It took some time since i restarted from the beginning, but i was able to finish up playing the current release
That ending scene and animations were epic! You went all out there!
Thoughts on new chapters + general thoughts:
Chapter 9
For an “escape” map there’s not enough pressure from behind to hurry up…or is it because i took the boss out first turn that no reinforcements spawned?
Chapter 10
My fav. Of the new ones! The “Ascension” gimmick is quite cool and how you gotta adapt to the spawning restore priests is fun. Boss could be played around with Milton’s heal book tho
Chapter 11
A fun Prison escape map! Although having no preps can land your spawning units in too much trouble. Especially on the top 11 with Phin and Rich, the myrmidon/mage combo was quite mean. Especially with poison weapons. Couldn’t capture fortify priest
…and one of Oliver’s books critted the Silver Longbow Sniper lmao, but not like Stella needs it xD
Also i think the light siege magic in the last room might be a bit too strong.
A cool chapter with alot of events tho!
general gameplay thoughts
Maybe less poison weapons? There’re imo too much poison enemy users, and poison here seems stronger than usual
I love what you did with Rescue/Drop…but it also makes Leticia’s chapters even more cheesy since they can be one turned then. Then again Letty OP is kinda the point xD
Writing
Theo should be forced to play through DD xD
I think a bit more discontent in the general populace should’ve been shown to make the rebellion have more weight behind it
Ending fangirling
Ah man. Hitting me with the Emiya theme followed by Tidal wave and all these amazing animations!!!
Even at the start with the warping around and stuff it was so coool
Also dunno why, but i kinda expected Sid to turn into a dragon xD
I had kind of thought I made the Chapter 9 Boss strong enough that you couldn’t really beat him unless you had Indignations left on Poseidon. Is that what you did or did I just not make him as strong as I thought I had?
I don’t doubt that you can stall the Chapter 10 boss with Milton’s familiar, but to get Chapter 10x you have to beat the chapter in 12 turns or less. The timing to get 10x and the Exploder Tome from Milton’s bookshelf is pretty tight and pretty much requires constant use of Rally Move.
In Chapter 11, I usually let Phin get an attack in then rescue him with Richard since Richard doesn’t lose stats from carrying someone. And I but a Barrier on Richard which makes the Wind Mages pretty much unable to damage him. Maybe it would be better to give them a more straightforward matchup.
Poison damage is increased from vanilla because getting poisoned in vanilla never seems to matter much. The idea was to put poison weapons on low damage enemies with high hit rates to make getting hit by them matter more. 7B is also meant to be a “Poison Map” along the lines of Ninian’s join chapter in FE7.
It’s actually the opposite where he gives up the power of his dragon blood to strengthen the powers he gets from his Leticia bloodline.
I’m glad you liked the Chapter 11 ending scene it was a lot of work.
I used all 3 Indignations in ch.8, however i still had Splash Saber, some Magic stuff (or Maybe Martha Rapier?) and Olivers books
He wasn’t that easy to beat all things considered, but still quite doable even without Indignation
…is there a hint i missed for that? I stayed a bit longer on that map to get the priest with the Physics and the Silence…
I could’ve done it on 12 Turns if i knew about the limit, i think
…do you have a ch.10x save around by any chance so i could take a swing at it? (And incase i missed any story stuff).
Oh. Sometimes i forget Barrier’s range lol. That and i had Sid fighting stuff on the right
There isn’t a direct hint that there’s a Gaiden, just the general idea that you’re supposed to be in a hurry during Chapter 10. I had meant to post the requirements for 10x after the current version had been out for a couple of months and never remembered to, but you need to finish Chapter 10 in 12 turns or less, and Annie and Clarabel have to be alive.
Gameplay wise, pretty standard route map. So many rewards i missed on on my save file tho…
I did like the interactions quite a bit
I do think the requirements for 10x could’ve been made more explicit tho (specifically the turn count, as hurry up doesn’t really mean much imo in the context of an escape map).
I guess the difficulty I have with spelling out that there’s a Gaiden at stake is that it’s meant to just be a reward map for not dawdling on Chapter 10, and there isn’t really a narrative reason why 10x happens by beating Chapter 10 in under 12 turns. It was originally 10 turns but I changed it to twelve before release to make it easier to get without knowing about it. There are also some very strong enemies that will probably kill anyone they get in range of that appear on turn 15. I don’t think it’s as out there as some of FE7’s Gaiden conditions (level up Nils to level 7 in Lyn mode, earn 700 Exp in the desert, etc.). Maybe I could have Milton say something along the lines that he estimates it will take 12 minutes for the mansion to be overrun just to put the number out there.
A lot of the time in Fire Emblem, characters join because of circumstances in their join chapter, and there isn’t really a reason why they stick around. 10x is there to solidify Annie and Clarabel as part of Milton’s team. This is also the reason why everyone can talk to one of the three main characters in Chapter 11. Some of the supporting characters might not have an obvious reason to stick with the group after things started getting serious.
Hey, all. I’m here for my usual progress update. Chapter 13 is almost done, and I’ve been moving along with getting some portraits I need for upcoming story scenes made. I won’t show all of these here because I want them to be seen for the first time in game, but I can show this revised Milton for the flashbacks to his college days. It might look it’s just an outfit edit, but his hair is slightly longer, and his eyes are more upcast.
I also (finally) made Leticia’s daughters, which allows me to put together teaser images that appeal to whatever positive feeling you may have for the first game.
Rini’s portrait was actually made from finishing a revised Cosette that I was working on but abandoned after Scraiza sent me a redesigned Cosette.
I also want to mention that I’m not planning to have Saint’s Blood appear at FEE3 this year. It’s not because I’m burned out on the game and quitting development. I just don’t feel like I have much I want to say about the game in video format that wasn’t addressed in last year’s presentation. A lot of what I might say at this point would constitute fairly major spoilers. I think modern game trailers have a tendency to show too much before release, seemingly insecure that people will buy the game without spoiling how epic it’s going to be. This kills the impact of some things because the player is waiting for something to happen or get a specific ability, and I prefer to keep things closer to the chest. I probably won’t be back at FEE3 until the game is finished (assuming FEE3 is still a thing by then).
This is one of those things where your past cred makes me, as a ‘consumer,’ trust in you as a developer. If this was your first project I’d be more worried that this would be another MoD but the project is relatively new and you’ve got a solid track record for knowing what to do next. Keep doing you fella and I know I’ll wait patiently cause you’ve earned it
I was thinking: is it necessary for Cosette and Orville’s descendants to have that weird hair palette. I mean, I understand that it’s supposed to show who their ancestors were, but this game happens centuries after Deity Device and in CosettexOrville ending, it was said that Orville’s child had blue hair. Blue hair, not half blond half blue hair. After centuries, wouldn’t it make sense for their descendants to have full blue hair?
The only explanation I can find to that hair colour is that having a powerful magic bloodline makes your hair of a certain colour, meaning that Hezul’s and Blagi’s blood are more powerful than Leticia’s daughter.
And finally: what’s that interrogation under Ceres and Cronus? I guess the interrogation under Callista is her and Bertram’s descendant, just like with Cosette. Meanwhile, the green interrogation is Olga and Victor’s descendant. Following that pattern: why is there a brown interrogation? Cronus and Ceres died before they could have any children, right?
…
Right?
Their designs are meant to convey that they have both the power of a descendent of Leticia and Holy Blood from Jugdral. There probably wouldn’t be many people on a different continent, that was unknown to Celesia during the time of the first game, who would strengthen Leticia’s bloodline, so the balance of power between the two bloodlines probably shifted over time.
Wait and see, he says… But since you obviously like Holy War I’ll dare to ask: did you pull out some kind of incest between Cronus and Ceres? Like, “Hey little sister, maybe by inbreeding we could revive the magic of our bloodline”.
That or some bastard child from Cronus (because I doubt Tartarus had some extramarital child, he looked and acted like a family man above everything else).
Or maybe I’m just being paranoid and that brown interrogation simbolizes “anyone important from Erdus”, in which case I would put my money on Gregory’s descendant.
In any case, I’m going to try the game now because I have no patience. Let’s go.
So Theo is most likely Callista and Bertram descendant (or so I think). I don’t know how good is to make almost every playable character a descendant of the characters from Deity device (like those farmers, Arachne and Ivan’s children and, well, all the obvious others). I mean, what are the odds of every single descendant coming all together? But hey, I’m not complaining, You do you, Permafrost.
I’m kind of happy about the chapter numbering. You could have put the Leticia chapters as gaidens, but you didn’t. This makes it more difficult to make the characters overpowered as they were in Deity Device, as you use them less. Good calling there.
Leticia… You see, there’s something that has been bothering me. It’s true that Leticia marries the emperor in the end. However… Well, Mark and those 3 soldiers have a suspicious hair colour, don’t they? Are the 4 of them the actual parents of Leticia’s children and not the emperor? I’ll have to wait and see, I guess.
I really like the atmosphere that surrounds the entire game, too. While Deity Device looked full of radiance, this game has a much darker aura surrounding it. Hell, the main menu music and that chalice full of blood is cold as Gehenna.
It’s not just the main menu. You have purposefully changed the tiles you use for the plains, for example, making them look much less greener than they did in Deity Device. The choice of music is excellent too: you took the darkest BGM of Chrono Trigger and used them masterfully. Same with all those songs you used for different characters, using the same themes their ancestors used but giving them a nostalgic, slower sense. And of course, Emiya Shirou’s theme for Poseidon’s awakening is the best.
My man, you can’t publish part 2 fast enough. I’m eager to see what you have in store, so I hope you don’t make us wait too long.
As far as the number of descendants being a bit uncanny, for most of the minor characters, it’s just a heavily implied easter egg. It also helped me get through the process of designing characters without feeling like I had to start from scratch for each one because I could borrow elements from existing portraits for the descendants. It also helped me come up with some of the more quirky stat builds such as Phineas being a Thief with a high magic growth and an above average defense growth. There are twelve planned characters who are descendants and twelve who aren’t, so it is a bit of a mix.
I hope you understand that I’m not willing to directly answer most of your questions about what’s coming, but I will say that Cronus and Ceres did not have a child together.
I’m really glad that you enjoyed what I’ve been able to show so far. I touched on this at FEE3 last year, but Deity Device was somewhat of my take on the sort of story you might expect to see in a classic JRPG, and Saint’s Blood is me using what I established in Deity Device as a foundation for a darker and less derivative story.
No no, don’t worry about it. I wasn’t trying to make you answer the questions in the previous message, they are more like rethorical questions wrote when my hype was over the roof (the roof, the sky and the stars, too).
Besides, I already figured out who has the saint’s “blood” from Erdus. That character appears just a few times, but it is very obvious when you see its design and do the math, it makes a lot of sense.
I also liked how supports are story based. That means you have no room to make your own pairings. It feels like I am playing a good novel in which I, as a reader, has no say in which relationships will be formed and how deep will they be, as they are canon from the beggining. Judging for the free space in the supports/weapon experience screen, it also looks like you will have more than just 5 supports for each character. The preferent weapon for various characters is also a good detail, reminds me of FE Four kings.
Just finished playing earlier today after having marathoned all of Deity Device the past couple weeks! Looks good so far!
I ran into a minor but weird bug regarding Oliver’s familiars on chapter 11. They have the ability to use “Escape” like the player units do and will play the cutscene of Martha/Theo/Georgette getting the merchant’s goods back when they do. They’ll disappear but still be considered “active” (disappear from the field but turn auto-end won’t activate, can see their status page when tabbing player units with R) but luckily it didn’t prevent me finishing the chapter after escaping with my last unit. I’m playing via VC Injection on a 3DS which I know isn’t the most popular form of emulation (on the plus side, Saint’s Blood’s magic animations actually have all worked just fine while Deity Device’s had some laggy flashy bits).
Basically, I thought that whatever I might come up with for FEE3 this year would mainly be a repeat of last year. Aside from that, committing myself to get something ready in time for FEE3 would be difficult given how little time I have to work on Saint’s Blood, and it would take away time that could have gone to making progress on the game.
