Rorasuketo Dev Blog

Bout 1 is done. This is a big achievement! I have been putting it off for ages. It is starting to feel like Rora is finally coming together as one unit, not scattered into bits and pieces. It feels like it's really happening. I will stitch together these pieces into a whole. I find that being visible on Steam is holding me accountable and giving me the energy to work on the game every day, rather than my usual fits of starts and stops. At some point, I will need to tend to my homework more faithfully, but the game must march on as well. There are  expectations now. He's worried! You cut him! You hurt him! You see? You see? He's not a machine! He's a man! - Duke, Rocky IV

We're getting into the weeds now. This is not for the faint of heart! And for aspiring game makers, I can't guarantee this is the easiest way to go about this, but it's what I've cobbled together during my time in RPG Maker MZ. First of all, I establish some variables. These are numeral integers that you can set, add to, subtract from, multiply, whatever - and then apply to any other variables or game parameters you like, like gaining or losing a very specific number of HP. I name one variable per teammate.   The idea: whenever you encounter a teammate for the first time, you can talk to them to raise their Affection variable a little bit. Let's say I want to plop the skater Wreck on a map. I create a new event - one square on the map. This will be Wreck. She will be hanging out, doing squats.   I open the event's details. On the left side of this window, I specify her image, that she'll be "stepping" (animated), that she doesn't change directi...

Something I've saved for the last big push of the game build is the derby bouts* themselves (of which there will be four). It may have been a poor strategy, saving the most tedious parts for last, but here we are. Maybe I needed to get all the art and affection mechanics and endings and town maps to build the sunk cost to a point of no return. Anyway, I've been developing the individual minigame mechanics of these bouts for a while, and you do  encounter most of them in the demo at team practices. So I've had things more or less planned out and built - all I have to do is piece together all the if-thens at bouts and plop in the quick time events. If you succeed or fail at one task, there's a branch. If you succeed or fail at the next task after that, there's a branch. And so on. So you can either rock a jam completely or fail it completely - or fall somewhere in between. Just like real derby, one good hit (or whiff) can change the entire dynamic of a jam. That's...

If you go to Steam and search for "rora," this happens. Oh, look, it's the thing I made! Check it out here ! Wishlist if you desire.

If you haven't played a demo yet, head to rorasuketo.win and grab the latest. In this new demo, you can get a new job, shop for gifts to your teammates, and endure a short series of drills to join the roller derby team. It ends on a nice little cliffhanger that I think is appropriate for a demo. It's been so long since I put out the last demo (two years?) that I can't remember what other improvements I may have made. Presumably, though, there are a few!

I have spent the last day toiling away on graphical assets and officially pushed the "submit for review" button. We'll see what happens next. Here's the preview that I can see, at least: The Japanese in the subheader of the logo is a little treat for the manga fans and gives a little taste of that influence. I'm not putting the subheader in  all  of the promotional materials because the game is in English and I don't want to give the wrong impression. Previously, the subheader was all katakana, but I seem to have dialed in the right kanji . At least, Google Translate seems to think so. Phew. I also realized that in my own Steam store , I have filtered out the tag "Sports" (I played a little  Mutant League Football   when I was a kid, but even then, I was randomly selecting plays), so hopefully that will not do any harm in the scheme of the almighty algorithm. Prioritizing tags was very difficult, but in the end I listed the first five as: JRPG Skat...

This post contains a mild spoiler. One of the things I try to do is give Rorasuketo a bit more of a Japanese flavor. I am not necessarily what I would call a "weeb," but I have played a lot of games from Japan, some with the occasional strange translation (spoony bard!). I have watched both Fullmetal Alchemists all the way through, and I collect Yotsuba and Black Jack manga. Of course I love me a Studio Ghibli film. But 90% of the time, if you ask me if I have heard of a manga/anime/band, I will probably say no. As someone with a lot of white guilt, who tries to be hyper aware of power dynamics, I wrestle a bit with the idea of injecting Japanese culture into the game - or at least my second- or third-hand interpretation of Japanese culture. In a way, I consider Rora's tongue-in-cheek references fair game due to the massive influx of such media into the west. My little game does not have the power of the Nintendo corporation. I am sure my translations in places are ro...

I have this dreadful personal flaw where I tend to operate under the assumption that other people know the things I know. I don't mean to be rude or confusing or annoying. I just spend so much time rummaging around in my own neurotic head that I forget other people's heads might work differently. So when I'm writing dialogue for seven skaters,  I  know the differences between them. But a cast of seven Affection-garnering NPCs is kind of a lot for a 4-hour game, especially when those NPCs are always gathered in the same physical location, all more feminine-leaning in gender, and all  wearing   uniforms. Maybe this is why no one's made a game like this. It's a fool's errand! All that to say: I'm adding a diary in Kady's apartment where you can look up your teammates' names, portraits, Affection level, what gifts they like, and what's happened on your dates (if any). You're welcome, player.   I remember playing video games in the '90s, like...

  These kinds of things are always subject to change, but I thought I'd share what it looks like about now. And what it looks like about now is... almost like a real game. I enjoy the cast, and having a more horizontal graphic was going to fit better than a full-length skater on the screen, so I thought I'd put our skaters front and center. Just kind of smash 'em all in there. Lots of color, lots of personality, lots of possibilities.