Angels of Exodus by Illustrious

Liam dreams to reunite with his brother after he received a letter from him. However Meriveau is in the New World, so the trip won't be short. Liam reaches the town of Fern during the evening, hoping to catch a ride to Meriveau. This time the demo never gets to Meriveau, nor we'll experience the shenigans and battles of the original title, and it's just a short introduction to a bigger adventure that was never made.

 

Angel of Exodus is a peculiar title: in this prologue we can explore the little town of Fern, chat with bizarre individuale, gamble and even hunt faeries (honestly I did not like that minigame, but it's optional), anyway he real focus of the game is leaving the place. This time there isn't action and all plays more like and adventure game, with a couple of cutscenes that hint to some mysterious menaces that the two brothers will have to face in the future. Aside for a couple of maps that are pretty simple and used in cutscenes, the game looks like a big improvement over the first demo.

 

Download Link

Mirror Link

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Random Fact: in both Angels of Exodus and Forever Across Dreams appears a character called "the sneaky wizard" (that resembles a Black Mag from Final Fantasy). He hides in some corner of a map, and the player has to find him, however you can find him only once in each of these demos (or so I think!), so we have no idea about which reward was offered by finding him. Anyway play and see if you can find him too!

Forever Across Dreams by Illustrious

Liam dreams to reunite with his brother, so he travels to Meriveau, a peaceful town, and he finally reaches his brother's home. But his arrival doesn't go as planned and after exploring a bit the town strange and unexplicable things start happening! As Liam loses contact with the reality he gets mysterious powers, but he will also have to face challenges and enemies.

 Forever Across Dreams starts as a low-fantasy story, and then it suddenly becomes a mysteryous adventure. Unfortunately the game is a demo, so many questions will be left unanswered. This is what you can expect from a classic Rpgmaker 2000 game, exploration ,battles and the occasional puzzle, but there are some particular edits and surprisingly little detailed animation (like when a secondary character types on a keyboard).

 

Download Link

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Oniromancie

Random Fact: Angels of Exodus was an attempt of Illustrious to remake this game. The plot is in fact the same, and the intro sequence (with the dialogue in front of a waterfall) is also virtually identical, save for the use of different assets, the new game also contains an alternate main screen with the old title Forever Across Dreams. However in this remake the story takes a different direction, and it's even shorter than this demo, offering only a sort of prologue. But this will be seen next time!

 

Alvorada Do Mal by Calunio (portoguese)

Alvorada do Mal (Dawn of Evil) is the story of Dorio, an ordinary high-school boy who one day finds out that strange things are happening in his school, his house, and his entire city. People start to behave oddly, badly, and turn into monsters. Not knowing what to do, Dorio and a few friends escape town, and eventually come across a strange masked man who says a powerful evil being is bringing a new era of evil to the world. Between not believing and not wanting to be a part of it, Dorio and his friends are caught up in a strange set of events, and have to travel through strange places and try to figure out what's going on.

 

 

Alvorada do Mal is a dark modern horror RPG using basic Rm2k3 system with lots of custom graphics, edits and also minigames. This game impressed me because it creates a convincing and interesting modern world where the supernatural is present, some maps like for example the big city (Magnopolis) are impressive. The game has also various paths that lead to different situations: in the beginning you may befriend a school bully and have him join the team, but it's not mandatory, later there is a situation where Dorio may become more than human and get some powers, which ones will be the player's choice. The game also uses a selection of popular music from Green Day, Offspring and Metallica, but they fit the theme since Dorio is a teenager and the game also has a section that takes place at a concert. My only gripe is that this game was never complete, so there isn't an ending to the adventures of Dorio and friends. Pity. Anyway you can still enjoy this unique game finding it here:

 

Internet Archive

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Random Fact: although the demo was sadly never translated in english, there is a collection of all the minigames featured in the game that's instead available in english: you can find and download this "minigames-only" version from the first link together with the Demo 4 version.

Tales of Urodora by Budowear

Phalcia and Urodora are two separated worlds: the people of Phalcia used to exile people, often criminals, to the barren lands of Urodora, that soon became overpopulated. Valian, the man who rose as the leader of the people in Urodora, built an army to start a war against those who exiliated them… unfortunately for him the Phalcians have some gifted individual called Dreamchasers that can reach Urodora through dreams, while Urodora doesnt.

We start playing as Daryl, a promising young knight that fights for Valian in the war… but we also play as Raine, a young Dreamchaser from Phalcia that doesn't know how he came to Urodora, as Vistido, a mercenary Phalcian general, and the mysterious sorceress Deseree.

 

Tales of Urodora is a classic Rpgmaker game with random battles, many cutscenes and dialogues and lots of walking around. In fact it will happen to visit the same areas many times even if using a different character, and the adventure is mostly linear. I consider this more an adventure than an rpg since most of the time (but not always) we'll play as a single character rather than a party of heroes.
For a 2002 game this isn't bad, and the assets are used pretty well, still more recent games will be probably more varied, interesting and entertaining. 

Download Link

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Random Fact: the title screen, that doesn't even display a title, was used as it is also for another Rpgmaker 2000 game, El dragón rojo (see here). Other games like Sword of Salvation or Tallon instead added the title of the game on the picture.

The Song of Elegin by Madriel222

The Song of Elegin starts on the aftermath of the defeat of evil: the demons were banished from the realm, and now after the Xiannodel Wars, those who were trained in the arcane arts find themselves purposeless, and the masses they protected from the dark demonic forces now look at them with distrust and fear.
Oroth Naraskodel is an apprentice mage who's 10 year training at the arcane academy known as The Order. A deeply caring and empathetic individual, Oroth now heads back to his childhood home of Innarlith, back to a father whom he believes abandoned his responsibilities as a parent. Embarking on the long odyssey with his childhood friend, the young warrior Berundd, he will attempt to find purpose in this world. What will start out simply as a journey home will evolve into a great adventure that will make our heroes reveal and face the greatest conspiracy the world has ever known.

The Song of Elegin is apparently a classic Rpgmaker2003 fantasy game: there is a certain freedom to explore and talk to people to obtain a series of optional quests, the game uses classical random battle encounters, but there are also some really interesting features, like the day/night cycle that also changes the dialogues of the npcs encountered, there are many custom menus to keep track of the various quests and to manage spells and characters. Overall these additions are good, but add an extra layer of complexity that not every player may like. Mapping is for the most part pretty good, with varied areas ike colorful villages and dark forests, sunny beaches and snowy areas.

 

Download Link

Mirror Link

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Random Fact: Madriel isn't just the name of the developer of the game, but also of an important character that appears in this adventure. This character (like all the important ones) has a unique faceset, and coincidentally is the same used for Nickel Arand, the protagonist of another game created by Madriel222, Final Fantasy The Phoenix Prophecies. But that's another game for another day.

 

The Shadow of Life by Legacy

During the middle ages Lord Ferith the Seer escapes from the king that wants to execute him. But since the lady who saved him is going to be burned as a witch, he returns to the castle to rescue her, unfortunately during the attempt he is killed by the king's men, and she dies in the pyre too.

In 2001 a young man that lives in the city of Kerain, Narin Ressanon, is haunted by some weird dreams about mysterious entities that are calling him. Things aren't also going well with Kara, the girl he loves, anyway he will soon have other serious problems: for some unknown reason the police is going to arrest him for terrorism. Meanwhile Kara must escape from a burning building…

 

The Shadow of Life is a game with some good ideas, an many problems: sure there are lots of maps, puzzles, a hacking minigame and timed action sections, unfortunately the realization is a bit… mediocre. Maps are often big and almost empty, there are really too few savepoints, and too many dialogues with typos. Some situations also do not make sense (for example the protagonist is lost in a forest but suddenly he remembers there is an exit through a tree? How??).
Anyway you can make your own opinion playing the game:

 

Download Link

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Random Fact: the game is set in two different time periods and there is an attempt to diversify them: the middle age section has charactersthat speak in a sort of archaic english language, unlike the parts set in the modern times that use modern slang. Oddly both timelines feature some popular rock and pop songs from the 80s-90s.

 

 

Love and War: Act I by Admiral Styles

This game starts with a mysterious opening about two strange characters, but after a short series of dramatic events we start playin ad Ryan Eramond,a young man of eighteen who has just graduated from high school, and has the rest of his life in front of him. The story begins light-heartedly enough, with situations based on the joys and trials of adolescence, involving Ryan and his best friends Armin and Henrik, the girls Marianne and Lavie, and his rival Juno. However, as the game progresses, we slowly begin to learn about political unrest in Terra, and by the end, our hero and his friends have all been touched by it.

Love and War is a complete game, even if the story is left open for a sequel. It's however a real charming and lighthearted game with lots of explorable maps, custom cutscenes and art, and interesting characters. We also have the opportunity to play ad Juno and Lavie (that surprisingly unlike other characters can gain levels by solving tests of agility or intelligence!) in some sections, and the game includes nice custom aspects, from the custom menus to the voiced dialogues (a really unique feature!) and Ryan's custom combat style that employs the use of both sword and gun.

A really fun experience, grab it here:

Official Site
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Random Fact: as an added bonus, from the official site or from this download link you can get C'est Lavie, a spin-off fifteen minutes funny cutscene made with Rpgmaker about Lavender "Lavie" Regale, Ryan's childhood friend. 

Beyond Dreams by Mad Hatter

In Beyond Dreams we play as Elias, a soldier and personal bodyguard of Prince Clarence: they met ten years ago, and now they are friends. The game starts with the the Prince's speech, and Elias that has to do his usual security job, but after that event, Clarence tells that he spotted a beautiful girl among the audience of his speech, and he would like to know her. So that's how the adventure begins, with two friends searching for a pretty girl…

Beyond Dreams is a fun game, a demo packed with activities: besides the usual battles and exploration, found in most Rpgmaker games, there are puzzles, minigames, a cooking system (that in this demo starts at level 1 and can reach level 2), and a casino where you can gamble your money. Oh and do not forget to "attack" the bushes on the various maps since they may hide some loot.

The aestetic are also refined: maps are well done, and there are many edited sprites and custom graphics, like the portraits or the title screen. I can really recommend this game, it's a pity that the demo was never completed. Play and have fun:

 

Download Link

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Random Fact: for this game also Mad Hatter's sister collaborated and they won the 5th Misao award for Best World Map in 2006.

 

WorldSong by Craze

Raniano, Ryan for friends, is a half elf (father is a human, mother is an elf) that quarrels with his parents, and decides to leave his home after their last argument. The day after, he then joins a trio of wacky adventurers: April, a mage obsessed with cakes, Adomi the snakeblooded human, and their magical talking green cat Treewhiskers. The four friends will go to the Adventurer's Guild of the nearby town and get the briefing for their first assignment…

WorldSong is a comedic fantasy adventure (even if it culminates with a dramatic cliffhanger, since it's the demo of a first chapter) about a group of unlikely heroes. The game uses edited sprites, nicely animated battlers, and some really hilarious custom portraits for the main cast. It's also an anti-grinding game since you get no experience point nor levels from the battles (there is only a single map with random battles), and the main adventure consists in a dungeon where all the combat encounters are fixed.

Get the game here:

Download Link

Rmarchiv.de 

 

Random Fact: the only way to improve characters, aside for upgrading their equipment, is to answer some trivia questions about the game setting and story, asked by some stone gargoyles. Each correct answer will net some kind of upgrade for the heroes.

Fifth Era - Fragments of the Holy Stone by LolloRocketDiver aka MissingSeven (italian)

The story opens with four mercenaries sent by the Red Wolf Corporation to check a radio antenna. The squad is attacked by a dragon, and only the swordsman Redian survives. He later learns that monster are returning since the Fourth Era is ending, and the one that collects the pieces of the Holy Stone will become the God of the Fifth Era. Both the ruthless Red Wolf Corporation and the dark sect called Sabbat are looking for the pieces, but Redian decides to antagonize them with the help of a ragtag team of rebels…

 

Fifth Era is the first complete italian rpgmaker game I played, a love letter to Final Fantasy, especially FVII and FVIII, since it takes inspiration manly from those two (but not only! Anyway there is a location identical to Costa del Sol, e party member that looks like Rinoa, etc...). The game is pretty easy, except for a couple of optional quests that flesh out the lore of the setting and explores the past of some characters. 

Speaking about characters, there are 12 party members (3 of these unlockables), an unlockable stealth minigame, hidden artworks and cutscenes. The game uses many edited sprites, like the colorful Fire Emblem portraits and battlers. The developer later created even better games (such as Theia the Crimson Eclipse), but this was a pretty stylish, enjoyable and fun game too!

Download Link

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2008 Trailer

Random Fact: the game originally included a special dungeon that was removed from the game, called The Mad Place. Here the characters had to face opponents from their past (like their parents, their mentor or their younger self) in boss battles. The facesets, charsets and enemy sprites are still in the game, and the author covered this cancelled part in a Youtube video. However other mysteries remain, for example the unused battle of an archer named Seth that doesn't appear in game.

 

A remake, or better, a reboot of this game is in the works. It's going to be a very different game, I mean some party members will become npcs, some npcs will be playable characters, some characters are gender-swapped, the setting is somehow different and the plot was changed… so if you can do not refrain to play both games. The new Fifth Era demo can be found on Itch.io and on Steam.

 

 

Birds of Freedom by TheDigitalMonk

In this game people are enslaved and forced to harvest a magical plant called Majai by the cruel wardens that use guards and monsters to keep workers from escaping and rebelling. The magical plant is then taken into a factory, but no one is allowed to enter the place. The protagonist is one of these slaves that decides to gives himself a name, that his very first step to escape his endless servitude in the fields.

Meanwhile a rebellious organization called Birds of Freedom opposes the cruel teen emperor Envidous that created these working camps, and one of the rebels, the sorceress Meyai, encounters and helps our protagonist. Meanwhile, in another land, Hyerde the adventurer is summoned to King Duman's castle…

 

This is another old rpg that uses Final Fantasy VI sprites: our unnamed protagonist uses both Locke Cole's charset and faceset, there are Moogles, the evil warden looks like Gogo. There are also sprites from other sources and edits, and the game plays like a classic Rpgmaker 2000 game (this time without battlers nor attack sprites), there are some simple puzzles, a stealth section and multiple playable characters. An ok game for the time in which it was released, despite the banal looking untitled title screen it's a little better than you may think.

Check it here:

Download Link

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Random Fact: during the first 15 minutes of the game, after a dramatic scene, the evil hooded warden wakes up the protagonist and then drops Darth Vader's most iconic quote "I am your father"! But this will turn out to be a lie.

Knights of Eden by Rpgwolfpack

In the past the Knights of Eden fought a great war against the evil Domnu armies, bringer of chaos and suffering. The empire is annihilated but the Magus Ban-Fail was able to seal the Nexus imprisoning the Domnu and their Queen in space and time, but also creating four different realities.
Like in the previous game, we can choose our hero and starting scenario: 

Levy Griphon is a warrior, descendent of the people of Eden and son of the wandering knight Rolantes. Levy is visiting the temple where he spent his youth with his zany friend Finn the brawler. Joined by his childhood friend, the priestess Mari, they will have to search for a fugitive in the Beltaine Forest.

Morringan is instead a child of the Void and a sorceress. The archmage Nuada raised her after the death of her mother, the wayward seer Ethlinn. One day Morrigan dreams of the legendary Magus Ban-Fail, and when she wakes up she notices that Nuada left, summoned by King Dagda, so Morrigan decides to explore the world.

Aside for the starting character selection, this is a classic fantasy Rpgmaker 2000 jrpg adventure, with many random and boss battles, exploration and puzzles (like the classic boulder/barrel pushing mazes). Walking is a little slow and there are some very large maps, besides some initial difficulty spikes (Morrigan's first battle, Levy's lack of money/equipment), but that's never too bad. No battle sprites, but there is good music and the best thing are the many little animations that make the characters very expressive. And here's the game:

Download Link

Mirror Link

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Random Fact: in one room of the temple you can find a cameo of Inuyasha, Kagome Higurashi and Kikyo from the InuYasha manga and anime series.

 

Utopian Chaos 2 - Rise of Chaos by Flash

This game starts immediately without an intro, and with a choice: who is our hero? Yes, this time we can choose between SIX different characters, like Xavier the noble swordsman sorcerer, or Jennifer Eva, the gun-wielding scientist. Each character has his or her own scenario, set in the same futuristic world of the first game, mostly dominated by the FORCE corporation and the noblemen that control it. Anyway I won't spoil what happens in each scenario, but they are quite different.

The game looks good: colorful sprites ripped from various game like the Romancing Saga and Fire Emblem series look good, and mapping is better than in the first game, unfortunately this game was very ambitious, probably too ambitious, since it was left unfinished: many areas are incomplete, there are many typos, in some parts there is no music (that is good when present) nor sounds, and the game may crash sometimes due to its unfinished state.

And then there is the awful combat: unfortunately Flash removed the old classic rpgmaker combat system to implement a real-time combat that's pretty buggy and glitchy. Sometimes enemies are near and you can't attack, other times you go into attack mode even if enemies are far. Rarely real time combat works well in Rpgmaker and this is not the case. 
So this was the end of the series, but you can still play and see what this demo has to offer:

Download Link

Rmarchiv.de 

Random Fact: like in the first game keeping pressed the action/spacebar button lets you move at twice speed. That's a good feature that was kept, since the walking speed is so slow!

Utopian Chaos by Flash

The story begins with the battle between the goddesses of Hope and Chaos, that culminates with the arrival of the Beast, a terrifying creature that was let loose across the land. The goddesses and the Beast mysteriously disappeared. Now, after centuries the world has forgotten the times of magic and embraced technology. 

We play as Karyn, a commander of a powerful Corporation called FORCE (and the son of the president Iris), that after receiving a signal, is sent with two soldiers to investigate the ruins of an ancient temple, the same temple where the Beast disappeared lots of years in the past. Here he finds a mysterious energy sphere that he is going to take to the FORCE laboratories…

 

 

Utopian Chaos, like the previous games, includes edits (Karyn, the protagonist is an edit of the RTP charset Zack, with brown fatigues), attack sprites and some nice little animations (for example when Karyn uses a radio when speaking with his base). 

The game is not without some flaws, and one I didn't find before: the lack of guidance. Unlike the previous games here you are free to wander anywhere on the map, so pay attention to the indications people give you! Maps are large, there is a lot of walking, and the game uses random battles, luckily escape is always an option. The game also includes some puzzles, but they are quite easy.

Download Link

Rmarchiv.de

Random Fact: the walking speed is quite slow, BUT keeping pressed the action/spacebar button lets you run in some areas. And I didn't see that feature indicated anywhere.

 

Extrenia: the Messiah by Chipstouille

Year 2356: lieutenant Rydia is a member of a group that travels the galaxy on the spaceship Aphrodite. With her a large number of other people, including Captain Spike and Professor Schoenberg. Unfortunately due to an incident Rydia, Spike and Schoenberg find themselves stranded back on Earth... but they also went back in time! Moreover a strange mysterious man with arcane powers kidnaps Rydia for some unknown reason…

This was the second Rpgmaker game I played, and I liked even more the first: the game starts with Dies Irae and e cool colorful title, uses lots of different assets (like ripped sprites from FFVI and Front Mission), characters and story are more complex and still there are some original resources like the custom attacking sprites. It's also a longer demo, with more playable characters, monsters and maps. There is a trial where you can give multiple answers, and a scenario selection for each of the three characters. That was something new and cool for me.

It's not without flaws, for example I found the RTP medieval village inside the spaceship quite out of place… it was sufficient mentioning it, since it has no purpouse, or adding some hi-tech elements.

Once again, here's some links if you want to play the game:

Download Link

Mirror Link

Rmarchiv.de

Random Fact: this 2001 game was infamously called "the Setzer chick game" since the protagonist Rydia uses both FFVI Setzer Almasi's slighly edited faceset and charset.

Until We Get To Heaven by B*B

This game is about Amos, an orphan that with his friend Timothy is hired by Mr. Jimes, an old sailor, to recover a jade coral from Carin Cove. All goes well until they come back and they witness a tragic event that send them to pursue a murderous thief that stole a magic sword. During this chase the two friends will make new friends and enemies...

The story is linear and not very original, maps are very simple and have some errors, loot is scarce and combat is standard, on the other hand difficulty is balanced, music is pretty good, and characters don't use the classic Rpgmaker default RTPs but there are some rarely seen charsets (like the protagonist, a grey haired boy with goggles and a red coat) that even have custom made attack sprites! Despite these efforts, this looks like a first game from this developer. Not sure if this is true, anyway if you want you can check it by yourself here:

Download link
Rmarchiv.de
Playthrough video

This game is a just a short 30 minutes demo, not the best and not the worst game I found, but it was the first Rpgmaker adventure I ever played. So I am grateful to B*B to have made this game since it introduced me to a new world.

Random Fact: the title screen is an artwork of Synesta, a location in Breath of Fire IV, with added the game title.

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Hello! 

This is the RpgmakerAddict, an avid player of rpgmaker games. Ok, some of these are incomplete, and others are bad, but there are some good and fun ones, and most were made with love by the developers! This blog, that I'll try to keep updated daily, as part of my personal 2026 challenge, will be a collection of the games I found, archived, and (especially) played during all these years. 

A memorial of all the fun I (and many other players) had, and still have today. So check them, download them, play them! And comment (if you want of course!), in any case I'll be here!

Let's begin!