RPGM - Abandoned - Kingdom: Wrath of the Dark Lady [v0.25] [NobleoneStudio]

After at least 2 hours playing this game I can tell this game is a disaster. There are too many things to note but I will list few things.

1. The walking speed will deter anyone who only want to play the game to actually enjoy the content, what's the point making somebody walk all over the map to finish quest while you are also punishing him with slow walking speed, it doesn't make any sense, any feeling of expectation might died off by the time you reach the area because you need full half an hour to reach the designated area to do your quest and actually enjoy the content.

2. The lockpicking game is absolutely stupid, because it actually really depend on how good your computer are at processing command, not to mention the pin drop is actually controlled by RNG, imagine a player got all 4 pin that drop in 1-2 second, no human can process this, because moving the ball from pin section 1 to section 4 need at least 3 second, and another second to tap the pin. So you actually need 4 second to tap the 4th pin and we are talking about ideal condition, imagine you also need to tap 3rd and 4th pin at almost the same time, and your time is only 2 second to do it. How does this minigame make any sense at all?

3. The game is way too grindy for a content that actually not that much. Despite the grandiose opening, the content is not that much despite it's already version 0.5, the grind element is already there, the content still not there.

4. The game is way too buggy thanks to spaghetii way of putting of event map, why would you want minigame also included in a story event map, RPGMaker is the worst engine for this, this is why despite image already exist in the folder, the game will always have chance to fail to load the image thanks to the placing of minigame in same 1 event map, your computer just fail to tell your game to load it just because pure chance of misdetection. Do you know what makes your expensive $10000 PC play this game at 4FPS? Yes it is exactly this problem, your PC keep sending order to RPGM to load it, then RPGM fail to load and report back to your computer and your computer redo it over and over again until it succeed, and when it fails you will get error messages. It is soooo sooooo stupid...

Review of version 0.5.0
Truly awful. I think this game was designed to troll the player. Quests tell you where to go but there is no map and no signs to tell where that is. Also you walk at a crawl so when you do end up walking miles off course (because there is no way to know which way is the right way) it takes ages to get back. Transitions and dialogue scenes will end and the character you were talking to walks slowly off screen, so you have to wait for that too (sometimes a number of people but no they won't walk at the same time). Did I mention the opening cutscene voiced by text to speech that seems to go for an eternity? After it ends and the game starts, you get to move your character for a couple of seconds before another long ass boring cutscene starts? Yeah this is a troll game.

Edit: I forgot to mention it is buggy as hell.

Utter dogshit of a game there is stamina bar to run otherwise you're slow as fuck, the game is bugged and bricks like every 3 minutes or so, there is a mini game to lockpick things that make no sense whatsoever.
Game has some idea but sadly they're all shit.

This review is versus the developer and I will change it in the future.
An unfinished game with an unskipable warning of 10secs + an unskipable introduction movie of 3 minutes and 47seconds is a big no-no.
As a player, I was already frustrated before even the game started.
Then when finally I got control of the player I was hit with a disabled dash and a crawling movement speed.
Heck, even if the MC had no legs, he would move faster...
And if this was not enough there is a fatigue system that even if dash is re-enabled it will drop the speed after a few steps.
And here my patience worn out and just deleted it.

All the above make the definition why most players hate rpgmaker games (and this comes from someone who loves the engine).

ps1. Before releasing a game you should play it as a user and not as a developer that fast plays, by modding the speed.
ps2. Your game could be a gem but not as it is now.
(I'll update the review when the annoyancies are fixed )
edit: After moding it a bit, (changing MC speed a little by moding stealth and stamina events, used 2x play speed, removing some very long waits between event's & commands and deactivating the flashing buttons in the menu) I liked it. So to be fair I'll give it 3 stars (potential 5stars but current game play 1star)

Update: 28/11/2021
The game became better. Far frome perfect, but better. Some actual choice in how to handle bitchy lady of the town and your step family, instead of average lineral bullshit - some abuse of power for the power fantasy sake. As of now, the only issue I really have aside from some minor bugs like randomly vanishing stamina bar, is journal not showing if you are able to progress further on some quests. So, unless you know about the walktrough, you are screwed out of several hours of your time.


I cant say that I hate the models, or the story, but so far 3/5 for not giving player proper directions/map, stupid runing mechanic(srsly, why give us slow base speed and stamina related percs if you also choose to add horse, that makes them obsolite) and lock-pick minigame that takes way too much time and coordination to beat.

Playability
- Tutorial -
No human-friendly tutorial. Sometimes in moment, when You didn't expect some explanations - it can have it's place, so it's easy to skip it by accident,
There is a lockpicking mini-game, but no explanation how it should work, and whole mini-game is not intuitive.

- Walking -
Those who designed this system obviously want his players to suffer. Character walk either very slow(without dash) or like a cripple(no offence to people with physical restrictions, but in this game player weren't warned, that his character has some leg/health problems). He can run for 10+ tiles, and run out of "stamina". This mechanics is real and very big obstacle to try to enjoy this game.
- Navigation -
No village map, no road pointers or marks where to go, but a lot of references about place, that player have no idea where are they.

- Quests -
They are either undone or very badly designed. Even simplest. There is quest with gathering herbs, and character, who gave it even told where to find them. I've spent almost hour walking around all maps and clicking on every herb, and there was no result. Maybe it's just undone, but there is no warning about it.

Performance
Sometimes, when ordinary characters walking - my FPS drops to 3-4(except this game only Discord were launched, and I have no issues with playing heavy games on my PC),.

Summary
Maybe this game is a gem, but mentioned issues is problem, that didn't allowed me to try to enjoy it, at least a little.