A Different Sort of Lamp Battle
December 28, 2011 by The DaveHere’s an enemy Mars came up with. I came up with the name~ (But that’s secret!) The lovely sprite was done by Pik and the battle background was put together by Phones. Also note the updated battle UI that the art team and I collaborated on. Team effort!
Fun stuff!
In other news, we have a couple posts in the works.
- Zephys has been putting together a “everything we’ve told you” post where he goes over just about everything we’ve told you about the game. It’ll be a handy catch-up guide for newcomers and a good ol’ review for folks that have been following us for a while.
- I’m going to be putting together another mailbag post here shortly. We’ve got a backlog of mail and it needs clearin’ out. We’ve responded to the mail we recieved that wasn’t marked as for the mailbag. But we do miss some occasionally. If we didn’t answer yours, and it wasn’t marked as for the mailbag, please ask us again or mention it in the comments here.
- I’d like to do another technical post some time. Any requests? (Something general would be good.)
So that’s that! Hope your holidays were excellent, and I hope you all have a wonderful New Year. Put your feet up and spend some good time with your family. 
Very curious to find out what those bars will do. Maybe they’ll be a guage for how often you can get SMASH attacks or something like that? And for a tech post, maybe you can go through the menus and show how they work? It may be more gameplay then tech, but anything is nice. And can someone describe what ATB is for me?
Awesome lamp dudes!Keep up the good work! I also remember from mother 3 that the + thing is to guard on there and the baseball bat is probably to bash and the other thing is probably items. The question is…what about PSI I don’t see anything for it…
Very creative with the lamp. I’d like to see some other concept work soon. keep it up
@rrrbub
Weather is scripted. But that’s a pretty neat idea. It seems like something they might’ve done in the N64DD version of Mother 3. Sort of in the same vein as the “plant a seed, come back later and it’s turned into a vine or tree to climb” idea they had going.
*The lamb flashes
*Couldn’t stop crying
I’m kind of pulling this out of the old bag of tricks in the back, but the bar might have a relationship with music. Like say you if guys (big if here) were bringing back the sound battles, this could be a gauge for a special or extra attack move of some for when you successfully pull off a combo.
Either that or something else. I’m still going with something music related though.
Hmm… well I’m out of guesses. Mysterious, indeed!
Yeah it’s been previously mentioned it’s not an ATB representation, that’s why I dismissed it. EXP indicator has also been dismissed… How mysterious!~
Hola chicos soy nuevo…
me gustaria que me informaran sobre el avance del juego y padirles que me envian un mensaje personal…
de todas formas esa lampara esta interesante
It’s not ATB.
I don’t think Zack’s gauge is filled. It looks like it stopped at the top, which is when he went unconscious. This implies that it is an ATB. That’s my theory anyway.
Also, Square may hold a patent on the ATB, but many RPG’s have their own variations of that system, so I don’t think it should be a problem. Just like Mother 3 has a patent on sound battles; that may be a bit more tricky for the team to get around. then again, they are using Nintendo’s copywritten title “Mother”, so they’re probably jus doing whatever they want with this game and hopin for the best. With the way game developers have become more relaxed on fangames (Sonic CD’s remake was originally a fan project, for example; Mother 3′s translation never got a cease and desist) I doubt they’ll have too many problems.
Ah, I just remembered that there WILL BE a night-and-day mechanic in the game. I’m really in dire need of that “Everything we’ve told you” post. So, sorry for that one.
I’ll repeat my notion in here that this lamp reminds me of Lon Chaney, sr. I do chuckle at the little pun on “lamp stalk” / “stalk lamp”.
Also, seeing that you ask for it, I have a quasi-technical question, concerning a specific type of game-play mechanics. What I’d like to ask (and forgive my faulty English, I’ll try to make myself as clear as I can): will there be – more or less elaborate – time- or weather-mechanics in the final game?
I remember a screenshot where it was obviously night in-game; but will day- and night time ultimately be fixed according to the game’s narrative at a specific moment (there was some sort of scene-to-scene progression from day to night in Mother 3), or will there be a continuous shift of night-and-day during gameplay?
In regards to weather-mechanics (or “weather-cycles”): naturally, specific locations will have a set climatic theme (e.g., snowy or desert regions, to name tropical examples), but will the weather itself in those areas change organically? In the standard grassy, rural area, there would occur rainfalls occasionally, in snowy, mountainous regions, there’d occur more or less heavy snowfalls – blizzards, even – and so on.
I imagine these changes in weather would then also affect the area in certain forms. For example, rainfalls in the aforementioned standard “grassy areas” could let flowers bloom or mushrooms sprout which the player would then be able to pick up and use as items. The effects of chaning weather would of course not needed to be limited to randomly generating items, but could also block off or open up new areas in the region (although this would perhaps be too complicated, or simply too random to be considered).
So… uhm… Yes, this turned into not just a “technical question”, really. Nonetheless, I’d like to know if anything in this manner is planned for the final game.
Well this is a really nice POST.
……… It’s a lamp post…… Ahem, Great redesign guys!
Perhaps the bars represent attack priority or charge for a signature attack. Or maybe its something simple like HP remaining. Either way, you guys are doing an outstanding job. You make us Mother fans proud.
Random screenshot(s) and mailbag updates and songs from the game are good but you guys are being far too secretive!!! Why can’t you put together a short gameplay video for us dedicated fans? There are people who will (and do) shower praise on you for any tiny teasing update you post, but plenty more lurkers who get discouraged and don’t return. The long wait for the Mother 3 fan translation was bearable because Mato did so many nice interesting updates — this is just painful! Respectfully.. a fan. Thank you for your hard work.
I doubt it is a ATB. Zack is dead and his gauge is filled. I say Limit Breaker.
This game looks so much like Mother 3 (except better!). However, the small screen of the GBA definitely was a setback for Mother 3 and the M1+2 version of Mother 2. So my question is, what is the screen resolution for Mother 4? Also, are you guys planning on offering a filter option, i.e. HQ2x or something like it? I’m just curious is all
That street lamp is awesome. I hope you give it a funny name.
Looks good. Please be cautious with using anything too similar to the ATB, as Square-Enix holds a patent on it.
Awesome, I was wondering if the project was still going on as of late. Good to see more progress.
I personally want to see some gameplay footage. An overworld video and a battle sequence maybe? I’d also love to see more of the sprites and a better synopsis of the main story…
…Please?
The phrase “A picture’s worth a thousand words” is really relevant here: I try to study all the screen shots you give and each really reveals a lot if you look at it long enough. Anyway, good work guys, keep it up! The game is looking great and I can’t wait to play it!
@the-rope-snake
This is probably the equivalent of the “secret bars” mentioned earlier in the project.
@the-rope-snake
I was thinking the same. Does the speed stat affect the ATB system?
Hm… The colouring…. Its looking a lot like a recharging meter… And the fact that meryl’s is is completely full and she’s active is leading me to believe its like an ATB gauge from the final fantasy games. ATB plus mother? Sounds awesome!
haha! looking awesome!
i cant wait to see whatever you guys dish out next.
the review post is a good idea. iv been following this project for a good while now and it would be nice to see all the good stuff in one place.
and from the screenshot, this game is looking so damn legit. polished to the extreme.
nice work guys.
damn nice work.
@The Dave: A technical post suggestion: The Level Up System In Mother 4.
Now I know this may be rather basic for some RPGs, but then there’s systems like Pokemon with secret EV and IV points that happen in the background which determine which stat gets boosted and by how much, requiring characters to do certain things in order to improve certain stats and by how much. For example: Character A must take X amount of damage for Defence to go up by Y amount at next level up, or battle certain enemy Z amount of times for stat boosts etc.
Anyways, thumbs up for the update it’s lookin’ good! The main thing I noticed is that the bars beneath the HP/PP meters is now gone… I assume that’s been replaced with the colouring right? Dunno what it represents but I suppose we’ll find out when we actually play the game (whenever that may be)
Great Work! I like the lamp sprite
Looks neat. And I like what all you’ve done with the battle UI so far. Can’t wait till the project is finished so we all can play it ^_^ (though that means don’t hurry and take your time, for we also want it to be the very best you can make it) ^_^