The best advice I ever got for writing characters (of any kind) was "Every person is the hero of their own story". That is to say, nobody really thinks of themselves as "evil". Well, insane people do... but they're insane. Everyone thinks of every action they're taking as reasonable because... reasons! A villain is simply anyone opposing the party, in all honesty. They don't even have to have nefarious motives of becoming a dictator. Maybe they want the exact same thing as the party, but their methods are different, and so they clash. But, again, everyone is the hero of their own story. Everyone joins the party for their own reasons, they're united in saving the world, because it accomplishes their own personal goals to join up with these other people who have different goals, but the same way to accomplish them. Rarely is it ever in real life that a group of people who don't know each other stay together for very long, or even long enough to get any sort of project done. Without a personal stake for each individual, they just engage in whatever it is as "meh" and half-ass everything. All characters are heroes. Even NPCs. That farmer is concerned about his crops because he can't feed his family without them. Maybe he can't buy a horse in the future to help plow fields of those crops fail. Maybe the major thinks he's the best man for running the town, so he wants to win because he thinks the townspeople just don't understand how screwed the town is without him. We are all heroes of our own stories. It's the best advice I was ever given about writing characters. It goes into the thought-process behind every character I've ever created.
@@MetaKnight964 That's known as "a crazy person" and is not only unrealistic, but also quite boring in terms of writing. "Why did they do that? Oh, they're evil. No other reason." It's flimsy justification for anything you have them do and it lets the reader know that such people are basically just a plot device. To be treated as no more important than a rock by the side of the road. Such a character exists because you can't have the story without them.
One thing that I always found interesting and fleshed the characters more for me was something that Final Fantasy IV for the DS did. As the story progressed, each character had their own thought bubble when you checked your menu. The thought bubbles served as a sort of status update for each character. It was usually them giving their opinion on each situation and giving them a voice. Just throwing in my two cents. You could replicate this thing in your own sort of way whether it be through a journal, making a mechanic where you're able to talk to your characters whenever, etc.
I would be *very* careful with your last point. "Love your characters." There are creators of stories out there who would fall in love with certain characters to the detriment of the story. Anne McCaffrey, Laurell K. Hamilton and J.K Rowling spring to mind. Love your characters too much and you lose some of your objectivity when it comes to the situations they are in. Or worse they become self inserts.
I love how similar your description of creating characters for a game is to creating them for a written story, because that's EXACTLY how it should be. As a writer, I've found that if you neglect a character, so will your readers. Each character needs to feel loved, because that love carries over to your audience. No one is going to care about the protagonist's girlfriend getting killed if they don't have any idea who she is, even if it sends said protagonist into a vicious cycle of revenge. Regardless of whether they are words on a page or dots on a screen, every character is alive and has a story to tell.
for some reason I usually have an easier time writing villains than I do heroes this lead to me developing a technique where I try figuring out the story with the 'antagonist' as the 'protagonist' it works for me but, this is some incredibly useful information, and I am glad that I have come across this thank you
+savegalkissy My current method is just to write stuff down when I think of it. Whatever tidbit it may be, I add it to my ideas page. When I have enough to start forming something coherent, a story is born. Problem is it takes time, but my best ideas come to me in the most random of times.
You seriously have the most fun to watch informational channel ever. Although I suck at almost everything you mention, it's so nice to take all these tips and work with them!! Also, usually when I see a 13 min video, I'm like 'nah.. too long.' Not with your vid's! :D
+Lisa Michelle lol I can usually tolerate 15 minutes or less, though they've reaaaally gotta hold my interest:3, save LPs or naturally longer videos - I'm about 40 min max for those:P Thankies for watching^_^
Echo607 Hehe, no problem, I like watching. I usually don't watch let's plays because they're too long, and I like playing itself more :3 Although I still want to finish your Gaia's Melody LP! (I'm at part 2... oops)
Haha, LPs are a long time dedication:3 I honestly only watch them from like... one or two people anymore. The game's available for download if you'd rather play it - it's not 'too' broken anymore:P
I don’t know how many years it’s been since I first watched this video, but even now it still stands as the best video I’ve seen on how to write characters.
Another thing with characters: Make sure there isn't too much "overlap". Usually, you should make sure that no character is too similar to another character.
To be fair, there can be good reasons for making characters similar intentionally. The example for this I use in one of my stories, is that there are 4 characters, each looking like a twin of each other, but being inverted of each other (twins of dark and twins of light, but all 4 share the same face) There's lore stuff that actually connects the 4 characters together in perfect inverses of each other's twin. Complicated? Basically there's twins of dark -happy go lucky and likes to fight -introverted, caring but more reserved and cautious. Then the twins of light -happy go lucky, caring and reserved -introverted but likes to fight All 4 characters are intentionally similar but are memorable because of their expressive methods. _the lore reason that the 4 characters all share the same face is that the Goddess of Creation had given the Kings of Light and Dark a fragment of the purest form of Life and Death respectively and asked them to create children with it and raise them however they desired. Their birth and creation was made to be two sets of fragmented Life and Death combining to create a new God of Creation and continue to oversee the flow of Life and Death from all of Creation._ The Goddess does this because of the exhaustive list of powers, she was capable of having premonitions and knew of her own demise at the hands of a demon and made preparations so that the power of Creation didn't fall into the hands of one who only destroys. Anyway, the long winded point is that characters can be as similar as you want them to be, the trick is to make them stand out from that similarity and leave their own mark on the story, but more importantly, on you, the one experiencing the story? Apologies if I misunderstood, I know the comment is quite old but I just felt like sharing my thoughts on your comment.
I use RPG Maker MV, too! In it, I'm currently working on a game called Project Chibi. There's this one character in the game called Alex who ends up being the first boss. The boss fight with him is actually meant to be lost! Kinda ironic but I went with it. Alex is an assassin who was forced to work for a Dark Lord. He was sent to kill the main characters (Amelia, Cassie, Marsha and Melanie) and if Alex didn't agree, the Dark Lord would kill him, then go to kill your party himself. After losing the battle like you're meant to, he takes your party to a place where they can be safe from the Dark Lord. But, before your party wakes up, Alex gets killed off in a pretty brutal way. The way he dies is that he was beaten up until he could barely even stand and then strangled until his neck broke. By time Amelia wakes up, Alex has already been killed and the Dark Lord has already left the area. When your party finds him dead against the wall, Amelia concludes that he was murdered. Is that good character design?
Well, I recommend that you show some of Alex’s personality, is he likeable? how does he feel about his blackmail? Can you tell from his design? Those are just a few tips.
I'm subscribing to you. As a writer, character development has always been one of the most important aspect of any story (and it's just downright fun). Seeing a character grow is something that I've always enjoyed in writing, whether it's a character that starts weak and scared to being strong and courageous through the actions and guidance of her friends, or something who cares very little about human life and wouldn't hesitate to kill to being someone who tries to make the best of her life (and everyone elses), but is deeply troubled by her past actions and haunted by the lives she has taken. Also, people complaining about cliche's has always been a peeve of mine. I don't mind cliche's in the slightest bit. To me, it's not a matter of how original (or unoriginal) said plot device is, but a matter of how it is executed. Two villains can capture a princess for different reasons. One could capture the princess to use her as a means of gaining her kingdoms cooperation as the kingdom she is a part of is actually a kingdom meaning to take over the villian's homeland, and the princess herself would be unaware of it and actually joins her captors side knowing that her homeland is more villainous than she was aware of. The other villain could capture a princess because the villain is the princess' true father. She could have been adopted after her mother died and the father was at war. Later in life, the father learns of the princess being his daughter (or so he would believe), and captures her. He tries to explain this, but she isn't believing him until the father comments on her birthmark, something only her adopted parents would know about. Right there is the exact same concept (princess is captured), but entirely different reasons on why she is captured. One is for negotiation, the other is for father-daughter reunion.
Well, it's good to see Chrono Cross mentioned once every few years, lol. I've done quite a bit since I messaged you last, and the project I spoke to you about is very much underway. Characters are honestly one of the only things I'm not struggling with - "variables," "switches," and all those scary programming stuff are the things holding me back. It doesn't seem like there's any really good beginner tutorials for advanced eventing in MV - and I do mean beginner, not "do this, do that, and you're done! What's that, you want to know what I clicked? ...oh." Honestly, I think the biggest problem with indie games is the hook - they need something to really stand out, for gamers to really be interested in it vs. all the other good stuff out there. Otherwise, you have a perfectly good game, but no one to play it.
When I was working on the earliest version of my first game, I didn't really know what I was gonna do with the plot besides the generic "save the world" crap. But I knew I wanted to do something more than that, so as I went on, I just kinda... let my characters write themselves. I let them have stupid arguments and monologue about their innermost feelings, even when it felt contrived or pointless to the plot. This actually ended up helping a LOT, because now I understood my own characters well enough to write them into a proper story. I ended up putting in bits of my own life and personality into them that made them feel more special to me, and I grew to love all of them, even the more "generic" characters I created. So now that I'm working on a remake of my first game, I can't wait to flesh out my characters even more and see what they get up to ^w^
I don't know why but I find antagonists so hard to write. I'm making a trilogy of games, and I try to make the villains fit in with the main characters In my first game, the main character is Sard, he's a loner who doesn't have many friends, he doesn't really mind though, then there the villain, Darius, who's a wind mage who can also use water and light magic. He was kind of picked on, his goal is to gain more power to lead the city he lives in to take over the world, so he will be respected, I took a bit of inspiration from the Romans, who make their heroes into a god when they die. Darius aimed for this, but the player stopped him. Fits to where the final fight takes place, you've defeated the god of destruction foiled all of his efforts, so this time you fight him, he's angry, now using physical attacks, the fight takes place in a colosseum, with thousands of people watching, he wanted everyone to see your downfall, and he would down in history as a legend.
You know, ive been writing npcs for over 25 years (for d&d not video games) and this video still told me a lot about ways to create, not only new npcs/pcs, but also, it reminded me that all the characters shoyld have.. well character. Thanks for making these videos.
Funnily enough, I tend to go either way with characters & game mechanics. For things like roleplays where there is already a universe set, I can usually build one for the universe easily. When it comes to games, I prefer to focus on the game mechanics over everything else. Personally, if a game is very fun, I can deal without amazing characters or an amazing story. (Binding of Isaac, Castle Crashers, Street Fighter, etc.) Once I have the core concept that I want to build the game around (i.e. I say I want to make a game based around exploration/puzzle mechanic/Throw everything I ever wanted to program in one thing and see what happens) I figure out a motive, then what sort of character would fulfill that motive. For the rest of the party members, I try to go with foils and mess with RPG archetypes. By having a gist of what I want to do with the mechanics, I can branch out and see what fits around it. I feel like there's more to say, but I don't want to ramble too much.
In regards to point #4: Sometimes, if you put characters in a certain scene, and you've developed them enough, they can easily end up writing themselves. The question goes from "What would I have Character X do?" to "What would Character X do?". If the scene in Gaia's Melody Another Epilogue originally ended up going in a direction you didn't expect, I think I would have changed the next part of the scene or game to reflect the sudden change. You know, instead of trying to railroad everything to be exactly the way you want it to be. Just my thoughts.
+wariodude128 Normally I don't do that. In the example, I personally was feeling over emotional at the time and it reflected on the character I was writing. After re-reading it later, I didn't like how it turned out and redid it while I was more conscious of what I was doing:P I could've continued the scene with what I had written without much trouble, but I ended up basically using the same scene later anyway. Akira had little reason to feel that way at the time. I was just being emo so I made it short and less prominent instead:3
I generally never comment anywhere, but I must say all of your rpg making advice seems pretty spot on. I've dabbled in game creation and story writing a good bit myself, and this video really reminded me how fun it is to have your characters come alive and sometimes surprise even you to some extent. Anyways Great job, keep up the awesome work!
Echo607; *Characters pop up at **3:31* Me; Wait, that one on the right looks like Cecil. . . Echo607; *Talks about character 'A''* Me; But, can that be Cecil? Could it be a coincidence. . .? Echo607; *Says character 'B' is the hero, but doesn't like being called that cause he feels he doesn't deserve it* Me; It's my baby ;-; It's my baby Cecil ;-; Echo607; *Continues Character 'B' List* Me; *Is continuously, internally, fan-girl screaming* @Echo607 Awesome example of a character >:3 *He combines an interesting personality, a whole kind of character we rarely see as the main character (:D), awesome organic character progression throughout the game (It feels like he's actually growing and learning through it all, and us along with him! XD), and just an over-all lovable character you actually want to have succeed/you want to root for! >XD* I'm just so happy to see another FF4 fan!! XD (
Hey. This is awesome. c: I think I should throw this in there though - allowing the player to project themselves onto the main character is truly one of the greatest things you can do when telling a story with a video game because... well, no other form of media lets you do that nearly as well. Maybe excluding adventure books or something, right right. And so the story for the main character becomes a lot more exciting for the player if they're sort of... writing it themselves. Placing a vague template - "You're such and such from so and so," and then letting them roll with it can, ironically, become pretty impressive story writing! Not that anyone has to do that of course, but to me it's really more about the world that games takes place in, and giving a player excuses to experience a new world is, in a word, beautiful. Striding along the clouds, the Well-Above, atop the churning world of sand below, stumbling at times because the cumulus is patchy and easy to slip on. Feverish steps through the hushed moaning of the slick and worming Whispering Grass, the shuddering as it tries to pass on its pathogens to a new host. Climbing flight after flight of stairs with such determination that you don't even realize that they've already curled back around to meet themselves, if they were even real to begin with... There should be a blurrier line between writing characters and worlds in my book. I'm rambling though, what I'm saying is - strongly consider making the WORLD your protagonist! That's a real character right there! :D Now if only I could stop being a lazy bum who writes drawn out UA-cam comments and finish my game instead.
+ZachPlaysWhatHeWants Hahaha:P That's very true:3 Thanks for sharing that:) I didn't want to go too much into that as I can't write characters like that myself:P When I make games it's to project my own characters and their story. That's what gets me, personally, hooked on making a game^_^ I could never make a game where the player has complete control over who the mc is:P It removes the side of game making I like:3 :D Best of luck finishing your game!
+Echo607 Completely fair point, that is. And hey thanks! Good luck in your endeavors as well, miss! Especially the tutorial videos. Coming from a guy who's only experience prior to MV was... uh... RPGMaker 3... they're really helpful. c':
Echo this is another wonderful tutorial, thank you for putting out these videos, you're helping the community in so many ways! Personally, my project has been affected greatly by some of your advice, so please keep it up and thanks for this! I really needed some clarity on my character design
I've been scribbling up concepts for a good eight characters for a future project of mine, and I've found it hard to imagine them as real people. Even though I roughly knew what makes a character come to life. But your explanation of everything has cleared some block in the creative part of my brain, and suddenly ideas are flowing. Thanks for this, Echo :D
I generally enjoy games better when the main character is more or less just an avatar for me. Like the Elder Scrolls games. So, I tend to make my main characters with few details so the player can 'be' that main character. However, I certainly get what you're saying about other types of characters. When I occasionally write fiction, I find the original story I envisioned gets slight tweaks to it from time to time, based on what the characters CHOOSE to do that's different from what I initially wanted them to do. And in creating characters, I will usually take different traits from different people I've known in life and mix them together to create characters that are based partly on me and partly on other people. "Write what you know" is a good saying I like to follow. I realize I'm late, like 4 years late, lol, but I've only gotten into game making in the last couple of years and hope you are still dedicated to it. I love RPG Maker because all my creativity is in the written word (I can't make visual art and I never got into programming when I could have learned it better [I'm 46 and felt lost trying to learn Unity when I couldn't even figure out the most basic aspects of it with a tutorial!]) so having all the assets and mechanics built into the system frees me up to make characters, plot and quests. I've made 3 games that I've released and more than that of game that may never get released. It's the Eventing part that tires and bores me into not finishing something, and I want to overcome that. Do you have any advice for an old guy?
I'm a life long writer (this is a dummy account) with numerous projects out. Having been writing for nearly 3 decades, I'm astounded at your insight and your ability to convey it in a simple, easy to digest manner.I'm guessing you're young just because you talk about releasing games recently as a young teen.I really want to see your games now.I also highly anticipate seeing where your ability for story telling goes in the coming years.
Your tutorial is making me want to get back into game making and actually finish a game. I used to start RPG making but I never finished any of my project.
+Camycon It's quite a long trip to finish an RPG, but once it's finished it's a lot easier to finish the next one:P Plus you get the satisfaction of telling everyone LOOK I MADE A GAME, haha:3 Best of luck!
Thank you for this eye-opening video! I'm exactly the same way. I create characters first and then flesh out the world around them. I love daydreaming about how my characters interact with each other, why they are the way they are, and how to make them relatable/interesting. I never thought of incorporating the personalities of the people (or cats!) I know, but, because of your video, I'm going to give it a shot! XD
The one about making sure your characters talk to each other and not just about Plot Stuffz reminded me of Digimon. Like they would talk to each other and interact and I think that was one of the best things about it, or at least in my opinion...
Yeah so true on the characters. I have written scene with one intent the characters totally took over. I am currently working on a game which originally I was planning on a very large party, but that got narrowed down, thinking maybe around 6 for more development. Good video too, been pretty much watching most of your videos to learn. Programming is not my strong suit.
I completely get what you mean, it is so much easier if you blend a character's personality with someone you know in real life. You could think back about how the would act given in that particular situation. It certainly gets more difficult when you bring in an unique character to whom you can't relate. Anyway I love your videos... keep up the good work. :)
I start all my games from characters or plots, and the gameplay and story in general sprout from that. I will be having at least 10 playable characters in my game, but they arent always together= gameplay variety and room for development. And to avoid the whole boring protagonist thing I am making a game mechanic where literally each character sees the world differently. Depending on who is leading the party and who is in party different events will happen, which means if you replay the game, it allows for character development if you choose different members to show the experience. Certain puzzle mechanics are only accessible if you switch between party members. The villains in my game have a messed up backstory so I know I am giving them good reasons for being "evil". I love this video because a TON of games I played failed with character development. Those games have too many characters, focus only on a few, and the rest dont matter because the game wasnt long enough to cover them. I am definetely chexking out your patreon cause I love your other game tutorials. Would you like to see my game trailer when I finish it? Some game mechanic ideas i got from your other videos lol
You are so passionate when you speak! this goes to show how much you care for your own creations! That is exactly why I love listening to you! Keep it up! :3
I like this type of video. It's very informative and talks about something outside of the usual tutorial setting and talks more about the game design. Would you ever consider some talks about game mechanics and design?
Noomber 6 is basically what im making my game about, except I will be taking things from my horrible life and putting it in the game. Basically showing that abuse comes in many forms, but that you can get over it by trying your best to fix it and forget about the bad times. But then there’s that one random boss that is literally called Random and he’s a jester with crazy powers that have to do with cards. Also I know I’m posting this in 2018 but your videos are still helpful. And be on the lookout for a game called “Soaring-The Will of the World”!!!!
Echo607 If you want a flat villain or an over the top one. I didn't write up a million years of complicated reincarnations and wars and technological advances for a flat story. He promptly got the well - intentioned extremist treatment.
There's one out there, but from what I hear it doesn't work very well at the moment, though I haven't tested it myself. I'm also not sure where to find a download link at the moment. Apparently javascript let's you do a lot more in terms of 3d or mode7 so I'm expecting it to get better in the future:3
+翔寿夫 Akira has her 'me' moments, but none of my characters 100% reflect me:P They've all absorbed different parts of my personality. Thankies for watching^_^ Happy game making!
When I think about it, this might just be the main flaw within my game (way too short for 26 characters), and many games I see being made. This video is very important for character creation, especially for those who want to make something epic, because comical games don't always follow the rules. I'm working on getting an early micro version of my brother's game out, but there's this one character that has no plot importance, barely even a line, no reason to join the party, and no character development because not one line, and she's there for the majority of the game. She's probably only there because he needed a crutch-character to carry him through playtests and he forgot to take her off, but she's the first one to get a gameplay gimmick. I wonder if it feels right to just take her out of the game though.
On villains: Usually, I suggest making the villain "wrong genre savvy"-they think they're the hero of a different type of story than what's actually going on. For example, a heroic character in 40K would be a villain in Star Wars. So, you're writing an a Star Wars villain, have them think they're in a 40K-like setting.
TheGuyYouCantStand Warhammer 40K, a sci-fantasy setting that takes place in a grim. dark universe where humanity is beset on all sides by hostile aliens and demons, and the only thing protecting mankind is the Imperium of Man, who themselves are basically space Nazis akin to the Empire in Star Wars. Thing is, the Imperium comes across as surprisingly benevolent, since their iron fisted rule legitimately IS the only thing that keeps the human species alive, and it actually is true in-universe that attempting to co-exist with aliens is a horrible idea 90% of the time. For example, orks in the setting are biologically programmed to be violent and destructive, so killing every last one of them is basically your only option. If you took a "good guy" from that setting and had them trying something similar in a Star Wars setting, they'd be bad guys.
I love love LOVE this video. It's really good just to have talks about game making. I'd love to see more 'discussion' videos in the future. As a writer I can really appreciate this content.
A technique I like to use in character creation is take a pre-existing character and change/fix it to suit my opinions and desires. Not superficial stuff, like giving them an axe or cool powers, but altering their character, morality and thought process. For example, I'm not a fan of how many "ultimate lifeform" characters just accept that with no hesitation or hangups. Therefore, I write an ultimate lifeform who doesn't want to be perfect.
I think character creation is the most fun part in creating stories. At my current project I really enjoy writing the rebellious and strong willed but sometimes insensitive guy named Rumiko, who made it his personal quest to avenge his master and adoptive father, who was killed by a world known assassin. I'm having trouble writing his first love interest though, who accompanies him through most parts of the first half of the game. I want her to be level headed, but also aware of herself and her beauty. But since I ship someone else with Rumiko in my mind the whole time, it's hard to actually write the relationship between them, since I'm looking forward to those moments, where the protagonist is with the future "wifey".
I didn't realize it until watching this video, but the only character in my game that didn't seem perfect was the so called "villain". so after I watched this video I wrote out more of the back stories of my characters before I started working on my game and then it just all mixed together and made a storyline that I really liked. And I also didn't realize that the Main Character and the villain had very similar reasons to be out doing what they are in the world (to simplify it they were out to revenge a loved one but in the game it's more into detail) Oops sorry I started ranting xD Well anyways, Your videos help me a lot and gave me many new ideas for my game so thank you!
I’ll probably go through with the Dragon Quest 3 personality system, and work from there, adding those personalities into “switches”, then I can branch out resources that someone with that kind of personality would comment with.
Wow, epic video! No wonder this took you a bunch longer to make, a crazy ton of editing and effort clearly went into this and it was totally worth the wait, awesome work :D!!!! Pretty much everything in this is perfect so there isn't much to add xD; For me I jump back and forth between characters and stories and mechanics and try to grow them all out together, but this was all seriously awesome advice for growing your characters :), putting them in random scenes and seeing how they interact is especially helpful for rounding out there everyday conversations. Working with other game engines I wanted to focus on mechanics first then build a character from there but it's harder to do that with RPG maker. While I might like to make a light plot/character dungeon crawler for a fun smaller project, likable characters are *extremely* important to me. This mostly effects me in anime, where if I don't like the protagonist/protagonists in the first episode or if a super annoying character is introduced within 3 episodes I immediately quit it. I don't know where people got the idea that annoying characters are a trope they need to have or something, the world is annoying enough as it is I don't want to be annoyed when watching a story develop. Thanks for all the effort you poured into this :D looking forward to future videos as always :)
+MGswiftillusion Thanks^_^ This one was sure tough lol I usually implement mechanics as I go, and have story ideas in mind, but it all depends on how the characters end up for me:P Regarding anime I KNOW RIGHT? My big thing is when I see the exact same "japanese highschool student boy" as the protag in every anime... I also have a thing against stupidity violence... it was funny when I was younger, but now random characters punching each other for dumb reasons all the time is... bleh:/ Thanks for watching^w^
+Echo607 ^^ can imagine. Ahh yeah :)! Haha yeah aw my goodness! That really drives me crazy =_= especially when it's like 'hey we have a large and wonderful magic world-let's follow this group of highschool students in it and have all the unnecessary cliches of a school environment' or 'oh you are a highschool student lets magically give you the power to save the world, and here's a harem as a bonus' =_=;;;! Sometimes though thankfully there are ones that actually work, like 'Hyouka' is probably top 3 mystery/detective show for me easily if not #1 and the protagonist is a high school student, but it uses that environment as a meaningful way for the character to interact and grow instead of just a mess of tropes and ridiculous coincidences. As soon as I see a male attacked by a female because of something the female did/obliviously allowed to occur, that's an immediate rage quit for me xD; especially if it's attempting to be serious outside of that. Slapstick comedy can be fun-pretty sure I've seen some I enjoyed but I forget them (Gintama is amazing but can get a bit too crazy for me sometimes, though it's the show I've sincerely laughed the most at alongside Nichijou), but if the female attacking the male ridiculously is the first thing done I know I'm not missing out on anything special. (to think with some of the amazing manga that anime relying on that is still made drives me crazy). ^^ No worries, thanks for the awesome content to watch :D
Hyouka was good:P In terms of dumb violence and such, my big one is tsundere characters - I used to love them, but recently in every show I've watched they're just overly violent for the stupidest reasons and you just watch it thinking "...someone thought this was a good idea." _"Oh no, the guy I secretly like is talking to another girl. Better beat the living daylights out of him because he obviously knows he's doing something wrong!"_ I absolutely loved your little overused anime summary XD
+Echo607 ^^. OHH yeah! But of course the girl never expresses her own feelings, meanwhile for some unfathomable reason the guy continues to be their best friend at a just-short of a relationship distance??!? like, whyyyyy!? Just feels so often like lazy writing to cause unnecessary conflict and avoid any potential relationship conclusion instead of genuine character development/interaction haha :)
" Love your character " Uhh... What if I love ALL of my characters, and by all I mean everyone of 300++ original character that I made over the course of over a decade-- Cause I have this HUGE-ass urge to make games [ Or anything to remember them by really-- ] including at least each a portion of them-- [ Which would probably cost me a few years, at the very least but this urge is just that big-- ]
Honestly one of my favourite characters to write is the villain. In my last game the main villain wasn't exactly evil, he was just evil because the god of destruction possessed his body to become whole again
I have big Fantasy and i already use chracters change hands position, look to side and other sprite changes. I have lot's of characters and all i love. I make them from think and give them personallity. All my main characters have emotions and personality. And nice video thanks for. Now i can watch if i'm not have been right i don't miss something. :)
In the future, I would like to suggest that you do a follow-up on this video: Creating Villains. It's one thing to get the audience to love the characters that have been created, but it's something different to get the audience to hate the villains while simultaneously caring about them and taking them seriously. Which do you think is more difficult? Creating good heroes, or creating good villains?
+FireFlower46 For me personally it's always the villain. It took me a long time to be able to write them as more then "the evil badguy that progresses the plot" - I mean, they had reasons for what they were doing, but at the time I didn't know how to write that:P I had a really fun villain to write in GMAE - I got to have a really unique perspective on his situation... you know, while he was being evil and enslaving humanity. I'll consider doing a pure villain episode:3
Well i'm sure i'm super weird but for some reason every time i need to create a new very important character i come back to watch this video to help me
To develop a character, I make the story and change they little by little, trying to shape they in the character I have in mind, change the stories background, personality etc. And finaly,I alter some parts of the story to correspond the final character.
One thing I love to do is making my characters ambivalent. (Which basically means you as the player have mixed feelings about if they're a good or bad guy.) Like maybe the antagonist might be truly doing something good or better, maybe they really aren't a fully bad person. (which sounds cliche, but if it's written correctly, it's literally beauty)
10:13 That guy in the red cloak looks like Mao (from Disgaea 3) and basically sums up his character. In a way. I've only just started the final chapter (Chapter 8) and I'm pretty confused about his trauma stuff that Almaz keeps talking about... I can go on for ages about Disgaea.
One time, I was making a character that was supposed to be a bit shy. She was (secertly) royalty and she did not know it. People in the game kept comparing her to a character in a historical book saying "I wonder if your the same character from the book?" Later I put her to watch some TV. The question was on the news. I wanted her to patiently watch and then go to sleep. But instead she threw a rock at the TV and broke it and screamed. Then she was grounded and her friends had to help her escape. At the time I was like "WHAT JUST HAPPENED?!?" so the story turned into something else completely. I never finished the game but I might try to use the same story and someday maybe finish the game.
Kachie! A comedic weirdo!? I always thought she was quite a mature character. I always thought Miki, and Niki were the ones that played that role. Not to mention she was considering moving far away from the world and raising them herself, playing the role of their mother!
#4 is so true, as an RPer, creating and driving characters is a big part of my life... and In many situations Ive wanted to do certain things but the characters goals and wants were far removed from my own, and in the characters drive itself took thigns far away from where I wanted or even expected. @_@
10:58 I thought they were talking about a fallen god(dess) in game, then I got your joke. Nice. Also, 'nice' to the video as well, you gave me a lot of things to think about! Thanks! (:
One thing to remember: at some point in development, your characters won't really have to follow the original storyline you had in mind; at that point your characters will build a story of their own, through their interactions and reactions to each other.
9:40 because- >THIS WORLD IS IMPERFECT... >what? >IF ONLY I COULD WIPE AWARE THE IMPURITIES >is anyone else listening to this?.... >AND MAKE IT AS BEAUTIFUL AS ME.
woah! Nice! thanks! I did have a lot of this things in mind while creating my characters... Now, I do have a LOT of characters, but not all of them are playable though, at least not at the same time. Now I have more tips on how to flesh them more and make them more interesting. Oh and my villains, one of them yeah is the annoying evil asshole, but the other has a very good reason to be the main antagonist
I like the idea of the character actually TALk to each other , sometimes forgot that and they just a job-slave in battle and member to save the world maybe we should do the comical/manga approach in conversation section xD
This is actually something ive never entirely gotten into. I get into my game, and start developing something incredible but then I hit a snag. A character that feels like it should be where it is not. But by then I do not have said character, and ruins my motivation to keep working. To start I should always do what I forget to do first, brainstorm, and planning...
It's impossible to keep track of all the ideas that come into my mind while I would like to create a grand epic RPG. After keep myself within some realistic expectations
I want to make a main character who's an Android learning how the world works. So most of the time I'll have choices in their dialogue so the player can choose what they say or feel during those dialogue trees. Kinda like Fallout 3 and 4.
So I am currently planning for an RPG that focuses on two opposing teams Team 1 Mary: main protagonist, someone who is trying to live peacefully, attempts to stop the prophecy Lea: secondary protagonist, trying to help Mary, attempts to stop the prophecy Ian: mysterious figure who is suspicious, he looks for strategic locations Arthur: a sword fighter who specialises in light magic, has apparently punched a god before. Team 2 Exa: main protagonist 2, Mary's biological sister, she seems to omit her past. Attempts to stop the prophecy. Karl: tertiary protagonist, he seems to be perfect, but is hiding behind a facade, but it has some truth inside of it. Likes tabletop role-playing games, attempts to stop the prophecy Ben: the main strategist, he is occasionally seen looking through his briefcase. Thomas: a spy working for Team 1, is adamant on fulfilling the prophecy.
I really like your enthusiasm. I'm making a game for mygirlfriend's bitrhdtay and your videos help me a lot. I mean a LOT. So I want to say thank you. Please keep up the good work. :)
I'm currently getting started on a survival horror game. I figured it's best to start out somewhat small but something within my familiar territory as I know my Horror and I grew up with horror video games horror movies you name it.
I am into Character design, too and I totaly agree with evrything you sad in that vid. I also have problems to find a villan form my story and I also love my Characters. (I have so much of them from serval RPG games even but I love them all
LOVE YOUR CHARACTERS yeaaaaaa that tip also could be a "but dont love em too much or something might go wrong with it!" seriously sometimes people love the characters they make too much and it might ruin the game for the player.....
I remember the good old days for Fire Emblem when characters had this immense depth... Intelligent Systems needs your video, to be honest. By the way, how do you start with one protagonist, then an event comes by and another joins your party?
I usually choose a story first. Then create characters that go with that story. I keep finding myself having to make more random characters at the moment than main characters while trying to progress the story. To make it fit and make the world feel more real than just a bunch of random NPC's that don't mean anything. While i'm making my game my characters and ideas just go with the flow. They evolve. Sometimes you'll think of a great idea but you wont know how to execute it the way your character would. So like Echo said. Sometimes characters take over and end up changing little bits of the story. Spoiler alert i'm planning to kill a few off so... Yay game of thrones inspiration.
The best advice I ever got for writing characters (of any kind) was "Every person is the hero of their own story". That is to say, nobody really thinks of themselves as "evil". Well, insane people do... but they're insane. Everyone thinks of every action they're taking as reasonable because... reasons!
A villain is simply anyone opposing the party, in all honesty. They don't even have to have nefarious motives of becoming a dictator. Maybe they want the exact same thing as the party, but their methods are different, and so they clash.
But, again, everyone is the hero of their own story. Everyone joins the party for their own reasons, they're united in saving the world, because it accomplishes their own personal goals to join up with these other people who have different goals, but the same way to accomplish them.
Rarely is it ever in real life that a group of people who don't know each other stay together for very long, or even long enough to get any sort of project done. Without a personal stake for each individual, they just engage in whatever it is as "meh" and half-ass everything.
All characters are heroes. Even NPCs. That farmer is concerned about his crops because he can't feed his family without them. Maybe he can't buy a horse in the future to help plow fields of those crops fail. Maybe the major thinks he's the best man for running the town, so he wants to win because he thinks the townspeople just don't understand how screwed the town is without him.
We are all heroes of our own stories. It's the best advice I was ever given about writing characters. It goes into the thought-process behind every character I've ever created.
very good advice, thanks!
XxTaiMTxX THANK YOU SO MUCH BLESS
Same here. I had trouble writing characters until I was given the same advice.
Except some characters don't care about goodness and willingly and intentionally commit evil acts.
@@MetaKnight964 That's known as "a crazy person" and is not only unrealistic, but also quite boring in terms of writing. "Why did they do that? Oh, they're evil. No other reason." It's flimsy justification for anything you have them do and it lets the reader know that such people are basically just a plot device. To be treated as no more important than a rock by the side of the road. Such a character exists because you can't have the story without them.
One thing that I always found interesting and fleshed the characters more for me was something that Final Fantasy IV for the DS did. As the story progressed, each character had their own thought bubble when you checked your menu. The thought bubbles served as a sort of status update for each character. It was usually them giving their opinion on each situation and giving them a voice.
Just throwing in my two cents. You could replicate this thing in your own sort of way whether it be through a journal, making a mechanic where you're able to talk to your characters whenever, etc.
Prince zuko in avatar last airbender is some of the coolest character development I have seen in anything ever :)
I would be *very* careful with your last point.
"Love your characters."
There are creators of stories out there who would fall in love with certain characters to the detriment of the story.
Anne McCaffrey, Laurell K. Hamilton and J.K Rowling spring to mind.
Love your characters too much and you lose some of your objectivity when it comes to the situations they are in.
Or worse they become self inserts.
Tom Crusader self inserts themselves making themselves invincible.
The dreaded Mary Sues.
God you are the most inspirational person i have ever had the pleasure of meeting.
💀
@@GreenEyedDazzler what's this for?....
I love how similar your description of creating characters for a game is to creating them for a written story, because that's EXACTLY how it should be. As a writer, I've found that if you neglect a character, so will your readers. Each character needs to feel loved, because that love carries over to your audience. No one is going to care about the protagonist's girlfriend getting killed if they don't have any idea who she is, even if it sends said protagonist into a vicious cycle of revenge. Regardless of whether they are words on a page or dots on a screen, every character is alive and has a story to tell.
as an example , i wonder how many ppl cared about jacket's girlfriend getting killed in hotline miami o:
for some reason
I usually have an easier time writing villains than I do heroes
this lead to me developing a technique where I try figuring out the story with the 'antagonist' as the 'protagonist'
it works for me
but, this is some incredibly useful information, and I am glad that I have come across this
thank you
That video on making a story would be lovely. I'm never sure where to start aside from having a random cool idea or two and trying to connect them.
I know what you mean. It's like having a bucket of LEGO and then having to build something that doesn't look like a fun mess.
here's a tip: write it down, write down your plot, no matter how much you think you suck at writing. get the basics down at least!
+savegalkissy My current method is just to write stuff down when I think of it. Whatever tidbit it may be, I add it to my ideas page. When I have enough to start forming something coherent, a story is born. Problem is it takes time, but my best ideas come to me in the most random of times.
You seriously have the most fun to watch informational channel ever. Although I suck at almost everything you mention, it's so nice to take all these tips and work with them!! Also, usually when I see a 13 min video, I'm like 'nah.. too long.'
Not with your vid's! :D
+Lisa Michelle lol I can usually tolerate 15 minutes or less, though they've reaaaally gotta hold my interest:3, save LPs or naturally longer videos - I'm about 40 min max for those:P
Thankies for watching^_^
Echo607 Hehe, no problem, I like watching. I usually don't watch let's plays because they're too long, and I like playing itself more :3 Although I still want to finish your Gaia's Melody LP! (I'm at part 2... oops)
Haha, LPs are a long time dedication:3 I honestly only watch them from like... one or two people anymore.
The game's available for download if you'd rather play it - it's not 'too' broken anymore:P
+Echo607 Oohh, I do want to play it :D I found the link~~ I will miss out on your commentary, but yay for gaming! :D
Lisa Michelle yes he videos captures my attention
Before this moment in time, I had never had a shred of creativity in my life. Now I actually have an idea of what I want to make. Thank you so much!
I don’t know how many years it’s been since I first watched this video, but even now it still stands as the best video I’ve seen on how to write characters.
Another thing with characters: Make sure there isn't too much "overlap". Usually, you should make sure that no character is too similar to another character.
To be fair, there can be good reasons for making characters similar intentionally.
The example for this I use in one of my stories, is that there are 4 characters, each looking like a twin of each other, but being inverted of each other (twins of dark and twins of light, but all 4 share the same face)
There's lore stuff that actually connects the 4 characters together in perfect inverses of each other's twin. Complicated?
Basically there's twins of dark
-happy go lucky and likes to fight
-introverted, caring but more reserved and cautious.
Then the twins of light
-happy go lucky, caring and reserved
-introverted but likes to fight
All 4 characters are intentionally similar but are memorable because of their expressive methods.
_the lore reason that the 4 characters all share the same face is that the Goddess of Creation had given the Kings of Light and Dark a fragment of the purest form of Life and Death respectively and asked them to create children with it and raise them however they desired. Their birth and creation was made to be two sets of fragmented Life and Death combining to create a new God of Creation and continue to oversee the flow of Life and Death from all of Creation._
The Goddess does this because of the exhaustive list of powers, she was capable of having premonitions and knew of her own demise at the hands of a demon and made preparations so that the power of Creation didn't fall into the hands of one who only destroys.
Anyway, the long winded point is that characters can be as similar as you want them to be, the trick is to make them stand out from that similarity and leave their own mark on the story, but more importantly, on you, the one experiencing the story?
Apologies if I misunderstood, I know the comment is quite old but I just felt like sharing my thoughts on your comment.
I use RPG Maker MV, too!
In it, I'm currently working on a game called Project Chibi. There's this one character in the game called Alex who ends up being the first boss. The boss fight with him is actually meant to be lost! Kinda ironic but I went with it. Alex is an assassin who was forced to work for a Dark Lord. He was sent to kill the main characters (Amelia, Cassie, Marsha and Melanie) and if Alex didn't agree, the Dark Lord would kill him, then go to kill your party himself. After losing the battle like you're meant to, he takes your party to a place where they can be safe from the Dark Lord. But, before your party wakes up, Alex gets killed off in a pretty brutal way. The way he dies is that he was beaten up until he could barely even stand and then strangled until his neck broke. By time Amelia wakes up, Alex has already been killed and the Dark Lord has already left the area. When your party finds him dead against the wall, Amelia concludes that he was murdered.
Is that good character design?
It actually is.
Well, I recommend that you show some of Alex’s personality, is he likeable? how does he feel about his blackmail? Can you tell from his design? Those are just a few tips.
I'm subscribing to you. As a writer, character development has always been one of the most important aspect of any story (and it's just downright fun). Seeing a character grow is something that I've always enjoyed in writing, whether it's a character that starts weak and scared to being strong and courageous through the actions and guidance of her friends, or something who cares very little about human life and wouldn't hesitate to kill to being someone who tries to make the best of her life (and everyone elses), but is deeply troubled by her past actions and haunted by the lives she has taken.
Also, people complaining about cliche's has always been a peeve of mine. I don't mind cliche's in the slightest bit. To me, it's not a matter of how original (or unoriginal) said plot device is, but a matter of how it is executed. Two villains can capture a princess for different reasons. One could capture the princess to use her as a means of gaining her kingdoms cooperation as the kingdom she is a part of is actually a kingdom meaning to take over the villian's homeland, and the princess herself would be unaware of it and actually joins her captors side knowing that her homeland is more villainous than she was aware of.
The other villain could capture a princess because the villain is the princess' true father. She could have been adopted after her mother died and the father was at war. Later in life, the father learns of the princess being his daughter (or so he would believe), and captures her. He tries to explain this, but she isn't believing him until the father comments on her birthmark, something only her adopted parents would know about.
Right there is the exact same concept (princess is captured), but entirely different reasons on why she is captured. One is for negotiation, the other is for father-daughter reunion.
Well, it's good to see Chrono Cross mentioned once every few years, lol. I've done quite a bit since I messaged you last, and the project I spoke to you about is very much underway. Characters are honestly one of the only things I'm not struggling with - "variables," "switches," and all those scary programming stuff are the things holding me back. It doesn't seem like there's any really good beginner tutorials for advanced eventing in MV - and I do mean beginner, not "do this, do that, and you're done! What's that, you want to know what I clicked? ...oh."
Honestly, I think the biggest problem with indie games is the hook - they need something to really stand out, for gamers to really be interested in it vs. all the other good stuff out there. Otherwise, you have a perfectly good game, but no one to play it.
When I was working on the earliest version of my first game, I didn't really know what I was gonna do with the plot besides the generic "save the world" crap. But I knew I wanted to do something more than that, so as I went on, I just kinda... let my characters write themselves. I let them have stupid arguments and monologue about their innermost feelings, even when it felt contrived or pointless to the plot. This actually ended up helping a LOT, because now I understood my own characters well enough to write them into a proper story. I ended up putting in bits of my own life and personality into them that made them feel more special to me, and I grew to love all of them, even the more "generic" characters I created. So now that I'm working on a remake of my first game, I can't wait to flesh out my characters even more and see what they get up to ^w^
I don't know why but I find antagonists so hard to write.
I'm making a trilogy of games, and I try to make the villains fit in with the main characters
In my first game, the main character is Sard, he's a loner who doesn't have many friends, he doesn't really mind though, then there the villain, Darius, who's a wind mage who can also use water and light magic. He was kind of picked on, his goal is to gain more power to lead the city he lives in to take over the world, so he will be respected, I took a bit of inspiration from the Romans, who make their heroes into a god when they die. Darius aimed for this, but the player stopped him. Fits to where the final fight takes place, you've defeated the god of destruction foiled all of his efforts, so this time you fight him, he's angry, now using physical attacks, the fight takes place in a colosseum, with thousands of people watching, he wanted everyone to see your downfall, and he would down in history as a legend.
You know, ive been writing npcs for over 25 years (for d&d not video games) and this video still told me a lot about ways to create, not only new npcs/pcs, but also, it reminded me that all the characters shoyld have.. well character. Thanks for making these videos.
You just reminded me how happy it is to sit down and write a story and design characters with nothing bothering.
Encouraging! Thank you!
Funnily enough, I tend to go either way with characters & game mechanics. For things like roleplays where there is already a universe set, I can usually build one for the universe easily.
When it comes to games, I prefer to focus on the game mechanics over everything else. Personally, if a game is very fun, I can deal without amazing characters or an amazing story. (Binding of Isaac, Castle Crashers, Street Fighter, etc.) Once I have the core concept that I want to build the game around (i.e. I say I want to make a game based around exploration/puzzle mechanic/Throw everything I ever wanted to program in one thing and see what happens) I figure out a motive, then what sort of character would fulfill that motive. For the rest of the party members, I try to go with foils and mess with RPG archetypes. By having a gist of what I want to do with the mechanics, I can branch out and see what fits around it. I feel like there's more to say, but I don't want to ramble too much.
In regards to point #4: Sometimes, if you put characters in a certain scene, and you've developed them enough, they can easily end up writing themselves. The question goes from "What would I have Character X do?" to "What would Character X do?". If the scene in Gaia's Melody Another Epilogue originally ended up going in a direction you didn't expect, I think I would have changed the next part of the scene or game to reflect the sudden change. You know, instead of trying to railroad everything to be exactly the way you want it to be. Just my thoughts.
+wariodude128 Normally I don't do that. In the example, I personally was feeling over emotional at the time and it reflected on the character I was writing.
After re-reading it later, I didn't like how it turned out and redid it while I was more conscious of what I was doing:P
I could've continued the scene with what I had written without much trouble, but I ended up basically using the same scene later anyway.
Akira had little reason to feel that way at the time. I was just being emo so I made it short and less prominent instead:3
I see. So your feelings ended up reflecting onto the character you were writing without you even realizing it. No wonder you rewrote the scene.
I generally never comment anywhere, but I must say all of your rpg making advice seems pretty spot on. I've dabbled in game creation and story writing a good bit myself, and this video really reminded me how fun it is to have your characters come alive and sometimes surprise even you to some extent. Anyways Great job, keep up the awesome work!
+Mightyclark ^_^ Thank you for watching, and taking the time to comment:)
Echo607; *Characters pop up at **3:31*
Me; Wait, that one on the right looks like Cecil. . .
Echo607; *Talks about character 'A''*
Me; But, can that be Cecil? Could it be a coincidence. . .?
Echo607; *Says character 'B' is the hero, but doesn't like being called that cause he feels he doesn't deserve it*
Me; It's my baby ;-; It's my baby Cecil ;-;
Echo607; *Continues Character 'B' List*
Me; *Is continuously, internally, fan-girl screaming*
@Echo607 Awesome example of a character >:3
*He combines an interesting personality, a whole kind of character we rarely see as the main character (:D), awesome organic character progression throughout the game (It feels like he's actually growing and learning through it all, and us along with him! XD), and just an over-all lovable character you actually want to have succeed/you want to root for! >XD*
I'm just so happy to see another FF4 fan!! XD (
Same feeling when that happened.
I think the best villain is one that can easily be the hero and thinks he/she/it is the hero (make a game ware you are the villain and don't know it)
Oh, did you mean Spec Ops The Line?
So a anti-hero? (Or anti-villian, I always forget the difference.)
Hey. This is awesome. c:
I think I should throw this in there though - allowing the player to project themselves onto the main character is truly one of the greatest things you can do when telling a story with a video game because... well, no other form of media lets you do that nearly as well. Maybe excluding adventure books or something, right right. And so the story for the main character becomes a lot more exciting for the player if they're sort of... writing it themselves. Placing a vague template - "You're such and such from so and so," and then letting them roll with it can, ironically, become pretty impressive story writing! Not that anyone has to do that of course, but to me it's really more about the world that games takes place in, and giving a player excuses to experience a new world is, in a word, beautiful.
Striding along the clouds, the Well-Above, atop the churning world of sand below, stumbling at times because the cumulus is patchy and easy to slip on.
Feverish steps through the hushed moaning of the slick and worming Whispering Grass, the shuddering as it tries to pass on its pathogens to a new host.
Climbing flight after flight of stairs with such determination that you don't even realize that they've already curled back around to meet themselves, if they were even real to begin with...
There should be a blurrier line between writing characters and worlds in my book.
I'm rambling though, what I'm saying is - strongly consider making the WORLD your protagonist! That's a real character right there! :D
Now if only I could stop being a lazy bum who writes drawn out UA-cam comments and finish my game instead.
+ZachPlaysWhatHeWants Hahaha:P That's very true:3
Thanks for sharing that:)
I didn't want to go too much into that as I can't write characters like that myself:P
When I make games it's to project my own characters and their story. That's what gets me, personally, hooked on making a game^_^
I could never make a game where the player has complete control over who the mc is:P
It removes the side of game making I like:3
:D Best of luck finishing your game!
+Echo607
Completely fair point, that is. And hey thanks! Good luck in your endeavors as well, miss!
Especially the tutorial videos. Coming from a guy who's only experience prior to MV was... uh... RPGMaker 3... they're really helpful. c':
Echo this is another wonderful tutorial, thank you for putting out these videos, you're helping the community in so many ways! Personally, my project has been affected greatly by some of your advice, so please keep it up and thanks for this! I really needed some clarity on my character design
+Michael Fernandez ^_^ Happy to help!
Best of luck on your project:D
I've been scribbling up concepts for a good eight characters for a future project of mine, and I've found it hard to imagine them as real people. Even though I roughly knew what makes a character come to life. But your explanation of everything has cleared some block in the creative part of my brain, and suddenly ideas are flowing. Thanks for this, Echo :D
+PyroOfZen That's awesome! Good luck:D
Some of my characters are:
Toby/ , who uses magic like PK or PSI.
Varik: A villain who was created once and only had one thing on his mind: bloodlust.
I generally enjoy games better when the main character is more or less just an avatar for me. Like the Elder Scrolls games. So, I tend to make my main characters with few details so the player can 'be' that main character. However, I certainly get what you're saying about other types of characters. When I occasionally write fiction, I find the original story I envisioned gets slight tweaks to it from time to time, based on what the characters CHOOSE to do that's different from what I initially wanted them to do. And in creating characters, I will usually take different traits from different people I've known in life and mix them together to create characters that are based partly on me and partly on other people. "Write what you know" is a good saying I like to follow.
I realize I'm late, like 4 years late, lol, but I've only gotten into game making in the last couple of years and hope you are still dedicated to it. I love RPG Maker because all my creativity is in the written word (I can't make visual art and I never got into programming when I could have learned it better [I'm 46 and felt lost trying to learn Unity when I couldn't even figure out the most basic aspects of it with a tutorial!]) so having all the assets and mechanics built into the system frees me up to make characters, plot and quests. I've made 3 games that I've released and more than that of game that may never get released. It's the Eventing part that tires and bores me into not finishing something, and I want to overcome that. Do you have any advice for an old guy?
I'm a life long writer (this is a dummy account) with numerous projects out. Having been writing for nearly 3 decades, I'm astounded at your insight and your ability to convey it in a simple, easy to digest manner.I'm guessing you're young just because you talk about releasing games recently as a young teen.I really want to see your games now.I also highly anticipate seeing where your ability for story telling goes in the coming years.
You really know your stuff. Your videos are worth rewatching.
Your tutorial is making me want to get back into game making and actually finish a game. I used to start RPG making but I never finished any of my project.
+Camycon It's quite a long trip to finish an RPG, but once it's finished it's a lot easier to finish the next one:P
Plus you get the satisfaction of telling everyone LOOK I MADE A GAME, haha:3
Best of luck!
its done now?
what about now?
Any news?
Is it finished?
Thank you for this eye-opening video! I'm exactly the same way. I create characters first and then flesh out the world around them. I love daydreaming about how my characters interact with each other, why they are the way they are, and how to make them relatable/interesting. I never thought of incorporating the personalities of the people (or cats!) I know, but, because of your video, I'm going to give it a shot! XD
The one about making sure your characters talk to each other and not just about Plot Stuffz reminded me of Digimon. Like they would talk to each other and interact and I think that was one of the best things about it, or at least in my opinion...
You have helped me so much in making my first couple RPG games.
BTW I love your voice!
This video actually gave me the right inspiration to make a handful of unique characters with really deep personalities.
Thanks :D
Yeah so true on the characters. I have written scene with one intent the characters totally took over. I am currently working on a game which originally I was planning on a very large party, but that got narrowed down, thinking maybe around 6 for more development.
Good video too, been pretty much watching most of your videos to learn. Programming is not my strong suit.
I completely get what you mean, it is so much easier if you blend a character's personality with someone you know in real life. You could think back about how the would act given in that particular situation. It certainly gets more difficult when you bring in an unique character to whom you can't relate.
Anyway I love your videos... keep up the good work. :)
I know this is random but your voice could totally make a fantastic Velma!
I start all my games from characters or plots, and the gameplay and story in general sprout from that.
I will be having at least 10 playable characters in my game, but they arent always together= gameplay variety and room for development.
And to avoid the whole boring protagonist thing I am making a game mechanic where literally each character sees the world differently. Depending on who is leading the party and who is in party different events will happen, which means if you replay the game, it allows for character development if you choose different members to show the experience. Certain puzzle mechanics are only accessible if you switch between party members. The villains in my game have a messed up backstory so I know I am giving them good reasons for being "evil".
I love this video because a TON of games I played failed with character development. Those games have too many characters, focus only on a few, and the rest dont matter because the game wasnt long enough to cover them. I am definetely chexking out your patreon cause I love your other game tutorials. Would you like to see my game trailer when I finish it? Some game mechanic ideas i got from your other videos lol
You are so passionate when you speak! this goes to show how much you care for your own creations! That is exactly why I love listening to you! Keep it up! :3
I'm more of a character B option since I feel more leaning towards the antagonist's end game choice. *Shield Hero* rejection.
I like this type of video. It's very informative and talks about something outside of the usual tutorial setting and talks more about the game design. Would you ever consider some talks about game mechanics and design?
Noomber 6 is basically what im making my game about, except I will be taking things from my horrible life and putting it in the game. Basically showing that abuse comes in many forms, but that you can get over it by trying your best to fix it and forget about the bad times. But then there’s that one random boss that is literally called Random and he’s a jester with crazy powers that have to do with cards. Also I know I’m posting this in 2018 but your videos are still helpful. And be on the lookout for a game called “Soaring-The Will of the World”!!!!
ENjoy your tuts, just started with RPGM and found things overwhelming. Your guides help me get past that. Thank you.
THANKS! I totally forgot to give my main villain a reason for his actions beyond "delusions of godhood" until now.
+Yannick “Tiberius” Luecker Delusions of Godhood is totally a legit reason:P
Echo607
If you want a flat villain or an over the top one. I didn't write up a million years of complicated reincarnations and wars and technological advances for a flat story. He promptly got the well - intentioned extremist treatment.
Hahaha I see:P
+Echo607 Hey, do you know of any plugins that can be used to create a mode - 7 effect in MV?
There's one out there, but from what I hear it doesn't work very well at the moment, though I haven't tested it myself.
I'm also not sure where to find a download link at the moment.
Apparently javascript let's you do a lot more in terms of 3d or mode7 so I'm expecting it to get better in the future:3
Yea, because Akira is mostly a reflection(?) of your real personality.
Good "talk" though... I really needed it.
+翔寿夫 Akira has her 'me' moments, but none of my characters 100% reflect me:P They've all absorbed different parts of my personality.
Thankies for watching^_^ Happy game making!
When I think about it, this might just be the main flaw within my game (way too short for 26 characters), and many games I see being made.
This video is very important for character creation, especially for those who want to make something epic, because comical games don't always follow the rules.
I'm working on getting an early micro version of my brother's game out, but there's this one character that has no plot importance, barely even a line, no reason to join the party, and no character development because not one line, and she's there for the majority of the game. She's probably only there because he needed a crutch-character to carry him through playtests and he forgot to take her off, but she's the first one to get a gameplay gimmick. I wonder if it feels right to just take her out of the game though.
On villains:
Usually, I suggest making the villain "wrong genre savvy"-they think they're the hero of a different type of story than what's actually going on. For example, a heroic character in 40K would be a villain in Star Wars. So, you're writing an a Star Wars villain, have them think they're in a 40K-like setting.
40K?
TheGuyYouCantStand Warhammer 40K, a sci-fantasy setting that takes place in a grim. dark universe where humanity is beset on all sides by hostile aliens and demons, and the only thing protecting mankind is the Imperium of Man, who themselves are basically space Nazis akin to the Empire in Star Wars.
Thing is, the Imperium comes across as surprisingly benevolent, since their iron fisted rule legitimately IS the only thing that keeps the human species alive, and it actually is true in-universe that attempting to co-exist with aliens is a horrible idea 90% of the time. For example, orks in the setting are biologically programmed to be violent and destructive, so killing every last one of them is basically your only option.
If you took a "good guy" from that setting and had them trying something similar in a Star Wars setting, they'd be bad guys.
Matthew Campbell That gives me a new way to look at heroes and villains. Thanks.
I love love LOVE this video. It's really good just to have talks about game making. I'd love to see more 'discussion' videos in the future. As a writer I can really appreciate this content.
where can I get Gaia's Melody???
it just looks so interesting.
Steam
A technique I like to use in character creation is take a pre-existing character and change/fix it to suit my opinions and desires. Not superficial stuff, like giving them an axe or cool powers, but altering their character, morality and thought process.
For example, I'm not a fan of how many "ultimate lifeform" characters just accept that with no hesitation or hangups. Therefore, I write an ultimate lifeform who doesn't want to be perfect.
I think character creation is the most fun part in creating stories. At my current project I really enjoy writing the rebellious and strong willed but sometimes insensitive guy named Rumiko, who made it his personal quest to avenge his master and adoptive father, who was killed by a world known assassin. I'm having trouble writing his first love interest though, who accompanies him through most parts of the first half of the game. I want her to be level headed, but also aware of herself and her beauty. But since I ship someone else with Rumiko in my mind the whole time, it's hard to actually write the relationship between them, since I'm looking forward to those moments, where the protagonist is with the future "wifey".
aw man! I can't wait until Christmas! I'm gonna have a lot of fun making a game! IM GONNA SHOVE IN SO MANY OF MY OC'S!!!!
I didn't realize it until watching this video, but the only character in my game that didn't seem perfect was the so called "villain". so after I watched this video I wrote out more of the back stories of my characters before I started working on my game and then it just all mixed together and made a storyline that I really liked. And I also didn't realize that the Main Character and the villain had very similar reasons to be out doing what they are in the world (to simplify it they were out to revenge a loved one but in the game it's more into detail)
Oops sorry I started ranting xD Well anyways, Your videos help me a lot and gave me many new ideas for my game so thank you!
I’ll probably go through with the Dragon Quest 3 personality system, and work from there, adding those personalities into “switches”, then I can branch out resources that someone with that kind of personality would comment with.
I love this, it is basic stuff, but no one thinks about it. Great job Echo!
You're a pretty good artist, a devout game developer. I kinda sad that I'll never truly be able to appreciate your work
Wow, epic video! No wonder this took you a bunch longer to make, a crazy ton of editing and effort clearly went into this and it was totally worth the wait, awesome work :D!!!!
Pretty much everything in this is perfect so there isn't much to add xD;
For me I jump back and forth between characters and stories and mechanics and try to grow them all out together, but this was all seriously awesome advice for growing your characters :), putting them in random scenes and seeing how they interact is especially helpful for rounding out there everyday conversations.
Working with other game engines I wanted to focus on mechanics first then build a character from there but it's harder to do that with RPG maker.
While I might like to make a light plot/character dungeon crawler for a fun smaller project, likable characters are *extremely* important to me. This mostly effects me in anime, where if I don't like the protagonist/protagonists in the first episode or if a super annoying character is introduced within 3 episodes I immediately quit it. I don't know where people got the idea that annoying characters are a trope they need to have or something, the world is annoying enough as it is I don't want to be annoyed when watching a story develop.
Thanks for all the effort you poured into this :D looking forward to future videos as always :)
+MGswiftillusion Thanks^_^ This one was sure tough lol
I usually implement mechanics as I go, and have story ideas in mind, but it all depends on how the characters end up for me:P
Regarding anime I KNOW RIGHT?
My big thing is when I see the exact same "japanese highschool student boy" as the protag in every anime...
I also have a thing against stupidity violence... it was funny when I was younger, but now random characters punching each other for dumb reasons all the time is... bleh:/
Thanks for watching^w^
+Echo607 ^^ can imagine.
Ahh yeah :)!
Haha yeah aw my goodness!
That really drives me crazy =_= especially when it's like 'hey we have a large and wonderful magic world-let's follow this group of highschool students in it and have all the unnecessary cliches of a school environment' or 'oh you are a highschool student lets magically give you the power to save the world, and here's a harem as a bonus' =_=;;;!
Sometimes though thankfully there are ones that actually work, like 'Hyouka' is probably top 3 mystery/detective show for me easily if not #1 and the protagonist is a high school student, but it uses that environment as a meaningful way for the character to interact and grow instead of just a mess of tropes and ridiculous coincidences.
As soon as I see a male attacked by a female because of something the female did/obliviously allowed to occur, that's an immediate rage quit for me xD; especially if it's attempting to be serious outside of that. Slapstick comedy can be fun-pretty sure I've seen some I enjoyed but I forget them (Gintama is amazing but can get a bit too crazy for me sometimes, though it's the show I've sincerely laughed the most at alongside Nichijou), but if the female attacking the male ridiculously is the first thing done I know I'm not missing out on anything special.
(to think with some of the amazing manga that anime relying on that is still made drives me crazy).
^^ No worries, thanks for the awesome content to watch :D
Hyouka was good:P
In terms of dumb violence and such, my big one is tsundere characters - I used to love them, but recently in every show I've watched they're just overly violent for the stupidest reasons and you just watch it thinking "...someone thought this was a good idea."
_"Oh no, the guy I secretly like is talking to another girl. Better beat the living daylights out of him because he obviously knows he's doing something wrong!"_
I absolutely loved your little overused anime summary XD
+Echo607 ^^.
OHH yeah! But of course the girl never expresses her own feelings, meanwhile for some unfathomable reason the guy continues to be their best friend at a just-short of a relationship distance??!? like, whyyyyy!? Just feels so often like lazy writing to cause unnecessary conflict and avoid any potential relationship conclusion instead of genuine character development/interaction
haha :)
O_O I. KNOW. RIGHT.
" Love your character "
Uhh... What if I love ALL of my characters, and by all I mean everyone of 300++ original character that I made over the course of over a decade--
Cause I have this HUGE-ass urge to make games [ Or anything to remember them by really-- ] including at least each a portion of them-- [ Which would probably cost me a few years, at the very least but this urge is just that big-- ]
Silent protagonist and Side characters getting the details is what I like imo
Tons and tons of characters works really well for games trying to do Jagged Alliance-shaped things.
Honestly one of my favourite characters to write is the villain. In my last game the main villain wasn't exactly evil, he was just evil because the god of destruction possessed his body to become whole again
I have big Fantasy and i already use chracters change hands position, look to side and other sprite changes. I have lot's of characters and all i love. I make them from think and give them personallity. All my main characters have emotions and personality. And nice video thanks for. Now i can watch if i'm not have been right i don't miss something. :)
Truly inspiring, great advice. Like your voice.
In the future, I would like to suggest that you do a follow-up on this video: Creating Villains. It's one thing to get the audience to love the characters that have been created, but it's something different to get the audience to hate the villains while simultaneously caring about them and taking them seriously. Which do you think is more difficult? Creating good heroes, or creating good villains?
+FireFlower46 For me personally it's always the villain. It took me a long time to be able to write them as more then "the evil badguy that progresses the plot" - I mean, they had reasons for what they were doing, but at the time I didn't know how to write that:P
I had a really fun villain to write in GMAE - I got to have a really unique perspective on his situation... you know, while he was being evil and enslaving humanity.
I'll consider doing a pure villain episode:3
Well i'm sure i'm super weird but for some reason every time i need to create a new very important character i come back to watch this video to help me
To develop a character, I make the story and change they little by little, trying to shape they in the character I have in mind, change the stories background, personality etc. And finaly,I alter some parts of the story to correspond the final character.
One thing I love to do is making my characters ambivalent. (Which basically means you as the player have mixed feelings about if they're a good or bad guy.) Like maybe the antagonist might be truly doing something good or better, maybe they really aren't a fully bad person. (which sounds cliche, but if it's written correctly, it's literally beauty)
Character B = Shield Hero, Leon Magnus, and Lancelot. You either gonna love or hate that character in between. Love and hate relationship. :\
i Like when the Main Character starts off as a Timid or a Wuss, then due to a Event, change em to be more Brave or somewhat of a Jerk.
10:13 That guy in the red cloak looks like Mao (from Disgaea 3) and basically sums up his character. In a way. I've only just started the final chapter (Chapter 8) and I'm pretty confused about his trauma stuff that Almaz keeps talking about... I can go on for ages about Disgaea.
One time, I was making a character that was supposed to be a bit shy. She was (secertly) royalty and she did not know it. People in the game kept comparing her to a character in a historical book saying "I wonder if your the same character from the book?" Later I put her to watch some TV. The question was on the news. I wanted her to patiently watch and then go to sleep. But instead she threw a rock at the TV and broke it and screamed. Then she was grounded and her friends had to help her escape.
At the time I was like "WHAT JUST HAPPENED?!?" so the story turned into something else completely.
I never finished the game but I might try to use the same story and someday maybe finish the game.
Kachie! A comedic weirdo!? I always thought she was quite a mature character. I always thought Miki, and Niki were the ones that played that role. Not to mention she was considering moving far away from the world and raising them herself, playing the role of their mother!
Thank you for this! I plan on getting an rpg maker for my ds and really needed help for Asura and my other characters.
You should do more of let´s talk series. How about Let's Talk: How to come up with a good plot!
That would be super helpful.
#4 is so true, as an RPer, creating and driving characters is a big part of my life... and In many situations Ive wanted to do certain things but the characters goals and wants were far removed from my own, and in the characters drive itself took thigns far away from where I wanted or even expected. @_@
10:58 I thought they were talking about a fallen god(dess) in game, then I got your joke. Nice. Also, 'nice' to the video as well, you gave me a lot of things to think about! Thanks! (:
One thing to remember: at some point in development, your characters won't really have to follow the original storyline you had in mind; at that point your characters will build a story of their own, through their interactions and reactions to each other.
9:40 because-
>THIS WORLD IS IMPERFECT...
>what?
>IF ONLY I COULD WIPE AWARE THE IMPURITIES
>is anyone else listening to this?....
>AND MAKE IT AS BEAUTIFUL AS ME.
Nice to watch a random RM video and realize "hey i've played that game !" :)
woah! Nice! thanks! I did have a lot of this things in mind while creating my characters... Now, I do have a LOT of characters, but not all of them are playable though, at least not at the same time. Now I have more tips on how to flesh them more and make them more interesting. Oh and my villains, one of them yeah is the annoying evil asshole, but the other has a very good reason to be the main antagonist
7:32 you made a character based on your cat! I love it XD
I like the idea of the character actually TALk to each other , sometimes forgot that and they just a job-slave in battle and member to save the world
maybe we should do the comical/manga approach in conversation section xD
This is actually something ive never entirely gotten into. I get into my game, and start developing something incredible but then I hit a snag. A character that feels like it should be where it is not. But by then I do not have said character, and ruins my motivation to keep working. To start I should always do what I forget to do first, brainstorm, and planning...
It's impossible to keep track of all the ideas that come into my mind while I would like to create a grand epic RPG. After keep myself within some realistic expectations
I want to make a main character who's an Android learning how the world works. So most of the time I'll have choices in their dialogue so the player can choose what they say or feel during those dialogue trees. Kinda like Fallout 3 and 4.
Thank you I am Brazilian and I'm creating a game and you help me a lot with your videos
So I am currently planning for an RPG that focuses on two opposing teams
Team 1
Mary: main protagonist, someone who is trying to live peacefully, attempts to stop the prophecy
Lea: secondary protagonist, trying to help Mary, attempts to stop the prophecy
Ian: mysterious figure who is suspicious, he looks for strategic locations
Arthur: a sword fighter who specialises in light magic, has apparently punched a god before.
Team 2
Exa: main protagonist 2, Mary's biological sister, she seems to omit her past. Attempts to stop the prophecy.
Karl: tertiary protagonist, he seems to be perfect, but is hiding behind a facade, but it has some truth inside of it. Likes tabletop role-playing games, attempts to stop the prophecy
Ben: the main strategist, he is occasionally seen looking through his briefcase.
Thomas: a spy working for Team 1, is adamant on fulfilling the prophecy.
There are other members on both sides and they both want to do good, they have different ideas on what is good
I really like your enthusiasm. I'm making a game for mygirlfriend's bitrhdtay and your videos help me a lot. I mean a LOT. So I want to say thank you. Please keep up the good work. :)
+András Rátkay ^_^ Awe, that's sweet! Best of luck to you!
I'm currently getting started on a survival horror game. I figured it's best to start out somewhat small but something within my familiar territory as I know my Horror and I grew up with horror video games horror movies you name it.
Loved the inclusion of bravely default (most of my inspiration)
I am into Character design, too and I totaly agree with evrything you sad in that vid. I also have problems to find a villan form my story and I also love my Characters. (I have so much of them from serval RPG games even but I love them all
Thank you! This helped a lot! Oh and also, I don't think a character would just randomly turn evil then brag about how evil they are.->
5:05 tht's my problem, i aways start a scene thinking like this, and then out of nowere my characters start to change the whole scene.
"Fun to have a crazy villain every now and then you can't take seriously, until they destroy the world or something" - Lol, very nice FF3/6 reference.
I like the style of sprite you use here ^^
Speaking of games with too many characters, a perfect example of one is suikoden 1, 2, 3, 4 and 5.
LOVE YOUR CHARACTERS
yeaaaaaa that tip also could be a "but dont love em too much or something might go wrong with it!"
seriously sometimes people love the characters they make too much and it might ruin the game for the player.....
I remember the good old days for Fire Emblem when characters had this immense depth... Intelligent Systems needs your video, to be honest. By the way, how do you start with one protagonist, then an event comes by and another joins your party?
I usually choose a story first. Then create characters that go with that story. I keep finding myself having to make more random characters at the moment than main characters while trying to progress the story. To make it fit and make the world feel more real than just a bunch of random NPC's that don't mean anything. While i'm making my game my characters and ideas just go with the flow. They evolve. Sometimes you'll think of a great idea but you wont know how to execute it the way your character would. So like Echo said. Sometimes characters take over and end up changing little bits of the story.
Spoiler alert i'm planning to kill a few off so... Yay game of thrones inspiration.