Ateria - Kontinent der Schatten by Xargoth (german)

 

An attack by a horde of vampires sweeps across the island in the great sea of ​​Gaiana, nearly wiping out its entire population. Young Charon survives thanks to his combat skills and the training his father gave him from childhood. 

He finds his father gravely wounded on the battlefield and receives a small key from him before the man ultimately succumbs to his injuries. The key leads Charon to the cellar of his own home, revealing the entrance to a small room. Inside, he discovers a modified pistol and a valuable elemental sword. He also finds a strange mirror. It turns out that a demon named Dagon is trapped within it; the demon immediately proposes a deal: Charon will gain a portion of its powers if he uses them to kill the vampires. Driven by a desire for revenge against the creatures responsible for his family's death, he accepts the offer.

 

 

Ateria - Continent of Shadows is a Rpgmaker horror game demo created by Xorgoth: the game is basically amystery horror adventure with a single character, a vampire hunter. It features some custom activities and original gameplay elements like climbing, a custom made combat system that lets the player switch between gun and sword, anyway the additions are still rather simple and do not overwhelm the player. The graphics use edited REFMAP assets and there is a lot of attention to light, shadows and atmospherical effects.

Download Link

Rmarchiv.de

Rpg Atelier 

 

Let's Play Youtube Video 

 

Random Fact: although the game includes a monster encyclopedia that can reveal the strength and weaknesses of the opponents, mind that it can be only consulted when in town and not while travelling! A bit odd choice anyway. 

 

Final Verdict: despite the short playtime, Ateria is impressive as an high quality game with great use of lightning, good mapping, many poses, sprites ans features like climbing, monster encyclopedia, slot machines, and more. There are two only issues: the first is that you will often have to travel through the forest and that's becomes boring, there isn't a lot of story, since you are just a vampire hunter hunting vampires! That's it! Anyway it's an excellent demo, and very unique adventure, considering it was released in 2008 it was certainly one of the best games of the time. It's a pity this was never completed.

The Blade by VietEmotion (german)

For centuries, brutal wars have dominated the seven kingdoms of the Eastern Empire. Qin Shi Huangdi, the Qin king, is obsessed with the vision of an empire where all peoples live together in peace and to achieve this goal, the monarch will stop at nothing. The Western Empire, unified by King Lu Xun, fears that the Qin king also intends to annex his lands and is preparing its troops for battle.

Emperor Lu Xun, his life drawing to a close, has appointed his general Dian Wei as his successor to Koei, the Western Empire, tasking him with restoring the old order and defending the country against a potential invasion by Qin. However, this decision clashes with the plans of the emperor's son…

The Blade is an adventure-rpg where we play as the 23 years old swordsman Huang Qi as he travels around the land while the events unfold. The game uses a mix of RTPs and lots of custom art, facesets, characters edits and so on. The style fits the oriental theme and setting. The game also uses custom menus, and the various abilities have some little images that reminds of the Pip Boy from the Fallout saga, but in this game they are instead cartoonish versions of the protagonst.

Download Link

Rmarchiv.de

Rpg Atelier

 

Random Fact: Huang Qi's weapon if a katana. That is a japanese sword, while he is chinese and the game is set in China, so that's pretty odd. I guess it was more cool than other weapons!

 

 

 

Final Verdict: while I do not know enough german to ay something about story and style, the aestetics are really pretty and mapping is pretty good. I also like he protagonist battler and its cool animations. 

Gods of Ashes by RedCube (german)

Germany, August 12, 1999. Today, the fate of three children scarred by life will be sealed. A final act of terror before they escape their cruel past. Stella, Kasper and Maksim, they are ready to fight, to die, and to kill. But life has other plans, and their schemes fail. From then on, the three become entangled ever deeper in a seemingly endless and bloody maelstrom of violence and despair, drawing in not only the police but also the mafia. Nothing is permanent in a life filled with rage and a merciless city. And to survive in this jungle, they must become worse than all their enemies.

Nothing is permanent in a life filled with rage and a city without mercy. And to survive in this jungle, they must become worse than all their enemies.

They are masters of destruction, angels of death, and gods of ashes!

Gods of Ashes is a dark, grim and violent adventure in a modern setting: we play as three friends that due to a series of events become masked killers. The game is pretty violent and has a modern setting, there is nothing supernatural going on, just like in other games of masked killers fighting criminals and cops, like Hotline Miami, for example. The game uses the classic Rpgmaker 2003 combat system, but the adventure is well realized and takes place in a believable urban setting. The facesets are also custom made and have lots of different expressions.

 

WARNING: the game is about mature themes like bullying, sex, violence, revenge. Expect blood and violence, 

 

Download Link

Rmarchiv.de 

Rpg-Atelier.net 

Youtube Playthrough

 

Random Fact: although the protagonists are Stella, Kasper and Maksim, the gods of ashes, the game starts making us play as Guenther, an experienced police officer and Kasper's father. Not only we control him in the beginning, but also the first battles against criminals are fought controlling him. 

 

 

Final Verdict: a real shame this was never translated, since other games by RedCube such as Grimorum and Wartools had their english version. The game is very stylish and extremely well done, even if not for everyone, but we will see that's a common occurence with RedCube's games.

Die Reise Ins All by Real Troll (german)

 

Die Reise ins All, or The Journey to Space is a steampunk rpg adventure game influenced by the works of Verne, Doyle, and Wells: it's a journey all around the world of four different characters: Lieutenant von Mackwitz, a strong but dumb prussian soldier, Professor Heisen, a mad scientist, the Frankenstein's monster and Fräulein Eleonore, a smart journalist that opposes the military like Mackwitz and their attempt of using Heisen's inventions as weapons. Anyway they will learn the cooperate when they will have to face a menace from space.

 

 

This game is an incredible story driven adventure with an unusual setting where we will travel to Transylvania, Texas, India and many other places to stop a martian invasion. The adventure is lighthearted and linear except for a couple of branching paths. The storyfeatures lots of different characters, both real historical figures and fictional characters, heroes and villains from various famous novels (from Sherlock Holmes to Buffalo Bill Cody, Zorro, Sigmund Freud and Captain Nemo, to name a few). The game is really well done with edits, custom sprites, animated cutscenes, and also some minigames.

 

Official Page

Download Link

Rmarchiv.de

 

Random Fact: at a certain point the Lieutenant von Mackwitz can choose to read a book, and this will be Treasure Island by Robert Louis Stevenson. The game will then switch to the story, making Jim Hawking the playable character, then this side-story can be played fully or quitted. However the player may miss a nice part of the game and bonus points if he quits it early or didn't picks it up at all. 

 

 

 

Final Verdict: an excellent and unique adventure game, winner of two RPG Atelier awards: first place in 2007 Demo des Jahres - Player's Choice and of the third place in 2012 Goldener Deiji - All-Time Bestes Spiel oder Demo vor Juni 2009.