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Too good to be true?

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Started by Shane C March 21, 2016 12:04 AM

28 comments, last by menyo 8 years ago

Shane C

1,369

Author

March 21, 2016 12:04 AM

Hypothetically speaking, I could:

1. Buy RPG Maker MV for $80

2. Craft a storyline better than your typical mobile game, taking 3 whole seconds

3. Make a RPG using premade assets

4. Throw in a couple of songs not in the kit for flavor

5. Release it on the App Store, because you can legally release games made with the kit even using the kit's assets AFAIK - just read the terms

6. Probably make a thousand dollars or more, since the premade assets would be up-to-snuff quality, and since you're really not competing with much, even among other people who used RPG Maker

What are the flaws in this idea? It sounds downright evil and diabolical, because most of us or at least me have it embedded in our brains to actually try harder than a kit like RPG Maker, even if we fail badly.....

vlj

1,071

March 21, 2016 12:29 AM

"craft a storyline better than your typical mobile game" is likely to take you more than 3s. Typical mobile dev don't make poor story on purpose, it's just that it's much more difficult than it looks to write a good story. And even with lot of efforts it can fail to impress the player due to wrong integration in a game, wrong "storytelling" through cinematics and make it looks like a storyline from a typical mobile game.

"make an rpg" is actually the job of a game developer. It takes likely years

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Tom Sloper

17,201

March 21, 2016 12:55 AM

Hypothetically speaking, I could:
1. Buy RPG Maker MV for $80
2. Craft a storyline better than your typical mobile game, taking 3 whole seconds
3. Make a RPG using premade assets
4. Throw in a couple of songs not in the kit for flavor
5. Release it on the App Store, because you can legally release games made with the kit even using the kit's assets AFAIK - just read the terms
6. Probably make a thousand dollars or more, since the premade assets would be up-to-snuff quality, and since you're really not competing with much, even among other people who used RPG Maker
What are the flaws in this idea?
It sounds downright evil and diabolical, because most of us or at least me have it embedded in our brains to actually try harder than a kit like RPG Maker, even if we fail badly.....

Hypothetically, yes. With caveats.
2. As another poster said, it will take longer than 3 seconds.
3. Hypothetically, yes. The game will not look terribly original, but if you're okay with that, then fine.
4. Hypothetically, yes. The flavor search, combined with the right license, could take some time. Or you could create your own music, which also will take some time (and some talent).
5. Hypothetically, yes. Not saying it'll be easy to get your game through the certification process, and you'll have to spend money.
6. "Probably"?? No. You've skipped a bunch of steps. This shouldn't be step 6; this should be step 11 or 12 or 13. You need to market the game. You need to try to make your game discoverable among the thousands of others on the store. You need to set up a website, and some communication channels and finances, and get an attorney and accountant on retainer. And you need a backup plan for when (I mean, the eventuality that) no money comes in.
7. It sounds like your real question is, "why use a hard-to-use engine or learn a bunch of technology, if RPG Maker is just as good?" It's not just as good. Such games inevitably have a distinctive look; sophisticated players will spot it right away. A game made with that tool can succeed, but you have to play your cards very well, and still be lucky.

-- Tom Sloper -- sloperama.com

Shane C

1,369

Author

March 21, 2016 01:17 AM

Sorry if I was a bit snarky in the OP. It runs the risk of rubbing people the wrong way. I think Tom Sloper summed it up really well when he said, "it's possible, but you have to play your cards right".

Okay, so I am between the skill level of making the next 3D game I envision, which will probably turn out bad due to it being too much for one person like myself, and mastering the RPG Maker program, actually maybe producing a good game with it. My question is, what should I go for?

When I said it takes 3 seconds to make a good story, I was of course being sarcastic, saying "It takes way less time than producing a novel to make a storyline that can compete with your average mobile game." I of course wouldn't take this route. I would want to spend more time with it. Again, I need to stop being so snarky when I try to get points across.

Khatharr

8,814

March 21, 2016 01:26 AM

RPG Maker is very easy to pick up, and I think VM switched from Ruby to JavaScript, so there's a chance you may even know the language already. On the other hand, a lot of people have had this idea and probably about 1 in 100 of the ones that have actually done the mountain of work to create a commercial project have broke even.

The issue with RPG Maker games isn't that they're intrinsically bad. It's that so very many people who don't want to do any work have picked up RPG Maker and crapped out a half-assed game with a bad story, cheesy dialogue, unimaginative combat, and basically no reason for a user to invest their time in playing it. After a while the distinctive look of the RTP becomes a warning sign to consumers.

Can you succeed commercially with RPG Maker? Absolutely.

Will it be easier than succeeding with something else? NO.

if you decide to get RPG Maker then do it for your own benefit, so you have a tool on hand that you can use to play with and create toys or test ideas.

It costs a lot, it's limited, and people are conditioned to avoid it. Compare that to other easy-entry tools like Unity or UE4 and it becomes a questionable choice.

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Bearhugger

1,276

March 21, 2016 01:56 AM

Hypothetically speaking, I could:

1. Buy RPG Maker MV for $80

2. Craft a storyline better than your typical mobile game, taking 3 whole seconds

3. Make a RPG using premade assets

4. Throw in a couple of songs not in the kit for flavor

5. Release it on the App Store, because you can legally release games made with the kit even using the kit's assets AFAIK - just read the terms

6. Probably make a thousand dollars or more, since the premade assets would be up-to-snuff quality, and since you're really not competing with much, even among other people who used RPG Maker

What are the flaws in this idea? It sounds downright evil and diabolical, because most of us or at least me have it embedded in our brains to actually try harder than a kit like RPG Maker, even if we fail badly.....

A few points.

It takes time to make an RPG. When I dabbled with RPG Maker 2000, me and my brother both had our own RPG Maker games that lasted about 50 to 70 hours (which is about where it's acceptable for selling IMHO), but they took us years to make. I remember spending an entire summer just for a chapter of my game. Making interesting dungeons takes a bit of planning, writing good dialogues takes some time to reread yourself and ideally a few other pairs of eyes, making bosses that aren't either damage sponges or cheap shot spammers needs a good balancing eye, etc, etc, etc.

Considering the abysmal return on investment of the crushing majority of paid-for iOS games, spending that time flipping burgers at McDonalds will likely be a lot more profitable. If you're doing this to get super rich, the flaws in your idea is right there. You also forgot to add $100 per year for your Apple dev license, so your production costs are minimum $180, plus whatever licensing fees that your extra songs will cost you.

Yeah, you can bundle it with the premade assets, but if you actually take the time to make a good game, other people will have already flooded the App Store with cheap ass 2-minute games and people will be used to those assets. When I was in the RPG Maker community, whenever I saw games with RPG Maker "Alex" (or sprite rips from Squaresoft games for that matter) as the main character I hit ALT-Left and browse the next game. Although this is personal opinion, I also think that the current RPG Maker assets are fugly. You can use RPG Maker XP's graphics instead, but they are more work to use because the auto-tile function doesn't work very well with them.

Also, just in general I don't see the appeal of epic RPGs on iOS; I think it's silly to expect me to "game" seriously on my phone with a 6 inches screen and touch controls, and when you look at it, a lot of big companies (lol Sega) broke their neck on mobile platforms, thinking it had place for "true" games. Personally, I have owned Final Fantasy Dimensions on my Android phone for two years, and I am a huge fan of the classic Final Fantasy games, and I consider FFD this to be the best game titled "Final Fantasy" since FFX-1... and yet I still prefer playing Solitaire than Final Fantasy on my phone. (In fact I wish I could just play FFD on my PC.) I just don't care about "serious" gaming on my mobile phone, I want to play quick games on that platform. Things like Three!, Solitaire, Angry Birds, etc. So I'm not going to buy your RPG Maker game knowing that I didn't even finish Final Fantasy Dimensions... And I don't care about your epic storyline on my tiny mobile phone screen, I don't have the attention span for it when I'm playing on my phone. You could have the next Lord of the Ring or a story about a distant future where bionic toilets have overrun humans after a zombie invasion and it would be the same to me. Perhaps other gamers have more tolerance for tiny screens than I do, but to me gaming on iOS is a joke. Maybe I would on an iPad Pro but at that price I would put a Titan X in my PC instead.

Hodgman

52,717

March 21, 2016 02:15 AM

1. Buy RPG Maker MV for $80.
2. Craft an RPG storyline over the course of several months - say $10k worth of labour.
3. Make a RPG using premade assets.
4. Throw in a couple of songs not in the kit for flavor.
5. Release it on the App Store, because you can legally release games made with the kit even using the kit's assets AFAIK - just read the terms
6. Probably make zero dollars, since about eight million games are published per second and you did no marketing

FTFY

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ferrous

6,164

March 21, 2016 02:44 AM

It's not impossible, but it takes time, skill, dedication, and filling a niche that isn't crowded. Stardew Valley is a pretty good example of a game that could probably be made with RPGmaker, (I don't know if it was or not, certainly could've been)

Also Stardew valley took, what only 4 years of self-imposed crunch =)

Servant of the Lord

33,739

March 21, 2016 04:07 AM

"Make a RPG using premade assets."

The problem is, all the premade assets don't actually fit very well together unless you use the most commonly used art style that everyone else already uses.

You'll have to do:

A) Some serious modifying and tweaking of assets from various different free sources, to make them fit well together

B) Spend serious effort making new assets, to fill the big gaps that existing assets don't cover well.

or C) Use the generic RPG Maker art-style that everybody uses, meaning NOBODY will buy your game, because it looks like every other trashy RPG Maker game. You can shout "But I have a better story, honest!" but your screenshots will shout "GENERIC!" even louder.

You can't see good story in screenshots or even in videotrailers.

Promit

13,404

March 21, 2016 05:29 AM

1. Buy RPG Maker MV for $80.
2. Craft an RPG storyline over the course of several months - say $10k worth of labour.
3. Make a RPG using premade assets.
4. Throw in a couple of songs not in the kit for flavor.
5. Release it on the App Store, because you can legally release games made with the kit even using the kit's assets AFAIK - just read the terms
6. Probably make zero dollars, since about eight million games are published per second and you did no marketing
FTFY

QFE

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