What do you dislike about RPG Maker games?

[Winterfire]

In these months I saw various people disliking RPG Maker games, people asking for CGs only or even remakes (from RPG Maker to Ren'Py).
What do you personally dislike about RPG Maker?

If I had to guess, it would be the grinding or perhaps the battle system being too repetitive, anything else?

 

[Snarkfu]

For me it very rarely matches the type of game being made, you also end up with a huge difference between the overworld assets and the actualy content which always throws me. The content can be good but you end up walking all over the shop for no actual reason.

 

[Avaron1974]

Rpg's by their nature are grindy it doesn't matter if they are H or AAA. Some games hide it better but even the grindiest of H RPGM game doesn't come close to old NES RPG's.

Let's be honest, not everyone is cut out for RPG's. The most annoying thing about people that hate RPGM is they still whine about it every time one comes out. Rather than not click on it at all because it shows the engine before you go to the page, just move the fuck along.

Sure, VN's done in RPGM are usually shit walk simulators that would be better in Ren'py and the requests are justified. That being said a lot of them are actual RPG's that, no matter how much you whine, aint getting ported to another engine.

 

[Dicks McKenzie]

The default menu sound effects

 

[skazy]

running

 

[DarthSeduction]

The biggest problem is definitely that developers use the engine to make generic VN content. Seriously, before using RPGM, think, do you need the mechanics of an RPG to tell your story?

The rest are all superficial. I don't like the default character sprites. The games I enjoy that are in RPGM don't use them and it really does make a difference. I don't like the fact that I can't save in CG scenes. This is pretty easy to fix though, just make an "You are about to enter a conversation, do you want to save?" popup every time we enter a major decision scene.

The last is combat balance. Personally I don't mind turn based combat. However, I found that every RPGM that used the combat mechanics seemed to not have balance. Early game fights should be simple, unless we are meant to lose it, to learn a lesson. The scale by which the difficulty increases should be gradual. And sure, you can make us grind a little, I generally enjoy combat grind at least a little bit, but don't make us grind for hours and hours in a porn game. The best way I can explain this is the way Pokemon does it. Seriously, you battle the forced battle trainers and the guys at the gym and by the time you get to the leader you should be able to beat them. You don't have to grind, but it might be more difficult. If you do grind, kill all the pokemon in the area till yours are at a certain level and then face the gym, you'll sweep it. That's the best way to do it.

 

[Winterfire]

Is saving during CGs a must for you or would any other way to replay those scenes at any moment be a good alternative?

 

[DarthSeduction]

Is saving during CGs a must for you or would any other way to replay those scenes at any moment be a good alternative?

The biggest thing is at least giving us the "would you like to save" option right before it starts. I know RPGM has that ability, as I've seen it done in certain games, but yes, if I make choices in a CG scene that might affect the future of the story, then not being able to save prior to that scene is game breaking for me.

 

[monak]

i don't know why people hate RPGM we cannot just hate something because some developers ruined it with aimless walking and large empty world

personally i like RPGM games because
1- the ability to make me walk around and more engaged in the story [something near from open world]
2- in my opinion when i walk from my room to the kitchen in RPGM game is better than just clicking on map in renpy game
3- i have played a game called my girlfriend amnesia and i liked it alot it was RPGM totally


but if you are going to make me walk around aimless or walking around for 15 minute only for mini games then i am out

on reddit and 4chan people are complaining from the same things about RPGM
- repetitive battles
- aimless walking around
- lack of CGs and more walking
- extremely large empty map
- complicated missions

and i think if the developer managed to do that then the game will be better than renpy
so let's not blame RPGM and just blame the developers who made people hate it

 

[DarthSeduction]

3- i have played a game called my girlfriend amnesia and i liked it alot it was RPGM totally

See, this is the number one RPGM that should have been made in Ren'py. It didn't make use of it's maps, they were just there to pad run time and make it into a walking sim. Furthermore, it didn't have a "do you want to save" before major decisions. What? You're trying to keep your girlfriend happy so you leave her sister who's been hitting on you? You just ate out some girl you don't know under the table instead. Have fun replaying the last 30 minutes to undo this.

 

[W65]

I kinda have to admit that I roll my eyes a least a little bit when I see the provided assets crop up in an RPG Maker game--not the 95-cent throwaway ones, I guess.

Then again, it's hardly deal-breaking, and it's kinda why those assets are there in the first place.

It does sort of have a knock-on effect for me, personally. I can't engage myself in making a game in RPG Maker because I get stuck in my own don't-use-those-tired-old-sprites mindset. It's kinda off-putting when you're starting out feeling snide about your own work before you even get anything done with it. Then, when I see some not-porn RPG Maker game that looks sorta interesting, my mind's kinda conditioned to think of it as a porn game. That's just because, well, most times I see that fat fuck with the purple hat he's about to put a dick into someone. It'd be like seeing some really recognizable porn actor show up suddenly in some serious context. Just conditioning.

EDIT: Okay, in fairness even highly customized RPG Maker games will usually use at least some of the default assets. It's probably pretty tempting not to redraw the grass or the water, for instance, and I don't necessarily mean I notice that kind of thing.

Portraits, character chips, and enemy sprites are usually the ones that're most noticeable and jarring.

 

[monak]

See, this is the number one RPGM that should have been made in Ren'py. It didn't make use of it's maps, they were just there to pad run time and make it into a walking sim. Furthermore, it didn't have a "do you want to save" before major decisions. What? You're trying to keep your girlfriend happy so you leave her sister who's been hitting on you? You just ate out some girl you don't know under the table instead. Have fun replaying the last 30 minutes to undo this.

okay partially agree with you but
-the developer didn't abuse the map like others do [go around aimless and do aimless things not related to the story]
-the game didn't forced me to watch NTR [it gave me choice yes or no] i think any other RPGM won't do that
-there was no boring or aimless mini games
-this game is one of the games that i still remember every single part of it that's because the map it's somehow made me more engaged to the story

for EX:
moving from the bed room to the kitchen and make breakfast for my girl in [in RPGM]
is better than just click on the kitchen image on the map [in renpy]

it make you more engaged and make the game more detailed

 

[Barabash]

Well, I must say most important things were already said in here. As for me, I'll just add a bit from myself.

Pointless walking around city, especially when the game doesn't give You any map or hints where's what/who. Can be quite annoying. Was it Incest Story 2 in which You had to make some money to pay the rent, visit aunt etc. but nobody told You where's what? Not intentionally You walked into something You didn't wanted to, beacause You didn't know where You are and time advances. Kind of ruining feeling of control.

Fights. Don't get me wrong in here, I enjoy good old turn based combat, but, if the enemies are respawning every time You leave location (by accident, let's say), when You're back You have to redo a lot of fighting just to explore and check if You didn't miss anything.

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is great example, I was so tired of these repetetive fights, few times I almost deleted it. Especially in the beginning, when You're weak and they're taking few turns to win. Quite annoying.

QTE and obstacle courses. I, fucking, hate them, not only in RPGM but generally. Character movement in these games is specific, so You're not always ending up where You wanted to be, so avoiding some damn flames, guards, wolves or different crap at some supernatural speed makes me wanna break my keyboard.

Sound balance. It may be just my personal issue, but in every RPGM I can't seem adjust the volume of music and sounds without system sound mixer, even on 20% they're damn loud, every other game, movie and music seems fine. I think the issue is on me somehow, but hey, it also annoys so I mentioned.

Interface. Last but not least. There's so much clicking when You want to check Your journal, stats, items, save, load... It would be so awesome if someone could just fix this. Yeah.

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actually improved in this aspect but not entirely.

So just to quickly summarize: there are some annoying elements of gameplay in RPGM, but, like someone earlier mentioned, it mostly depend on design, so it depends... It have to be emphasized here that there are still very good RPGM games that deserves praise.

 

[redknight00]

I kinda have to admit that I roll my eyes a least a little bit when I see the provided assets crop up in an RPG Maker game--not the 95-cent throwaway ones, I guess.

Then again, it's hardly deal-breaking, and it's kinda why those assets are there in the first place.

It does sort of have a knock-on effect for me, personally. I can't engage myself in making a game in RPG Maker because I get stuck in my own don't-use-those-tired-old-sprites mindset. It's kinda off-putting when you're starting out feeling snide about your own work before you even get anything done with it. Then, when I see some not-porn RPG Maker game that looks sorta interesting, my mind's kinda conditioned to think of it as a porn game. That's just because, well, most times I see that fat fuck with the purple hat he's about to put a dick into someone. It'd be like seeing some really recognizable porn actor show up suddenly in some serious context. Just conditioning.

EDIT: Okay, in fairness even highly customized RPG Maker games will usually use at least some of the default assets. It's probably pretty tempting not to redraw the grass or the water, for instance, and I don't necessarily mean I notice that kind of thing.

Portraits, character chips, and enemy sprites are usually the ones that're most noticeable and jarring.

Even default assets can be used to create great maps, sprites, battlers, etc, as long as you put some effort into it. Like this:

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[W65]

Even default assets can be used to create great maps, sprites, battlers, etc, as long as you put some effort into it. Like this:

Spoiler

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Yeah, I should've spoken to that a bit more.

Using the provided assets exclusively is a little uncreative, but probably excusable for someone without any access to better resources. After all, they're there so that a budding dev has SOMETHING to use to put together a working game.

Using the provided assets as a basis to expand upon makes a lot of sense, rather than having to start from scratch with your own everything everywhere. There're only so many ways to draw green grass or a generic house when you're not looking for a particular art style.

I guess portraits and character sprites are the main offenders for me, especially for important characters.

Then again, not every small developer is necessarily going to have access to a good artist, and it's probably better to use the provided face/chip assets (even if they're very recognizable) than to have bad custom art just for the sake of not looking like the default. Then again again, I've seen games with actually sorta crappy custom art, but that have enough love in other places to still be worthwhile.

Anyhow, like pretty much everything else, it's a matter of how much time and attention is put into the game. Using default assets to be able to concentrate creator effort somewhere else makes sense. I just get the little hairs on my neck up a bit when I start seeing them running around.

(Naturally, if I don't even notice that they're being used, then the point's kinda moot because the rest of the game's succeeded in being distinguished enough for them not to stick out.)

 

[gunderson]

I don't have a problem with RPGMaker itself, but I think that there's a much vaster gulf between novice RPGMaker devs and advanced RPGMaker devs as opposed to novice Ren'py devs and advanced Ren'Py devs, and the preponderance of novice devs these days makes RPGMaker look bad because of how much worse a bad RPGMaker game is than a bad Ren'py game (in most cases).

As long as a beginner has some decent renders or drawings and some semblance of a story with some choices, they can basically make a functional Ren'py game.

A beginner RPGMaker dev, however, also needs to manage gameplay concerns. Do they have RPG battles? Are there block puzzles? Is there an in-game economy? How do you use grinding to expand gameplay time without wasting the player's time? Do you use special effects and cutscenes? How does a player track where they are in the story or side-quests? All these features can make a game much more fun to play, but if they're done poorly or entirely missing it can lead players to ask, "Why even use this engine?" Poor use of the engine encourages devs to waste a player's time on content that isn't fun, like walking around big maps or walking up to every item on a map trying to find an interaction point or on endless grindy battles with few interesting mechanics that clearly only exist to pad out content.

So people just get frustrated with new RPGMaker releases now. I can't blame them, but I really don't think it's the engine's fault so much as the baseline level of skill required to put out something decent that most devs just don't bring to the table.

 

[Carpe Stultus]

In these months I saw various people disliking RPG Maker games, people asking for CGs only or even remakes (from RPG Maker to Ren'Py).
What do you personally dislike about RPG Maker?

If I had to guess, it would be the grinding or perhaps the battle system being too repetitive, anything else?

The reasons why i hate most rpgm games are:

- a lot of them force you to run around with the arrow keys
- the resolution is most of the time pretty low
- the menu system is annoying to handle
- the menu sounds are disgusting
- most rpgm games are a grindy pain in the ass
- i had to many rpgm games that were so badly programmed that they lagged all the time and i'm not playing on a potato
- not beeing able to roll back

 

[Deleted member 113137]

Actually, in general i still love RPGM. For me it's a great tool, which allows even People, who doesn't have much experience with any kind of development, and simply want an "basic" RPG Game where they tell their Stories, while more experienced folks can even deliver something unique and specific. It's a Tool which have a lot of possibilities, and unlike some other Folks, i don't find the Style or Graphics outdated.

But there are two Issue which i have if it comes down to Porn-Games.
First, and i would argue this is also an general issue for me, i dislike the earlier RPG-Maker Editions. Since MV which feels more polished, better / easier fullscreen options plus also have native Mouse-Support and such, i kinda dislike the older Versions. Most of the Time on an modern Machine, it's an pretty wonky experience.

But moreover for my Second-Point:
Most RPGM Games simply doesn't feel right, because the Creator / Developer don't use the tool right. I would argue, there are two big strenght of RPGM over VN or Renpy. It's RPG Elements (obviously) and Open World|Sandbox. I mean there are also Renpy Games which allows sandbox elements as well, and unity / unreal Games obviously are great too(though for the last two you need more gamedev experience), however i'd like to argue an RPGM Game is better if it comes down to Sandbox experience than any Renpy can dream off.

But then you see Games (i hope that was the correct title) Sarah's Life. It was an RPGM Game where you run straight from NPC to NPC... and there was no Reason for the Open World at all.. you simply had an strongly linear experience. And to be fair, it's not like there isn't an way for RPGM to work as Linear-Games as well, because it's possible... but you still need to take advantage of RPGM Engine... like more possible interaction with your Sorroundings. And that's where most fail. As someone pointed out already, most Porn-RPGM-Game-Developers develope an RPGM Game like it is an mere VN, and that's why this games feel so wrong, and that's why some of these Remakes makes so much sense to me.

#Combat:
Idk. With RPG-Maker there is good Combat possible which is comparable to classic FF's and such, but the question is, does an H-Game needs such a thing? Because for me it feels like most People want to play H-Games for fapping anyway... that's why for Porn-Games it kinda would feel waisted, except the Dev's intention truly is in focus with gameplay (and story) and the H-Content is something to add an extra layer.

 

[Nerro]

The grind...If I wanted to play a full fledged RPG with 20 stats and 100 weapons i'd play an actual JRPG. Make it simple and easy and focus on the story. The story is what makes the CG's worth it anyway.

 

[Lizard Wizard]

Grind, tedious dumbf.ck missions and walking.

Gotta go through this maze oh oopsie you got caught by guard go back and try again and again and again and again. Like fck off.