Sounds like you got a compromise that should maximize the nostalgia factor while still giving you the satisfaction of improving what you can improve.
I am a bit cautious because I don't want you to burn out, but it seems you have put some thought into this.
That's the fun about being an adult, when you got bills to pay, you can't do all the fun stuff you want QuQ
For myself, I use the project I want to work on as a reward for getting though sections of a project I don't want to do.
For Belief and MARDEK, maybe the easiest solution would be to have them as separate continuities, kinda like how comic books have separate continuities for their stories. I think the movie "Spiderman : Into the Spider-verse" is a good example of what I mean.
Maybe you remember my excitement for the "reveal under the hood," I am still down for the idea of ROHOPH. So with the different continuities, ROHOPH and Belief would be in one continuity, so that way you would not be constrained by the characters and events in MARDEK.
If you do get to the conclusion of whichever MARDEK iteration you decide to go, maybe label it MARDEK 8 just as a way to show it's the last chapter even though it doesn't follow numeric numbering. Or it is a way of showing the condensed version of 4-8.
I also finished all my applications so I finally have time to watch the Belief demo and play Pokemon Let's go and Sword & Shield.
For the Belief demo, I have to say I got a chuckle out of the dummy lines. xD And looks pretty good so far, it looks interesting with how it'll play out. I can absolutely see this becoming a puzzle game with loads of funny silly encounters xD
I remember back when you mentioned in a blog about nostalgia and that sparked up the MARDEK remake. I remeber you mention annoyance for how Let's Go is essentially Gen 1 remade for like the 3rd time. After playing a bit I think that part of the reason comes from the appeal to kids and that it makes a good game to experiment with for new features. In Let's go you have pokemon actually wandering in the wild for the first time in a main game series. That idea worked well and will probably be brought back for the rest of the series. I think that Game Freak learned that, if they put in new features, they need to have a good base so that people will be able to use those new features. For example, the X & Y games were probably the least well received games. There were a bunch of new features, but the game's plot was subpar so those features didn't get used. Since each game needs to make money for the company to survive, it would make sense for them to use the base of a successful game in order to experiment with new features and improve on old stuff. With the base of a successful game they get to make a profit while seeing how well new stuff is received.
Tangent Aside, and back to the blog. I am all for going 3D graphics. As much as I prefer the 2D graphics, I am all too aware just how many frames of animation are needed for 2D pixel animation. With the scope of remaking MARDEK, the art assets may just push development for another few years x-x
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Tobias 1104~4Y
I've no intention of returning to the continuity or world of the old MARDEK games! Those are a thing of the past now. A rerelease would leave them untouched, but would be explicitly stated to be released for nostalgia's sake, with no plans to continue them, while a remake would be essentially what I described for the "ROHOPH" thing, where the 'GdM' are the Magisterium, etc, though I'm wondering whether to replace names or go with something more faithful to the structure and cast of the original MARDEK if not all its plot elements and mechanics. I'll have to brainstorm some things.
That's an interesting point about Pokemon Let's Go being used to experiment with features, and it's probably accurate. From what I remember, there were a lot of previously established mechanics omitted, like held items or abilities, plus of course all but the bland original Pokemon, and I wondered whether that meant they were going to be discarded permanently. Perhaps that was the plan, at least with the mechanics, but it was poorly-received, or maybe they just didn't bother adding too much since they wanted to test the basics first? I wonder.
Perhaps I could see a MARDEK remake in a similar way, to serve as a test for what people might like in future games. Having both a standard violence combat system and a 'magic' system built on sentiments and runes seems like a nice bridge between my old work and new work...
Though I wonder whether people would be resistant because it's different to the old and familiar, which wasn't really the case with Let's Go, which in many ways was more faithful to the original Gen I by omitting those features...
It's annoying that MARDEK's so huge, though. I wish it was just a short standalone story I could completely remaster in a few weeks. OH WELL.
What I need to do next (I'll start this tomorrow) is build a working demo, perhaps of MARDEK 1's initial fantasy sequence. Maybe that'd get more attention than the Belief demo video, hmm. I'm glad you found something of interest in that, by the way!
I am a bit cautious because I don't want you to burn out, but it seems you have put some thought into this.
That's the fun about being an adult, when you got bills to pay, you can't do all the fun stuff you want QuQ
For myself, I use the project I want to work on as a reward for getting though sections of a project I don't want to do.
For Belief and MARDEK, maybe the easiest solution would be to have them as separate continuities, kinda like how comic books have separate continuities for their stories. I think the movie "Spiderman : Into the Spider-verse" is a good example of what I mean.
Maybe you remember my excitement for the "reveal under the hood," I am still down for the idea of ROHOPH. So with the different continuities, ROHOPH and Belief would be in one continuity, so that way you would not be constrained by the characters and events in MARDEK.
If you do get to the conclusion of whichever MARDEK iteration you decide to go, maybe label it MARDEK 8 just as a way to show it's the last chapter even though it doesn't follow numeric numbering. Or it is a way of showing the condensed version of 4-8.
I also finished all my applications so I finally have time to watch the Belief demo and play Pokemon Let's go and Sword & Shield.
For the Belief demo, I have to say I got a chuckle out of the dummy lines. xD And looks pretty good so far, it looks interesting with how it'll play out. I can absolutely see this becoming a puzzle game with loads of funny silly encounters xD
I remember back when you mentioned in a blog about nostalgia and that sparked up the MARDEK remake. I remeber you mention annoyance for how Let's Go is essentially Gen 1 remade for like the 3rd time. After playing a bit I think that part of the reason comes from the appeal to kids and that it makes a good game to experiment with for new features. In Let's go you have pokemon actually wandering in the wild for the first time in a main game series. That idea worked well and will probably be brought back for the rest of the series. I think that Game Freak learned that, if they put in new features, they need to have a good base so that people will be able to use those new features. For example, the X & Y games were probably the least well received games. There were a bunch of new features, but the game's plot was subpar so those features didn't get used. Since each game needs to make money for the company to survive, it would make sense for them to use the base of a successful game in order to experiment with new features and improve on old stuff. With the base of a successful game they get to make a profit while seeing how well new stuff is received.
Tangent Aside, and back to the blog. I am all for going 3D graphics. As much as I prefer the 2D graphics, I am all too aware just how many frames of animation are needed for 2D pixel animation. With the scope of remaking MARDEK, the art assets may just push development for another few years x-x
That's an interesting point about Pokemon Let's Go being used to experiment with features, and it's probably accurate. From what I remember, there were a lot of previously established mechanics omitted, like held items or abilities, plus of course all but the bland original Pokemon, and I wondered whether that meant they were going to be discarded permanently. Perhaps that was the plan, at least with the mechanics, but it was poorly-received, or maybe they just didn't bother adding too much since they wanted to test the basics first? I wonder.
Perhaps I could see a MARDEK remake in a similar way, to serve as a test for what people might like in future games. Having both a standard violence combat system and a 'magic' system built on sentiments and runes seems like a nice bridge between my old work and new work...
Though I wonder whether people would be resistant because it's different to the old and familiar, which wasn't really the case with Let's Go, which in many ways was more faithful to the original Gen I by omitting those features...
It's annoying that MARDEK's so huge, though. I wish it was just a short standalone story I could completely remaster in a few weeks. OH WELL.
What I need to do next (I'll start this tomorrow) is build a working demo, perhaps of MARDEK 1's initial fantasy sequence. Maybe that'd get more attention than the Belief demo video, hmm. I'm glad you found something of interest in that, by the way!