Winds Rhapsody

A well-crafted little RPGMaker game which inside its small scope shows a lot of potential. Unique art assets are always nice to see, though not required, in an RPGMaker game, which is no exception in this case! From the characters and enemies to the buildings and tiles everything looks cohesive within the simple Steampunk aesthetic of the setting. The effects stand out as well, look good and are just the right level of flashy. The music is decent as well and fits nicely with the setting and particularly the machines that comprise the majority of the enemies. Given that this is a sample game it makes sense that the story is more of a prologue and offers only a small glimpse into the world and the characters of Joyanne and Sonie. That being said it would be nice to see a sequel to this as there is a good amount of potential to the setting and the open-ended nature of this game leaves a lot of questions unanswered. Also the environmental storytelling is quite well done in such as the house of an author being littered in scripts and wine bottles. Combat happens in real-time which is a bit of a double-edged sword. On the one hand it keeps you on your toes. But on the other hand it doesn’t allow for much strategic variety, rather it encourages finding one strategy, often just piling on damage on the enemies, and sticking with it with little incentive to experiment. Equally the concept of obtaining new skills by getting a certain amount of specific items, in this case Research, from enemies is very interesting and has a lot of potential. However that too doesn’t shine as much as it could given the lacking incentive to gather more utility skills and not just whichever skill deals the most damage. The world is still ripe with mystery and allusions to a broader cast of characters that could be interesting to meet. Additionally the combat too has a lot of potential to be developed into something greater than it is here. All of the parts assemble into a fun little game for an afternoon that leaves you wanting for more.