CAT & DOG GAIDEN

I have decided to make my own game called "CAT & DOG GAIDEN", a game that has a serious story with a bit of humor added to it.  A game takes place in a Japan like country in the view point of a dog and cat trying to get back home to their family.  You have to hunt for food, places to sleep, do quests as you fight Samurai Dogs, Ninja cats & Buddahist mice.  I just think that our world is far too serious at times and we need to laugh from time to time.  I am using RPG MAKER VX ACE, so the style is going to be simplistic, which is nice.  I am debating about to release it for free or commercial game.  I would release it for five dollars or ten dollars, max.


I will be releasing screenshots as I can.

FINAL FANTASY XV - A DIVIDED REALM

I am a long time player of Final Fantasy, played each one, got excited for each new game as they were announced, only with Final Fantasy XIII, did I begin to realize that I haven't enjoyed them as much as I used to.  However, it isn't "ME", that has changed, but rather Square-Enix.  I was hoping a return to the formula of RPG or ROLE PLAYING GAMES, only now, I discover not only will there be no world map, no vehicles, a crappy ACTION BASED SYSTEM, but no playable women.  I am not a perverted guy, but am an adult woman.  

Some of my favorite characters have included both men and women, since I am someone who loves to create and develop worlds and am more likely to go off of backstory, over sex.  Mr.  Nomura's statements about putting women in the game would be hard, is a turn off for me and I feel as if he has told me, I don't need bother playing this game.  One of my more favorite characters has to be the "CELES" and "Locke" relationship, it's hinted about growing feelings between them, but it has tension, distrustful moments.  This relationship is much better done than the Rosa and Cecil relationship, even if Cecil is one of my favorite characters, along with Kain.  

I, of course, loved Reks over Vaan, as he would have had more passion and feelings than the boy toy, Vaan did.  I, also, thought that the Ashe was a well done character with deep feelings about her loss and her determination and hatred of Captain Bash, who was well done, as well.  He was very believable in his reactions and feelings.  But the biggest questions has been, what's been happening with RPGs lately?  Why have they fallen from grace, so to speak?  I am a long time player and I am aware of the issues with old games, something I think needs to be spoken of and discussed.

Games in the 1980s had two ways of doing it:  graphics or story, but not both.

That is a problem in the nutshell, only RPGs had world maps, which made it easier, so let's fast forward to about the 1990s, when those previously narrow games like ACTION or even games like Ninja Gaiden were platform games.  They exploded, because now, it wasn't suddenly about graphics or story, but rather both, story and graphics. This is something that would continue over time, from the 1990s, 2000s, until today.   Games that used to be quite narrow, became deeper and more complex, as they only suffered due to a lack of memory.  Role Playing games, Japanese got a boost and became quite popular, only tapering off recently.  Why? The answer is simple, actually.  

RPGs despite their growth have not grown past what they were in the 1980s, only the maps are bigger.  If they had grown much like the other games had, what would we be seeing these days?  What should a REAL RPG look like?  An open world, with aircraft or ships you can travel in (airships, if you were FINAL FANTASY), towns, main quest, side quests and plenty of places to explore.  I will be honest, if they created an ENGINE each Gen, only tweaking the graphics as they used it... It would cut down on cost. But the question is:  Is this what RPGs look like today?  

The answer is NO, but rather they are long tunnels straight from point "A" to point "B", with QTE moments, cut scenes (not using game graphics) and bland characters, you could care less about.  They have become anything than an RPG as a matter of fact, Square-Enix is facing a loss and I bet they are wondering why.  With games like Final Fantasy XIII, that got three games, when people could barely swallow the first one, It's not too surprising that Square-Enix is facing hard times.  The best female character they have is Laura Croft, which they bought with a studio that we all know.  Other than that, when was the last female that truly felt like a female with her own strengths and problems, more than just boy problems.  

The one character I am referring to is, of course, Celes from Final Fantasy VI, not Lightning from Final Fantasy XIII.  Celes is one of the Generals from the Empire, who betrays them, and starts to have feelings for Locke.  I wish this young woman had been the main character and Terra, was the side character, because she was far more interesting.  Why she betrayed them?  Her problems with Locke's lack of trust and his own problems/past.  It isn't just about his feelings for her, as a matter of fact, she is as beautiful as she is deadly: that's Celes.  As time passes, she begins to learn the truth.  In my conclusion, Celes was a really powerful character, and one that might have changed the very beginning of the story.  

When you compare Celes to "Lightning", you see that they don't even compare: Celes is 100% better than Lightning.  In the end, why was Celes doing or had done the things that she was doing?  Lightning in the end was trying to save a girl, even if that girl was her sister and the girl that Snow loved.  In Final Fantasy VI, there was a wide variety of characters, who all had their reasons of hating the Empire, only minus Gau.  They were various ages and in different positions in their lives, from Saban, Edgar, Celes..., only in later, "Final Fantasy" games that has completely vanished.  

We, women, have been told by Final Fantasy that girls can't be anything other than love interests, side or background characters, and it's far worse than some of the crappy characters they've had in Final Fantasy.  Yeah, with that reasoning, I will sooner play a "TALES OF...." games, before Final Fantasy, because, at least, ANIME has a wider variety of female characters than Square-Enix has.  I am a woman and I love games, piss me off, I will rant.  Just like you guys, I am passionate about gaming, sick of games holding our hands, or worse, leaving us to fend for ourselves.  Yeah, give us the option of the tutorial, that's all we need and go from there.  I, of course, never thought I would see a day when I would turn my nose at a "FINAL FANTASY" game that in recent times turned into a cliche sci fi game, doing the opposite of what their fans are actually saying and just doing whatever they want.  

And they wonder why their games aren't selling, anymore?  Hmm, I wonder why.

Game Reviews

One of my favorite part of anything is story, weather or not that comes from games, mangas, anime or movies. I play a lot of games, but my favorites have to be RPGS, both actions and console versions. I am not really into Action games, not good at them.
I play quite a bit of facebook games. I think they have good concepts, not that they always materializes into a good game. I am going to start with the big daddy of all facebook games: PETVILLE.
In case, you haven't played petville, it is a game created by Zynga who is one of the bigger companies besides Playfish.
Concept - You create a pet with some really cute adorable graphics and feed your pets to increase their personality. They have interesting tricks they do when given certain treats.
When you first begin PETVILLE, you have quite a bit to discover, unlock and decorate, but nothing else, really. It's kind of boring when you reach a high level and must wait for the programmers to add new levels.
There is no real reason for leveling up in petville, but what do I mean? In Pet Society, run by Playfish, as you level up you gain new things like new soap, jump rope or even unlocking a new rooom. This is a different idea than ZYNGA which has neighbor based unlocking system. In Pet society, you have neighbors you visit and clean to gain money, but takes a lot less time than PETVILLE.
In Petville, there is hardly NO interaction with anything from the video game machines to the soda machines, none. In Pet Society, your pet will actually pick things up, jump into the bath tub and wash themselves, and carry their stuff toys around. Petville, on the other hand, the pet will just stand there, run around not really doing anything, and do this too long and they'll start pounding on the screen.
Which was cute when I was new in the game, but not so much anymore. It's gotten old and frankly, boring. What drew me to Zynga's game over Playfish's Pet Society was GRAPHICS, but what is drawing me to Pet Society is the one thing that is Pet Society's advantage: game play.
GRAPHICS - B
There is a such a thing as too much cute, and Zynga not only crossed that line, but threw up candy color barf all over it.
SOUNDS AND MUSIC -D
Why is it no matter what kind of pet you create, it always sounds like a ... cat? The theme song is cute the first few times you hear it and then, it get annoying.
GAME ISSUES -10 points from score
Pop ups are a constant complaint on this and many of Zynga's game, the more you complain the more they seem to add. It's almost as if they're doing it just to piss you off. Pet personalities are boring when you finished everything, and doesn't add anything to game play, not a single bit.
INGAME GOLD/PETVILLE CASH RATIO - D
My biggest issue is that this is a free game, but you have to make money by selling things for cash. However, Zynga seems to put more attention into the CASH stuff rather than the ingame gold stuff. Recently, they began to add more gold stuff, but the truth is they haven't updated the gold stuff in a long time.
CUSTOMER SERVICE - C, but they really should get a D or F
Customer service is a bit tricky when it comes to Zynga, if your missing something or have an error, they'll work with you. They'll solve the issue at hand, but things like the neighborhood was just bad altogether. They have a bad habit of hyping things up, and then, letting down the player. Not once, not twice, but three times.
They have issues with customer service in other games such as frontierville, but I will talk about that in a FRONTIERVILLE REVIEW. But I took it into consideration because it is the same company.
FINAL GRADE: D
If you have a choice between PETVILLE AND PET SOCIETY, leave that petville puppy out to dry and head to PET SOCIETY, you'll have fun longer and for the right reasons.
My final grade is a "D", but playfish on the other hand is at least a "B+" My issue with Pet Society is that they don't have ways to earn more cash than they do. My suggestion is that if you are considering playing one of these games: go with pet society. In pet society, if you play their games and don't like it or get mad, you take your cash with you when you play another of their games. Not so with Zynga.