It's almost finished. The thead doesn't seem very useful. It's perfectly fine if you didn't find any bugs, because there could be very few or almost none already. Impressions are very welcome Enjoy the game.
In the second text in DeMenchev's dialogue instead of "If you say a negative thing, it doesn't mean you're feeling bad." he should say "Anything you say can be valuable if you're being honest, even if it makes you feel bad and others don't like it. Honesty isn't a conscious choice but a skill to be practiced, and adopting it as a value results in better self-control and can help you reach your ultimate potential along with integrity. It's impossible to do without much patience though. Meditation is about developing patience." Meditation isn't about practicing positivity, even though it can help to be more positive. So DeMenchev should say "Meditation can help you to be more positive. Being positive makes you so much stronger." instead of "Meditation is about practicing positivity." Yup, this is what I strongly and consciously believe in as it lets me stand a good chance against my social anxiety and manage it, which affects very much in my life. Do dialogues increase the file size considerably or is there some other problem with that, if there is?
Yes, dialogues increase the file size. The whole purpose of this thread is to find bugs on the iOS platform. You tested on PC, which is fine. But if there are no reports of bugs on iOS here, I'm satisfied with that. No more changes unless it's an iOS bug. Or unless someone isn't happy with their items or shop. I got enough comments that the file is clean via messaging here that I'm quite happy.
Town Portal doesn't work. The August Crown would be better with 35 Ac as it requires you to finish the whole game and to have overcome all challenges except for one, so it's fair for only that one item to be that much better. Speaking of the last challenge, White Bones Demons' Ac isn't very fair. Perhaps it would be better to make magic work against them as well, in case the player loses the blade. Gu Demon in Chu-Chih Palace can be killed with magic, for example. You probably didn't intend that, but I like that feature. Since it's supposed to be the ultimate challenge, it's better to just make the White Bones Demons ' Damage/attack higher: 250-370. Also, doing that favor for the Monkey King triggers a "Script Error!" message. Store-bought Iron Turbans have the most enchant storage, which doesn't seem right. 0 enchant storage might be interesting. There are few unenchantable items, and it may still be the most useful helm for those who don't like enchanting for a while in the beginning, as the Ac is very good.
I'm infected by some bacteria and my body temperature has been around 38ºC on average for three days, so I was prescribed a course of antibiotics. And my head is literally hot. Getting well soon. The Balanced Sword would be better with 300 raw enchant storage. It doesn't have to be enchanted. Only if you wanted the amazing protection a Drain hp enchantment can give you, you could choose to have it. It's outstandingly powerful, even at that stage and with the great beasts that need to be faced with it, and I don't object to that. That should be some of the last item adjustment suggestions that I gave. Although it's primarily my pleasure and gratification it seems. I'm not going to endlessly come up with something to write about items. Now it's time to stop. But still, a bunch of the suggestions haven't been accepted yet to satisfy and fit my Quest balancing biases (positive connotation). Sorry if I'm somewhat too cocky with it or something, it gets me carried away quite a bit for sure.
So far I have not noticed any typos which is great! Bug wise, nothing huge has popped up. I have not completed the game yet but so far so good!!!
@tintin888--that's great. Take your time and finish. I'll wait. @DeMenchev--I hope you feel better. I'll increase the AC of the August Crown. I'll check that script error. I thought I fixed it but maybe missed something. We already talked about the Balanced Sword and I don't want to change it. I think the monsters are already hard enough now. The Gu demon can be fought with magic but that gets tricky so I don't want to change the other monsters. I'll let Phredd sell the Balanced Sword and the Demon-hacking Blade. I don't know why town portal doesn't work. It's coded correctly.
I think one or two monsters like the White Bones Demons are ok with high AC. They are after all, according to the story, the demons who have been tormenting the Monkey King. They can't be pushovers. Some of the changes you suggested, Demenchev, Liz is opposed to, so I don't want to make them. I must confess I agree with her. : ) I think the Balanced Blade should be left alone for that reason. She wanted Bethor's Rod to stay as it was but as a compromise I lowered it a little. If Bethor has any objection, I'll raise it back. Liz said, "Lucky is the one who finds Bethor's Rod early in the game." Have to keep in mind many play just to explore and do the quests. They want a slightly easier path. Many of the suggestions you made are incorporated, quite a lot. : ) These changes will be in the next file--- Phredd now sells the Balanced Sword and the Demon-Hacking Blade Typo fixed. Script error after you do the favor for the Monkey King fixed. August Crown AC now 35. Wand and scroll skill effects higher. They won't require a restart.
All right. It's very good the way it is. Bethor's Rod's attack is perfect now. Some more magic skill power would be good, if it needs to be stronger. It can't make the game easier in any case, it just outclassed other weapons while being relatively easily accessible. You need more high skills than luck. The Quest is a skill-based game. It doesn't actually require very much to play Dragon Jade with ease, you can easily overdo with protection in this expansion if you'd like to, and you can get ready for everything without any enchant. The point is, if you're struggling a lot, it's probably armor skill that's not high enough. It's like this in every expansion, even where the gear is super strong (monsters are super strong there). Iron Emperor's Helm can't be crafted in the special booth because of a bug. I didn't have enough Iron Ore and the Crafting Spirit got silent permanently. Since it can only be obtained after the August Crown, it's better if its Ac is outstandingly high too. 30 Ac. You can add more various enchantments too (just not very high armor skills). Ok, no more new item adjustment suggestions. I wonder why some of the Yin/Yang items (Yin Shield, Yang Shield, Yin Helm and Yang helm) cannot be used. is it intended? Un-enchanting the Balanced Sword won't make anything more difficult without a way to make it easier. With low Enchant storage there will be very little room for any fear of missing out, which is probably what makes enchantable items undesirable for some players (including me). It's different if the enchant storage isn't awfully high, but relatively low (300), where either drain hp or sp can be added if you'd like it easier as well as one more interesting thing to choose like new disease or poison. Good armor skills are more important for standing a good chance. There are two swords to pick from as well, so it could be more interesting if there could be some difference... Well, it's perfectly fine anyway, both items and monsters are well balanced and the game is very stable, and the sword is fine too. Though it's a bit odd that Chaos, the first dragon boss, has the strongest attack power of all boss dragons, while Agony, the last dragon boss, isn't the strongest dragon. Does town portal work on iOS?
These changes will be in the next version--I don't think there's any reason to restart. DeMenchev's changes and one or two of my own. Town Portal should work now. The Yin and Yang shields and helms can be used now. Iron Emperor's Helm is now 30 AC. Monster Agony's attack upped slightly. Wu Witch no longer poisons you and poison effect removed from spell Gu. The Crafting Spirit will now talk to you if you don't have what you need to craft the Iron Emperor's Helm. Typo fixed. Some door chat and shops added in Vermilion Palace area. I hid a hammer on a window close to the beginning to give the player a better chance to get around without too much hardship. The stats are open to discussion but I think players need some more help in the beginning. Going through again on my ipad I find it very rough going using the Standalone version--I think it would be better if a stronger weapon or spell were available in the beginning, so I added the hammer which is not easy to find. Without having a better weapon, I played for a few hours and died about fifteen times. I spend most of my time going back to Liz to buy potions. I don't think that's very much fun. Liz agrees. What do you think? I think most players will be embedding the expansion and will have higher level weapons to fight with from the beginning. But if you buy and play the standalone version without something better to fight with in the beginning, I think you'll have a tough time. The only reason I kept going was to test whether Town Portal worked in the standalone game and I inched along by saving every few minutes. I had just about zero satisfaction and was praying for a barrel or magic shop with a Town Portal book, scroll or wand to end my agony. So I think that hammer on the window in Ancients' Temple is a good thing, at least in the standalone version.
(I agree with you mostly, but more on that further below) A stronger weapon in the beginning won't make anything easier. It just won't make anything less difficult. What it will do is it'll make around 80% of the different weapons in the expansion almost useless because of being inferior to one weapon, and rewards will be less rewarding, and it will be weird. That's why I care about some weapons' attack so much, like that of Bethor's Rod. Your attack power depends on a number of things, and the damage values aren't the most important things in the sense that they don't make you deal much more damage right away, but "one strong weapon available in the beginning" can be paraphrased as "there's one good weapon and almost all other weapons are bad (I mean worse)" It just can't help the player to to get around with less hardship. If the player does get around with less hardship, it doesn't mean that a weapon helped in any way. But it means that now he will find dozens of weapons which it doesn't make sense to use, the quest now is getting rid of weapons. Armor has the potential to help very much, on the other hand, so let's focus more on that. Maybe leave some heavy armor of different types in the temple that aren't there already, so that there aren't 2 heavy armor for the same part of body etc. and every single item is unique, but not better than other armors. It can be *slightly* worse (the word "worse" here doesn't mean "bad" as in the example above. Here it means good, useful, best available, etc.) A spell available in the beginning is a good idea too, but it shouldn't outclass spells found later so that those remain interesting. It can be something better than lightning storm though. And make sure you check your skills before you say the game is hard. If the hero is weak, it will be wrong if it's not rough. So what I'm saying is, I agree with you that it could be too rough in the standalone version at first and it's a great idea to give the player a better chance to get around without hardship, but NOT by adding a stronger weapon or armor that's better than all other armors for that matter too. Oh, and one more thing: I wasn't talking about the hammer in this message at all. I was talking more about Bethor's Rod and a number of similar instances. The hammer you added is good and should stay. It's an interesting thing.
I know a stronger weapon will make things easier because I always test the first version with a strong weapon I've made for myself. If the hammer is good, then let's just leave it and see how people do. When the game is released, I can always do an update if there's a difficulty problem. Right now, without the hammer, the gameplay is awful in my humble opinion on the standalone version. Of course, very few people will play with that version--they'll embed the game and use their favorite high-power weapons and armor but the standalone players count too. Most people will play the embedded game and for them if they've played the higher expansions first, they might want just to sell the weapons in this game. Keep that in mind. Or they might find one useful. But I don't want to torture the players playing the standalone game. It was torture for me.
There's a problem with the standalone version. It's much more difficult to start than it should be. Shouldn't be hard to fix and will be fixed, so hang on.
Yay! Do you think raising the standalone version's pre-generated character's level to 25 would be helpful?
I just beat beat HOL IV with no enchants and little trouble. I am pretty good at the game, and I am enjoying the challenge. I am fine either way. Good Expansion!
Oh, and a suggestion. If you make any more quest expansions, can you make the story have a little more mystery? I noticed that it is made pretty obvious exactly what you are aiming to do immediately.
Cool! That's gonna be awesome. I'm gonna keep looking for bugs in this expansion. Hopefully I will fail
