Puzzle RPG Consolidation
I’ve been horribly busy with various assignments and I’ve neglected to update my blog! Apologies. Look out later this week for some stuff added to the Sketchbook!
With the Blitz Games open day only a few days a way I’m consolidating my Puzzle RPG Idea into an easy to digest format so I can stick it in a Portfolio to show off. I’ll also be writing about a few other ideas in there, too!
After the “break” there’s a simplified version of the Puzzle RPG Idea that will go in my portfolio (the full version will hopefully be added later this week into the “Portfolio” section)
Title: Puzzle Blade: Tales of Veron
Platform: Nintendo DS
High Concept: Story Based Tactical RPG. Blockbreaker meets Final Fantasy Tactics/Advance Wars with Turnbased Combat relying on Puzzle System for Action.
Aims: Combine Puzzle and RPG elements into a cohesive Tactics games, introduce a simple narrative to keep the game flowing.
Story: Centuries ago, in the land of Veron, a dark Lord ruled over the lands – using the powers of a Magic sword he kept the people under his grasp. One day a Wizard – desperate to rid the lands of the dark Lord and usher in an era of peace – crafted an equally powerful Sword using all the Magic he could muster. Unfortunately the crafting of the Sword cost the Wizard his life, with his last breath he gave the sword to a brave Knight who went to do battle with the dark Lord. The battle raged on for days but finally the brave Knight was victorious and Veron was saved.
No one ever saw the Knight or the Sword again.
The game’s story begins several hundred years later, where the player controls Korus, a young orphan adventurer who, whilst exploring one day, stumbles upon an old Sword deep within a forest. The old Sword speaks to him and warns him that dark forces are gathering and he – along with the Puzzle Blade – must fight them off.
Puzzle Blade: Tales of Veron has a large focus on it’s combat system. As it’s aimed at the Nintendo DS the combat system utilises both of the screens: The bottom screen is a Blockbreaker-esque puzzle game that controls the flow of the combat and the top screen is the combat movement screen.
Elaborating on each screen; The bottom screen contains the main puzzle window as well as character stats, the action pool and the character’s experience bar.
A Mock-Up of the Bottom Screen
The main Puzzle Window contains a Block Breaker-esque puzzle that controls the main flow of the game; the player is presented with a 12×12 grid that has 4 different types of blocks, the aim is to break the block by tapping them [with the stylus], blocks may only be broken in numbers of 2 or greater.
When the blocks are broken they are added to the “Pool”, the pool contains all the blocks that are broken and can be used for actions in the top screen, these actions include movement, attacking, magic and special abilities.
As the game progresses, the experience bar at the bottom fills up and the player character advances in level gaining new stats and abilities which are shown in the “Stats” window.
The top screen contains the battlefield. The combat is turnbased with actions requiring certain numbers of points in your “Pool”. Using the d-pad, the player can move/attack/cast spell and use abilities of a selected character, once the player is unable to perform any actions, the turn is ended and the computer controlled opponents have their turn. The battlefield can vary on size depending on environments and number of opponents.
