The Stuff Fairy Tales Are Made Of 2 (in development)

[EntangledPear]

Hello everyone!

We'd like to tell you about a game we're working on, the sequel to our first (topic here), The Stuff Fairy Tales Are Made Of 2. Like its predecessor, it is a retro RPG, with many traditional features of the genre. The story takes place five years after the end of the first game. The main character, Paul, a scholar with some skill in magic, now has a wife and a child, but what should have been happy years were marred by a strange disease, the Crimson Slumber, that spread around the world, and left some of the afflicted ones – including Paul's wife – in a deep sleep they can't wake up from. Adele comes to the rescue with the story of a town far away where nobody slumbers. Thus begins the quest to find the town and the cure.





The features are similar to those of the previous game:

- a simple turn-based battle system,
- gathering resources for various recipes,
- puzzle solving,
- gathering information from NPCs and other sources to get closer to finding the cure.


The game rewards exploration and communication, which often yields vital clues to be able to progress, but also gives more colour to the world of the game. Paul's journal can be used again as a reminder what the player has already achieved and what is still to be done. The weakness mechanic doesn't make a reappearance, since Paul is more skilled now, but we added a "communicate" skill, which can be used in battle. Its use is limited to humanoid enemies, but it can provide additional information, some clues, or even influence the outcome of the battle. The game is quite linear, with a maximum of four party members at any one time.

We're getting close to finishing the game, but it will, of course, still need a lot of testing and balancing. For now, there is a demo available, which is quite representative of what can be expected in the rest of the game, although since we published it, there have been some modifications and additions that will make the experience a little more pleasant.

You can find the demo on the game's itch page. We'd love to hear what you think. And if you'd like to play the current version of the full game and give us some feedback, let us know 

[Jubal]

Ooh, exciting! Good luck for the development! I will try and have a go with it sometime soon, but work is currently a bit of an avalanche so can't promise being super rapid with it

[Antiquity]

What kind of goals did you have for this game as a followup to the first one?

[EntangledPear]

Well, originally, it was supposed to be more epic and also commercial - the first one being free to give players a taste before buying the second one. However, with the amount of time we have, and the fact that I just can't seem to make things bigger (maps, dungeons, story), it won't end up that much different in scope from the first one. And seeing how successful I am in my pathetic attempts at marketing, I dropped the notion of someone ever paying for it    At this point, it's just doing it for the fun of creating, and because I like the characters.

[Jubal]

I empathise, marketing is very difficult and I've never had the knack or drive for it either. I might try selling my next game, but I've had to do the Austrian paperwork for being a small business anyway for other reasons so there's less reason not to now.

I think liking the characters you're writing is always vital though

[Antiquity]

I think it's at least a bit bigger.  I finished the first in about twelve hours (a good chunk of which was just the Black Castle), and I'm already past that here.  More importantly though, I think it feels bigger.  There are more varied events and locations covering more ground, and it feels like more of a journey, whereas the first game felt pretty local and contained.  In terms of scope, I think it's plenty big enough for a commercial game.  Certainly many aren't even as big.

Honestly the main thing that I think brings it down from a commercial perspective is that the RPG Maker version is (I guess) pretty old, so it lacks any QoL features and doesn't cooperate with Windows very well.

I get not wanting to deal with self-promotion, though.  I experimented with that with ML, I hated doing even as little as I did, and I accomplished nothing from it.  I still plan to release my next major game commercially, but I'll probably just put it out there and not stress too much.

[EntangledPear]

I empathise, marketing is very difficult and I've never had the knack or drive for it either. I might try selling my next game, but I've had to do the Austrian paperwork for being a small business anyway for other reasons so there's less reason not to now.

I think liking the characters you're writing is always vital though

Yeah, that's another thing, I don't know how the legal business side works where I am. It might end up being more hassle than it's worth.

I think it's at least a bit bigger.  I finished the first in about twelve hours (a good chunk of which was just the Black Castle), and I'm already past that here.  More importantly though, I think it feels bigger.  There are more varied events and locations covering more ground, and it feels like more of a journey, whereas the first game felt pretty local and contained.  In terms of scope, I think it's plenty big enough for a commercial game.  Certainly many aren't even as big.

Honestly the main thing that I think brings it down from a commercial perspective is that the RPG Maker version is (I guess) pretty old, so it lacks any QoL features and doesn't cooperate with Windows very well.

I get not wanting to deal with self-promotion, though.  I experimented with that with ML, I hated doing even as little as I did, and I accomplished nothing from it.  I still plan to release my next major game commercially, but I'll probably just put it out there and not stress too much.

I'm "stuck" with the old RPG Maker, but it's the one I'm quite comfortable with now, so I'm not planning to upgrade. But I wasn't aware of problems in Windows, can you give me some examples? I have 10, and everything runs fine for me.

I second not stressing. In the current indiedev climate you either have to go all out, or accept that you won't reach that many people. I guess finding a popular streamer to bring the game out to the hip kids might help, but ugh...

[Antiquity]

I'm "stuck" with the old RPG Maker, but it's the one I'm quite comfortable with now, so I'm not planning to upgrade. But I wasn't aware of problems in Windows, can you give me some examples? I have 10, and everything runs fine for me.

It forces my desktop to 640x480, pushes all of my open applications to an inactive display, and makes a fuss whenever I alt-tab.  The aspect ratio may or may not be correct, depending on my current projection mode and which monitor it's on.  It also doesn't detect my gamepads at all, so I'm running it through Steam Input.

Any older RPG Maker game behaves this way for me.  Do you not have any issues like these?

[EntangledPear]

Huh, I never had such issues... Civilization III does that for me, but never RPG Maker.

However, controllers are not supported in this version (not sure about the later ones). I think I saw some scripts, or plugins that would do that, but never gave it a second thought since I always use the keyboard.