Reforestation
IntroductionWelcome, dear apprentice, visitor, and maker, to my latest tutorial on RPG Maker VX/Ace, this time focusing on mapping. Here, I'll discuss how to create forests in your project. I hope you understand what I'm trying to convey. Any doubts about what I'm going to discuss can be clarified by reading the previous tutorial on maps.
Where Do I Begin?
Firstly, let's start with the height and width of the map. I prefer creating a small map to avoid difficulty in filling in details later and it's better for demonstration in this tutorial. After deciding on the size (I chose 45x38), we need to think about how the forest will be. I'll include an entrance to a cave, a river, and a cabin throughout this tutorial.
I'll start with the location of the cave, river, cabin, and the terrain, which will consist of low grass, high grass, and dirt paths at the entrances. It's better to have multiple entrances to avoid simplicity, such as a boss area, a chest, a village...
Regarding the cabin, I left the area with more dirt because it's a place where people walk, like paths made by horses with little grass and water, for fishing or swimming. Now, the river; I only outlined its location for now; I'll also add a supposed entrance to a cave in the empty space, center-top.
Why these gaps in the high grass? To make the player think about which path to choose and to determine where the trees will be placed, because sometimes we have to give options for them to choose whether to lead to a place with nothing, a chest, or an exit.
Walls A4Now comes the part of the small entrance to the cave and the closed forest tile, which are from TileA4 of the exterior.
Notice that I used the closed forest tile over the high grass, then placed the high grass around it and the mountain using shift. Utilizing the shift, I used it with water behind the tree because those edges look strange. Additionally, I made some repairs to the map to ensure the paths are correct and there are no spacing issues.
Time to Copy!
After finishing the use of shift with the high grass, now it's "time to copy!" Let's copy the tiles using the other function of shift, as explained earlier.
First, let's create the other entrance to the cave. Either create a new map or leave space to copy. Make variations to use on top of what has already been used; it can be tiring, but the final result is worth it.
I'll also include a part of dirt and grass by copying, and another thing is to copy the edges of the river with grass to place behind the closed tree tile. To finish the terrain part, I'll use the darker water tile to give the impression of depth in the river.
Details and More Details...Now let's move on to the objects of the map, but before that, I'll mention a few things to avoid:
- Don't place identical objects next to each other, such as stones, holes, flowers, and bushes, depending on the format and purpose of your map, like a garden or a mine where it's not a problem;
- Use objects according to the terrain; you wouldn't use a mushroom, dry bushes, and dead trees on grass terrain;
- I prefer to avoid placing identical colors next to each other, like flowers; for example, I place yellow, red, white, yellow... This is optional.
Since I left a larger space and by preference, I used this larger bridge found in TileA exterior, and remember to use shift to not interfere with the terrain, turning it into grass underneath. Use various positions with trees, wall bushes with high grass terrain, dry branches in places with little high grass, colors of flowers far from each other at the entrance...
At the supposed entrance, we'll use the same methods as mentioned above. Additionally, I added a staircase to a lower part, where there could be a chest, NPCs...
Tent
Place the tent in a location with dirt and grass nearby and add other objects like chopped logs, a bucket with water, a place for a fire that sits on top of the dirt... You'll notice that the top part of the tent is obscured by the objects, but don't worry, just use events to replace them. And use what I mentioned about the entrance before.
General/Events
The details mentioned in the previous sections can be applied to the rest of your map. Now, about the river, use aquatic plants and other objects that are events to add variation to your map, making it rich in details. Don't forget about events; use some tiles that couldn't be placed as events, the rest of the tent, stones with water, chests, smoke above the campfire, and others you want.
Acknowledgments
I would like to thank you for reading this tutorial and sticking with it until the end. Also, thanks to Enterbrain for creating RPG Maker VX/Ace.
