Old and New

One of the things I did while away from the computer was to take a good, hard look at the features I wanted to include. While they're all really fun and interesting, I've found that some of them are unnecessary. The "lose gold when you run away from battle" is a good example of such a feature.Sure, it's fun and I got it to work with the simple use of a common event, but it's one extra thing to worry about when eventing. Not to mention that it could be a source of a lot of frustration for the player.


Other changes that have been made:
- There are more opportunities to gain/lose relationship points via cutscenes as well as character-based side quests.
- Addition of a "gift shop" where you can buy special gifts for your party members.
- More instances of where interacting with the environment (checking a bookcase, for example) will result in party chatter or relationship-altering cutscene. I'm on the fence about whether there should be an indicator (small arrow, for example) or whether the mystery would be more fun to the players.


Lastly, I'm working on revamping Sparrowight Academy, as it was the only area that still had the "old" maps. This is how Sparrowight used to look:

While the mapping isn't horrendous and I really like the layout, it's very different from the more recent maps. So, here is an updated version of the map and an extra screenshot for fun:

 Much better!

Over the next week, I'm planning on focusing on eventing rather than just art. As pretty and fun as mapping gets, I do want the player to actually play the game rather than just look around.