All right, here I was, minding my own business, just off on a little walk with my best friend, Carol. Then this talking lion informs me that there's a wizard out to take over the world! Yeah, I admit it sounded suspicious, but are YOU going to argue with a talking lion?
Well, at any rate, this threw me and Carol into a quest to stop this wizard with the funny name. We meet friends and enemies, geniuses and morons, men, women and animals alike, with hopes of stopping this guy. Are we going to win? I have no idea. But I sure hope so.
Jay's Journey may seem simple at first. And it kind-of is. After all, I used only the graphics and sounds that CAME with RPGMaker 2000 (at least so far). But it does have its interesting points:
Switch Crystal: Given to you when you meet your fifth character, this takes you to the switch room where you can swap party members at almost any time. For reasons that may become obvious when you think about it, you can't use it in boats (boats can't navigate the switch room), or in battle (yeah, right, I'm gonna let you pause the battle so you can replace all your dead characters with fully-refreshed ones), or in the switch room (if you could use it there you'd never be able to exit!), or when your team only consists of four (or fewer) members anyway (duh). NOTE: I have recently designed a switch menu that looks like a Final Fantasy switch menu BUT I developed it after I was way too far into Jay's Journey. Then I decided, what the heck? After a lot of work, I transferred my Switch Menu system into J'sJ. Pictures on the screennshot page. In the switch menu, you just highlight a face, hit enter, move to another face, hit enter again, and the characters switch. With this system, you can even manipulate the order of the characters as you see fit!
Puzzle Rooms: Hey, they're more interesting than the basic weapon, armor and item shops that appear in all RPG towns. For a small cost, you get the opportunity to try and solve a puzzle. If you win, you get your money back and so much more. The puzzle rooms involve flipping levers and switches to open gates (or move barrels or bridges or whatever) so you can get to the treasure chest. Levers can be flipped both ways, but switches can only be pulled down. If you give up and can't walk back to the entrance yourself, simply push a button that appears on every lever and switch to teleport to the beginning (even switches that have been pulled have the button on them.) For newer versions, this feature has been replaced: Now, just hit the Escape key on the keyboard and the room (and your location) reset. Some puzzle rooms have added quirks: you may need to take a boat with you, or you may have to split up and have Carol tag-team with you.
Boathouses: Yeah, that's right. No more of this sissy taking over the boats belonging to your adversaries. Now, you have to BUY your vehicles from shops. (Don't worry too much, as there's always a game room nearby.) Sailboats and canoes have the limit of only navigating shallow water, but steamships can travel over any water. Tanks can cross shallow water, cliffs, and land. Hot-air balloons can land anywhere you can walk, even trees. But they can't cross mountains. And airships, well, I hope you don't need an explanation THERE.
Mages: Many different mages can join your party (although not all are referred to as mages.) They each cast magic of ONE element: Ice, Fire, Wind, Earth, Holy or Darkness. If you know a boss weak against a specific element is coming up, make sure you include the character who casts it! Jay, the hero, can also learn sword magic from six books hidden throughout the game (the demo version only has three.) Ice and Fire are opposites, as are Earth and Wind, and Holy and Darkness.
Mini-Game Rooms: NOTE THAT THERE ARE NO MINI-GAME ROOMS ANYWHERE IN THE DEMO! In the game's mini-game rooms, you can play a game that lets you win money and fabulous prizes. You might have to race a team of NPCs. Or, shoot down moving targets with a bow and arrow. Perhaps, you'll have to play whack-a-mole with a bunch of switches. You might even get asked a Jay's Journey Trivia Quiz.
Tagalongs: THE TAGALONG SYSTEM HAS NOT BEEN IMPLEMENTED INTO THE DEMO! but if you look at the screenshot page, you can see some evidence that it does exist. I am the person Drakul credits with having improved the "Caterpillar" system in RM2K, and J'sJ uses the improved system (of course). However, since I was most of the way through the game before implementing it, I only installed it in the towns.
Secret Characters: YOU CANNOT GET FAR ENOUGH INTO THE GAME TO FIND THE SECRET CHARACTERS IN THE DEMO! There are two optional characters in Jay's Journey. I won't tell you where to find them or how. I'll just say this much: You have only one chance to get one, and you'll meet him even if he doesn't join. The other can be met at any time after a certain point, but if he doesn't join you'll never meet him. Why add these characters to your team? One is cool and strong, and has magic spells no one else has. The other may take a little using before he shows his usefulness...