Nice try. You did some things pretty well, like the text above NPCs. And I was a bit surprised to see a patcher, as most newbies are far from making this work. However, there's a lot of awkward bugs and it just doesn't look smooth.
I have a few suggestions:
- Learn about sprite origins. Think about it this way; If you swing your arm in real life, your feet don't move, although your arm extends outward. The same concept is similar for sprites. Even if the character attacks and therefore needs a wider sprite, we want the origin to stay at the same relative position on the character so it doesn't look like they moved. Therefore, your sprite origin on all character sprites should be at the bottom of the feet, between the legs. If you do this, I promise the animation will look a little less awkward.
- Don't worry about overlapping invisible objects. I noticed the character often walks above the ground, and I suspect this is because you made a "ground" object that's 32x32, and you simply stacked them on top of each other. Reduce the grid y snap in the room editor and fine tune the placement of the ground so the character actually walks on it and not above it. Believe me, this is the first thing I noticed after making a character and it's a sure sign of an amateur game creator.
- Fix the level limit on quests. I reached an npc and then said yes to accept a quest, only to find "you need to be level 6", and it still spawned the mobs anyway. I would suggest when the window pops up to begin with, rather than ask if they want a quest, check their level FIRST. That way they can't even say yes to a quest they aren't high enough for.
- Use terminology that suits the game. The words "register" and "login" imply a server (online) database, when in fact it is stored right in the folder. It would be better to just have a "create account", and then have an account list where you choose which account to use. Also, the word "settings" is typo'd as "sittings"
- Add a next and previous button on the NPC dialogue screens. It's confusing to have a keyboard shortcut, but nothing to tell me on screen that there is any more dialogue.
- Encrypt the passwords or get rid of them. If the purpose of a password is so that other people who use your computer can't use your account, then it's very counter-productive to have it stored in a "login" config file that one can easily open and see the passwords. Look up "encryption" on here and learn how to make it more secure. If you were just going for Maple-likeness and you're not really concerned with people using your account, then get rid of passwords altogether. It is kind of silly for a local game.
Also, one more thing... I know that probably your first response is going to be "the final version will be multiplayer", but I would suggest
do not attempt multiplayer/online yet. You have some working framework, but you still have a lot of things that need adjustment and improvement. You definitely aren't ready for multiplayer yet. I'm not trying to be harsh, but I'm 19, I've been using GM for 7 years, and I just started using multiplayer a year ago. It's a bit complicated and just not really practical for someone who's obviously inexperienced with GM.
That being said, I hope you will continue to practice using GM, increasing your skills, until one day you will be able to do something like that. It may seem like a slow climb right now, but knowledge is the way to become a better programmer. Look for all kinds of examples and tutorials you can learn from, and before you know it you'll be saying, "Wow, I can't believe how much I've improved." Good luck to you.
P.S. "Female" is a class? LOL XD That is awesome.
Edited by Funk E. Gamez, 31 July 2012 - 12:22 PM.
