Topic: Moonlight Requiem

[Trebor777]

Hello People!! I'm going to present you the project I'm working on.
( drum rolls )
Let me introduce you to Moonlight Requiem!!

Project's History
This project started a few years back in 2008, in the old days when RPG Maker VX had came out. We had a good team going on, artists, composer and all was well.
We kept working with it until the end of summer 2009. Then the project kinda died due to our busy lives.
During that time I started to realize that the api provided by VX wouldn't be able to fill completely our expectations.
Then came summer 2010 where I tried to restart the project with my co founder, sadly, most of the rest of the team was gone. I had then decided to keep using the editor that VX provided and only the data generated by it and would make my own engine.
And then it died again...

Until a few weeks ago! This time I have time, my friend has time, we have a new composer, and an extra coder and We're now building our own editor that will be tailored to our needs.
Now we're kinda looking for artists to help us (more on that later). And now we're changing a few things from our original start!

If all goes according to plan... we hope to have something playable a minimum in 6-months.

Introduction
Moonlight Requiem aims to be an hommage to the series in the style of a metroidvania with our own vision of things, things we'd like to see in the original series. We're not pretending it's gonna be perfect but we're working for that. The title used to be "Castlevania: Moonlight Requiem" but we'd like to avoid any problem with Konami, as we're building our own assets pretty much from scratch the only thing not belonging to us was the 'Castlevania' bit.

The game is in 2D, with a resolution of 1280x720 pixel, the main character will be about 160px high. ( used to be 480x272 with a 48px high character)
We were going for a pixel art style similar to the DS episodes. it was working well for the previous resolution but due to the fact that good pixel artists willing to work on that kind of project for free is extremely rare, and also because of the new dimensions, we're going for a slightly different look! ( can't tell you much yet as we're still discussing it )

For the music, we are going for a blend of orchestral themes and some "goth" metal.

Gameplay Features
We're keeping the nice formula that Metroidvania offers and we're adding a RPG side to it but more developed than in the original games. That allows us to make it a bit more tactical.

Because we're going for a main character not related to the Belmont or any character's in the series, this gave us a little more freedom in what she (yes it's a she) can do
Our main character is the daughter of a vampire and a witch.
With this you have to play style to handle combat. You can go Witch Side, and fight at range with powerful spells with some melee elements or you can go Vampire Side and go berserk in melee slicing your way through, being stronger, faster, more resistant, etc...!
This is balanced so that Vampire side isn't overkill either It has its counterpart as well.

The Equipment is similar to what you can do in Order of Ecclesia. You can equip a weapon for each arm unless it's two handed weapon (like a claymore or a bow). But to make things a bit more interesting, you can't have access to all the stuff you found all the time. So we're using a magic bag/chest system. The bag contains what you have access to all the time and his limited in the amount of stuff you can carry. Once a bag is full, all the stuff you find gets sent to the chest. The chest you can find it in the save rooms.

We have a skill system, for both play style. The idea is that you can equip 3 skills ( 2 actives and 1 passive ) that you learn over time. You can find the skills imbued in the gear you're currently wearing. Once learned, you can equip that skill whenever, gear or no gear.

We obviously still have the relic system, giving you special abilities to progress in the different areas.

About Exploration: The story will take you around the old Europe of the mid 17th century and will end somewhere we all love here. We aim to offer something bigger than Order of Ecclesia... with more people to meet and talk to. ( and not limited to one tiny town )

The famous sub weapons will be in game.


Story

The stars read June 6th, 1666, an appropriately unassuming date for such an unassuming event as the Indefin Eclipse. For days, astronomers fell dazzled not only at how such a perfect eclipse had been overlooked, but the fact that the moon fell still at the very moment that the umbra fell on London - even more so of course that the moon fell still at all. At the dawn of the eclipse's second day, the inner workings of the Church - after much heated debate and deliberation - declared the event an intervening of the Divine, and that the now dubbed Indefin Eclipse could be explained not by scientific measures, but faith alone.
   The Order Ex Corde Dominus, a religious guild of specialized vanguards and associates independent from the Church itself, had their hands in the debates of the Indefin Eclipse's devine declaration. One official representative, Mr. Mars Cadre, and two slightly less official representatives attended the meetings of the Church on the Order's behalf.
   To the ignorance of the Church and its leaders, the Order Ex Corde Dominus had already sent an officer to investigate the area of London under which the umbra of the Indefin most vividly held. The officer's name was Jena Cross, daughter of none, an up-and-coming Officer in the ranks of the Order and apprentice to Mars Cadre himself...


About us
Currently the team is composed of:
Emryx: Founder of the project, works on the Game Design and Story as well as interface elements.
Myself: Co Founder, did a bit of design too, and mostly coding the game and managing the team.
JohnSpade: Our second coder, working on the game editor.
AlexG: Our composer, working on fantastic pieces of music.

Show me stuff
We strongly invite you to visit our website for updates and information on the project ( http://moonlight-requiem.trebor777.net )
Here are some old videos ( what is used to be like ) and a recent one ( not showing much though)
You can listen to some of the music on the website !

OLD vid with myself explaining stuff:
Moonlight Requiem - Mask and Skills

New Vid, but it's pretty ugly, old assets and nothing pretty to show:
Moonlight Requiem July 2011 Update

Help
We need graphical artist(s), myself being busy with the coding. Having talented people with 2D is what we need right now (for the levels assets and concepts for the characters)
If you fancy helping us and be part of the project. Give me a shout here via this thread or by PM... or email.

Enjoy!
P.S. (after a search I found our project mentioned on these in an old post: Here )

[X]

This project looks interesting. I also find it intriguing that you have the main protagonist as a Dhampir running around with Wicca-like abilities. I'll want to try this when its done!

[ScionOfBalance]

This look's quite promising.i'll look forward to it.

[Dark Nemesis]

I remember looking videos of this one on youtube, but i have thought that it was dead....
I am happy that it isn't't!!!

[X]

I noticed in the vid that the protagonist's arms aren't very natural-looking in her idle stance. Are you going to touch them up or was that already taken care of?

[Gunlord]

Hmm...I coulda sworn I saw this project before. Maybe on the Anti-Chapel or something?

[Trebor777]

Yes we had a thread too at AntiChapel.

X: As I said don't take any into account any graphical stuff from the old videos. This stuff is going to change!
 

[AISTODIAOLO]

hey
I m the one who commented on ur site . yeah I m "just some fan"
I hope u ll find the help u need
looking forward for ur next update

[KaZudra]

great game, keep it up!

[Trebor777]

Cheers

Tiny dev news:
Updated logo and title screen with something closer to what we want in the end.
Also
Enemies are alive :p almost, they dont move or attack but you can kill them :p with your blue rectangle sword/staff/whatever is long and thin (:p). More progress to go obviously.
Next steps:
- Implement physics for them so they can move and collide properly with the map.
- Implement simple physics for items to fall on the floor.
- Start basics for simple projectile physics. (mass, initial velocity and map collision)
With that I should have a lot more interaction on the map going on.  ^^
Loads to go still :p ( I want our other coder to come back from his holidays... 3-weeks god damnit to wait on the freaking editor )

Anyway :p Enjoy!

[Inccubus]

Cheers! I love seeing progress on our fan games. With all the drama lately about the 25th anniversary and what not it's good that we can at least do our own things without relying on Konami. If they can't deliver the stuff we want, then we can do it ourselves. ^___^

[Trebor777]

Yeah you're right ! :p Im quite wondering what it's gonna be... please be IGA on console big 2D xD (please SOTN on PS3 for Europe... that'd be very nice)
Probably gonna be a HD version of something though... like other Konami products.


I also completely forgot to mention our facebook page (you can find it on the website ) if people want to "like" us

[Flame]

Wow this looks really cool! I love in particular, the artwork for the character. It all just looks perfectly  'vania! Im certainly going to follow this with anticipation.

[Trebor777]

question people:
If we were to open the project to donations ( in order to commission talented artists ) would you think it'd work?
How would you perceived it ?

I'm not sure about it yet, and I still need to talk with my team mates about the idea. But it could be one way to increase the pace and still have a good quality while being able to complete the project.

Also small update on the website!

[X]

Donations might be a good idea to bring in more talented help or as an incentive, however it might also be just that one step closer to crossing the fine line between fan-made and profit made. If you do go for the idea don't let the suits at Konami know or they may send you a C&D order