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Version 1.03 is available on the front page.

Because of time constraints, I will no longer update this topic. Those who are interested in Zenith can follow the thread at gamefaqs and/or visit the project's site.

Thank you all for your continued support!

v1.02 is now available on the 1st page. Changes are:

Fixed a door exit at Hallowed Hope, Sanctum.

Fixed cutscene problems at Limestone Quarry and Great Cathedral.

Lich, Lich Lord and Death enemies are less powerful.

2-Handed Break Arts have been rebalanced.

Break Arts kill requirements have been reduced.

On 18/01/2021 at 12:46 AM, blackcat777 said:

Oh my god, so I'm so excited to start this!!

Is there anything you specifically want feedback from while I play it? Thank you for your years of hard work.

Hello, sorry for the late reply. If you're playing the mod, do tell me what you think of the difficulty, especially in later areas. With the roulette removed, the gap between Ashley's stats and the enemies becomes quite considerable as you progress. In the next update I will nerf Guildenstern's 2nd form, as it's just too powerful for a base stats playthrough.

Also, if you experience any problems with cutscenes, tell me where it happened and what emulator you are using. Thanks!

On 10/02/2021 at 10:04 AM, vsisgood said:

in the previous version i thought that the rozencrantz fight was too difficult as he would constantly heal and you couldnt analyze him

but this time around i beat him on my first try and he didnt heal once, i dont know if that is due to him not being able to heal or i just got lucky

I would say that the healing of rozencrantz in the last patch was too much but if he cant heal in this one then that is good.

 

I guess you just got lucky, because he is still able to heal himself.

Since you reached Rosencrantz, I assume you got through Snowfly Forest - did you have any issues with the Grissom boss fight? Some people have reported problems with the cutscenes there.

On 10/02/2021 at 10:04 AM, vsisgood said:

Also duane and grissom it said that the hit% on analyze for them was 0% which wasnt true as i could analyse them so that is a bug i suppose.

Interesting. I will look into that.

On 10/02/2021 at 10:04 AM, vsisgood said:

Could i ask if the combination tables have been reverted back to the original ones? i tried to combine a spear and a glaive but i didnt get a scorpion, just a spear.

Yes, I reverted the combination tables. In the case of Spear + Glaive = Scorpion, I might put that back into the next version, along with Wizard Staff + Clergy Rod = Summoner Baton.

On 10/02/2021 at 10:04 AM, vsisgood said:

Would you be able to post a change log detailing all the changes you have made to the base game? i understand that you want to leave it as a mystery but it would be nice to know where to find the new stuff, and know how everything has changed, it would be up to the user to not spoil themselves and i wouldn't want to miss any of your changes!

Sure. I'm still writing the changelog but it will be available soon.

On 10/02/2021 at 10:04 AM, vsisgood said:

also do you have any plans to introduce more dyeing effects to enemies other than killing the legs or wings for 50% movement?

Not right now, but it is a possibility in the future. This is a common request so I will try to implement something.

Thanks for playing!

v1.01 is live. This one should be bug-free.

4 hours ago, DarrenGordom said:

Is the Dark Crusader able to use Herakles too?

Not that one, no.

On the topic of Prostasia, if a Crusader is equipped with an accessory, casting Prostasia will boost the accessory's stats. In that case it might reduce the damage dealt to him. IIRC the Last Crusader boss at Temple of Kiltia is an example of this.

The next patch - v1.01 - will fix the Grissom bug and the enemy Encyclopaedia, which is broken atm. v1.02 will focus on bosses rebalancing.

Edit: Now that I think about it, if we put armor on his armor he can protect his protection. Which is good.

7 hours ago, DarrenGordom said:

Anyway Idk if this is normal, my damage against the Abdomen of the Dark Crusader was 26, he used Prostasia on him, and my Damage was still 26. Prostasia should upgrade all the equipment, that mean's that the Dark Crusader is "naked"? Shouldn't my attack be reduced?

Yes, he has no armor equipped. It makes sense, if you think about it. Like the Dullahan, he's an animated suit of armor, so wearing armor on his armor... well.

Unless you do like Xzibit and go "Yo dawg, we put an armor in your armor...", etcetera.

42 minutes ago, DarrenGordom said:

So I think that the magical attacks are almost perfect. Phisycal attacks need a huge upgrade, and yes, cooldown too. Anyway when i beat Grissom and the Crusader, the game stopped working, blackscreen (as soon as the cutscene started). But it could be an isolated case, so i will try to beat Grissom again and let u know.

 

I've had several reports of that same bug -- it's probably being caused by Grissom's character model. I gave him a different weapon, a Summoner Baton, instead of his original Wizard Staff. Even though it runs fine on my end, at least 3 other people had the game freeze in this boss fight, sometimes before the cutscene, sometimes after it. I'll put a patch out as soon as I can.

If it's not too much to ask, can you keep a save file of your game in this area? In the "Forest River" savepoint, before the boss fight. That way you could perhaps test it again when the patch is available.

Thanks for the feedback, I'll be sure to tweak the bosses in the coming updates. Seems that the issues are mainly the high cooldown and weak offense (physical especially). Glad you didn't experience any bugs or crashes.

So you got through Snowfly Forest without problems?

1 hour ago, DarrenGordom said:

I think I'm not gonna use any other elixirs, but if u think it's good i will restart the game without using it at all.

No need, just play it however you prefer.

1 hour ago, DarrenGordom said:

So I reached the first Dragon, i beat him pretty easily, but he almost killed me with his first magic attack, which is fine, cause if u go under his neck, he's not gonna use it anymore.

I see. The Dragon breath was already powerful in the original and now with a low-stats Ashley it must be near-fatal, even with a shield. For the record, are you increasing your stats with Elixirs or are you keeping your base stats of 100 STR/100 INT/100 AGL? Just so I know.

1 hour ago, DarrenGordom said:

In my opinion the cooldown attack for most of the enemies is too high compared to Ashley, it makes sense if it's a zombie, cause they're usually slow, but a Lizardman should be pretty quick. I can do several actions (plus combos) before being attacked too.

Yes, I agree. The cooldown is something that can be easily reduced, although some enemies will always be slower than others. This will definitely be tweaked in the following updates.

1 hour ago, DarrenGordom said:

P.s. I really like that Attack spells and break arts are now useful, plus the removal of the cloud when an enemy attacks. 

Glad to hear it.

Thanks for the feedback, this is the kind of stuff that will be useful for me later on.

From the OP: "The difficulty rebalance will be done in later versions, after players provide feedback on how hard or easy is v1.00, and once I have a definite idea of how I'm going to tackle this aspect."

Right now, I'm interested in how the removal of the bonus roulette will affect the difficulty, as well as the new mechanic of "if your HP reaches 0, you die" instead of healing yourself back to life with Defense chains.

If the early game is still easy, that will be adjusted later. Do tell me how hard or easy the rest of the game feels, because that info will be taken into account when I begin the difficulty rebalance.

29 minutes ago, DarrenGordom said:

It's better to not add the italian translation mod right?

I don't think it would break anything, TBH. I've had reports of the Russian translation being compatible with the now defunct Rebalance mod. So it's worth a try.

Zenith v1.00 will be released in the next few days.

If someone would like to help by playtesting it, drop me a message and I'll provide the link.

Edit: version 1.00 is ready. Check the opening post for the download link.

@hitakoh@gmail.com To be clear, the version you're playing is the old Rebalance Mod, not Zenith. Zenith can't be found online yet.

As you've noticed, some of the boss fights are all but broken. That's one of the reasons I removed the download link.

Rebalance was merely my first attempt at hacking the game and I don't recommend playing it. When Zenith is ready later this year I'll make it available in this topic.

On 30/01/2020 at 2:09 PM, praetarius5018 said:

would you mind saying what the issue was or what you changed to get it working?

I'm not sure. The clean rom was working fine, but everytime I patched it with the tech demo - or the retranslation - it broke and wouldn't run.

Then I found a pre-patched retranslation rom (v1.2b) and applied the tech demo on it. Then it worked fine.

I'm trying to play your tech demo, but the patched rom doesn't boot. I'm using Breath of Fire II (U).smc

Edit: Nevermind, got it. Timed hits and item priority are working.

New site: https://vszenith.wordpress.com/

Yeah, the Minotaur is too powerful in the current version. Bosses in general. The next update will fix that problem.

Also, the changes made to blade combinations will be unmade. Like this one:

On 12/03/2019 at 5:55 AM, Jazz-Man said:

Not sure if this is due to the mod, but I currently cannot combine two Mjolnirs to form a Griever, oddly enough. 

Might as well post the last video update:

Release date: probably early next year.

From the discussion thread at GameFaqs:

"So I've decided not to release the next build just yet. It will be a long while until it becomes a coherent whole, and I don't want to hand over some patchwork mess to you guys. Moreover, there are some glaring issues with balance and difficulty that I need to address -- boss fights, especially. Damage multipliers, stats, everything really. Even drop rates; because I increased them, they interrupt the gameplay too much. The mod needs a top to bottom revision.

My suggestion is to forget about this project for the time being. I will leave its current version (0.92) available on ngplus.net, although it's very dated and not representative of future releases. This topic can stay open (if anyone cares to bump it), but I don't really plan to provide updates on what I'm doing. So there will be some radio silence from me in the coming months.

I realize I'm going back on my word, but it's all for the best. The longer the wait, the better the final product will be. In the meanwhile, go check the awesome NES mods at romhacking.net. Like Rogue Dawn and Dragoon X Omega II. Great stuff.

I'll catch you guys later, then."

So this is goodbye for now. Thanks to all who supported the project. I will return with Zenith when it's done, and hopefully it will be worthy of its name. See you all later.

This sounds very cool. It could get more people to play snes mods, especially outsiders who don't really know about romhacking, patching, headers and the like. Personally I'm not involved in snes hacking, but it's a sleek idea nonetheless.

6 hours ago, Jazz-Man said:

Not sure if this is due to the mod, but I currently cannot combine two Mjolnirs to form a Griever, oddly enough. 

Yes, that's intentional. I changed a few of the combinations, sometimes to enable upgrades, sometimes to disable them. In this case, you'll have to acquire a Griever from an enemy in the field. Barring that, you can also use lateral combinations with other weapon categories to somehow produce a Griever. I did the same thing with the Double Blade; you can no longer forge it with the Balbriggan + Sabre Halberd combination. The reason for these changes was the new power level of those weapons -- considering how early (and easily) you could make them, they obsoleted other weapons before they really should, and threw a wrench in the balance of things.

OTOH, I enabled some early upgrades that weren't possible in the original. Examples:

Wizard Staff + Clergy Rod = Summoner Baton (previously Wizard Staff)

Spear + Glaive = Scorpion (previously Spear)

Etc. The next update will include similar changes, such as Guisarme + Large Crescent = Sabre Halberd (previously Guisarme). Even so, I don't intend to rework too much of the combinations; just make things more fun and balanced overall.

17 hours ago, blackcat777 said:

I'm happy to playtest whenever you need someone to playtest something.

Good to hear. There will be a workbuild prior to release, I'll send it your way when the time comes.

Thanks to all you guys for the testing and continued support.

A little progress update, and my plans for the mod in the near future:

Yesterday I finished rebalancing Guildenstern, so all 1st play content is done. For the New Game+ areas, I had already rebalanced the normal enemies, which means there's only the bosses of Forgotten Pathway, Snowfly Forest East and IMB2 left to do. That brings me to the point I want to address: while the Rebalance mod is nearly complete, its sucessor, Zenith, is still at its infancy. So my intention is, when I finish Rebalance, I'll release Zenith instead.

I'll explain. The main fact is the newborn Zenith is already head and shoulders above the latest version of Rebalance. TBH, it makes the latter look a bit ridiculous.

What are the differences between the two? The focus of Zenith is on world building, namely the addition of enemies and encounters to all areas, and transforming them over time. Like the old saying goes, you never step in the same river twice. All this I had mentioned already in the original thread at gamefaqs. What I hadn't mentioned is that the mod also includes a new rebalance of spells, two-handed weapons and Break Arts, the removal of the enemies' "thought bubble", and a number of miscellaneous changes I can't possibly list here. It also does away with the noobishness that's still found in Rebalance. Like having Last Crusaders all over the place, or bosses with super-immunities -- typical bad design by someone who was besottted with what he could do, not minding if he should.

In short, one of the reasons for moving onto Zenith is the improvement in design quality. But most importantly for me, it's also much more organized internally (in terms of data), which makes a world of difference when modifying it. Valendian's teachings really paid off in this aspect; now I have a much better platform to work with. It's probably the main reason I want to perform this upgrade.

Finally, there is the question of timeframe. You might be wondering, why not finish the new mod before releasing it? The truth is, considering the workload required to give one area the "Zenith treatment", it will take approximately 2 years minimum to get even close to completion. That's assuming I can work on it every day. To be fair I'm surprised myself with how high my standards got, and how far I can run with this idea.

As for the present state of Zenith, I'll discuss it when it's time to release it. Which means Soon™.