Karakuri-kun: A Japanese Tale

A beautiful story about Japanese cultures and the origins of Japan

A short RPGMaker game that tries to wedge a quiz game about medieval Japan inside a bare-bones old school JRPG. The concept is appealing, but the execution and technical issues are a lot to overcome. The "quiz game" consists of talking to multiple characters who dump pages of text on you, and then getting quizzed by another character on what they all said. Get one question wrong and you start over from the beginning. The "RPG" part mostly consists of random battles against the same 5 monsters while you walk through the handful of outdoor areas in the game. Your starter spell costs no MP and can be spammed infinitely, and it is very easy to pump your defense stat with "Sashimi" (earned from fishing) to the point where you're untouchable by anything (including the main game's bosses). This makes the combat side of things little more than interruptions that drag out the game. Glitches are common, such as NPCs flying around the screen during dialog, and the one other character that briefly joins your party not having any sprites in combat. After finishing the main story, you are given a vague promise of "more secrets to find" without any hints. I did find a hidden post-game boss th…