As you can guess from the title, This post is to announce my new collection of plugins for the RPG Maker MZ (and possibly also MV) game engine. I started writing these a few days ago, but a lot of the code is an advancement on existing systems I had previously written. I am currently working with a core based around MZ.
I could have already started looking into MV compatibility if I hadn’t spent far too much time trying to think of a name for my plugin collection. It is a tradition of mine to have a name for my own plugin ‘engine’, such as my previous DMV, Dekyde, $D13x, and Pokemon Ace engines (collection of systems). After much deliberation I have decided to simply go with the name ‘RPG Plugins’. I feel like this is nice and short, and also fits well due to my username, and the underlying RPG Maker program.
As shown in the clip above, some of the new systems are already functional, some are finished, and others are currently being worked on. There are quite a number of systems that I intend to bring over to the new RPG Plugins collection, I don’t want to say too much about some of the larger ones, but there are some smaller things that I’m willing to mention:
- Animated Title Scene (shown above – almost finished)
- Animated Dragonbones (shown above – core finished)
- Animated Map Name (inspired by my old ace script)
- Various Statistic Control/Distribution Systems
- Pokemon: Natures/IV-EV/Exp/More
- Teleportation Systems
- Hexagon Map System
- LootBoxes (finished)
- Antialias (finished)
- Screenshotter (mv port, finished)
- KursorBlink (mv port, finished)
- PreventViewSource (finished)
- RunGameInBG (finished)
There is also quite a few systems that I am now planning that I wasn’t before, this is due to me having written my own Dragonbones processing core and implemented it within my custom core modules. This allows me to easily use Dragonbones animations everywhere, as shown in my new title scene plugin. This includes enabling Dragonbones animations to be used for things like Battlers, Map Events, or even as background characters within the game status menu!!
With all that being said, I’m still unsure what the best model would be for releasing these systems. Naturally the community wants them to be free, and I do intend to release a number of free systems. But after having a look around on websites like itch.io, when I see there are a number of creators charging money for incredibly small systems that require no more than basic knowledge and minor changes to a few lines of code, it confirms for me, that the quality of work that I’m able to create, along with the level of customisation it brings, is worth something. I’m just not yet sure what…
As a side note, 3 or 4 days ago some RPG Maker MZ demo games went up over on https://tkool.jp/mz/. They have also added some documentation for how you can write your very own plugins for the new engine. (google can auto translate for you). I’m not going to detail how, but its possible to view the source code for these demo games, and in turn, gain early access to the new MZ codebase (although a few things are in Japanese).
I’m not going to give a full review of the code until after the engine and editor is officially released; however, I will say that I have been pleased with the changes I’ve seen so far. None of the default classes are written with an ES6 class structure, but there is a number of small features that can help make new systems easier/faster to create, such as a proper clickable sprite class ~ even though they haven’t ironed out all the bugs yet…
Once RPG Maker MZ is officially released, I will spend a few days tinkering with the new editor features and then post my review of both the editor and the underlying codebase the engine uses. Plugins may be released on day 1, I haven’t yet decided what things I want to release first.
Be sure to like, subscribe/follow, and check back soon! ❤
You can find out more about the upcoming features in RPG Maker MZ, as well as pre-order your own copy below;
Dekita RPG 