Exile by QHeretic

 

The story is set in a semi-futuristic / medieval world where machines meet magic. The game begins with the introduction to three seperate tales, each with it's own protagonist. When evil is amidst, these three have a kind of bond that seems to call them together to fight the enemy.

 

However, each ends up in their own tangle on the same day...and soon each person's story develops into a epic battle tale. The complete story begins 10 years before the present day, when a power hungry emperor comes close to taking over the world. His desire for power also drives the children that he kidnapped to serve him to assassinate him, to phase in a new era of peace. The day this occurred was further known as the Medlahm Assassination, and the ringleader of this faction was Xelan. He lead this faction named Sabre to become the new leader of the world capital, Imanene.

 

 

Exile is a very old Rpgmaker adventure game released in 2002, and one of the first to feature different protagonists in different scenarios: however as the titles says, all three heroes will be exiled for different reasons and this will lead to a series of adventures. Do not expect anything new or original, this was a basic adventure rpg using the classic Rpgmaker system and the default RTP graphics, still it was one of the first works by the author of the great Kindred Saga.

Download Link

Rmarchiv.de

 

Random Fact: the old defunct original site for the game can still be found using Waybackmachine: see it here https://web.archive.org/web/20001017095906/http://www.geocities.com/enterranet/exile-sto.html 

 

Final Verdict: an ok game if you are very nostalgic, the adventure is however well made but pretty classic and can be still be enjoyable. Anyway being a demo do not expect a real epilogue to the story.

Dark Dreams by TitanOmega

  

A boy wakes up with no memory of his past during a stormy night. Apparently he was a normal human once (eve if he had white hair, but uh ok), but now he's a sort of anthropomorphic rabbit. For some unknown reason he was also transported to a world populated by other anthropomorphic animals that are mostly friendly, but it's also a world where the wilderness is plagued by monsters and bandits. The rabbit-boy, taking the name of Cole (or whatever the player chooses) arms himself with a mallet and decides to find a way to go home...

 

After a short but nice animated cartoonish intro, the game starts with a simple mission: go back home. This adventure follows the classic tropes of the classic jrpg games: the protagonist will have to helps the inhabitants of this mysterious world to obtain their collaboration, earning the trust of some friends that will help him during his adventure, fighting monsters and exploring dungeons. That's nothing new at least mechanically, but the cute custom art and lighthearted story make this rpg stand out among the countless FF-clones made with Rpgmaker 2000.

Download Link

Rmarchiv.de

Rpgmaker Archive 

 

Random Fact: while this is a classic rpgmaker game, for some reason the developer created a custom menu that includes some extra options (like managing the gauntlets, the items used to "do magic" in this universe). Not that was really necessary, but again, like the cartoon-like cutscenes s something that makes this game different from the others.

 

Final Verdict: despite the title this isn't really a "dark" game, it's pretty lighthearted. And it's also a pretty interesting strange fantasy adventure.

Seekers by Shear Destiny

Dominique is a blonde girl that when she was young saw her little brother Eriks fall into a river and disappear... every night she dreams of this, remembering the tragic event. Now she's a grown up woman that works with two associates, Kincade and Teela, and the trio recently heard some Seekes talking about exploring some ruins to the north of their village... this is clearly interesting place for our three adventurers, and they decide to investigate.

 

Seekers is one of the unfortunately incomplete Rpgmaker projects that were quite promising and interesting: besides some enemy sprites ripped from other games, we have some custom made portraits for the protagonists, good mapping and an intriguing story. For the rest this is a classic rpg with random battle encounters, that includes a village, a world map and a complete dungeon, plus some cutscenes.

Download Link 

Rmarchiv.de

Rpgmakerarchive.net

 

Random Fact: Shear Destiny is listed as a "ripper" or someone who extracts game assets) on the French RPG Maker site Rpg-maker.fr. However the protagonist and important character charsets seems to be designed by this developer and Silver X. But this is instead not the case of the portraits, that were created by Mellowmonkey.

 

Final Verdict: a carefully creafted prologue that is unfortunately quite short, and deserved being remembered: the little animations like the people fishing, the cats walking around and other tiny details were pretty nice, considering how old is this game.

Heaven & Hell episode III - Rise and Fall of the Hero by Kharan5876

 

In what initially appears as a classical fantasy world populated by various races, a mysterious man named Sirran has created a highly technological city and crowned himself emperor. He now rules like a tyrant, but a rebel movement called Operation Resistance was created and Commander Fleet leads a secret operation against Emperor Sirran. 

Enters our hero, Ayen, a new agent assigned to a team that includes the wizard Celine Ashe and the cleric Professor Marx. Ayen will be involved in a mission that will make him visit many place all around the world and fight seven tracherous humans that possess powers received from the seven deadly sins.

 

Heaven & Hell episode III begins with a prologue where we play as a very powerful character named Kharan (like the developer of the game), but after that short introductive part it makes us choose Ayen's class, and there are 15 of them. I personally chose the Monk, since Celine and Marx are a Wizard and a Cleric, later you may also find a Rogue, a Fighter, a Paladin and others, but the party limit is of four characters, so you may use the ones you prefer. The classes are all taken from Advance Dungeons and Dragons, and so are the skills and spells. The setting instead, despite the presence of dwarves, elves and drows, is a modern fantasy world that includes firearms and futuristic vehicles.

 

Download Link 

Rpgmaker.net

Rmarchiv,de 

Rpgmaker Archive 

 

Official Site

 

Random Fact: this was NOT a game in a series. There are no episode I or II, and unfortunately this game is also just a demo, however it has a lot of content included, and can offer hours of adventures.

 

Final Verdict: a very ambitious project that uses a custom made system, I'm not sure that the classes are balanced nor that the game is without flaws, however it's really enjoyable, unique and full of content. There are also many interesting maps, some isometric or side view scenarios. 

Shichimenchouken, Sword of the Seven-Faced Bird by Felix Trapper

The protagonist of this story is Kojitsuke, a young thief that lives in a setting inspired by feudal Japan called Tsai. In attempting to steal medicine to heal his sickly father Yoshinori, he is caught and forced to go on a quest to acquire the ingredients himself. With the aid of numerous allies Kojituske explores the land and he discovers that there is something more sinister at work in the land that must be fought.

 

 

Shichimenchouken is an oriental rpgmaker adventure created by someone who really likes Japan. The game is styled as a classic SNES rpg but with some interesting features: for example an important aspect of the game is the use of a barter system: in the game there is no "gold" but you rather trade items for other items. Advanced armors and weapons also require to give a lesser item. Another quite peculiar feature is the use of multiple parties: from a certain point we can play alternately with two full parties of four for a total of eight characters!

Despite the oriental setting there are some odd music choices, for example the barter tutorial used a 8-bit version of Rock DJ by Robbie Williams. And the developer even mentions the title of the song itself!

Download Link

Mirror Link

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Rpgmaker Archive 

Random Fact: entering the back of the house in front of Kojitsuke's home sends you to a map of a cave with some unreachable monsters wandering around, and a sign with written a single sentence: "HEY, STUPID! YOU ARE IN THE WRONG GAME!". There are other weird maps inside the game, like for example a bathroom with a giant Wc that's clearly out of place.

 

Final Verdict: a classic Rpgmaker adventure game with many peculiarities, it may be pretty old and some parts are even a little silly, anyway it shows a lot of attention to the details. 

Crossbone by Daniel Olsén

 

The game starts with the Baracudan pirates attacking, and we play as Breeze, a freelancer armed with an anchor that becomes involved with the battle that takes place on the wharf where he worked. He later gets into every sort of trouble facing first the attack of a giant bug monster and an attack of some dragon raiders. The setting is a mix of fantasy and sci-fi, with monstrous creatures and ships that turn into mechas.

 

 Crossbone is another cool game from the Gaming Ground Zero site: an entertaining wild adventure where we will meet many quirky characters. Breeze is in fact just the first hero we'll control, but there are others, and the setting is colorful and original. The author used RTPs but also worked a lot making original graphics, sprites and assets that make this game stand out. Aside for Crossbone Daniel Olsen made a lot of cool art in other games, like for example in Mog's Adventure.

Download Link

Rmarchiv.de

 

Random Fact: this game, despite being only a demo, was also translated into spanish by someone. No one knows who is this mysterious translator.

Final Verdict: this game is pretty well done, with many custom animations and graphics. The setting is also unique, a futuristic age of pirates with technology and magic. It's really a pity that's only a short demo, because it's really polished and fun!

Frontier Extreme by Frontiers

Some Guy is the weird name of a generic character summoned to become a hero and save the city of La Pine. He wakes up inside a house that is strangely located inside a Church, a place populated by weird characters like a talking cat, a talking bird, and... uh, Uncle Save that at least will provide to be useful. Anyway since the different worlds collided reaching La Pine won't be so easy for Some Guy: exploring various weird areas and solving puzzles and quest he'll have to slowly but relentlessy reach his objective. Well, he's the only one that can do that!

Frontier Extreme is a 2006 parody of classic adventure games, but the game isn't just bizarre and populated by weird characters, but it's also… "gamey". This means that the game constantly reminds that it takes place into the world of gaming, quoting and referring to other videogames from mmorpgs to old classic games like Zelda. The access to many locations is also blocked by doors of different colors, requiring keys of the same colors to be removed, and this seems something that seems inspired by Doom. The adventure requires exploring and solving puzzles and quests, a lot of work went into this game considering the variety of locations and resources used, but as usual, you are free to play it and make your own opinion:

 

Download Link

RpgmakerArchive  

Rmarchiv.de

 

Random Fact: the title screen is a background taken from the 2001 game Gensou Suikoden Card Stories. An odd choice to use a serious and realistic landscape without characters, considering that the game seems to be quite wacky and colorful.

 

 

Final Verdict: a very old game with a distinct charm and a unique weird style. I didn't understand the need for some custom features like the custom menu, anyway I still found the game enjoyable enough even if it's not the usual rpg adventure. Probably for this reason some players won't like it, and others will like it more!

DupliCity by Ryanwh

DupliCity is a cyberpunk story: in the future a group of expert operatives prepare for an important operation against a powerful local leader, and at first everything goes well… but suddenly it turns out that they were betrayed! Ruthus, the protagonist, is nearly killed. However the agents who have him in custody decides that after he wakes up from the coma he may be a useful asset, but our hero isn't willing to follow the orders, and decides to battle the corporations and unveil the Conspiracy…

 

This time I didn't brough a game, because DupliCity is in truth a linear visual novel with very limited interactivity, formerly released on GamingGroundZero. The main part consists in cutscenes: action sequences and dialogues. There are some rare parts in which we can move the character and interact with the surroundings, but for most of the time we'll just have to sit and enjoy a story of robots, hackers and hi-tech assassins. I must admit that while limited in its scope, this "game" really presents some well done scenes and dialogues, nice music, maps and charsets are also appropriate and the setting created by the developer recalls popular cyberpunk anime series like Ghost in the Shell or Cyber City Oedo 808. It's also a complete story, even if the ending seems to hint a possible sequel game based on this.

 

Download Link 

RpgmakerArchive 

Rmarchiv.de 

 

Random Fact: this game was the winner of the Misao "The Fonz Award" for Coolest Storyline. A well deserved award, if you want my opinion!

Final Verdict: this is a very well made setting, and maps are also excellent. I only wished there were more interactive parts and gameplay. Still this was an interesting and unusual use of Rpgmaker. A really unique experience.