Elements Update and OpenRTP Announcement (Patreon)

Hello! Been a while since I've made a post like this.

Today I just want to drop a quick update, so you know what's going on with our current active asset projects, and what's coming up in the near future. 

I'll try to keep this brief!

1. Time Elements Core Character Pack

This is the one that I released at the end of last year for patrons (and have shared some updates since that first release). As I've said before, this is pretty much already completed, and patrons already have access to it.

• Then why isn't it published and in the stores yet?

Yeah-- obviously I've been delaying on this! I meant to have it released to the public months ago! At first I was waiting while I added some extras based on patron ideas (like these helmet and hooded cloak updates).

After that, there has been some announcements and cryptic chatter about an upcoming new RPGMaker-- RPG Maker Unite for Unity. 

If this thing is coming soon, then ideally I could launch Elements in a format that would work with it-- it would be really sweet if Elements was ready to go with Unite, so I've been hoping to get more information about the asset requirements and formatting. 

Afaik, my contacts are still waiting on information from Japan, and they don't know much more than anybody else :shrug: -- so that's the big reason that I've recently been stalling on the Elements official release. I'm holding out for info so that I can hopefully release these things on launch to be compatible with that new engine.

That makes sense, right?

If we don't hear anything new in the next month, then I'm not gonna keep holding my breath, and we'll just go ahead with what I already have for the originally-planned Elements release, just this summer instead of spring.

Anyways-- if you're reading this you're already a Patron-- so you already have early access to the pack! The delays won't mean much to you 😘

2. Quirky NPC April Asset Release

While I'm sitting on Elements for the above reasons,  I'm taking advantage of this time to push hard on other things. 

Obviously, I put some of that towards the grind in the previous month for Quirky NPC April, where I released a new character every single weekday. It was a lot of fun and patrons seemed to really enjoy it! 

Anyways-- I'm not gonna dwell on it too much here, just to say that you can expect some sort of release in the near future that will compile all of those characters.

Most likely, it'll be a simple .zip that I put up on my itch.io page, similar to other releases that I've made in the past out of patron content.

And like all of those, it'll remain free for patrons, just in an additional special .zip for others, and/or to help promote the patreon page. Nothing new or surprising there, I think.

3. OpenRTP Tileset Project

Whaaaaaaaaaat's this?

If you follow me on Twitter, over the past couple of weeks, you might have seen some random screenshots from old RPGMaker 2000 games. I've been playing through some classics, like Jay's Journey and Legion Saga. It's a lot of fun for nostalgia-- but it's not just because of nostalgia. I'm paying attention to the ways that the games make use of the original 2K RTP tilesets.

See, I've decided that I'm going to contribute to the EasyRPG OpenRTP project.

Games preservation is an important topic these days, and especially for me, where RM2K/3 games were hugely influential on me and the online culture I came up in. EasyRPG makes playing those games a breeze, so it's a really great tool for games preservation. It goes in the other direction too, enabling modern releases so that people can use the RM2K/3 engines to make games in 2022.

(It-it-it's not like I want to make an RM2K game myself or anything... 👉👈)

Anyways, they have a project ongoing to create a suite of new original assets that can be used to overwrite the original RTP graphics (which are copyrighted), so that they can be shared as freeware.

And, well... 👉👈

... since I have a real love of the original RTP sets...

... I understand the tiles really well since I've been using RM2K for like 20 years...

... I've created sets before that are like this, so I have the experience...

... I want to give back to the community that's given me so much...

... and since I'm stalling for more info on Unite before I continue with Elements...

I'm recreating the entire set of RM2K3 RTP tilesets with original assets, and I will be releasing them to the public domain without any limitations.

Here's the cool news about this one: I'm more than halfway done with it already. 😚 So it'll be really fun to release it as a "drop" in the near future. Keep an eye out.

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• Q: Will the OpenRTP tiles be compatible with TF/Elements?

Sure. They use the same 16x16 tilebase.

Style-wise, they fall somewhere in between Time Fantasy and the upcoming Elements tiles (in fact, I'll probably re-use some object tiles here and there to fill out the set, so like a random TF chair tile or something might find its way into the public domain lol). 

The OpenRTP tiles should look good when mixed with either style-- and hopefully other styles by other people!!-- though note that the colors would need to be tweaked to match Time Fantasy.

• Q: Will the OpenRTP tiles be released in RMMV/MZ formats?

No. These tiles will be released in the "chipset" arrangement used by RM2K/3 and EasyRPG. They're designed specifically to correspond with and overwrite the original RM2K/3 RTP tilesets.

But because they're released as completely free, you'll be welcome to edit and re-organize them to whatever works for you.

• Q: Does a big open-source release compete against your own asset business?

Uh... I hope not! 😨 

I think that I'm in a unique position to create a set like this, and release it for free, specifically because I have the backing and support of my patrons. Thank you!

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Okay, that's it for this one. Thanks for reading.

If you have any questions or anything else, go ahead and ask in the comments.

See you soon with something new. Thanks!