The Blacksmith's Apprentice - Version 1.5 released

Tue Apr 15, 2008 8:37 pm

"The Blacksmith's Apprentice"

Remember to download BOTH the Game and Audio files. See "Notes" for instructions.
Download Game (version 1.51, 45MB): http://www.mediafire.com/?zmvtn04g0yw
Download Audio (91MB): http://www.mediafire.com/?tgngjtmwmmn
Game uses "OldTypefaces" font, included with game download; place font file in "C:\Windows\Fonts"

Story

At one time, the powerful mage Torbulus was regarded with great respect, awarded the highest honors throughout the kingdoms for his valiant fight in the war against the Orcs. Now, fifteen years later, all magic has been outlawed - and the once proud Torbulus lies imprisoned and shamed by the very people he helped protect. Stripped of his magical abilities by the collar bound around his neck, Torbulus seeks to escape and bring swift vengeance against those who locked him away. Fearing a similar fate as that of Torbulus, mages from every corner of the land have abandoned their talents in favor of simpler, safer lives - lived out in harmless anonymity...

You are William, the son and apprentice of the local blacksmith in Willow Glen. Your quest begins with a simple request by your father - to travel north to the Dwarven Mines and bring back your father's yearly supply of coal.

The story begins when William is given a dire warning, in the form of a letter written in his own handwriting. As William's journey unfolds, a dangerous and violent world of ancient magic opens up around him. His first adventure away from home will soon reveal that he is the unwitting center of an unimaginable plot...

Main Characters

Features

Screenshots

Notes and Credits

Summary of Changes

This game is my own personal project, approximately 30% complete, and the demo has around 10 hours+ of play time. I would like to get feedback on what you liked, didn't like, bugs, play balance, etc. Enjoy!

**Location:** Confirmed. Sending Supplies.

This looks good. I'm gonna try it out ;)

**Location:** World of Darkness

kool - MAP BUG ON 1ST SCREENSHOT...

Looks pretty awsome... I'll try it.

**Location:** New York

It might be wise to include the fonts you used in the game. I'm one of those people who fall under the category of "not having it so I can't see any text."

Wed Apr 16, 2008 12:51 am

Rubicant wrote:

It might be wise to include the fonts you used in the game. I'm one of those people who fall under the category of "not having it so I can't see any text."

Sorry, Rubicant... I updated the main post to include the font needed.

**Location:** New York

Excellent. Gonna play now, be back with impressions.

EDIT
OK, the good: the music, the dialogue, and the attention to detail (birds randomly flying in and out of the screen, nests in trees, butterflies, sound effects of waterfalls, blacksmith shop, etc)

The bad: FETCH QUEST CENTRAL in the beginning, so much so, that I got bored and exited the game for the moment. In a little while I'll continue it.

Thu Apr 17, 2008 1:02 am

I've posted an updated version, with a slight modification. I streamlined the first part, removing one of the more "fetchy" quests. The first 10-15 minutes is still deliberately slower than the rest, as its purpose is to introduce a story that will take place over several years.

**Location:** Sanctum Cay

Well, honestly rubicant. Fetch Quests and chores are generally what protagonists are capable of in the beginning of the game.
I mean, If your father just jogged up to and commanded you to destroy the goblin war band, "I'm sure you can handle it", would not be very realistic.
On the other hand, there really isn't to much reason to waste players time with ridiculous chores when you can deliver the same message with dialog,
or a series of events. Chores are fine, but not to many.

Sun Apr 20, 2008 8:52 pm

I agree. Having the player collect eggs or something would be very boring o.o

But the game looks awesome alrogether.
And its taking its time to download too xD

**Location:** New York

Tansred wrote:

Well, honestly rubicant. Fetch Quests and chores are generally what protagonists are capable of in the beginning of the game.
I mean, If your father just jogged up to and commanded you to destroy the goblin war band, "I'm sure you can handle it", would not be very realistic.
On the other hand, there really isn't to much reason to waste players time with ridiculous chores when you can deliver the same message with dialog,
or a series of events. Chores are fine, but not to many.

I do not believe that at all. There is no reason that any game cannot start out without boring, tedious fetch quests. It doesn't matter if the character is meant to be living a "boring" life in the country working for his father at the local smithery. Having several fetch quests in a row is simply bad design, in my opinion. But as I said, barring that small, easily-fixed problem, the game interests me and clearly the creator pays attention to the small things.

**Location:** California

Your story sounds interesting to me; I also like how you've got those green goblins riding on bulls :)

Sat Apr 26, 2008 5:00 pm

I must be pretty dull but I cannot find a rope ladder. Help please.

Thanks

Sat Apr 26, 2008 5:25 pm

Wow a 10 hour+ demo? I must DL this.

Sat Apr 26, 2008 6:28 pm

diannew wrote:

I must be pretty dull but I cannot find a rope ladder. Help please.

Thanks

You're not dull diannew... There's no rope ladder in the demo, because I haven't defined the area to the East of that bridge yet. I hope you're enjoying it otherwise!

**Location:** Florida

Why make a demo when your game is already 10 hours long? How long exactly are you planning to make this game?

Tue Apr 29, 2008 10:39 pm

Thanks for the info. Finished the demo and look forward to the full game. How much longer until it's released?

irekismaren@juno.com wrote:

diannew wrote:

I must be pretty dull but I cannot find a rope ladder. Help please.

Thanks

You're not dull diannew... There's no rope ladder in the demo, because I haven't defined the area to the East of that bridge yet. I hope you're enjoying it otherwise!

**Location:** lala land, aka nowheresville

sounds interesting.. i too am a fan of a deep twisting plot. and i'm glad someone else is trying to make a long game. downloading it now. let us know how long you plan on making it.

Wed Apr 30, 2008 11:38 pm

diannew wrote:

Thanks for the info. Finished the demo and look forward to the full game. How much longer until it's released?

The first portion of this game (which I'm calling "Book I") took me almost 2 years to make, and the game will probably contain 3 (maybe 4) books. Granted, this was my first project so I had the RMXP learning curve to deal with when I first started. Development has gotten a lot faster, and I have the entire plot defined from start to finish, but it's just me so I don't know when it will be finished. I will post each book as I complete it, but I can't give anyone a real good ETA. (That's one way I'm like Blizzard). As for game length, probably around 30 hours, based on what I've got mapped out.

@Diannew (and anyone else who's finished the demo): I'm really glad you finished it! Wow! I'd love to hear your thoughts on it. What did you like or dislike? Did the plot move at a good pace? How was the play balance?

Sat May 10, 2008 3:12 pm

(5/10/08)
I've made a minor update by adding "Thistle", the family horse to the game. During the first day, William will get to ride Thistle as he completes his various errands. If you've already played through the game and you want to try it out, you'll get to ride Thistle within the first two minutes of play. Otherwise, you haven't missed anything.

This will probably be the last update for a while. I wanted to post what I have now to get feedback, and to make the game better. I'll be focusing on developing new areas and furthering the plot, and I don't want to post an update unless I've made significant progress. I will be checking this thread often for play bugs, balance issues, and to respond to feedback, though. Thanks a bunch to those who have played! :wink:

**Location:** California

Adding Thistle to help you with errands sounds like a nice touch. Getting to ride a horse is a nice bit of icing for those early quests.

Thu May 15, 2008 12:06 am

Fun game, played the demo until William came out of the coma.....one thing tho, I managed to defeat the Salsaren before returning to Willowglen....but I didn't get the ring from her, the Quest was still in my Quest log, and she was still in the cave when I went back a second time.
There is a theory that I wasn't supposed to be able to defeat her at all yet, I did it by poisoning her with a poison arrow, and waiting for her to die 100 +/- hit points at a time, while staying alive by using the revive potions (forgot what they are called already). None of my strikes did any damage (0), but eventually she died, after Arthur and William revived each other as she killed them both one after another repeatedly. Lucky she couldn't kill both of them at once, and I almost lost anyway due to her confuse spell, but got really lucky when she killed the one she confused, instead of the other, or I would have been unable to revive and lost on the next round.
Is this a bug? My boyfriend insists it's a mistake, and poison should not work against a boss enemy like her, and it may take another weapon or item to defeat her, found later in the game.
Anyway, the quest was not solved, and I just wondered if you knew about this.

Fri May 16, 2008 5:45 am

this game is great, I love all the side quests and large areas that you can explore. One thing that bugs me though were the monsters, I never battled and lvled up enough before I went on the first caravan and once I got off it I couldn't go back to train on weaker monsters. So I ended up dying a bunch :(. Awsoem game though!

Fri May 16, 2008 7:06 pm

@WildstormSong:
Wow, I didn't think it was POSSIBLE to defeat the Salaseren with what I gave you in the demo. Good job! As for your question about the ring, I've added a section called "Notes", because there are a handful of quests that you receive in the demo, but you cannot yet finish. Getting Angus' Ring from the Salaseren is one of them. And it wasn't really a "bug" that you could defeat the Salaseren with poison, more of a balance issue that I will definitely correct. Thanks a bunch for the feedback.

Sat May 17, 2008 7:23 am

I think I ran into a problem. I'm at the garrison and the part where you need to make a distraction, I got the key and I got the three rats out of suzy's basement but I still can't unlock the gate, Arthur just says I should get all the rats out of the basement when I try opening it.

Sat May 17, 2008 10:07 pm

5/17/08

I found the bug with unlocking the gate and uploaded the fixed version. Most people won't need to re-download simply because it is VERY unlikely that you will encounter the bug. In case you do, re-downloading MAY not fix it anyway, so if what Nick5674398 described happens to you (above post), just PM or email me with your save game file, and I'll correct it for you. Good find by Nick (though I'm guessing you weren't necessarily looking.) :wink:

Sun May 18, 2008 2:55 am

Man! I just finished the demo. It was awsoem, this game could compete with MOTW, The story and characters are great, the romance between Charis and Will was tied into the story very well, I thought it built upon the story greatly. There weren't any major bugs other than the one I already told you. I want mooore! Can't wait till the next demo

**Location:** Minnesota, USA

I don't know if anyone has mentioned this yet...but the very first building I entered, I could not get back out of. There was no transfer event. Unless the version I downloaded isn't correct, because I did notice there was no introduction.

Mon May 19, 2008 3:47 am

ImmuneEntity wrote:

I don't know if anyone has mentioned this yet...but the very first building I entered, I could not get back out of. There was no transfer event. Unless the version I downloaded isn't correct, because I did notice there was no introduction.

Sorry about that, in the previous version I posted, I forgot to return the "Player Start Location" to where it belonged. :blush:

I've uploaded the fixed version now. Sorry to those people that have to re-download!

**Location:** too sicks oh?

Wow wasn't expecting something so early in the game. In Leiv's town, theres no transfer event to leave the general store. As well as the building right next to player start location, and the 2 building directly below the Inn, the one with the spade and the one next to it.

EDIT: actually ya know what? All the buildings EXCEPT the INN have no zone change to exit a building. OH, and if you go right outside the village in any direction and come right back in, it's suddenly lucious and green summer. Before it was winter... Hmm. As a matter of fact, with the version I have which I'm assuming is the most recent, I can't do anything unless i open it in the editor and add in those zone warp tiles, because the monsters outside the town in any direction kill william in atleast 2 hits, most 1. 10+ hours of gameplay and its so bugged in the first 2 minutes I can't proceed.

Mon May 19, 2008 2:05 pm

@Midir4000:

You must have downloaded the bugged version just before I uploaded the fix (The Player Start Location was in the wrong spot). The problem you described was fixed before you posted about it, but you'll have to re-download.

One question for you: How are you able to open it in the editor? I encrypted the data before posting, so I didn't think that was possible.

The Blacksmith's Apprentice - Version 1.5 released

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