Hello good day. I am planning to make my own RPG game and due to the fact that I'm still a very very hopeless beginner in these kinds of things, I really need some help for a Beginners Guide.

So, I planned my game to be 2d. The story and plot of the game is put on hold after I learn how to properly code the hell out of things. I can deal with the Sprites and Animations since I pretty much know how to draw, So I was planning on doing that by digital drawing (or is that bad?).

So can you give some tips? Here are some of the things that's been bothering me.

1. What programming language do I have to use? (I heared Flash, AS3, or Java would work on this)

2. What Applications do I need? (To code and sort my animations)

3. Is it okay for me to animate the sprites on my own?

4. If I'm using different programming languages (Like AS3 + Java) how do I compile it as one executable? (Sorry, not a programmer. I only know HTML :3)

Well, since its summer and I have nothing else to do. I'm bored out of hell so I decided that I could do something productive and learn and create some new things which will later... bore the fruits of my labor. I tried writing a story and creating a manga but after some realization, I decided I would implement those two in one by making a game of my own since I pretty much had some experience in programming and syntax(s)

note: not an English Speaker so spare me. :)

I'm recommending one of RPGMakers, 'cuz it's very simply program in which U don't have to have almost any programming skills. U can find a lot of very good and clearly explained guids. In my mind it's best choose for beginner, who want do 2D games.

>>2 Can I make it with my own sprites and animations? And also stage and backgrounds? I also want my RPG to be hack and slash not turn-base. So I will have to code for swapping weapons, armors and such.

>>3 It sounds to me that you want more than what RPGMaker can offer you in the department of flexibility and feature implementation. I am going to go ahead and recommend GameMaker because it has a very low barrier of entry and is a remarkably powerful engine (both Undertale and Hotline Miami where made using GameMaker). You will have to learn how to code GML (it's own custom language) and it does support sprite sheets so you can do your own sprite animation. Unity would be another pretty good choice as it has a very large array of powerful and flexible tools to work with. Here you would need to learn either Javascript or (my personal preference) C#. Be forewarned, a project of this scope will take more than a summer to complete so just keep that in mind. As a fellow game designer I encourage you to feel out the tools for yourself just to see what you like and what works best for you. Finally when you finish your first prototype (I am talking, the character can move swing his or her sword and attack an enemy) share it with the Dollars! We can absolutely provide you with feedback. Good luck and if you have any additional questions I can try and come back to this thread and answer them.

>>4 Thanks for the reccomendations, it's my first to hear such programs and I'm really glad there are dollars members to help me out with. Hopefully with my ambition and will I could finish my planned game and someday boast to my friends that I have done something productive for a change. Planning my game structure, I will create my own sprites using my skill in digital drawing, The elements of the game will be hack-and-slash equip your own inventory kind of RPG (since I like those kind of games), and I will have some time to learn programming language and I hope the tutorials on YT and FB will be of use.

As of now I'm learning how to make a basic RPG game using AS3 and It's going good so far (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sg7ndv6BQHw)

Well not too good for now since I have some problems like:
1.) I want an inventory for my hero. (Equipting)
2.) The interaction with characters in the tutorial is not what I wanted (I like: pressing a button and interact. not just standing next to it will make the side-char stop and talk.)
3.) Jumping features
4.) The ability to fight enemies is incomplete in the tutorial.
5.) Putting cinematics before the game.
6.) How to have a "next stage"...
7.) Putting cinematics between the game.

So yeah so many things to troubleshoot. I really would like someone to tutor me IRL so I may have to refer to my friends for that kind of matter.

U R going really fast i hope that we'll can play it when U finish it :D

>>4 U right that GameMaker is very good engine properting many possibly development way, but if sb know how he/she can make 3D racing games in RPGMaker. Of course it's fun for more experienced game-developers :D Engine don't rectrict U it giving U potential ;D

>>8 I actually had no idea that RPGMaker had that sort of functionality to it! Shows what I know XD.

>>6 I wish I could help but AS3 is not my forte in any way shape or form, I can give a few suggestions however:

1) If the language is object oriented (which I am pretty sure it is), I would give the player object an inventory object that contains a linked list or a vector of item objects which can basically be anything the player can pick up then allow the player to get the next object in the list using key presses.

2) You can use the fundamentals of standing next to someone and having them talk to you by wrapping the feature in a wait for keydown conditional statement.

The rest of your questions are pretty easy to implement (give the player a float upwards acceleration and give the game a gravity value and wait for the player to press space or something before moving upwards) or cinematics which is something I don't have much experience with unfortunately. I guess just get creative!

>>9 Yes, exactly what I thought in 1 and 2

(1) having images or vectors (like trees and rocks) that I can code them to be individual objects for my MC to interact with (or not to touch with), but I thought that it would take a lot of resources that it would lag the whole computer (since there's a lot LOT of trees I will put in) so I'm trying to code that in a certain area (like a box or free form or something) it would prevent the MC from crossing there or going there. And those important things that the MC would interact to progress to the game there I will code them to be individual object.

(2) The hurdle has been LIFTED. YESSSH. It's really simple, in a certain keypress I would make the side-char actor wait and pop up some text-box for dialouge.

I'm still having problems with jumping (Since I still don't know what you are talking about :3), and for cinematics, I'm not looking on how to make the cinematics (my own animations will do), just how could I put it in my code and in-game or something like that.

but now... I'm still puzzled on how to make the inventory box (those box thingy that puts your armor, swords, potions and such), buttons and things like that... I could make a RPG with one character and set only but it would be too boring so I want an inventory box. I could make it with GUI or something.

for now I'm creating my sprites for walking animations. I borrowed a drawing tab from a friend and would upload it anytime soon. But I will be uploading my MC full body sketch which I'll be basing my character design.

...still I'm downloading Flash CS4 tho. So I thought that I would be creating sprites first.

Here is the character I'm basing...

>>* thanks for the support, whew now I can't screw this up. hehe.

>>11 Not gonna lie that's awesome artwork. Might contract you for my own projects sometime in the future.

Now making my sprites for the walking anim, my stupid friend didn't let me borrow his drawing tab so I have to do it with my mouse instead. I hope he will fall into the abyss of oblivion. haha

>>11 thanks man and I'll be willing to help ya out!

I settled on using GameMaker for creating my game since Flash CS5 is really big and slow to download. GameMaker (ver. Free) is only 182+ mb so kinda big help there.

btw is GameMaker need plug-ins or third party tools that I will have to download again? It might take up some space.

>>14 GMtoolbox has a list of plugins for the program that you can download should you need them but the game maker base should be pretty solid on it's own.

Well I am excited to see how this turns out. Make sure to share it with the Dollars!

Wohoo At last! I got my game running. But still I'm currently on the boggle of my mind how to have NPC's and quests. Basic movement and animations are set for the MC and now I'm currently coding and making animations for the attack slashes and enemies.

PS: I haven't check in for awhile since I'm on countryside vacation with my grandparents and we don't have any internet connection here... I was just lucky enough that my cousins came and brought some pocket wifi. I'm uploading the game with basic movements in here and I would like some opinions. Note there are some few bugs that I had yet to be fix.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B7Qh_cbXqgs2OEFLWFo0S0hQN00/view?usp=sharing

Here is the link for my game... Basic Movements and Animations

>>18 >>17 sugeee~

You could almost certainly do this in Python using Pygame, if you want to do it from scratch and are actually considering learning a programming language. Python has got to be one of the easiest programming languages to learn, and despite it being slower than Java or C# or similar, it shouldn't matter much for what you are describing.

I would recommend Sololearn and Codecademy for getting your roots into Python. I am starting off with both at once and find it perfectly feasible to balance this with School, Studying, Spanish, and doing about 10% of both a day.
If you had an iPhone, I would recommend you get an App called lrn, and complete the Python course on it in a day(Should be easy, since all this course is is just reading and clicking a multiple choice problem), as opposed to Sololearn which has some multiple Choice problems but has more typing, and Codecademy which pretty much makes you type the entire thing with instructions. So basically, Do lrn first, then do Sololearn and Codecademy side by side(Keep in mind that Sololearn and Codecademy teach different versions of Python is why I am saying do both at once, but it is easy to figure out the differences between both).
I haven't gotten much beyond this, but a good example of something you could do after this would be Udemy or Udacity Video Lessons, or just from YouTube.

>>>21 I have heard Python as a programming language used mostly for games and is quite not that hard to understand either. But I recalled that my teacher doesn't quite acknowledge it and told me that I should learn more about Java and C+++. But I think that I would try to learn it tho, thanks for the advice.

>>22
It typically isn't very fast, if you want an actual reason your teacher dislikes it.
Python is very easy like you said though.

Besides, you shouldn't just learn 2 Programming Languages. Go ahead and learn something simple like Python, learn how to make games, and then move onto Java, then C++. While Java is typically easier to learn than C++, Python is typically one of the easiest languages to learn.

I don't know much about coding but as for your problem with interactions with trees, you can only code the individual trees that the character is able to reach and have the rest look the exact same but as part of the background, not as actual objects. For the interactions, you can probably make a set number and basically multiply them randomly for the trees that the character can reach. Not too sure if that will work though.

>>23 I think VB is the most easiest tho... XD.

Yo, I'm back! I'll be updating my ongoing 2d rpg game and if you have some time, you can download it if you want. Still very very very incomplete and I have some issues IRL so I coudn't finish it early. I'm having a real bind in making sprites especially animation sprites like attacking since the game is supposedly low-spec with 32x32px sprites and it's really hard to animate the characters slashes and movements with that kind of resolution.

So here is the download link, pretty much added the DASH state (press K to dash) and some enemies (that still doesn't attack):
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B2i2sVDXFStra2xUUkVCOGpBajQ/view?usp=sharing