RPG Patreon Ci-En Active RPG Maker [Boko877] Girl Beats Hero

[Lusy is best girl]

Great news. I'm sure some of you guys may have known that Boko's been working on GBH3 for a while now. Well, he just released the test version in Japanese not too long ago for his supporters. Since CP2 and CP1 are both in this thread, I'll just mention this here instead of making a new one.

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1685729903789166592

The contents are a test fight with Senri, the shrine maiden, and a test fight with the bunny girls, which can be edited to change the number of girls involved in the fight (They all only use one attack right now.).
He made this test version in RPG maker MZ instead of MV, which is what he usually uses. I don't really know enough about them to say what difference that makes, but I can talk about how different the game is now.

So the fights are still using turn based combat from a first person perspective, but the combat UI changed a lot. It's similar to the UI in UFG2, with up being attack, left to use magic, right for items, and down to...do stuff that make you lose intentionally, I guess? It's just do nothing or plead at the moment.
From a gameplay perspective, it seems GBH3 may use a style of gameplay that's a little similar to UFG2, with a rock-paper-scissor-ish system. Unlike the previous games, you no longer have a generic attack option. Instead, you're given 4 options whenever you select attack: Heavy Slash, Quick Slash, Slash Wave, and Hard Tackle.
-Heavy slash consumes no MP now, and it is the strongest attack. I assume it's going to be slow and hard to land most of the time in the full game.
-Quick slash is fast and seems to let you attack first. I'm guessing it'll also be more accurate and reliable than heavy slash.
-Slash Wave seems to be a replacement for thunder blade, and it is where things get interesting. Unlike the other attacks, it's a ranged attack.
-Hard Tackle seems to be the weakest attack, and I think it's intended to just get the girl off of you when you're in trouble. It can knock them down and get you a free turn when used at the right time.

The fight with Senri seems to be designed to show off how these attacks work and, I assume, how Boko plans on designing the fights from now on, because your attacks might not work if you make a bad choice. For example, if Senri uses her ice attack, she will freeze your legs and most of your attacks won't work because you can't reach her. But the ranged attack will. So it looks like it will be far more important than Thunder Blade ever was.

Senri only has 3 attacks so there isn't much going on right now, but I'm looking forward to see what Boko will make with a system like this. It kind of feels like a system from a visual novel RPG like MGQ. I just hope it won't be too simple and on the nose with its hints. Like "The enemy is charging up a really big move right now! Use block! Use the Block button or you'll lose, OK? Do it!". Now that I think about it, there's no block button right now. Weird.

Oh, and magic only has 4 spells now, Refresh, heal, Void, and Omni-Boost. Not surprising since most of the other spells were either rarely used, if ever, or just other buffs. So not much of value was lost.
The items seem to only include HP recovery, MP recovery, Status recovery, and an Elixir for now.

The video in the tweet has pretty much all of the animations for Senri.

And these are the bunny girls and the edit mode for their fight.

Spoiler: Boobs Peko

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1659821128217669633

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1660208234660257792

I hope Auphemia-sama doesn't take too long to make a come back...

 

[Sunshaded]

@Lusy is best girl It's wonderful that Boko has finally built a serious prototype for the next GBH.

My impressions after I tried it out just now:
- Yeah, Senri's battle strategy is simple once you figure out a handful of tracks and a few common patterns. Boko emphasized how this is just a test relase, so I assume he will make her battle more complicated later, otherwise Senri's battle will feel comparable to Leticia's back from the early days of GBH, and I feel like she deserves more than that, since Boko has hyped me up for how strong she is.
- It feels like HP falls fair quickly, but maybe it's just an illusion because I have trouble mentally processing how much HP I have left when the HP bar is vertical instead of horizontal. I also always fail to notice when my status changes, since it's just a tiny box in the upper-left corner.
- The new style of UI that's close to UFG 2 makes me think... I wonder if there's a chance Boko will set a time limit to select an action each turn? Well, maybe it's just me, but I feel like that would make them more exciting if done right. It would make it harder to win, certainly, if you can't stop and think all the time. Maybe that'd be too drastic a change for people, though...
- The "press z" message for some of Senri's animations didn't work when I pressed it early on; it seems like I have to actually wait for the animation to be shown at least once before it works.
- Can I say that the red-haired bunny girl is my tentative favorite, though the brown- and white-haired ones seem cool too? Though, it's hard to be sure when they don't even speak.

I'm looking forward to when Boko actually adds the story and makes this a true GBH release, rather than just a test release to check compatibility with users' PCs. It'd be cool if Boko incorporated that one story-oriented Senri cutscene he showed off on Twitter a long time ago (Senri flying around and beating up some sexist male soldiers) because it was awesome.

 

[Lusy is best girl]

It feels like HP falls fair quickly,

It does feel that way. It may be thanks to how much the damage from the same attack can vary, combined with the fact Heavy Slash decreases the damage you take when you use it. So one turn you'd use Heavy Slash and feel fine when you see how little damage you took, but the next turn you try to use something else and all of a sudden 1000+ HP just goes poof.

I wonder if there's a chance Boko will set a time limit to select an action each turn?

It could be neat. But some people complain when he merely requires a couple of simple inputs to escape from a grab (which is why escaping from Sharifa's combo was so braindead easy in ch2), so asking them to go through 2 menus in every single turn within a time limit seems like something Boko would rather avoid. Wouldn't be surprised if Loretta still had a time limit, though.

Can I say that the red-haired bunny girl is my tentative favorite

I'd say silver haired one is probably my favorite cause she looks cool, followed by the red haired one because she seems the most feminine and assertive. Not big on the others, not sure if it's the short hair or the hair color. Hopefully that'll change once they start talking.

It'd be cool if Boko incorporated that one story-oriented Senri cutscene he showed off on Twitter a long time ago

It's a story told from a girl's perspective instead of Alf's, which Boko tends to avoid, but I hope Boko includes it. In fact, I think he should go even further and include stories for some of the other girls too. Seeing their backstories or goals & motivations could be pretty neat. And watching them humiliate and beat the shit out of someone who actually deserves it instead of Alf wouldn't hurt.

 

[Lusy is best girl]

0.0.5 has been released.

Spoiler: Update content

Added skills to Senri.
Added skills to Bunny Girls
Added "Plead" to Bunny Girls
Added finishing scenes to some of Senri's skills.
"Void" can now be selected (but this may be changed in the future).
"Heavy Slash" was changed to "Guard Counter".
"Slash Wave" can now hit neighboring characters.
Changed the "weakness" level to 5.
Added damage popups for some moves.
Added BGM selection function

Boko hasn't been all that active recently and the update isn't that big even though it took a long time for it to release. Sadly, there is a reason for that. Boko has recently lost a close family member to the big C and the emotional burden along with the funeral arrangements have taken a big portion of his time. Hopefully he's feeling better now, because he's back on the saddle with this update.

 

[Someone92]

Link to the demo (pay wall)

You must be registered to see the links

 

[Sunshaded]

I loved the latest GBH3 test prototype update! Senri's dialogue makes her feel like another top-tier heroine to me, on the level of the other three from GHB CP2. I didn't expect to love her already. She's verbally ruthless, perfect for a do-M player like me.

The bunnygirl fight was slightly more interesting than before with its extra animations, but of course, I don't expect much, since it's just a multi-person battle test. That said, unless the techniques they use vary a lot more (maybe even having some of them only attack every other turn? or perform combination moves?) it's a strategically uninteresting fight. Even Boko admitted it's a bit of a drag to clear in its current state. The concept of getting mobbed by 5 sexy bunnygirls obviously has potential, though.

There are a few bugs here and there, but most of them have been reported already in the comments of that Ci-en post @Someone92 linked to, so I expect Boko is on his way to fixing them. Bottom line: don't use high boost or void, because Senri's stat boosts will be retained between battles (until you close the window and double-click the .exe again). Doing things like using boost or plead mid-hold can also result in odd behavior. Regardless, this update makes me feel that GBH3 is close to reaching the point where Boko can ideally polish it a bit, add story, and release it as a non-prototype.

On a more somber note, it's unfortunate that Boko experienced the personal tragedy @Lusy is best girl mentioned (and which he also talked about it in his Ci-en post and a bit on Twitter/X). The burden of making various arrangements in the aftermath of a loss like this is huge... so it's no wonder that this update was a couple of months later than he expected. Well, most fans didn't even notice the delay much (and told him he should take as much time as he needs). As a bigger fan of GBH than UFG, I've been waiting a while for GBH3 and definitely have the resolve to wait more, as long as it takes, for Boko to realize this vision.

 

[Lusy is best girl]

It looks like Boko's doing well, but he's taking a little break from GBH and making some animations for Sherri as a change of pace and to help with his motivation. It's a good attitude to have.

Bunnygirls

I think the issue with the fight with the Bunny girls is a little fundamental (I think that's the word I want to use), and simply adding animations won't quite fix the inherent issues the fight has. I think the issue is the fact Boko is trying to make this fight balanced. It shouldn't be. I don't know about anyone else, but I don't want to fight 5 sexy bunny girls because I want to deal with 5 health bars in one fight. I want to fight 5 sexy bunny girls because I want to get mobbed, overwhelmed, and dominated by them. It shouldn't be fair. That's what made me like the fight with the maids in CP1. I didn't stand a chance even though they weren't even fighting seriously. The only thing I'm saddened by is the fact they didn't have their way with me afterwards.

I think when the time comes to truly add them to the game, then the fight should basically be an improved version of the fight with the maids in CP1. The girls could easily beat Alf if they wanted to, but they're barely trying. It's a good idea to have some of them waste their turns just standing around, maybe giggling as they watch what the other girls are doing to Alf before tagging in and out. We'd have to pay attention to which girls are currently active, because some girls work together really well and they'll whip out some very dangerous moves.
If we manage to deal enough damage to them or survive long enough, then they'll decide to finally get serious, and we're pretty much fucked at that point. Maybe if we make it that far then we'll get a special reward for doing so well... A man can dream.

Maybe there could be a way to beat them or run away from them to avoid losing, but I just want to get dominated by bunny girls, damn it!

 

[Someone92]

Indeed. A 1 vs 5 fight should be stacked against the hero.