A player sits down to play his favorite Role-Playing Game, “Final Fantasy,” for the last time. It had grown stale, what was there to do at his point in time other than tasks of small value. As he sat down, he saw something, a brand-new game, your game. My name is Jesse Vega, and I will be giving you 10 tips on how to make the ultimate RPG.
1 – A short and descriptive title
If a player had to choose between a game called, “Knight simulator, quest for the people,” and “Yorland,” they would choose the more descriptive title. Yorland means nothing to an outsider Knight simulator, however, it gives you an idea of the game, what you would be doing, and who you would do it for. A good title should not only fit in a few words, but also describe what the game entails for the player.
2 – Creative Premises
Similarly, to how a title can make or break a game, the premise of a game can as well. If you created a game that is the same as another game, why would anybody bother playing yours? Your game should not just take what is on the market already, but also build upon that with your own ideas and unique twists.
3 – Understand your market
It is hard to argue that RPGs are not a fun genre of game, you can play RPG and play as a sheep with godly powers that shoots rainbows out of its ears, and that is normal. Yet, as much as RPGs are fun, there are a lot of them. Even if your RPG is different, understand that it could be drowned out in a sea of games with a similar genre.
4 – Know your player base
As it stands, RPG players are either the most committed players in gaming, or the laziest. There is hardly an in-between, and as such, you need to accommodate both types of players; it is great to have tons of side quests, with many benefits to them, but those side quests should never impede the progress towards the player completing the game. Players should only have to do the bare minimum to get an ending, to see the game conclude, but there is nothing wrong with an incentive for them to do so.
5 – Downloadable content
In the gaming world, there seems to be multiple arguments, either “Developers should release a completed game on the get-go,” “DLC should always be free; why am I paying for an update,” “If the DLC is not free you will not get my money,” ETC. It is a debated topic, and the consensus seems to simply be that DLC should come in the base game/price. While it is your community, understand it is also your game, and while they can complain about it all they like, there will always be somebody out there excited about DLC. It is your choice whether you want to humor the niche that supports paid DLC, want to please the masses and release it free, or not want to release DLC at all.
6 – Online Play
Making an online game Is a delicate process, when doing so, there are many more implications than just, “What would the online game be?” Consider if you want the game to be online, and after that if you want players to communicate, voice chat is unmediatable, and text chat is easily taken out of context. Then there’s gameplay, what does being online do for the game? Making an RPG (or any game) online should be handled with utmost care, and if you need help with that, read my article at [link of website].
7 – Combat
An RPG without combat is as sad as having a simulator game that does not accurately simulate anything, a known component removed without any care. Your combat should depend on your type of RPG, in a challenging game, your combat should be open world, 3d, chaotic. In a skillful game, it may be better to do turn based combat, like a chess game. Your game, and thus your combat, heavily relies on the type of game; if you learn this, you can make the Ultimate combat system.
8 – Enemies
If the player begins a game doing 25 damage, and enemies have 100 health points, it will take 4 hits to defeat that enemy. Say the player is now around 10 hours in and has gear that does 250 damage, they decide to return to their starting area, and see the first enemy now has 1000 health points. There must be a significant feeling of progress, if a couple of hours ago an enemy would have been an ordeal to fight, that same enemy should not be a problem anymore.
9 – Game over and continuing
When the player’s character is defeated, and there is no one to save them, it is considered a game over. A game over should be a wakeup call for the player, you don’t have good enough gear, or this enemy is simply too powerful at the current moment in time, but it shouldn’t be the end of the world. The player should be able to replay at an area close to the point of their defeat (in a more difficult game, the items they used in battle may still be gone) and easily retreat to a local town or other hub space. Game over would have meant you have to restart from the beginning a while ago, but the term as evolved to simply mean you ran out of health points.
10 – The Big Bad
The villain, the main antagonist, not much has to be said about them. They are usually the driving force for the entire game, the thing you are fighting against, so there are certain criteria they should meet. Your Antagonist should be intimidating, you shouldn’t look at him and laugh, they should be a difficult fight, as the main fuel for conflict the fight itself shouldn’t be a cakewalk, they should have a façade, some games add this with a second phase while others have them be a main character right under your nose. Overall, your villain should be strong, intimidating, and deceiving, to home in, this is the bad guy.
With these 10 Tips, you will become unstoppable in your path to create the Ultimate RPG! Always remember that these are mostly my opinions, with that being said, they should still be a tremendous help if you have no idea what you’re doing.