Facesets

I also don't like new portraits, Altair seems bit depressive now.
I don't like what happened to Julia it just spoils the game, speech
of generals Aries and Gerovitus about war, what Aries tells Justine in front of White gate of Seraphia, how Glen talks at bunker at White gate.In previous version characters seemed more warm and kind now they are a bit darker, there is parade after war.Previous version seemed like stagnant logic but now I
don't like this version.Also I didn't like real world characters in
previous version like star wars troopers in fhorestain presidential palace it breaks immersion in game world.

Well. At the moment I am battling the first of four fiends. The change in battle is to be felt- I like that!

I like the new version, although there are a few things I need to commonet on now. I have to admit Glen seems to have had more character in the previous version and I think some players maybe somewhat disappointed in him as he is now. He seems to have lost something that made him attractive in 3.13 Although I love the fact that you have given more choice options- very good! That way it has more sense of development and a sense of forming Glen as the player goes, at least in certain ways.
Still, I think the way choices worked in 3.13 -less direct- was better. But putting thoughts and doubts aside, I find myself accepting and liking the new change quite a bit.

Drakeor is fine as ever as is Justin. Meredith and Sammy I don't think you could ever make them unlikable to me, they are still very fine characters.

I just have doubts as to whether the addition to Julia;s backstory was necesary. I think I liked her more as a helpless child but one willing to learn her ways and gain experience. What you have added in this version...I'm just not at all certain where it;s not an exaggeration.

Oh yes, Vetu, I believe, has retained his charm, which makes me glad and Brad is more ruthless-I reckon it's more suitable to him than the softness he tended to display in 3.13.

I am yet to see the reminaing characters.

as for villains, both Altairs are fine to me and I have no complaint about facesets. They work just well for me.

I am immensely enjoying what you have released. Storywise, it has expanded, towards my great joy, and I like how you try to explain and include the character's backstories into the plot, such as Sammy's or Glen's. As I say the only question mark so far is Julia's explanation to Drakeor and Sammy.

As much as I personally find myself enjoying the expansiosn and additions and changes, I'm just one player. Maybe you should think whether you really want everything to be explained neatly or want some things to retain an aura of ambiguity about them. Maybe some things are better left this way?
But personally I did like, for instance that you included Sammy's memories in Eridwell, it added to the story. I can't wait till |I get to see the new arena.

As for the cut scenes, i liked the added scenes in the camp and Seraphia Castle. I didn't get any bad impressions about those scenes but you know..igt might have been a good idea to add the possibility of them helping the defenders AND, if the rewards at Valiantide base will still work the same way thus increase the limit of rewards for the rescued allies. I can't recall how many you could rescue max in the previous release I know it stacked for every replay in Game + mode. If you havd doubts whether this would destroy the balance, you could always limit the number of allies saved at the Valiantide hideout so that numbers remained close. But this is just a suggestion based on what I have seen so far, when I"m not even sure if you kept the rewards system at the valiantide base in the later part of the game.


All in all, personally, I love it so far and I'm not disappointed. I m in awe of the effort you put into this release and I"m likely to keep this version stored on partioned disk somewhere just in case you decide to make further changes. This along with 3.13 version are likely to remain my favourite releases.

Once I have any more thoughts further into the game I will be happy to post them here. Will keep eyes open on any other bugs that might slip through. I like exploring but being familiar with this world helps a lot too.

Thanks for your hard work and for once more giving me the joy of playing through this rich-and now revamped and changed- world

Best regards,

Altair's new face graphic was originally designed for RMVX, so by converting it down to RM2k3 size some detail was lost and it also isn't consistent with the style of the other graphics. If nobody likes it I'll just switch him back to the Rm2K anime portrait.

Why do you say Julia's background spoils the game? I can agree perhaps it's too much too soon and should have been revealed more gradually, but I had specific windows where I could make plot changes and had to insert them there. Her Temple of Aurora dialog sets up the event at Tiro Amicus, but then Sammy's scenario doesn't have much more room for her development. After the war you can take any heroes you want and it becomes really tough to do any character development.

Her background is adult themed, as are many of the new additions, and it sounds like this is what you don't like. This is a risk I took with the new additions, but these are the kinds of stories I want to tell and games I want to make. You throw an attractive, young, naive woman into a war with a bunch of male soldiers what do you think would really happen?

It's war between Seraphia and the Cirigoth and their Tyr-Anox allies. The White Gate is breached and the capital is being burned and pillaged, do you really think Justin and the others aren't going to kill as many enemies as they can? They're certainly not going to swerve out of the way of the Cirigoth while riding through the enemy lines on horseback to safety.

Aries is a soldier and lives for battle, killing and destruction is what he knows and motivates him to continuing living. Why should he have sympathy for the weak and wish to do anything other than annihilate them with cruel malice? You don't have to agree with Glen's remarks in the bunker, but that's his view and understanding of war. It's an ugly truth, but a truth nonetheless as he sees it.

Prior to this version almost everyone is either an unflappable, perfectly moral hero or an evil, stereotypical villain. This is not only extremely unrealistic, but also I find it incredibly boring and uninteresting. Characters with faults and more complex or mature motivations and personal histories are far more compelling, at least to me. The only reason they were so bland and cliche in the previous versions is because I never put any time or planning into the characters since that was not my original focus when creating the first versions of Everlong.

Certainly there are plenty of people who prefer their fantasy more black and white, more predictable, less dark, and without mature themes. For me that's simply too unrealistic and starts to destroy the illusionary world of the fantasy rather than support it. For example, that's my one problem with Tolkein: there is no talk of sex in Middle Earth. Sorry, but sex is part of life and humanity, and this is why I think George R.R. Martin's work is superior fantasy writing to Tolkein's. You're not wrong if you prefer otherwise, but as a result you'll like the older versions of Everlong more than the new one, at least story and character wise. Some people don't even like heavy dialog in RPG's, they want a game not a book. But I have to make what I want to and what I like.

To be perfectly honest though, much of the dialog in the old version (and quite a bit in this version I didn't have a chance to rewrite) is absolutely horrific. It's total cliche, or droning plot synopsis, or using inappropriate modern language and slang. That kind of dialog adds nothing to the story or characters, it only shows how little imagination and effort when into writing it.

By the way, about the storm troopers and other such cameos, if I were starting over I would have never created those. That kind of stuff is from the very first version when Everlong was still a Final Fantasy fane game and was not to be taken seriously on any level. I'd remove it all if I had the time, but that would require rewriting the dialog for all the NPCs in towns and such, which would take forever.

Sorry about the really long answer, but I wanted to give you a good explanation since these plot changes are the crux of the new version. Also the Expirius graphic is from Final Fantasy Dissidia. It's a modified artwork of Golbez, and since Expirius originally used the FF4 Golbez graphic and was based on him, it only seemed right to come full circle.

The battles simply seem to be faster and somewhat more dynamic although there might be some balancing issues aboutwhich I'd like to take some time before posting since I like to try different approaches before saying something is or is not hard.

About Seraphia..I see and understand. Well, it can do wothout it as it is. Maybe you will have the time sometime in the future if you still decided to make some more improvements to the game (I hope you are having fun with this at least. I know it's hard work since I"m trying to make a game of my own right now. I;ve been playing lots of these rpg maker games lately and I'm happy with Everlong as it does have the old-school sensibility that most of, ay rpg vx games do not seem to have with a few exceptions. But that's just by the way. )

As for choices, you are right- the balance is hard to strike and some degree of a comprimise is necessary. In this case, Glen does lose something which in the previous version was there and which made this character more balanced over all. I thin I mentioned that I actually liked how things worked out for him and of of the player's choices in the end. It felt right. But..
seeing that through this loss the gaemplay and the character gains something else, I'd say the balance is there as much as it was possible to have it. He had to lose something to gain something else, right nd yes it feels loike the player is more in control while in 3.13 Glen was more of the chld of his creator.
I'm actually quite happy with both possibilities although I will tell no lie when I say that for me personally 3.13 Glen was a bit better and the ending was plausible.

What I mean by exaggeration...It is, as you put it, too much and too soon. I thought that scene was too abrupt and so I had to cringe at it. And altogether this doesn't help Julia too much....especially if it's all that there i to it. .

She could use more depth and by the way you mentioned Willis has been changed-- I sure hope so! I thought Vixen, Willis and Julia were the three characters who need it. As for Drakeor, yes, he could use something but you know not everything has to be too realistic, either. If you try and make things too realistic, things might also lose their depth and integrity. This is why I think that sometimes you have things confused. The fact what happened to julia in this version doesn't give her more plausibility, unless it would be developed as a separate sub-quest, which is impossible. The fact I like Drakeor, Keen (who also feels "in character due to his well-written dialogic parts), Vetu and Julian also has to do with the fact that their appearance is so well-woven into the game and very well-timed. Tey may not be entirely realistic but they are convincing and elaborate enough for me to ejoy their different styles. Not everyone in every game needs to be cynical, closed and suffused with doubts (though that was part of Glen;s charm and the charm of him opening up and responding to either girl, ever so tentatively through player choices.) and Drakeor has his own charm as a member of a noble and ancient race..and who, I'm sure, is all too familar with common problems- corruption, greed, thirst for power, with such a race and such a member you can do just about anything, if you really wanted to do something more. A Drakeor tainted by some negative drives or deception could possibly make him more complex, I'd agree. or maybe a neurotic Drakeor on the verge of madness, contemplating in shakespearan fashion what in fact is "nobler in the mind". To take the trials or rebel against them and be more violent than he's supposed to and thus cross some lines? Draonoir also seemed to me a good field for a conflict between tradition and more modern sensibilities... But would it really be Drakeor anymore, I wonder.

Everlong is a good and rich story with a good od-school sensibility I miss in a few more recent games of this type...especially when following the success of Amaranth games suddenly everyone is trying to squeeze money out of these rpg maker games. Among these, Everlong shines as a labour of effort and dedication. It's so rich, in fact, that I'm sure you will always find something you as a creator might not be too happy about or players will not be happy about. Not everything can be changed, though. Everlong is already as varied as rarely any game, and because pld ersions are kept for sownload (luckily), it's possible to trace the changes and the evolution. Which for me is becoming fun of its own accord.

Hopefully, you will not see some of my comments as excessively assuming, as it is not my intention. I am merely wondering as with Everlong (which does inspire the imagination and makes for instance myself think of alternative solutions out of which stories could actually be bred - the game's another- although arguably subjective plus- the reception of any game does depend on the player) things could still go much much further, it is true and in so many different directions. But then it would require cut-scenes, maps, re-coding to keep integrity within the game.

Oh..the only thing I really disliked in 3.13 was Osama. Too obvious and the head somehow wasn't in tune with anything. The reference and idea were a great idea, but the execution, I still think, could have used some polish there. Other references, to even other genres, were fine and much better integrated.

Thanks for reading this, I'll try to kee things short the next time.
Best regards and good luck.

DJC, have you ever thought of just moving on from Everlong?

I mean, it was pretty decent from its days as an RPG Maker 2000 game, and recent upgrades have only made it better. But surely there's only so much you can work on a project before it seems to be irredeemably flawed.

I know that you put a lot of work into this and that starting a whole new project would take an enormous amount of time and effort, but maybe starting afresh and using everything you've learned making Everlong to make a game that is better than Everlong in every way would be more rewarding than continuing to tweak Everlong until you've fixed every small problem in the game. Nothing is ever perfect, and I'm afraid that if you add too much stuff on you risk taking away what makes Everlong Everlong (see Shadows of Evil: Wings of Time for a good example of this).

(I haven't actually played the new beta because I am waiting for a bug-free version, so I don't have anything to say about the story or the facesets. Sorry)

I agree DJC spent enormous time on Everlong.Author of Laxius power simply
move on to next game after completing one, he never even released patch for
Laxius power 3 to fix bug that prevented nonimported game to finish main quest.
I also agree nothing can be perfect, even to best of best games some flaws can be found.
I think Everlong lacks mystery ( Laxius power used that a lot).In Everlong
everything is known/revealed and that might be reason why old game looks boring.
Mystery makes player curious and motivated to keep going to find out
what is really happening, it can make game more interesting while replaying
and unanswered questions for next game.