PSA: RPG Maker VX Ace is currently Free + Others cheap

[Daichi777]

Not a vore game itself so if it's not allowed, apologies Eka. Just thought it'd be good for people thinking to be Dev's etc while it's free and others on sale.

Steam is currently doing a big RPG Maker sale in 2 parts starting today, the next part is on Feb 10th (Not sure what it'll be, my guess lots of asset stuff on sale since most aren't on sale).

Currently RPG Maker VX Ace is available free for those looking to get into development or using it for existing games to explore and learn from them (that a dev has given permission for). The 2nd option of buying it is something else, think you get a key to give someone possibly. It doesn't give steam cards, and it might have limited quantities of it being free.

RPG MZ is the most expensive since it's the latest, but MV (IMO) is far better and easier to edit and learn from since it's been out longer and has a lot more support. MZ you cannot edit animations without another program, and plugins I believe are encrypted, and the differences between MV and MZ are so little. For the cheap price, MV is a good one to learn to develop on if you're looking to create vore story orientated games. There's a lot of other people and devs who are happy to answer questions and try help when asked that use MV too.

[manic2002]

Thanks for the heads up on this!!!

I've been guest hovering around this site for years, and of all the things that get me to sign up for an account it's this.. Definitely going to be having a play

I had no idea RPG maker could be found on steam and to get it for free, bonus!

[POWtato]

The plugins themselves aren't usually encrypted for MZ, but some of the developers have decided to start doing so (apparently the VIsuStella series of plugins are obfuscated, for example). And it's not limited to MZ, but folks are also doing that for their MV plugins.

I think the other program you refer to is for the effects stuff? Might have to look into that more, myself.

Anywho, it's definitely a nice sale, and I hope it encourages some folks to pick up RPG Maker, even if they don't end up using it for much.

Happy Game Making~. :3

[ianaro]

Thanks for this; I've picked it up.

[geminishades1]

let us all prepare for a massive influx of ai generated rpgmaker games

[strawhat64]

Thx for the heads up. I also got it even just for the heck of it. I've always been curious though what is like to build a game.

[BrowsingFrog]

let us all prepare for a massive influx of ai generated rpgmaker games

Oh god yeah. Truly is going to be more and more slop here.

[Daichi777]

The plugins themselves aren't usually encrypted for MZ, but some of the developers have decided to start doing so (apparently the VIsuStella series of plugins are obfuscated, for example). And it's not limited to MZ, but folks are also doing that for their MV plugins.

I think the other program you refer to is for the effects stuff? Might have to look into that more, myself.

Anywho, it's definitely a nice sale, and I hope it encourages some folks to pick up RPG Maker, even if they don't end up using it for much.

Happy Game Making~. :3

VisuStella were the ones that launched with MZ yeah, they were made by/with YanFly who's done the majority of the MV ones. He started charging and encrypting them because someone took his plugins, modified them and started selling them and pretending they made it.

let us all prepare for a massive influx of ai generated rpgmaker games

Oh god yeah. Truly is going to be more and more slop here.

While I don't like AI and what it's done/how stuff never looks consistent. People like to share their worlds and what they've made. Not everyone is capable of doing programming, art, tilesets, story, layout, audio etc all at once. Even less so with how much it costs to buy something or licenses to use it.

RPG Maker has a bad rep here because of similar. It's easy to use, has assets, but so many quit over motivation/seeing how hard it is to create a game. Doesn't mean all RPG Maker games are horrendous.

Everyone's got to start somewhere. Look at my early horrible asset work of Giantess Simulator to what I do with Tsumi Umi now for example.

[BrowsingFrog]

While I don't like AI and what it's done/how stuff never looks consistent. People like to share their worlds and what they've made. Not everyone is capable of doing programming, art, tilesets, story, layout, audio etc all at once. Even less so with how much it costs to buy something or licenses to use it.

RPG Maker has a bad rep here because of similar. It's easy to use, has assets, but so many quit over motivation/seeing how hard it is to create a game. Doesn't mean all RPG Maker games are horrendous.

Everyone's got to start somewhere. Look at my early horrible asset work of Giantess Simulator to what I do with Tsumi Umi now for example.

Oh I'm completely aware of that. I'm more just worried about the games *completely* generated by AI. After all, chatgpt exists for writing and so many ai programs exist for art. I personally just think that while it can of course be a tool for those who can't draw/comm artists, I'm personally worried about the prevalence of both writing and images generated by AI

[ian66613]

It should also be noted that both MV and MZ don't use Ruby/Whatever the normal RPGMaker coding language is/was. It instead uses JavaScript and the like. In addition, it can be exported to HTML5/Web, which would allow it to run directly in a browser, and thus on Linux. Furthermore, MV/MZ allows you to maximize the window, which is one of the reasons I prefer it to VX Ace and older. Shrink Hotel runs on MV/MZ, while FantasM runs on VX Ace and older. Meanwhile, Wolf RPG Editor is just sitting in the corner playing in its own little world.

These are good "Starter" game making tools if you really want to make RPGs and/or visual novels that can have intricate world maps/battles, but they all suffer from performance issues (usually limited by the game engine.) Like loading large images/parallax, etc. This is why you see people having body exploration scenes/etc. in these engines in their own small zone.

As a major tip to anyone getting started with these engines: Do NOT use event tiles everywhere. Instead, learn about region events and the like. They are way less intensive on the game engine. (Both MV/MZ have regions as part of the rpgmaker program. I believe for VX and older you need yanfly's region plugin or whatever.) Using these for large zone transition areas (like the entire edge of a map/screen) is the best option. Instead of having one singular tile the player must find, or is marked.

[Scoutboy25]

No current plans to make a game anytime soon, but I might just go ahead and pick up MV incase I do.

[antonioender]

I know it doesn't have much to do with it, but.... Does anyone know if any Godot games have been created lately around here. In metroidvania style or more like hollow knight? PS: I agree that AIs open people's vision to be able to present their worlds, but somehow we must not lose the focus of learning the process of how to do that very thing that the AI “”does“”. Simply taking them as temporary tools would be fine. Not substitutes.

[SquishySofty]

I know it doesn't have much to do with it, but.... Does anyone know if any Godot games have been created lately around here.

There's quite a ton of Metroidvania related games on Itch.io, but in here specifically? I don't know if there's anyone here who creates a vore based metroidvania (Even though that would be a sick ass idea).
I've been using Godot Engine since 2021, and I still don't think I'm ready to tackle a larger scale Metroidvania. (Smaller scale, maybe. I'm just a solo dev lmao)

Back to RPG maker, while I do have a massive disdain towards games made in that engine, I don't really blame the engine itself. It's kind of like the same fate to unity games with low quality garbage, even though it's not limited to just those engines in general. Don't get me wrong, I don't hate anyone that uses it. Some people just create some REALLY cool stuff with just RPG maker, if you made your own assets and your own tiles. Even better if the battle system is unique too. But I know that not everyone are artists or programmers, and I understand that it's a popular tool for beginners to create their (hopefully) first game. ... Sorry, I should stop rambling now.

I do appreciate that RPG maker is on sale for a reasonable price, and I might pick it up and play around with it for a while. However, I think I'm satisfied with Godot Engine for the time being.

[Nibor]

Bro! That's awesome; I can finally finish my (Non-vore) game that I've been wanting to do for so long! JUST picked it up on Steam. Started that game on the free trial of VX Ace, and only got to two "demos" before the trial ended. NOW I can finish it!

[bebopy]

I'm excited to see which games stand out above the others, this is probably the first step into game design for a lot of people and nowadays it's easier than ever. For every hundred bad games, a gem is born

[The_Prof]

I wouldn't worry about this being against the rules. Eka tends to be a pretty magnanimous, fair and even handed leader and would gladly be willing to help you spread the good news to aspiring vore game devs

send help she's in my walls

[Baron]

Thanks for the info

[antonioender]

I know it doesn't have much to do with it, but.... Does anyone know if any Godot games have been created lately around here.

There's quite a ton of Metroidvania related games on Itch.io, but in here specifically? I don't know if there's anyone here who creates a vore based metroidvania (Even though that would be a sick ass idea).
I've been using Godot Engine since 2021, and I still don't think I'm ready to tackle a larger scale Metroidvania. (Smaller scale, maybe. I'm just a solo dev lmao)

I do appreciate that RPG maker is on sale for a reasonable price, and I might pick it up and play around with it for a while. However, I think I'm satisfied with Godot Engine for the time being.

Oh, I see, thanks for taking the trouble to respond.

[dxasmodeus]

Thx for the heads up. I also got it even just for the heck of it. I've always been curious though what is like to build a game.

As someone who has worked with RPG maker since the Don Miguel days, I can tell you that making a game is both very rewarding, but also terribly exhausting, especially if you are a one-man show. It is near impossible, as others have said, to find a dev that is a total package; someone who can write, code and draw. Missing any of those talents is a massive discouragement for finishing a project. Collaboration is its own minefield and I won't discuss that here. The greatest challenge to making a game is simply doing the work. Most devs do so as a hobby. Said devs have day jobs just to pay bills and it can be damn hard to maintain a game development schedule when basic wage slaving sucks out one's will to do anything.

From my own experiences, my project has been in a hiatus because 1) I had to start it again from scratch to refine and remove slop from the code. 2) my day job pretty much sucks out my will to live, and 3) despite being a talented writer and reasonable coder, I cannot draw and porn games live and die upon artwork. Text can only get one so far. My project is also extremely ambitious, meaning more work on the backend to force RPG Maker to do what I want. The amount of work involved is daunting. I know I can do it, but being burned out on simply making a meager living destroys what energy reserves I may have for work on games.

If you or anyone else are serious about making games, I can give plenty of advice. I have experience with every version of RPG Maker as well as Smile Game Builder. However, make no mistake that making even a small game is one hell of a project that requires a ton of work and indepth knowledge of whatever engine you are using. It is surprisingly overwhelming.

[Flame_Valxsarion]

From my own experiences, my project has been in a hiatus because 1) I had to start it again from scratch to refine and remove slop from the code. 2) my day job pretty much sucks out my will to live, and 3) despite being a talented writer and reasonable coder, I cannot draw and porn games live and die upon artwork. Text can only get one so far. My project is also extremely ambitious, meaning more work on the backend to force RPG Maker to do what I want. The amount of work involved is daunting. I know I can do it, but being burned out on simply making a meager living destroys what energy reserves I may have for work on games.

Oh man do I feel this in my soul. The worst part is I have all my good ideas at work, but by the time I'm off I'd rather just die in my chair than work on anything.
I can vouch for VX Ace. It has very smooth performance, though it takes some getting used to its small resolution. It's also fairly flexible with some creative coding, and there are vast archives of plug-ins to tweak it as well. My game plays like TLOZ A Link to the Past, for example. Nearly anything is possible