starlessumbra

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Download Fixed

Hi! It seems rpgmaker.net's downloads are still down. I fixed the link on the downloads page now so you can give that a try if you haven't yet.

The steam page was also approved, and though release is a ways away it would mean the world to me if you wishlisted! Thanks.

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a bit late, but... 2023 recap video!

Still working on this. Please enjoy.

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Hey hey! I'm really impressed by this game and its artstyle! But the discord link here on this website doesn't seem to work... I would love to learn more about this all from other people who are involved

This should be fixed now! URL is here. Apologies for the late reply, but looking forward to seeing you there!

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More Questions Answered

The game has pretty nice OST, And art at least from what i've seen and heard off of Opera GX, Did you do all this yourself or did you get some help?

Thank you! Assets at this point are very much a combination of my original graphics and sound, royalty-free resources, some artwork done by my wife, and assets commissioned for the game. I am trying to get out of the habit of calling this a solo project, because the truth is I can't really do all of it myself. I'm focusing on content over polish, so writing a somewhat cohesive narrative from start to finish is the focus. I have and will continue to hire freelance help for sprite work, portraits, etc., but that all currently comes out-of-pocket.

With the time SU has taken to release and stuff, will the game, Will it ever be launched on a different platform? Like Itch.io or Steam or even Epic games, maybe different platforms if you'd like (i don't think rpgmaker games can be ported, probably would have to rewrite the whole code in a language like C# or something)

One of my sneaky little tricks comes from a closeness to the classic RPG Maker community: this isn't actually an RPG Maker project anymore. I do try to closely emulate the RPG Maker 2003 style, mostly out of nostalgia, but the game is written in Gamemaker so porting is relatively painless. Confirmed platforms are currently PC (Steam, itch, anywhere I can get) and Nintendo Switch.

What hurdles did you come across that made you restart the development of the game?

The first is primarily technical. RPG Maker 2003 (at the time) couldn't natively export to non-windows platforms. Even on windows support felt waning. I remember the game would crash if I had two GPUs running and the game did this awful anti-aliasing on windows 7. Everything felt dated. (Aside, easyrpg fixes a lot of this! But I feel this ship has already sailed...)

The second is graphical. Starless Umbra started in 2002 before indie games were even a thing. It was common practice to rip assets from other RPGs. And while that did teach me about palette usage, effective map creation, and pixel art overall, the result is the product started to feel like a mixtape of some of my favorite game assets, of varying degrees of quality. Few of which I could call my own.

The final reason is the writing. I started the game as a child, and though I did my best to revise the story as I matured, revisions on the story began to take its toll on the narrative. Interest in the story came mostly through a mystery I was explaining to players that I myself hadn't quite figured out. Overall, there's a lot of cringy moments in these older iterations of the game, but in those moments they felt very genuine to me. It wasn't until I took a step back and approached the narrative from the top-down did I at least have some semblance of a roadmap for a story I wanted to tell.

Is there something that you've been unable to do that still sucks to do/hard to do for the game?

The writing is still difficult for me. Typically, what I plan for an act goes through a series of revisions, some even requiring multiple rewrites if the story doesn't meet the desired pacing or tone. I try to minimize this, but often it takes a lot of trial-and-error.

Striking a balance in the combat system between something that feels like a JRPG, isn't boring, and doesn't require twitchy/quick reactions like most action games is also challenging. People come into the game with certain preconceived notions, eg., "I don't want this enemy to hit me", but in reality by moving away from it and not attacking you're letting its abilities recharge. Trading damage is okay because as long as you survive the encounter your health is replenished. Allowing players to understand that and make combat engaging has been difficult.

How long would you say till SU launches as a whole game?

I'm notoriously bad at giving estimates. (Heroes of Umbra's initial estimate was 6-12 months: it took almost 6 years!) At the pace I'm going without any help it'll be another 3-5 years, but I hope I can trim that down. This is primarily because the game is a hobby project. I also have a full-time job, a two-year-old daughter, and generally try to follow some semblance of a fitness regimen to keep me busy otherwise.

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So, in general my eye have catched some really nice looking artwork in GXC and the tags #rpg #actions. I say to myself: "hmm, let's check it out - I really like jRPGs and anime stuff. Maybe it will be good?" And to be honest, I'm very glad I clicked it. :D Nowadays there is very few 2D games like this. The combat system is awesome, it makes the play very dynamic. I only played the game for about 10-15min but already I can tell that I love it! <3 Is there some way I can contribute to the project?

Thanks so much for the kind message! I do not have a way to preorder or anything yet, but I do have a ko-fi for one-off donations. Hope you enjoy the game! https://ko-fi.com/zexyu

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Just to let you know, today I played through your demo on GXC and it's great. I clicked through out of curiosity but got absorbed and finished it. I hope you get to tell the whole story.

I'm so glad you played through it! Looking forward to releasing more. Thanks so much for your message. :)

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Progress Check-In

Hello! Things are moving. I've been staring at a blog draft since November. Some noteworthy things have happened since the last demo, but any time I have to write I typically spend working on the project. From here on I'll focus on more bite-sized updates, mostly for accountability and keeping you up to speed on the game progress

I got a lot of great feedback from the demo. Thanks a bunch! Feature-wise it's not quite where I want, but it's a good starting point. I don't want to dump features for the sake of features anymore, but I do think more variety around character progression/customization, enemies, and things to do in battle might go a long way. Details to come on those features down the road, once they're a bit more solidified.

Feedback, thank you!

Speaking of demos, the demo release picked up some attention around the internet. Here on RMN I was pleased to hear I won The kentona Award for Outstanding Achievement in the Field of Excellence. This is extra special to me because the 2k3 version has been nominated in the Misaos a few times, but its never formally won anything. In the Gamemaker community, SU was selected for "Best Puzzles" in a GXC Community Showcase event. Lastly, I started a twitter account specifically for game updates, and the rebuilt swimming & diving system gained a bit of traction.

Updates

So what's new since the last demo? For the sake of organization, I've broken the game down into 5 rough acts. The July demo consists of a rough Act 1. Act 2 will triple the length of the game by adding 4 more dungeons, a new village hub area, and plenty more minigames/puzzles. Drafts of the core cutscenes are all written, with about 40% of them actually implemented. The first two dungeons are mapped out with two of my favorite mechanics from the 2k3 version making a return. I'm currently tackling dungeon 3 as I continue to implement more scenes.

At a high-level, that leaves more cutscenes, two more dungeons, a whole slew of monsters to sprite and implement, a new gameplay feature, some minigames, and tons of balancing left. I'm bad at giving dates but if I can finish this by the end of summer I'll say I'm at a good pace. We'll see, though. Please cheer for me.

Thanks so much for reading. Take care!

Key Stats 99 Maps 333kb Database (skills, cutscenes, player data, etc in plaintext)

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Hi, I'm Aleksander from Norway. I love your game. Is there any other games by same the developers? I coudn't find who developed the game. - Aleksanderbest@icloud,com

Hi Aleksander! I appreciate you checking out my game. I released Heroes of Umbra in 2018, and if you want to dig deep into the vaults, older versions of Starless Umbra are available on rpgmaker.net. Thanks for contacting me. :)

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I just realized ALL my screenshots are ancient. Going to post more stuff here. These are from the demo I released last July. Thanks for all the wonderful feedback and suggestions. It means a lot to me.

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I played your game back in 2011 and we talked about it a bit. I even posted some glitches I found during the rail segment. Idk if you remember but I remembered your game and I'm glad you're still working on it. I hope to see it completed I really want to stream it. Keep up the good work it's inspiring to see.

So glad to see you haven’t forgotten about this! Thanks for checking in. I hope you get a chance to stream it. Slowly but surely I’m getting there! (I released a demo in July 2021 if you missed it.)

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Hi! How are you? Hope you're well! I've been chugging away and have a few updates to share with you. Dungeon Maps

I've made some progress on the first dungeon area. It's smallish in size, with 6-7 mostly straightforward maps and the revival of the character switching mechanics from SU2k3. Paired with character switching is another JRPG staple: pushable blocks and floor switches. I felt these were a safe starting point. As development continues I'll add more mechanics to play with as well.

Ambience and lighting are missing; those will come later on (after a demo I hope!)

WIP Menus

I've got a small framework in place to handle menus, which are basically a collection of windows under the hood. Some windows can have child windows which adds for some neat logical grouping. This isn't very far along but it seems to work well. Again, I'm borrowing a lot of design here from 2k3 and some classic JRPGs.The text is really ugly! I use bitmap fonts, and GM's anti-aliasing is a bit too much, so at some point later I'll probably end up manually anti-aliasing + outlining the larger stylized fonts.Battle SystemI've added the focus system from SU2k3, where monsters prioritize players to target based on how much damage they've dealt. This will be integral to planning out battles and mitigating damage. Monsters can now have multiple skills, each with some priority associated with it.JSON DatabasesCharacter, Monster, Skills, Items, etc are stored and loaded from JSON files. I might make a client to modify these on the go in the future, but for now they keep swaths of game data out of code and organized a bit.Up nextA boss battle, save/load data, the first major town, and more menu screens. Thanks for reading. I hope you have a great day.

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Some cutscene/battle system work from the past few weeks. 

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I've followed SU for years... as far back as when it was known as DragonHeart. Great to see some movement and progress on this project, I look forward to seeing what comes next!

Comments like these really help keep me going (maybe more than you realize!) Thanks so much, I’m happy to be working on it again.

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Here’s the map from Sunday’s “The Joy of Mapping” stream. Check out the facebook page if you’d like to join me next time. Hope you have a great week.

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Have you tried looking at Godot while you're trying different game engines? I've found it really good for 2D stuff, although I've never tried making an RPG in it (plus it's also fully open source which is really cool).

I’ve watched a few tutorials but haven’t played with it beyond that. It does sound good for 2D as well from what I’ve heard.