Rifts: A World Apart v0.2
A downloadable game for Windows
"I'll find you, even if it means... shattering the very fabric of dimensions."
Story: Join Harold on a captivating journey as he investigates mysterious ruins, only to be thrust into a perilous quest to prevent the dimensions from collapsing upon themselves. Along the way, you’ll encounter a diverse cast of characters—some will become your allies, while others will stand in your way. Embrace the challenges ahead, test your skills against formidable foes, and take a moment to enjoy the stunning scenery and immersive music.
Combat: Engage in strategic battles where every enemy is tied to a specific element, each with its own strengths and weaknesses. Choose your skills wisely and equip your party with unique accessories, as their effects may turn the tide in battle. Be mindful of cooldowns on more powerful spells, and plan your moves carefully!
Features:
- Skill Learn System: Spend special items and gold to teach your party members powerful skills they wouldn't learn otherwise.
- Quest Journal: Keep track of your tasks and ensure you never lose your way.
- Achievements: Showcase your heroic exploits and satisfy your inner completionist.
- Dev Switch: Toggle on/off for humorous commentary and insights from the developer during key story moments.
- Music Master: An item that reveals the name of the music track playing as you enter new areas or battles—also can be toggled on/off.
- Day/Night System: Experience a dynamic day and night cycle that impacts the world around you, unlocking time-exclusive events, quests, and encounters.
- Dev's Hourglass: Use a special item to change the time of day.
- Bestiary: An in-game compendium that provides useful information on enemies, skills, items etc...
- Consequential Choices: Your decisions will impact the storyline and how characters perceive you.
- Intriguing Plot Twists: Stay engaged with surprises that will keep you on your toes throughout the journey!
- Superbosses: Challenge powerful enemies for unique rewards to learn high-tier skills. Each superboss corresponds to an element, with signs indicating their strengths. Some roam the lands, while others are stationary, and you may need vehicles to reach them.
- A full list of features can be found in the changelog, accessible from the title screen.
Download
Install instructions
1. Download the zip folder.
2. For Windows 10/11:
a) Right click Rifts - A World Apart v0.2.zip
b) Click on "Extract all"
c) Make a new folder called "Rifts - A World Apart v0.2" (or whatever you like) somewhere you will remember, like your desktop. You can change the location with "Browse".
d) Hit "Extract" and wait for it to finish
e) When it's done, open the folder you created in c), and run Game.exe
You need to run Game.exe only from the extracted folder to make sure all files work as intended.
In case one of them is missing, all you can do is try to extract the game again.
3. For any other windows version other than 10/11:
a) If you have WinRar already on your pc, when you right click the zip folder there should be an option that says "WinRar" os something similar,
like "extract with WinRar". Follow steps c) to e).
b) If you don't have WinRar, you can use 7z, which you can get from here: https://www.7-zip.org/download.html
Download the appropriate version for your computer.
In case you don't know if you have a 32 or a 64-bit system, open the Settings app and go to About.
There's something that says System Type where it shows whether you have a 32 or 64-bit system.
Download the .exe version you need, run it when it's finished downloading, then follow these steps:
Follow step c) from above.
Right click the zip file, then hover your mouse above "7-Zip", and click on "Extract files..".
Follow step e).
While I am working on an update, please replace the Map004.json file in the www/data folder found in the game files with the one provided above. This fixes a transfer event that is not working.
Comments
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the events for transitioning to the next map here dont work or exist, meaning i am unable to progress past the starting area, and have been unable to find anything else to progress
Thanks for letting me know. For now, please replace your Map004.json file with the one that is provided above.
I apologise for any inconvenience.
quick pieces of advice:
- Reduce the frequency of random encounters greatly or use events that move around that you touch to fight instead, its like playing a game with a flashbang going off every 3 seconds after walking in some areas
- During the opening scene with the 2 crowned fellas, the lack of animation and sound made the scene of the woman falling into a rift kinda funny, which im not sure was the intention. Its very hard to make an emotional/dramatic scene, especially in rpg maker, but the most important things that was missing was Audio (sound effect of falling), Visuals (animation of the rift appearing and falling in), and Timing - without these things, it just kinda happens.
- Add autosaving or reminders to save before tough fights, died first time to the mechanical guy in the crystal place and i never saved so had to get to that point again, i was lucky to think to save before the "My Precious" orc, which i did no damage to with anything i had, and escaping was disabled so i either had to wait a few minutes to let it kill me or restart the game
- Minor thing that doesnt matter but something i like seeing: use a different icon set to the default one. this is personal preference but MV's icon set removes identity to the items and equipment i get, i recommend looking at Avy's Icons, which includes upscaled version of the older icon set from VX Ace, still its your choice (https://forums.rpgmakerweb.com/index.php?threads/open-avys-icon-workshop.21623/)
- A lot of new RPG Makers create oversized maps with little content to fill the area, this has some of those, like the crystal place being big and empty while only having a single chest (that i found) in it. I recommend condensing those kinds of maps.
- The Elder guy sure had a lot to say, I had the dev notes enabled so i know of the message saying "the following is very important lore please pay attention", but i dont think that'll convince an average player to read through all that info even if the important text was highlighted. It's very easy to get excited explaining lore and trying to get it all out as soon as possible, but I recommend spreading out the info more, only have the Elder say the basics of whats needed to be said and the rest can be pieced together throughout the game. There's also the challenge of getting players interested enough in the story to be willing to learn more about it themselves, which can be very hard to do.
- I stopped at the guard to the city who had 2000 health and healed and also restored to full once getting low enough, after he healed to full i assumed it was a scripted loss and let him kill me, turns out it wasnt and i didnt feel like doing that again. Enemies healing themselves often feels like its prolonging a fight rather than adding challenge to it, unless by healing it enters a different phase with different abilities. Also, when i began the fight I experimented by not attacking and guarding a few turns just to see if you thought to include an interaction to win by showing the guard we didnt want to fight him, so if it fits it'd be cool to add that kinda interaction, can do it with Troop Events and a switch that turns ON if the guard is below 100% HP etc.
"quick" pieces of advice done, some might even say the "quickest" pieces of advice... 🐈💨
first of all, thanks for the extensive feedback!
to start off: I have reduced the frequency of encounters, hopefully it will be less annoying now. I'm also thinking of giving the player an accessory that completely stops random encounters.
The opening scene..I made it like a year ago when I first started this, and my knowledge and experience of events/scripting was like 0 back then. I definitely need to go back and improve it, as you suggested.
There are currently 10 bosses in the game, with 3 being optional · I feel like I can't warn the player every single time, since it will get repetitive. Also regarding the majority of those, it seems pretty obvious that an important battle is coming up. Given that the player has over 20 save slots, I don't see how I can do something else than expect them to save the game (most bosses have a unique OW sprite). I am willing though to look into this more in case you have any more suggestions.
While playtesting, me and some friends had no trouble with enemies in the game (using the normal game version, not debug/cheats). Dealing 0 damage in the game usually means your attacking stat is lower than the enemy's defending stat, so the only thing you can do is level up a bit and/or buy better gear, or use stronger skills. Anyway, you can escape this battle now, and you can try again later if you're not strong enough.
Regarding the iconset: I had no idea this existed, and have indeed replaced the default one with this. Thanks for letting me know!
Celestial Ruins was also one of the first maps I ever made for this game. I intend to use my experience to improve it for the next update/patch.
I will have to figure out how to divide all the lore stuff, but I do think you have a point. It does seem a bit "too much text" for one event.
Again, the first wave of playtesters had no trouble with the Guard. However I find your idea really interesting, and I have added an alternate "ending" to the battle. I will not share the exact condtions, but it does have to do with Guarding.
Again, I appreciate the feedback! In case you'd like to discuss this more and maybe in more detail, feel free to DM on discord (I am preparing a server for the game).
i could offer advice or help if you have questions, i mainly use MZ but i have used MV for a while so i know quite a bit about how to do stuff in it and its plugins (mostly Yanfly). my discord username is halmska