General News - RPG in a Box

Justin Arnold, who created RPG in a Box, reached out and presented this project to us. This "engine" is built as an application made with Godot, which some of you may already know.

My name is Justin Arnold, and I'm a solo developer creating a game engine called RPG in a Box. I've been working on it for approximately 7 years, with the initial release in June of 2015. It's a passion project of mine, which I originally developed in my spare time while working a full-time job as a software developer. Around the end of 2017, I made the decision to leave my job in order to fully devote myself to RPG in a Box. I'm reaching out to RPGWatch to see if there would be any interest in covering RPG in a Box on your site or Steam curator page.

I feel that RPG in a Box is at a point in its development where it's ready for a wider audience, so I've been working towards reaching more people and building a larger community. It's awesome getting to see people express themselves creatively through RPG in a Box by using it to turn their ideas into games and experiences. I'd also like to get more feedback that I can use to shape the engine going forward and, most importantly, to help people easily bring their game ideas to life. If you're interested in covering RPG in a Box, I would love to discuss it further and answer any questions you may have.

You can find my press kit for RPG in a Box here: https://www.rpginabox.com/press

In addition to a brief overview and history of the game engine, I've included some videos and images to provide a look at both the editor interface and the games that can be created with it. The videos include an Early Access launch trailer, a playthrough of the built-in example game, and some short clips that demonstrate various gameplay mechanics. There's even a couple of community-made videos: a gameplay teaser of a sci-fi first-person shooter/crawler being made with RPG in a Box, as well as a quirky world made completely out of food!

In regards to the screenshots, I tried to include a good selection of images showing the various editors (Voxel Editor, Map Editor, etc.), as well as some demo games and examples of the camera options available. These images also include the most recent Community Game Showcase, which is a collection of screenshots submitted by the community of their RPG in a Box projects. The showcase image is quite large, so if you zoom in you can easily see each individual game.

The press kit lists some social media and store links under the factsheet section, and there's a link to my Trello board and Godot showcase interview at the bottom of the page if you're interested in some of the technical aspects of its development. I also included a few testimonials from the community.

More information.

Justin provided us with a Steam and itch.io keys to try the software, I'll copy them below. Just write a post if you grab one of the keys.

If you’d like to get a feel for the software, I’ve generated a Steam key and an itch.io key for you to use. Please feel free to use both!

Steam: XIW3M-V5DGX-3ELZY
itch.io: https://zeromatrix.itch.io/rpginabox…pxmOUJ_gW81n5w

Let me know if you have questions about anything, or if there’s any information or details that would be helpful to have. I look forward to hearing back!

Link to their Discord: discord.rpginabox.com

Umm… it looks like minecraft?

Thanks so much, Red! I really appreciate it. For anyone who's interested in seeing the wide range of styles that can be created with RPG in a Box, here's the community game showcase from January: https://i.imgur.com/f8lHzWx.jpg

If anyone would like to know more about the engine, just let me know! I'm happy to answer any questions you may have.

Looks quite cool.

I think it's also important to point out the following:

Am I allowed to sell the games that I create with RPG in a Box?
Yes! You are free to distribute and sell your games, with no strings attached (i.e. no royalties, licensing, or fees). Although it isn't required, crediting the use of RPG in a Box is always very much appreciated!

Source: https://www.rpginabox.com/faq

Yeah, that does indeed look like something I might enjoy. I wish him much success!

Originally Posted by Kordanor
Looks quite cool.

I think it's also important to point out the following:

Source: https://www.rpginabox.com/faq

That's right. And it is not open-source, I didn't mention those points above but the site is very clear, with an FAQ, documentation and examples. Very well done.

Is RPG in a Box open source?
No, I don't currently have any plans for it to be open source.

Originally Posted by ol_smaug
Thanks so much, Red! I really appreciate it. For anyone who's interested in seeing the wide range of styles that can be created with RPG in a Box, here's the community game showcase from January: https://i.imgur.com/f8lHzWx.jpg

If anyone would like to know more about the engine, just let me know! I'm happy to answer any questions you may have.

Welcome! And thanks for your offer.

It looks like a robust editor like RPG Maker, which is actually a surprising robust editor, unfortunately for me, I'm not a fan of the default graphics of either. I know that some developers have made pretty good looking games with RPG Maker, and have also made pretty good rpg systems, but that takes a good deal of extra work and creating a game even with the base program is something like 20 hours of work for 1 hour of gameplay.

Originally Posted by forgottenlor
creating a game even with the base program is something like 20 hours of work for 1 hour of gameplay.

I hope you are aware that 20:1 already is an unbelievable low ratio when creating games.

It would indeed mean being able to create a 90 hour game in a normal working year, including being able to take vacations

Originally Posted by Morrandir
I hope you are aware that 20:1 already is an unbelievable low ratio when creating games.

It is indeed, but with RPGmaker you are not creating everything from scratch. At the beginning it took me much longer, as I searched for scripts, graphics, et. and learned how to use the program. I also scrapped what I did initially, because playtesting showed that it wasn't fun. RPGMaker however has so much included, including monster templates, a portrait creator, a default map, some default skills, et. Also their website has a ton of useful tutorials. I imagine creating a game completely from scratch with custom graphics, sound, et. would take forever. I did ended up finishing two games, one clocked in at 2 hours, which I made for my daughter and exported to Steam about 7 years ago, and another one which I had on the RPG Maker forums, up until about a year ago when I had to clear out my Dropbox that was about 3 1/2 hours.

Originally Posted by Carnifex
Yeah, that does indeed look like something I might enjoy. I wish him much success!

Thank you so much!