t know.
If this is a response to my point about class customisation regarding fliers in Three Houses, I meant they’re overpowered in that specific instance, I should probably add 3H is my favourite FE so it’s clear I’m criticising something I love. But yeah, that makes sense, I don’t mind fliers not existing, if the game isn’t designed around incorporating them, then so be it.
Now I do very much agree that this is very concerning since the developers themselves believe the game is unfinished (the patches constantly coming out after release and possibly graphical updates). However, there is the possibility it’s down to a stakeholder situation. While the developers of Dark Deity fall under Sword and Axe LLC, they have a publisher called Freedom Games. Were they under pressure to release an unfinished game under a tight deadline? Maybe. The publisher would be much more interested in the cash flow than the game quality itself, so the developers maybe settled for something functionally complete.
That being said, I cannot speak for the developers or the publishers, this is simply a hypothesis, we have no idea what goes on behind closed doors.
I do really wish the game got a lot more development time because I’m of the belief there is a very solid foundation here and it could have been something great.
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It’s not to say that the game has little to no flaws, there are quite a lot depending on what you value or believe other players in general would value as well.
Classes like the guys with “what’s literally nosferatu”, after playing a bit, should be nerfed by how much they heal and whatnot. (Keeping their niche is sweet as long as it doesn’t become worthless or too powerful)
UI is very irksome and does effect how people would enjoy playing the game. I don’t mind it myself, but I imagine many others being very bothered by it. Even to the point where they don’t want to play anymore.
Weapons outside of the yellow weapon I feel could have their niches buffed to make them more worth using than the yellow, but not to the point where yellow becomes irredeemable.
Most definitely there are more issues with the game that I won’t list at the current moment in time, but I still find the game enjoyable for what it has at the moment.
and that’s my cents worth of critiques
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But I do want praise the game for what it does bring.
Many classes have different niches, and it is explained that changing classes will heavily impact your gameplay and playstyle with those units in mind. For example, a healing focused role could be dedicated to a unit if you were to select the priest class over, say the inquisitor.
Not only that, but entire class trees have access to a skill they would all have regardless of which branch they travel down. These skills provide a use for characters to be used, even if they don’t seem like they would do much against a specific unit type.
Ex: The “Thief” classline has access to disarm. If my thief wasn’t able to do much against any enemies in range, they always have the option to disarm an opponent to help my other units survive when they probably wouldn’t.
I would say more if I got deeper into the game, but for now this is what I’ve found myself enjoying so far.
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I’m trying to think of what parts of the game are truly unique and stand out.
The weapon system? Each character gets four weapons. These weapons all have exactly the same niche, and the same four stats. You can level them up, but they have no depth. You lose brave weapons, effective weapons, weapons with unique skills and abilities, weapons that give cool stat-ups, weapons with extremely limited durability but powerful 1-3-time use powers such as siege tomes, etc.
Is the weapon system really that fresh and unique? It’s like if every character in GBA only got to pick from four basic Prf weapons each, but you could level them up to make them slightly stronger. Does this enhance the game??? I think not. It actually reduces strategy.
Then, we have the promotion system. This is literally just Awakening promotions. It’s already been done before, having more than 3 possible promotions for units. It’s also something that reduces unit complexity and strategy. Every unit has so many promotions that they lose their sense of personality and uniqueness.
Sure, units having cool skills is cool, but is this really some exciting DD-unique feature? FE13 already did it, and way better, too.
Maps? Maps are awful. They are absolutely the worst part of the game. Even FE13 had tactical positioning with terrain that forced you to consider hitrates, slight damage modifiers, healing on the next turn, and so on. And that’s just basic terrain, most romhacks have FAR better maps.
The UI is awful. Like, beyond awful, even. It was clearly made by someone who has no experience with UI design. I actually have UI design experience, as evidenced by my work improving FEBuilder’s UI a couple of years ago. (See: Character, Class, and Item Editors)
Units amount to stat blobs with one or two skills that define their playstyle. Sure, this is cool, but in exchange you sacrifice ALL the other strategic elements that make Fire Emblem gameplay good.
It’s hard to even say ‘what the developers should fix’ because the entire game from the top down is mediocre. I wouldn’t play romhacks with this little effort put into their design, and I’m sure as hell not plopping $20 onto a ‘professional’ indie game for that level of quality.
I have a friend who made his very first game. It isn’t this bad.
I have other friends right here on these forums that made their own first games as romhacks, free of charge. Alfred Kamon didn’t put out his first romhack as a full-priced indie game. If he had, I’d have had all the same criticisms. Midnight Sun circa 2012 was mediocre, just like Dark Deity. Instead, he spent those years learning basic game design, absorbing criticism, and using it to bolster his design philosophy. The same is true of Blademaster and Corrupt Theocracy, and plenty of other hackers in this very community.
We all start somewhere, but only some people choose to put out their first mediocre project for $20. If the DD devs had been honest enough to put their game out as Early Access, I’d have had NO criticisms for them! That’s all they had to do, but they didn’t. If they don’t want me to judge their game as a finished game, then maybe they should have not released it as such. They solicited our community for graphics and resources, so we have the duty to call them out for their Cyberpunk and Fallout 76-esque behavior. This modern game dev behavior is awful for the entire game design scene and should not be excused.
A copypasta from a discord server:
“so what if no man’s sky sucks and took people’s money on false promises, just stop talking about it now”
“so what if fallout 76 sucks and took people’s money on false promises, just stop talking about it now”
“so what if cyberpunk sucks and took people’s money on false promises, just stop talking about it now”
“so what if dark deity sucks and took people’s money on false promises, just stop talking about it now”
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I know you deleted your post, but I hear these rebuttals a lot.
No Man’s Sky started out as sheer hot garbage. It has had a crapton of updates. While those updates have vastly improved it, I would argue it’s still a pretty awful game lacking identity with tons of major issues.
UI: Absolutely awful. The inventory menus are so clunky that they alone have made me drop the game.
Exploration: NMS is supposedly a game about space exploration, yet every update adds more and more content focusing on base building. It has become a non-voxel Minecraft set in space. That might sound awesome to some people, but it’s not the game we were promised.
Gameplay: Wide as an ocean, deep as a puddle. You still click on resources to add them to your clunky inventory, then use them to refill your tools so you can extract more resources. That’s the gameplay loop. It’s awful.
No Man’s Sky is vastly better than when it released, but I’d argue it’s still a bad game. And what about Fallout 76? Is there any question? It’s still utterly awful. And Cyberpunk? Sure, maybe it will become a god-tier game, like the Witcher 3, but do you and I know it will for sure? I’d argue not.
Oh right, I forgot about MN9. Yet another example of kickstarter incompetence.
For those of you who were pissed at Mighty Number 9, try 20XX instead. Much better game along the same concept.
Not perfect, but quite fun.
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yeah one of the most popular rpgs of 2015 was made in Gamemaker creating a huge community of toxicity and creativity
aka undertale
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that isn’t true in the slightest, there will always be ‘best classes’ that every character able to should go into especially with the low effort maps and how large they can be surely the classes with the highest move must be better
I’m not arguing that the game isn’t bad I’m just saying that it definitely doesn’t have class balance, no game similar to fire emblem will.
oh shoot that was you? Good work man. the UI for those editors are very intuitive
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Original class editor circa 3 years ago:
https://i.imgur.com/Ff4LJSK.png
A rework I made, which wasn’t added:
https://i.imgur.com/f9yomjp.png
A compromise version I finalized and 7743 added:
https://i.imgur.com/nm83zhl.png
You can compare the ones I posted in my old English Translation topic to the three we have now.
I’d fix all the other editors, but ain’t nobody got time fo’ dat.
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