VantaPsy DEMO V3.3.2 Update Log

So, if you’ve been paying attention, you may notice that since DEMO v3 has been uploaded, there have been several updates. I didn’t want to bring any attention to them until I was comfortable talking about them, so here we go. We’re going to go through some updates, but most importantly, I want to discuss things that I am aware of and am going to work on in the future.

Recent Updates v3.0 to v3.3.2

Visual/Audio

• Animation, sprites, portraits and general visual fixes (Mostly found in the Alternative Route of the game)
• Music and audio either not playing during scenes where they’re supposed to, or not changing when transitioning from areas
• Optional areas have better transition animations (They’re optional, that’s why I disregarded them previously)
• Better transition animations overall. Mostly walking under some of the map, rather than over it (The background is pre-rendered)
• Grammar and spelling mistakes, as well as rewording certain things. There’s probably a ton that I’ve missed, but I’ll get to it eventually

Menus, UI, Navigation

• Some fixes to make the UI more legible and navigable (This may not be noticeable really)
• Most of the work went into Gamepad support. RenPy isn’t really designed for complicated games, so getting Gamepad to work properly proved frustrating
• Certain text boxes were made into viewports, meaning you can scroll them
• Gamepad can hover over certain buttons that it couldn’t previously, including bars (I’m working on making this more intuitive)
• Removed shortcuts attached to Gamepad that mess with natural play
• You can’t access the Auto Save/Combat Save page from the Save Menu, and it automatically places you on the first page instead
• Certain functionality has been applied throughout the game. This is difficult to explain, but some things would only work under certain circumstances, so I fixed that

Gameplay/Combat (This one’s a doozy)

• Added CP, Card Points, so you can’t use all the Cards at once, and have to be more strategic
• Fixed certain Cards so they work properly. I honestly can’t remember what the issue was, I just remember that there was one
• When you die during a Boss fight, you’re given the option to Give Up and go to the last rest spot. You’re not supposed to lose VP, so I fixed that
• Add the option to load to just before the fight so you can adjust your Party, Cards, Items etc
• Fixed an issue where switching Aysha in and out of the party, it changes Zuki’s parameters instead
• Rebalanced the Party Member’s Stats so every combination is viable
• Fixed the Practice Fights menu to show all the enemies, as well as teaks to how it works
• Rebalanced enemy parameters to match your leveling and accommodate slight grinding
• Got rid of enemy actions that they’re not supposed to have
• Fixed how certain actions behave against various other actions, e.g counter vs punch is more effective
• Fixed an issue where using an item may not actually do anything
• You can no longer use Heal if you’re at both Max HP and AP (This usually causes the combat to commence with nothing happening, and forcing the enemy to use AP for their next move)
• When countering an attack, Traps and Walls will still be in effect (rather than just completely disregarding them)
• Made it so that when you or the enemy takes damage during specific instances (like Burning, Bleeding, Double Attacking when in AP Debt, Counter Attacking) the HP drain animation will play (the red trail effect on the HP bar, signifying how much damage you took)
• Readjusted how enemy Defense works for balancing purposes (to be technical, it’s to balance physical attacks with magic, since I found that if you only ever use physical, even if your STR and OM stats are the same, you deal significantly more damage with Physical when you charge. Which is fine on its own, but that’s the case even when the enemy is Weak to an elemental, basically negating any reason to us Magic, other than status effects and AP damage. Also, the average AP usage of Charge-and-Attack is 3, the same as the base Magic. This is a long explanation, but I just wanted to get across that I’m working really hard on balancing the game)
• Party Members now have Elementals, which adds damage to the appropriate Magic attack. E.g Aysha has the Ice Elemental, meaning if Aysha is in the Party, you deal extra Ice Damage
• The Elementals go the opposite direction as well, since Party Members now have Weakness. E.g Aysha is weak to Fire. If Aysha is directly hit with Fire (if the enemy specifically targets Aysha) you will receive extra damage
• When the enemy attacks a party member, their animation will see them target other positions as well, not just Offense. (This applies to the camera as well, though I think that was in the original version) These additional animations only apply when no one is in the Offense position
• When you have more AP or HP than your Max, it now changes colour to reflect this. (It looked like it was unintentional at first, but its a feature, not a bug)
• This one is difficult to explain, but bare with me. I fixed an issue where you can technically overwhelm the enemy if you hit their weakness and your speed is decent enough, essentially disallowing them to make any attack on you. There’s now a system that makes it so that enemies can and will get a hit on you if you’re successful too much. I call it Agro, which applies to their damage output as well. You can calm them down if they’re successful instead of you. (technically there are 2 systems at play here, both of which look after 2 different things, but they do coincide with each other)
• On top of the previous system, I funnily enough fixed an issue where the opposite effect happens and the enemy’s agro carries over from combat encounters. Whoops, lol.
• Enemies can now decide what Party Member to target. I’m planning on making this more robust, though I think it may be better if the enemies become smarter later on, rather than at the beginning of the game
• There are probably some that I’ve completely forgotten about, but if there’s a bug you’ve encountered previously, it may have been fixed. Or it hasn’t, in that case, please let me know

Known Issues and Future Updates

These are updates for the Demo, though some of these may only be addressed when I start working on the rest of the full game. You’ll also notice that most of these are visual based, rather than mechanical based. This is because most of the core mechanics are done, and everything on top of the mechanics will be additional things and bug fixes, rather than major overhauls

Gameplay/Combat

• The Punch mechanic button prompts. It only shows up once during the Demo, so it may take me a while to get around to it
• Other abilities, such as Snipe, Wide Slash, etc. They don’t have unique animations yet. They’re only accessible during the Soul Snatcher fight at the beginning
• Generally unique animations for various Abilities, like Soma. I want to give Dual Limits animations where the party members work together
• Unique animations for higher tier Abilities, like using Firtriga, I want a bigger fire animation to visualize the strength of it. This is already done with Electriga through the Limit, as well as enemy actions. But I want to make it more robust
• Party Member Animations. For instance, when using Charge, Zuki has a unique charge animation. I want to do these types of things for everyone else
• Unique enemy actions and animations. This is technically already a thing, like Firtrigger enemies using enlarge and detonate. Though, I want to do more like this, especially for bosses

Art, Visuals, Environment and Exploration

• UI fixes, mostly with regards to Gamepad functionality
• Fix up some areas to look nicer
• Adding details
• Adding things to interact with
• Adding lore relevant details
• Adding secrets (akin to breaking walls in a metroidvania)
• Add a run animation (This is so easy, I’m just lazy)
• Adding more character expressions
• Art for the Cards (This is gonna take a while)
• NPC dialogue, as well as unique interactions (This is already in the game, I just want more)
• More Side Quests
• More Cards and level up scenes (though this may not actually apply to the Demo, but rather the full game)
• Exploration of various areas that are supposed to be in Demo. This mainly applies to the School. I’m not sure if I want to put locations like the Graveyard or the Marsh in the Demo, since I want to keep them for the full game
• Adding animation and visuals to scenes without them. This mainly applies to the scene just before the Final Boss of the demo, and the very end scene
• More dialogue options, especially with the Alternative Route of the game
• Full picture Art for various scenes. I really want to do this, but its so extra, that it will take a while for me to get to this
• On top of the previous point, I also want to add animated cutscenes, akin to the Anime cutscenes in Persona games, but just not as robust. Just small clips to set the scene. I am an animator after all, and it will be ridiculous if I don’t do this

I just want to cap this off with saying that I’m working really hard on making this is Full RPG experience. I don’t want to half-ass this. Its just taking me very long to get things right, so please be patient. Just know that I’m never giving up on this, and that if people can give me feedback, it will be very much appreciated. Anyway, thanks for sitting through this and as always, Stay Alive!