Hoping to make your life's design a bit more dynamic!

Last year, 2015, was a modest year for the English SNES translation field but not without some notable additions including Marvelous and the only decent Spider-Man game on the SFC/SNES (It stayed inside Japan!).
But no sooner did we get into this new year of 2016 than we'd already got Demon Child Zenki from this group and now BS Super Aleste (English edition is called 'Space Megaforce') gets a proper and fully English translation patch as a functional SNES ROM! The Dynamic Designs group springing back up to life and promising works from new or experienced romhackers/translators such as DackR, Avicalendriya and ddstranslation, along with a possible new patch from Nightcrawler coming out... It's all happening!

Now, though, I've found this intriguing new JRPG game coming out on the PC that I thought looked like a cheap RPG Maker product but it is not and moreover it's from actual Japanese developers! It's called Asdivine Hearts. It is an enhanced port from the mobile games. The graphics and gameplay mechanics are in the spirits of the 16-bit and 32-bit JRPG styles, mixing bits from both the SNES/SFC and PSX platforms. The environment details are good or OK, the battle scenes are even better! The characters are lush and well-drawn with no obvious pixelation in sight unlike those RPG Maker games, which I don't like. The enemies in-battle are also animated and there are good spell effects there too. The battles kinda give off that 'Lunar' vibe. In towns or the world map the characters can move diagonally (which at least the older RPG Maker games couldn't emulate) although unfortunately this game doesn't have diagonally orientated sprites for the characters. So it looks like it was built with a custom in-house engine. One key character in particular is that pink cat creature which looks remarkably like Ruby from Lunar 2: Eternal Blue, so it reminds you of the Lunar series even more! Though he's got 'twice the tails'!

Seeing as this forum is for the diehard fans of the SNES RPGs and good SNES games in general, I thought why not to ask any of you if you do like this sort of thing. If you do like it then why wouldn't you want to continue supporting these well-designed games coming from true Japanese designers and keep maintaining the tradition of the 16/32-bit JRPG gaming alive? Sure Exe Create will probably never reach the heights of the Japanese greatness in the old-school JRPG genre on the SNES and PSX of the 90's. I mean Asdivine Hearts has a RRP of only $10 and they develop first for the mobile phone marketplaces. But they're probably close enough anyway.

https://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2016/0 ... -released/
http://www.siliconera.com/2016/02/02/jr ... itty-gods/
http://www.kemco.jp/sp/games/ashe/en/introduction.html
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WfdvCTDoXcY (Demo gameplay video)

Reviews:
http://toucharcade.com/2014/11/07/rpg-a ... ts-review/ (For the mobile phones. Really good review. 4.5 stars.)
https://themrwestern.wordpress.com/2015 ... droid-ios/ (3.5/5)

They even released two sequels on Android/iOS called Asdivine Dios and Asdivine Menace! Although do avoid their 3DS RPG Chronus Arc, which was widely panned by the console game reviewers.

Reviews of sequels (Just trying to broaden out your average expectations of this series by as much as possible so that you know what to expect.):
http://toucharcade.com/2015/09/23/rpg-a ... os-review/
http://rpginsanity.com/reviews/asdivine-menace

Ummmmm? NO! Im SO disappointed to find out that this is what Kemco are putting out there for the PC these days, sure.. they have sank into the background of making great games BUT iv'e seen better Kemco games on the Snes. Being the fact I have played and tested this on STEAM I demanded my money back within the 24hrs I bought it.. the game is awful. The battle sprites and character sprites are very well drawn and the music is great but that's it. Oh, you stated above that it's NOT made with an rpg maker engine because 8-way directional movement is not possible in the earlier rpgmakers.. ummm? 8-way directional movement was possible way back in Rpg Maker 2003 via scripts, I know this to be true cos i've been using rpg makers way back since the 2003 one and have used each one of the products since.. 2003, xp, vx, vx-ace.. just haven't tried out the new one.. MV as this one apparently is the same as vx-ace but just give the option for you to make the game playable on android/ios devices for extra charge.

So, i have to be extra honest here.. I DO NOT waste money on rpg maker style games usually but this one looked different so I took the chance and bought it and man I was so wrong.. it's rpg maker written all over it, the dungeons look, the graphics of the areas, the squareness of floor tiles etc.. it's all rpg maker. It makes me wonder if an employee at Kemco has worked on this game at home and has asked to add it using the Kemco logo by giving Kemco royalties.. I highly recommend you stay clear of THIS ONE guys, especially of the issues the game has, I quote a notice from Kamco..

"*IMPORTANT NOTICE*
The game screen can rarely flicker depending on the device environment. If you notice any instability, please quit the game once and load the it from CONTINUE in the title screen."

that's VERY professional putting a game out there that still has issues like that.. screen flickering on a PC game.. come on, that issue only usually happens with rpg maker style games that has WAY TOO MANY Scripts being used that are causing problems with each other, the stack error is a pain in the ASS!

Oh yeah. Sorry you had to try that game and then dislike it. I had thought that the RPG Maker engines weren't able to accommodate the 8-way walking feature especially as so many games from the likes of Amaranth Games and Aldorlea Games never had it. But from what I can see so far through Steam the very recent games, especially from the year 2015, and usually built on the latest engine the RPG Maker VX Ace do have this walking feature. But I don't really like these sort of games for many reasons, including the amateurish low-level deviantart-like character portrait drawings. Many parts in these games including the battle scenes can seem static too, the music can be overly loud and repetitive. For me it's just better to play the real Japanese RPG games and Western computer & action RPGs (3D ones like The Witcher series and Bioware's games and 2.5D Infinity engine-like games from Obsidian & Inxile), anything really that is built on custom engines.

Kemco used to make console games for a long time. But after a few on the mobile platform in 2003 they started making too many mobile games from 2004-onward and only mainly the mobile games. The effect of that is that it has seemed to make it harder for them to 'come back' to developing true console and/or PC games. But porting PC games from the mobile platform is not the way to do that, really... So yeah, a caveat in that we should still beware most mobile ports on the PC and whatever else.

Good info about Kemco's games on the SNES:
http://snesguide.com/publishers/kemco
http://www.gamefaqs.com/company/12920-k ... 0&devpub=0 (SNES)
http://www.gamefaqs.com/company/12920-k ... 0&devpub=0 (GBA)

Kemco:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kemco
http://au.ign.com/companies/kemco

They actually had 4 different names for their brand - 1, 2, 3 and 4.

People like amaranth games, (I know one of the game creators through rppgmaker forums), and aldora games... dont use the 8-way directional usually cos it dont look right if you don't use 8-way looking sprites, it cuts the work down on sprite art etc to get their games out quicker. Often the 8-way directional scripts can cause issues as well, another reason people don't often use it. It IS such a great shame to see a great games company go down the pan like this and just concentrait on mobile gaming Did you get my 2pms about those dragon ball z games for the snes?

Flash news! Just found a new Kickstarter project for a 2D 16-bit JRPG called Shadows of Adam! I think everybody on this board will like the look and feel of this game. The pixels and colours look almost very accurately in the style of the 16-bit SNES RPG era. Although the world-building details are very good for its kind! The colours do look a bit 'moody', can't find the right words to describe it - not exactly like most SNES JRPGs but different. The combat mechanics are probably turn-based and the monsters can be seen on-screen before you touch them. It's definitely not built in a RPG Maker engine, luckily. As you can check in their FAQs they're using the ImpactJS game engine to code this game!
But with under 70 hours to the deadline this project still needs almost over $5000 US just to achieve success, so it may be unlikely .

Edit: Just checked almost half a day ago and saw that it still needed under $4000 to reach its funding goal. But now it's passed that with another 100 plus backers. Amazing!

INTERESTING!

BTW.. they've HIT their target, by over 1k. I MIGHT have a look at the demo that's on their site for download to see how it plays, it looks GREAT graphically though, kinda reminds me
of "Game Gear" type games and how some of those looked. I just HOPE to god it's NOT made with rpgmaker, gamemaker.. OR any other indie game maker programme, before you ask..
YES! I have serious issues with those type of games, if I was the owner of STEAM company, (Valve), i'd be banning ANY uploads or sales of those type of games on STEAM.

EEEESH! just read the team creators information.. :/ not looking promising.. got together in 2013, all met on an old rpg message boards, (probably rmk.net or HBgames)... oh well, i'll
still give the demo a go, see what it's like.. will let you all know what I think of it personally.

UPDATE: Okay, played the demo and I must say.. it's quite interesting, the animation on the sprites, the music, sound effects are pretty good, the lack of story at the beginning of the
game might be weird to start with for some people but the story builds up as you play through the starting area in forms of flashbacks and chatting scenes. I think someone needs to go
through the game and proof read the script cos there's a TON of mistakes in sentences spoken, also some maps need to be checked for impassible bits, (one outside the house you appear
in after the starter area in Adams, invisible block there stopping you from passing in the path). thank god they added an option to define your own keys cos the 3 they auto assigned are so
annoyingly close together. As far as the game's engine goes.. I have a sneaky suspicion this is the NEW "Rpg maker MV" and they've just ripped rm2003 sprites/graphics for the game BUT
can't be 100% sure as iv'e NOT used that engine but they have made the maps and areas that well it's really hard to tell if it actually IS an rpg maker game, so KUDOS to those for that.
Another reasoning for me thinking it's the new MV engine is cos of the option they are aiming for, for it to be released on WiiU, Ps4, and Ps Vita.. all these options are given in MV to make
your games for.. but then so does "Game Maker" and other NEWER engines.

Would I play this game fully?.. PROBABLY.. but I would NOT pay for it.

Oh cool. Let's let have a go at the demo and see what you think of it! Yeah, you might be on the money regarding it looking like a Game Gear game. To me it's more like a mid-gen SNES RPG, but being closer to the Game Gear type feel might be a more accurate way to put it.
As I've mentioned in my previous post above be sure to check their FAQ list at the bottom of the main page - they're using the ImpactJS game engine to build this game.
Anyway, they've experimented with an earthy toned music track for a dungeon in the game with the lava pits. But it sounds too quiet and not that impressive to me. But other tracks could be better and more diverse though.
Besides I DON'T think they'll hit the 'August 2016' milestone for project completion for sure! I say add another 6 months or 1 year to that one!
* Reply to your added comment, SylarDean: Oh well, that's unfortunate that you do not think too positively of that game ATM. It is worth reading for all of us. ImpactJS is a HTML5 engine so obviously like many other HTML5 engines it's designed to work on many computing platforms.

Lots of comparisons with other engines like Phaser:
http://buildnewgames.com/game-engine-comparison/, 2nd linked article.
https://html5gameengine.com/details/2/impactjs (User reviews)
http://www.html5gamedevelopment.com/htm ... tjs-engine
http://www.adam-holden.com/blog/2014/04 ... ne-part-2/
http://www.slant.co/topics/341/viewpoin ... s~impactjs
http://forum.lostdecadegames.com/topic/ ... s-phaser/2
https://www.reddit.com/r/gamedev/commen ... ommend_me/

made with html5? omg. that makes me NOT want to play its full version now.. why the hell make a game using html5 that looks so old and pixilated as hell? I know they were trying
to capture the 16bit era feel of games but hell man... not even SneS games have that amount of pixilated art. They COULD make this a great game if they upped the graphics and
changed the entire menu system with a better looking one, as now knowing this is a html5 made game... i'm NOT impressed at all. NOT saying I could do any better cos I dnt know
HTML5 programming.

I WILL say.. THIS is a game i'm looking forward to seeing greenlighted on STEAM.. made with "Rpg maker VX-Ace" it truly looks amazing what they have achieved with that game makers
power, they HAVE tweeked the gamemaker's base core coding themselves though to be able to make this game, so much effort and they truly deserve this project to be on STEAM.. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KOlKh4PjLbg

Hey. Just a heads-up. RPS reckons this game The Count Lucanor should be a good billing for anybody who has played and enjoyed the recent 8-bit/16-bit game Undertale. It's a "dark fairytale adventure/RPG".

Even the music is a chiptune revision of Bach's music as funnily explained below...