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Mystery of the Sky Temple's itch.io pageResults
| Criteria | Rank | Score* | Raw Score |
| Sound/Music | #35 | 3.833 | 3.833 |
| Controls / UI | #43 | 3.667 | 3.667 |
| Overall Fun | #45 | 3.833 | 3.833 |
| Art / Graphics | #81 | 3.500 | 3.500 |
Ranked from 6 ratings. Score is adjusted from raw score by the median number of ratings per game in the jam.
Genre
RPG
JRPG | CRPG | MMO| RPG
Rating
For 13+
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Comments
Hey there! I've just played your game and want to share my thoughts!
First of all, it's an atmospheric retro piece with a nice, fitting soundtrack! It has a strong 90s–00s vibe, which I really like!
When I started the game, I found out it has a short but nice onboarding. The controls and story introduction were clear. For me, as someone new to retro JRPGs, it was a big plus.
At the very beginning, the game set up a short exposition about the heroine and the plot. Then I got my first quest goal, and after that I was busy exploring the nearby area :D I really liked the fact that you can interact with many NPCs. The interactions are short, of course, but I was curious about what EVERY NPC would say, so I clicked on them all :D
The game has many cool references and humor, and that's really great! I like this type of RPG that doesn’t try to be super serious or push the weight of the world’s problems on your shoulders in the first 5 minutes :)
The battle system is pretty clear, even considering I'm not a JRPG player myself. The battles felt good!
The UI is very fitting and underlines the style of the game.
And here are some of my suggestions that could help make the game even better (just my opinion, of course):
I would add a UI section for quests to clarify the current goal.
Some battles started really spontaneously. I don’t know if it’s a feature of the genre or not. If yes — not a problem at all. If no — I’d suggest making this moment a bit clearer.
Overall, it’s a really nice retro-style game! I wish you all the best with it!
Nice game the story was decent but can u full screen in this game ?
Yes! Press F4 while the player is open!
Hello! I didn't quite reach the end of the demo, but so far so good. I was never into JRPGs or RPG Maker, so I went into this with a fairly blank slate. I had fun for the while that I played, and so far I feel compelled to come back and keep on playing, so good work! The game worked well for me (although the installation was a bit of a mess, I did not have 7z installed and the game installed itself... somewhere, under the name of a company I hadn't bothered to remember), the interface felt a little archaic, which I assume is a plus given the type of game this is, and it was easy to use and fast to navigate during play. The music is pleasantly retro, the pixels are well done, if a little bit inconsistent between the crisp map and town graphics, and the aliased battle portraits.
Most importantly the story so far is working for me... the dialogue was the right kind of brief, everything felt charming, and the humor made me smile on several occasions. Good work!
You had a double post, so I removed one of them.
Thank you for playing and enjoying my game! I know that rpg maker 2003, being an old engine, can cause some mild annoyance with installation, but I'm glad you got it working easily!
Hello! Welcome to Feedback Quest 8! My name's Hythrain, a co-host and one of the streamers for this event! This feedback is being written live as I stream your game! If you're interested in seeing my live reaction, let me know and I can send you a link to the VOD once it's posted to YouTube!
So my normal approach for any game in these events is simple: I get the game, make sure it's not a virus, then play it with as little information on how to play as possible. This way, I can judge how intuitively someone can figure out the game. Only if it's obvious that I need to read more will I do so. I note this so you can get a sense where some of these feedback comes from. In addition, I want to note that feedback and rating are different; don't use this feedback to gauge what I'll rate, nor should you view my rating as entirely indicative of my feedback.
Where do I even start? I don't know. I seriously don't know. There's so much I want to say. Let's start with the basics.
Visuals, I'm assuming most of this is RPG Maker assets. If I had to guess, the character sprites are original. I could be wrong and they're all assets, though. The more RPG Maker assets used, the more I'd argue to move off them. This is something I say for all RPG Maker games, though. That is, unless it's intended as a for-fun project. Not much I can say otherwise.
Sound wise, I know the sound effects are RPG Maker stuff. Not sure on the music. The same applies as the visual assets, though. Since I don't know what's unique, I can't judge it too much.
Gameplay wise, it has the makings of a ATB game. I like how it gives you the option to turn ATB on. Heck, I'm glad people can now do ATB because screw SE for putting a patent on that crap and then not using it ever again after FF9.
Now before I get into the real meat and potatoes of my feedback, I want to note a couple of things that I felt I should cover.
First, I'd recommend removing the need for pressing a button to access the menu in a fight. Instead, the cursor should just appear and the player should get to start choosing. The time spent doing an extra input can be a serious problem when people turn WAIT mode off as it does slow things down. While we're at it, you'd be better off moving the menus to be beside their respective characters or even on the bottom of the screen so that they're not blocking vision of monsters (so that you can use visual effects on monsters to indicate buffs and debuffs). Second, I noticed in one room in the castle that the player avatar's head would clip underneath a top wall. This same room also has two invisible blocks on the very bottom with no indication of what's blocking you.
WITH THAT SAID, WHAT IS THIS BLASPHEMY?! YOU ALLOW A TURTLE, A SHEEP AND A FEW CATS TO TALK, BUT YOU DON'T ALLOW DOGS, CHICKENS AND COWS TO TALK?! HOW DARE YOU! THIS IS KILLING MY IMMERSION!
But then, but then! You had the gall... to do MYSTIC QUEST JOKE?! ARE YOU SERIOUSLY SERIOUS RIGHT NOW?! MYSTIC QUEST?! HOW DARE YOU!
AND DON'T GET ME START ON MY FATHER'S BROTHER'S COUSIN'S NEPHEW'S FORMER ROOMMATE! DON'T EVEN GET ME STARTED! HOW DARE YOU!
AND THEN TWO PATHS THAT GO TO THE SAME PLACE?! WHY?! WHY IS THIS A THING?! WHY DO YOU TEASE ME SO!
But see, here's the thing. I could forgive all of this if not for one problem. You made one fatal mistake. You took away what was mi- wait, I'm not Cell.
You made one big mistake: you said that King Rey was the "most popular king in recent history" but then said he was second only to his father. Given that his father was the KING BEFORE HIM, THAT WOULD COUNT AS RECENT HISTORY! THAT MEANS HIS FATHER WAS MORE POPULAR THAN HE IS! THEREFORE HE IS NOT THE MOST POPULAR KING IN RECENT HISTORY! YOU MESSED UP! HOW. DARE. YOU.
Okay, I'm done.
Thank you for playing my game! I'm glad I was able to catch the end part of your stream. Now answer a few of your questions concerns: the majority of sprites and assets are indeed stock rpg maker 2003 assets. The music and sound effects are as well. Some of the sprites/characters/assets came from asset packs made by either rpgmaker forum users or other external sources. Some sprites were modified by myself using aseprite. This is a primarily for-fun project.
As for the battles, I am able to remove the "fight/auto/escape" menu by changing the battle menu option, which does put the menu at the bottom of the screen. And for the castle room with the clipping--fixed that! I also have fixed the lore part about Rey's father.
I enjoyed your ranting/commentary about the various animals that can/cannot talk. 🤣🤣
Quick updates:
Fixed the text box to have a solid look instead of transparent. Added a couple of npcs.
Forgot to put this in my feedback.
Options for adjusting sound level and other things. :P
The solution was found--press F5 while playing the game to open up the options menu!
Here's my archive playthru, I didn't get far on round 1, I will revisit. (kiddo interruption!) Overall a pleasant playthru, I like that it's not taking itself too seriously and having fun, the game vibe is light hearted and it's fun, lively vibes comes through. I enjoyed it, and the 8 bit music also works so well.
Thank you for playing!!! Glad you enjoyed the silliness of the game so far.
To make the player bigger, press F4. That'll make it fullscreen. Also, you can save anywhere on the overworld, just like classic Final Fantasy games!
I reached the end of the demo, including defeating the optional boss (after I had dealt with that, the bozo at the end of the cave stood no chance). I had fun. Aside from that one boss, it was very easy - the attack command was enough to handle almost any encounter with minimal damage. However, this lends itself to a more breezy and relaxing playthrough, which might be what you were going for. I did find that the offensive magic and special attacks were generally too weak to spend MP on, aside from Sky Ninja's slash move.
I found the graphics overall appealing. I am not sure how much if any art is original vs. how much is stock RPG Maker, but this is more the era and style of what I think RPG Maker should look like. I find the newer 32-bit-ish RPG Maker graphics distasteful, so I'm glad you stuck with the classic look. The player combat sprites in particular are charismatic and cute. The anti-aliased portraits do feel a little mismatched against the sharper pixels on the field screen (that may be RPG Maker's fault), but this isn't a big deal. I did recognize some of the music tracks, which I don't think I've heard in the 25+ years since I was playing with RPG Maker 95, so that was a nice bit of unexpected nostalgia.
One thing that bothered me was that the dialogue boxes lack contrast; the light blue font on the translucent blue background is a little hard to read. The menu is better, so I think either a brighter font or darker dialogue box (or both) would improve readability, if that's possible to do.
I didn't find any particular bugs to speak of, other than this incorrectly Z-ordered plate of food. There's the occasional engine quirk, but from such an old version of RPG Maker, that's expected and forgivable.
I didn't seem able to do anything with the comb in the desert, so I'm not sure if it's for later in the game, or if I just missed something. The flame talon as well I'm guessing has some future use.
Thank you for playing and the feedback! Also, WOW congrats on beating the optional superboss. I turned the transparency OFF and that seems to make the dialogue boxes easier to read.
The comb and the talon you found do have uses, but those will be unlocked in the full version.