Sumnus

Also, for what it's worth, I often find visiting this site gives me motivation. Reading about game development/discussing game development tends to put me in the mood to actually do some of it myself in one way or another; even if it's just something small like tweaking a map, or adding a quest line or something. Progress is progress.

Basically what others have said: If you're just re-coloring the same characters. Giving them some new move effects, and a different color scheme, they aren't going to feel very different to the player. To answer the question in the OP - I don't think it's too much (even before you trimmed it down); just as has been said, some seem redundant. Are the five main characters all involved in the party? So the party is a five-member party? Make sure that the characters provide a decision for the player to make. Switching elements is a rather obvious basic example, but also along the lines of what Zvart mentioned - trading raw power for duration, or wanting stat debuffs or crowd control. Do you want a mage that deals low damage to multiple enemies, or a mage that deals high damage to a single target. Every new party member should provide some form of strategic decision for the player (at least in my opinion). So while it may not be too much for the player to handle, they didn't all seem necessary. Also, don't forget, the more characters you add, the more balancing you have to do, and the trickier that balancing becomes. The player will look for something that works efficiently, and then run with it. Think of it like the Pokemon series, in that sense. They don't load up on one type like the NPCs do, because it's impractical for playing through the game. Your player will try to create a team that can reasonably handle whatever they think they'll need to handle, so a a good amount of the classes may simply go unused. If it turns out that they can get through 90% of the game without using the Bard, and then suddenly they need the bard, but he's 30 levels behind the rest of their party, it might just make them quit all together because of the poor design. If you used the bard in your playtesting, and balanced the game around having it in your party, don't forget that the player won't do have the knowledge coming in that you have.

Personally, I just let mood dictate when I work on it. Sometimes, I actively want to work on it. I can look at my huge list of Steam games, or anything else I could do, and I still want to work on my project. If you aren't feeling it, don't force yourself to do it, though. Unless it's your job, you shouldn't force yourself to do anything, in my opinion. It can remove the fun. If you aren't feeling like doing anything on your game, I simply would put it back on the shelf for a while. Keep a document on your computer or notes in real life when you get an idea so that you don't forget about it later, but aside from that, there's nothing wrong with taking a break. I know the Steam Summer Sale a few weeks ago pretty much completely removed me from working on my project at all for a while; and there's nothing wrong with that. For me, it helps if I do something while I work on it. I generally have a beverage, and I put some music on, or a movie/television series in my other monitor, and work on it in that environment. It just becomes my default thing to do when I'm relaxing and not in the mood to play a more attention-demanding game.

So basically, parrying? You could sort of "cheat" it in without scripting, I'd imagine, but scripting it would be better. You could just have shields give an innate percentage-based chance of ignoring a physical attack.

Something I do for character development in general (not just for games, but for writing as a general rule), is make sure you know everything there is to know about your character. I usually make a text document for each character, and when i think of something that I should add to them, I add it into the list. Know their name, their nicknames, their hobbies, their dislikes, where they came from, their family situation... design a full character, create a life for them. And then once you have it all down, the player doesn't have to necessarily hear about everything, but if you have everything written down, you can pick and choose what elements to the character you reveal to players, and when you do it.

The point system is a good way to start, and it forces you to keep the base stats balanced. Outside of that, for a single player game, I doubt people would care all that much. Think about it like Pokemon. Any starter was viable, and almost any team could "beat the game" (beat the elite four/rival). I even saw someone beat the Elite Four with only a Magikarp (not joking). So for a single player, while balance is nice, I would focus on mainly making each character feel different from one another. The elements and damage types mentioned above are a way to go, and can also be taken from Pokemon. The Pokemon franchise, however, is victim of the whole "this water pokemon is better than this water pokemon" issue, but it's close enough that short of the few "competitive" pokemon players, any water pokemon will suffice in the single player mode. I would focus on developing each character. Give them personalities, give them unique traits/quirks. Give them different looks. The player will need a reason to pick favorites, and then the balancing issue will matter less and less (the Pokemon Effect). As long as they can all complete the game, and the game is fun, you would be fine. But numerical balance is rather simple - set a specific amount of points in stats at the start (as Kotori said), and then keep the scaling comparable. Don't have one character gain four points (in pre-defined stats) per level, and the others gain six or eight. Alternatively, if elements and damage types bother you, you could try to create a different playstyle among each character. Aside from the obvious tanky character, damage character, mage character, etc. You could add people focused on disables, maybe people that can escape from battles that other characters can't escape from, things like that. If there is a rogue, provide them rogue-like features that aren't there for other characters in terms of quest lines and options in the world (let them steal things, let them acquire extra gold, etc), Just tailor each character to have something that's fun about them that makes them feel like their own character. If there's an multitarget-focused character, maybe give them unique quest lines with large groups of enemies, where they can really shine.

I tried sending an individual map file with the MapInfos, and they saw the list of all of the maps in the project, but the map wouldn't open. I'll give it a shot with sending the tilesets along with it, thanks.

Well, sharing the files is easy enough with Dropbox, I'll just have to experiment I guess as to exactly what files I need to send if it works at all. Update: Well, from some minor testing, it works in theory. I had to send the entire data folder, because we couldn't quite identify what specific files were relevant for it to work, but sending the entire data folder back and forth seems to work, one person would just have to halt progress in the meantime, otherwise the changes wouldn't sync properly. If anyone knows more, that would be great. In any event, thanks for the response. The Data folder was indeed the place I needed to look into.

Any chance you know where a specific map file would be saved, then? Without having to export an entire game file itself?

I generally side with 0% as well, but as a developer, I keep it in mind if I do it that way, and try to compensate by introducing in new (and potentially necessary) characters at levels close to the player. During each playtest of my game, if I am reaching a city that adds a character at level 10-12, then I'll make the new character come into the party near the same level, so that there isn't a huge grind for the player to suddenly have to deal with. Also, at least this way, once they have a fifth party option, but they're full at four, the fifth would have come in at the highest level (and ideally right at the party level at the time), so even if the player didn't use them for a while immediately after gaining access, but wants to go back to them later, rather than being 20 levels behind, because you acquired them in the 2nd city, they still should be at least somewhat close to the party, even if they went forward without them for a while. Edit: I mean this for people who are not in the party at all (which I believe is what was being asked). If you have a party of four, but the first two actions cleared the entire enemy group in a battle, all four people should still get 100% of the exp i my opinion. But if you have 6 characters, the two that aren't in the party would get 0%, it just seems to make sense.

I certainly wouldn't let file size intimidate you from releasing something. If a player has a problem with that small of a download, that is their problem, not yours.

Personally, I believe that most ideas have the potential to work out well, and it's all about execution. I have played a huge amount of games that had tremendous concepts, and failed to deliver; and I have also played games that seemed very simple in concept, but the game was just so well made, that it all worked beautifully. So in my opinion, it's less about the base ideas, and more about the execution of them, and how it feels to the player as they are playing it. Reading your post, the idea sounds fine. It's a variation on the idea of sort of "choosing a character" to play, where as you choose a party, instead. More of a.. "Which four of these seven do you want?" sort of thing. It could work. If I were developing a game with that, I would be wary of the paths for character development. Are they developed when they're in the party? Then a lot of content may be missed by the player. A lot of players will try to find the strongest lineup they can get, and just roll that lineup through the game. Because of that, if the development is tied in with who is in the party when certain events occur, then a lot of the character development may never be seen. On the flip side, if the development happens regardless of the party composition, then it may come across as odd that you're talking about someone who you haven't had in your party with you since four cities ago. These are both things that can be worked around via the implementation, of course, but it's something I would personally keep in mind. Continuing with the idea that people will try to play the strongest combination - which is a normal response to that sort of a thing, it leads to a lot of balance issues, as well. Which would require a lot of hours spent playtesting the game, and making sure there isn't any specific lineup that is blatantly more powerful than others. Players will look for general power, good synergies, things like that when they're trying to make the party. And one last thought, which is something I'm dealing with in my own project - when the player has options for party members, if you happen to have a leveling system, some of the party members that may have been "balanced" into a certain region, or may have a specific place where they really shine may be underleveled, if the player hadn't been fighting with them all along. Just something to keep in mind. You didn't mention if you had a leveling system or not, but it's something to be aware of. If everyone starts at level 1 in your game, the player may very well have four people at level twenty, and three at level one, and if one of the characters is needed to get beyond that level twenty phase of the game is still level one, that's a lot of grinding the player will have to do to "catch up", and it may be a turnoff to the player.

Personally - I wouldn't worry about it. I certainly wouldn't consider 530 mb intimidating at all, and in a world where a lot of games are 2gb+, I really don't see it being an issue. Dial-up users may be annoyed by it, but they aren't really the targeted audience for the gaming industry anymore. While it may be large for a game of this type, meh. A good game is a good game regardless. If I were to download it, the size of the game would have nothing to do with how much I enjoyed the game or didn't enjoy it. It isn't something I'd worry about. It's not like it's a patch on server, where you have to worry about the downtime to implement it or something, it's a one-time download. I say you're fine.

I'm also doing something along these lines as well - the best thing I can advise is to know your story first. Once you, as the writer/developer know the story of each side, a natural way to present it to the player should make itself clear to you. Mechanically, it is done just as any other game, I'd imagine. You're still running the same loops, and calls, and combat system - a lot of the good or evil side is usually only represented in dialogue and story line. As was said earlier, you just have to convince the player. Decide what you want them to know, and when you want them to know it, and work the game around that. One thing I've seen a lot of games do is have the "protagonist" and the "antagonist" in the same party for a while during the game, and then introduce a divide somewhere through the story. One example of this would be in Star Wars - Anakin started off as a Jedi. That sort of thing can be done well in RPGs as well, you leveled up with someone, you've been with them since early in the game - but something sparks a divide. It could leave the player with the idea that the "bad" person is still "good" in a way, given how the game started - but the early stages would have served as the backstory for why the former ally is now "bad".