Jane Diary

very nice game! i liked it's more serious tone with some cool plot ideas and overall improved flow - the same ol' npc's that want to beat the shit out of you are still here, the battles are A LOT more dynamic, fun and harder as a result (which is the same as fun for me!) and there's lots of little, but impactful additions, too, that i loved: like the game's name spelled with map creator tiles in the beginning, it looks so cute and kinda nostalgic, too - it reminds me of old warcraft 3 maps, every map creator used to do this back then, especially with fire effect!) the new sideview battlers also looks really nice, even if their faces are a bit goofy - you get used to them and they look kinda charmy, too, now that i think) the fairy at the end of the dungeons is super helpful, too - she lets you teleport out of the dungeons to reduce backtracking by A LOT and that's very welcome!) the boss battles here are now especially brutal with how the system isn't as turn-based as before but a lot more dynamic, even the first big slime enemy gave me a run for my money!) next, all the references here and there are very nice, like the monster tamer kind and his older brother having the family name Wesker LMAO, and, finally, all the cameos from John's game were much appreciated, too - especially Mr.Cock and Ms.Pussy - love 'em)

still, i encountered two problems in my playthrough - one small and other big. the small one is that the fairy's save function is kinda redundant cuz you can save whenever ya want using the menu, and the big one is that it seems like A LOT of the enemies just don't have names, for some reason - they can still be fought normally yeah but even when they appear it just says Enemy appeared without actually telling you whose sorry ass appeared before you. oh well!

all in all, this was great. loved it from start to finish, Alertz, and i hope to see more from you - i think you got the handle of the 2k engine pretty well) best of luck with any of your future endeavors, and take care!

So, I actually played the first game before this one and I remeber enjoying it, so I had some good expections for the sequel. Unfortantly, I found Jane's Diary to be the weaker of the duology. It's still enjoyable in spots, some cool moments here and there, but overall it left much to be desired.

The story of this game has some nice ideas. I like the more serious tone compared to the first game and it's set appropetly right at the start with a story about saving your brother. There were some interesting ideas, like how we get to read into the protagonist long journey through journal entries (nice that you did that actually, it makes the adventure feel more realistic, as it would take that long to complete such a globe trotting adventure now would they?), or when the old characters from the last game make a come back - fun optional bosses by the way! Although the characters don't say much they still are cool to look at, and I liked how the game still had the same crazy npcs that attack you for no reason, that was always amusing to me.

I think you did a fine job with the overworld maps but I just wish you added some signs, or at the very least, a road? Because right now it's easy to get lost in the overworld and miss some important locations, like the caves. As far as the towns go, while I like the characters within in them I do wish they were more varied. Like, you have the first town which is just one building in the middle, and then it's copied in the desert town but with sand instead of grass. The castles feel the same too, same copy paste layout, different characters sure, but all the towns/castles are basically the same map copy and pasted. Annd, I can say the same for the dungeons although to a lesser extent as they have labyrinth like designs. Although, I would have maybe had less long, long, long, everlasting hallways? After a while it gets repeative and doesn't feel fun espically when you spend upwards of 3 minutes per random encounter. I'd much perfer shorter dungeons that are more packed, with more events, more special npcs, maybe some mini bosses. I will say though that one thing I liked was the teleporting fairy, nice solution to cut down backtracking. And I liked the pad locked chests, makes ya pay attention to what the npcs aresaying. On a side note: how come we have to wear protective boots while riding the tank in the toxic wasteland? Doesn't make sense...

Now for the battle system. It has potential but oooh boy it needs some adjustments. Battles take place in a side view and use action bars that refill according to your agility. I like that it adds a strategtic dynamic to the fights and reminds me of final fantasy. And the battles are done so well in the first half! They feel challenging than the first game but fair, even the first slime boss gave me a run for my money. The optional boss fights in the 3rd to 2nd towns are fun too and greatly reward the player on their adventure. The problem I found started during the second half of the game around the toxic and ice dungeons. The game is A LOT less grindy than it's older brother so it won't take long before the party is equipped with sweet, sweet gear at the point, greatly boosting their defense and attack... Just not their agility. Remeber when I said the battle system is agility based? Weeellll, because none of the gear boosts your agility the action bars take a loooonnnnnggggg time to fill up. The purpose is that the enemies pummel you in the meantime while you're waiting for your turn which I suppose is supposed to make it more challeging. Buuuut since your gear is so OP at this point all enemies deal 0 damage, so the result is this awkward battle system where you wait around 3 minutes just to finish one fight when it only should have lasted 1 minute. The easist way to fix that would be adding items that increase agility, or just have agility naturally increase during level ups, or decrease the enemy's agility. Also, what's with Jane and Shera having skills costing 50 MP when they only have 2 Max MP pts?

So those are my main thoughts on the game. I will say that I did like the first half but the second half has mediocore pacing that made me quit by the time I got to the lava dungeon. It dooees have potential and you do have a good grasp on the rpg maker 2000 engine. Besides the typo in the lava cave I saw little bugs or errors. Keep at it and good luck on your future projects. Take care, Alterz!

Pretty sure I'm typing it out exactly as the sign says but, nada.