The Catalyst (Sci-Fi/Adventure)[Canceled]

[TheSweetestNightmare]

Note: I apologize, but this game has been canceled. This project might be revisited in the future when I have a better computer and more experience.

The Catalyst is a story my friend and I have been working on for years now, and after discovering Renpy, we decided to turn it into a Visual Novel. The story has evolved many times over the years. The original story was basically scrapped because it didn't have a good plot. The Catalyst is my first Visual Novel. The game centers around three girls, Yuki, Iona, and Copper. There is a story mode for each of them.

The setting is after World War III, which was a war of science. This war left everything in ruins, and even after the trees and grass grew back and the sky returned to blue, humans are still a dying race. They hide behind the walls of their cities for fear that the mutants would finish the job. The mutants appeared during the war. It is believed that their DNA was altered during this time, and since then, they have multiplied.

The City of St. Alexander is especially cautious of Hybrids. They claim that each and every one of them have lost their human minds and have even enlisted the help of Hunters, like Iona to protect them. The problem is, the hybrids don't seem to be as the city claims. Yuki, a rebellious Hybrid, wishes to prove once and for all that she and her friends are not the beasts the city claims to be. She has created a rebel group called the Beast, stationed just outside of the city. When an anonymous letter is found, The Beast begins a new mission.

A more detailed(and less confusing) description is posted on the website.

Click here to download the Demo

Screenshots:

[gekiganwing]

About Yuki, Iona, and Copper:

* How much do their stories overlap? Just a little (each one is just barely aware of the other girls' actions), a lot (they meet and team up), or somewhere in the middle?
* Does each girl have her own point of view narration?
* Would you consider all three to be equal main characters?

On your Story page, you said, "To win a battle, you must be quick. Press the corresponding key to the letter that appears on screen. If you are using your element, you must fill up the bar on screen of you could make a deadly mistake."

I'm not sure if I like timed choices or quick time events. They kinda make sense in action scenes. But they don't seem to require much thought or strategy. Instead of asking the player to plan their next move, they ask the player to press X to not die. But it's your project, so create what you want. Especially if you like this game mechanic, or if it's relevant to your story and goals.

[TheSweetestNightmare]

About Yuki, Iona, and Copper:

* How much do their stories overlap? Just a little (each one is just barely aware of the other girls' actions), a lot (they meet and team up), or somewhere in the middle?
* Does each girl have her own point of view narration?
* Would you consider all three to be equal main characters?

On your Story page, you said, "To win a battle, you must be quick. Press the corresponding key to the letter that appears on screen. If you are using your element, you must fill up the bar on screen of you could make a deadly mistake."

I'm not sure if I like timed choices or quick time events. They kinda make sense in action scenes. But they don't seem to require much thought or strategy. Instead of asking the player to plan their next move, they ask the player to press X to not die. But it's your project, so create what you want. Especially if you like this game mechanic, or if it's relevant to your story and goals.

First, thanks for replying to this topic. ^w^

*I would say somewhere in between. Since the hunters are hired by the church to capture and/or kill the Hybrids, they are actually enemies, but they do have some of the same goals and the stories do overlap.
*Yes, each girl has her own narration. This way, the player can get to know each one of them separately.
*Yes, I would say so, but although they are equal, they are on different sides, or rather, Iona and Yuki are. Copper is neutral.

As for the battles, I'm currently experimenting with different ways to fight. That is just what the battles are like now, but it might change later. When a battle starts, it will tell the player to either aim, dodge, or use their elemental powers. Aiming usually isn't timed, and all you have to do is move the mouse around a black screen until you see the target, then you click to shoot. The dodging games are the only hard parts of the game, and you could compare this to DDR in a way. A letter floats on the screen and if you press it in time, you dodge or possibly attack. If not, you lose a bit of health. I'm thinking of making it to where there is always a way to skip this part, like a choice you could make to keep you from having to play this part. Either that, or I could change these parts to simple RPG battles like the old Final Fantasy games, which wouldn't be time-sensitive. The elemental attacks are simple to complete. All you must do is press the x button repeatedly until you fill the element bar at the top. I hope none of these battles are too hard, but I just wanted the game to be more interactive. ^^'

[TheSweetestNightmare]

______________________________________________________________________Update:

The Catalyst is slowly transforming into more of an RPG game. RPG battles will be added in place of the previous, less interactive mini games. The battle menu has already been designed and the abilities and items are being planned out. The previous elemental attack will be used as a special move within these battles, and the same rules apply to these attacks; you must fill the bar before time runs out. Don't worry, though. The time doesn't go by too quick. We still plan to add other mini games, but most or all of them will be optional.

The battles will be fought using a group of characters, not just one. If you attack or defend, you will switch to the next character, but using items doesn't take up a turn. Each character will have their own abilities. The more powerful the ability, the longer you have to charge up. Some of the abilities include stealing from the enemy, attacking, defending, using items, and special attacks like Bloodlust and Roar.

The FPS inspired mini games will still be there as a side-quest and possibly as a way to start a battle.

[Ferdokki]

I think the character design/artwork is really unique, I like it! =)

[TheSweetestNightmare]

I think the character design/artwork is really unique, I like it! =)

Thank you very much! ^w^

[TheSweetestNightmare]

______________________________________________________________________Update:

There are now three more screenshots on the website. Two are gameplay updates and one is a first look at Copper's Story Mode. RPG battles and shops have been added and the quick menu has a new look, although it can't be seen on the screenshots.

[TheSweetestNightmare]

______________________________________________________________________Update:

An updated Demo is now available. You can download it here.

[TheSweetestNightmare]

School has been keeping me very busy, so I apologize for the delay. This is also my first game, and I keep changing things. Almost all characters have been drawn and a few characters got re-drawn and a couple of songs have been added to the soundtrack including new battle themes. The thing that really keeps me from progressing is the code itself. I keep re-writing the whole thing because I find better ways to do certain things or add things to the gameplay. Again, I apologize to anyone who might be waiting for this game. ^^'

[Reikun]

Oh, it sounds like this game is going through quite a few iterations, huh? Take your time since you don't have a release deadline or anything I was just stopping by to let you know I played the demo linked in your first post and had a lot of fun ^___^ I can't decide if Iona's or Copper's side of the story was my favorite... but maybe I like Iona better by a little bit haha. Anyway! Looking forward to updates and the final release! Please keep us posted.

[TheSweetestNightmare]

I'm so sorry about the very late reply, but as an engineering student, I have a lot to do. I have been making a little progress, but the computer I used to compose music and draw sprites and backgrounds suddenly stopped working. I hope to fix it soon, but in the meantime, I might have enough material to put together, and that's what I will do throughout my free time. I have even created some animated scenes before the computer stopped working(5 small animations per main character to be exact), but, unfortunately, I can't get them to work on my mac. Even if I could, I don't know what to do about voice acting. So far, I have gone through three broken computers and now have a mac, but I am persistent. I will try to keep you updated!

[TheSweetestNightmare]

Oops! It's been a good while, hasn't it! I'm afraid I have some bad news. Due to constant technical difficulties along with story and programing problems (and life in general), I can't complete this game! My attempt at completing The Catalyst has gone on for a good while now and I honestly just had horrible luck the whole time. Life got in the way and I can't even remember where exactly I was going with this story, which caused the project as a whole to just be confusing. I realized that it is too much trouble to try and make a RPG through Renpy as my first project as well. I may try to revisit this project in the future when I have more experience and detangle the confusing story line into one that actually makes sense. I apologize to anyone who has been patiently waiting for this game to be released.

[MimirollCookie]

Hello TheSweetestNightmare!
It's a shame that your project is cancelled.
But I have a quote for you:
Start small, dream big.

[TheSweetestNightmare]

Thank you, MimirollCookie. That's great advice to live by! Luckily, I'm not all that sad about this project, which I admit is a failure. Through my frustration with this game, I've been practicing drawing better character sprites, backgrounds, ect, and ended up starting a new project in the process... I guess I'll mention that I might have good news soon. I'll probably make a new forum topic for this new project sometime very soon, but I hope and pray that I have much better luck with this one. Haha I Guess I found out how to work with computers that are almost completely broken. I'm also considering releasing the backgrounds and some music in this failed project for lemmasoft users to use in their VNs.