Hello everyone,
Firstly, here are the results out of 100: https://www.surveymonkey.com/results/SM-P3FHG23J/
I was really surprised at how they turned out, leaning one way for the first half and then balancing out at the end. Most people like the idea of the game but it's a tighter split for whether it should be like a CYOA book or a game. Most people liked the customization for the player character, except it was a pain to do over and over. And you can get the rest from the link above... What surprised me was how often people read Ver002, with only 13 out of the 100 or so reading it only once.
Well, what I learned in the past 2 weeks was very interesting. After Ver002, I've noticed an influx of people checking up on my blog and have been trying my best to cater to them. With the release of Ver002.1, a lot of people were upset, which was both disheartening and startling. This past week has been incredibly stressful because before all that, I was just doing SaSA on the side as a fun\carefree creative writing story. Before, it was a means to relieve stress, but now it seems like the cause of it. It was exhilarating to have so many people become interested in my neat little story, but now the pressure seems to be turned on and I don't know if I like that.
So here's what's been rattling around in my brain... should I get help? I've been offered help before but have turned it down because I didn't want to have to creatively clash with anyone. I know exactly what I want to do with the story and have most of the scenes, twists and turns conceptualized. It just seems like an unnecessary headache at the moment. Should I push this for full time? Juggling a job with this project being such a huge endeavor is not very ideal. Despite loving the concept, I don't know if I can guarantee anything at the end of it all and would hate for people to be burned on an ongoing project, or have it take so long that supporters become restless or resentful.
Those are just thoughts I've been having. Bottom line is, I'm going to continue as planned with a few changes taken from your feedback. I'm also going to check on the blog once a week only to avoid the stress of having an audience and hopefully within the near future, have something resembling more of what I intend for the game to be like and have you all judge it then. Ver002.2 will still be coming out with fixes, a save system and the Kelly-James scene integrated in, as promised. Until next week then.
Saturday, December 19, 2015
Monday, December 14, 2015
In response
I've been taking it easy over this past weekend and have been keeping track of the feedback. Despite having relatively few people chipping in, there appears to be an overwhelming number of people who dislike the new system. 4-5 commenters is no substitute for real statistics so I'm going to post up a survey. I understand a lot of people don't have time to answer in the form of creating an account and commenting so that'll be the best way to get 100 answers on whether or not people really enjoyed the new system.
The reason why I want to put out a survey is because I'm having quite a dilemma with what I want to do with the game and what people want. I understand people like the old system I get it, I enjoyed it too. Based on the comments I've received, this new varying sex style with numbers and trackers keeping track of whether or not you or your partner cums is a detriment to the game, which in all honesty I get; it's different, perhaps intrusive and may take away from the experience. But I believe people are incorrectly comparing this demo with the entirety of the last 500+ page version, which is unfair. In all honesty, the scene in the game is meant to replace the morning sex scene with Kevin-Judy, excluding all the variations (everything leading up to and everything that can happen differently). No one complained about the masturbation scene so... eh?
But why do it this new way?
Well, I already decided that I will not be writing the story/game on a Phase based system; the reason being that since everyone's story branches out so far that it would take me an incredible amount of time to get anywhere with it, (think 2-3 versions of the same thing). I was hoping that this new system would help alleviate those problems by accounting for variations, (think 1 version that changes based on what your actions/stats/whatever are). So, getting rid of the Phase system would require a day by day system, which should be time based, requiring you to do certain things to unlock more and more options for you as the days go along (aka. variation), as opposed to waking up the next day and getting a bunch of new content (which sounds good but requires time to write 2-3 versions of the same thing). What helps with variations? Statistics; how strong you are, how smart you are, how persuasive you are. And story markers; whether or not you've found out a certain thing about a certain person, whether you've done something before, etc.
What does this mean?
You lose instant gratification for a more complex story. Writing it the old way, would require more and more things to be added on as the days goes along. Good for you, bad for me. Writing it like this, all (most) variations are written the first time around, just hidden behind flags and gates. Good for you, good for me. I was hoping that the variations in the sex scene would give you direct control of what you wanted to do. If you were particularly good at any sexual stat, you'll exploit it on your partner and be rewarded accordingly. Also, it would make it so that you would never be reading the same thing two times in a row, although that's apparently what people are getting anyways. I understand it's not extremely good right now but it shows a lot of promise.
Can't it be a hybrid?
Not really. So, the new system spits out options depending on where your character is in the world. If you're home and the time is 8AM, then your family members are home and you can interact with them accordingly. The old system placed you at home and limited your options to that one starting point. Without a time system, there would really be no way to to account for all the crazy things that can happen. Basically, it's content on top of a time system vs. content that leads to more content. Incorporating code in the old story would technically work, but would require an entirely different system than the ones I've done in terms of accounting for what changes what.
What did I have in mind?
I wanted to make a looping system where the day would be hour based and have your limitations based off of where you are and what time it was. Depending on where you are in the world you would have your normal CYOA type options including movement options to encourage exploration. Every time you had positive interaction with a family member/friend/stranger, their affection for you would rise based off of how handsome/beautiful/charismatic/smart you were. And based off of their affections and your own stats, you could try and convince them to have sex with you in various ways, not unlike Ver002. BUT, where Ver002 gave you a number of incorrect and correct options, NO(almost none) options would be inherently correct or incorrect, giving you wildly new outcomes with the same options. Instead of waking up the next day stronger/smarter, you would need to work at it, via Sims style training and be able to keep your increased stats from day to day while everyone else stayed the same. Options would be opened to you gradually as you found out more and more things about the people who live in and outside of your town.
It is definitely different from what most of you have read, but I don't think it's a bad direction to take the game. Everything's still there, it just doesn't account for a time skip like the last story would have had.
Where do I plan to take the game version?
Honestly, I wanted this to be an alternative to a lot of gender-bending, furry and anthropomorphic games out there. Where it is based in reality and gradually winds up being some kind of weird, twisted, time-bending, sci-fi, smut story. Games I had in mind are: Corruption of Champions, Flexible Survival, Robozu and Cursed. They're not perfect games and neither will mine be. But in terms of content, I think mine would set it apart from everything else out there. Suggest me a game if I missed anything.
I suppose since I've been relatively quiet on the matter, it's surprising for many of you that I'm pushing the game version of it and it may be what's upsetting. Honestly, it's the best way I've figured out how to account for variations in the story and is not necessarily a bad thing.
The bottom line:
I'm okay with pressing on with the current planned format, perhaps dialing down on some of the "gameplay" aspects of it and making it more linear? I'm also okay with writing the story as one linear choose-your-own-adventure starting and looping on Phase 4 (the phase where you have godlike powers), because I really don't want to do Phase 1-3 just as an intro. We'll see though. I'll make my decision based on the first 100 surveys answered, so if you want to have a say please take the survey here: https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/N9T3DH6
Edit: Thank you for the comments, it's very heartwarming. As of right now, there are 48 entries on the survey so it will remain open. A small update on what I'm doing is that I updated Twine to the most current version, hoping that it will fix the inability to save. Good news is; it totally did. I was really stressed out about it because I didn't know why it wouldn't work as intended. Bad news is; it broke the (print:) function of the game, calling up an actual printer function instead of displaying your stats in the confirmation of character screen and whenever you pressed the "Stats" button. It's been noticed by the developer of Harlowe so I assume it would only be a matter of time before a new update fixes it. It will hopefully address the problems with the lack of a back button but keep in mind, I'll only allow people to save at certain points, including world exploration, first key scenes and wherever I see fit. The goal of the save function is to have a place to return to if you shut the game off, not to have a foot in the door and repeatedly try to do one thing over and over. I suppose it could always be abused to do just that, but the main thing I want to push is that you (your character) is relieving the day over and over and have to deal with your successes and failures accordingly. There will always be optional content that has 100% chance of success and will be there if you just want a quick romp, (prostitutes, Johns). I will most likely be lenient with it during the beginning unfinished world, letting you save wherever you want, but with time and more content, it will gradually become constrained to world exploration.
The reason why I want to put out a survey is because I'm having quite a dilemma with what I want to do with the game and what people want. I understand people like the old system I get it, I enjoyed it too. Based on the comments I've received, this new varying sex style with numbers and trackers keeping track of whether or not you or your partner cums is a detriment to the game, which in all honesty I get; it's different, perhaps intrusive and may take away from the experience. But I believe people are incorrectly comparing this demo with the entirety of the last 500+ page version, which is unfair. In all honesty, the scene in the game is meant to replace the morning sex scene with Kevin-Judy, excluding all the variations (everything leading up to and everything that can happen differently). No one complained about the masturbation scene so... eh?
But why do it this new way?
Well, I already decided that I will not be writing the story/game on a Phase based system; the reason being that since everyone's story branches out so far that it would take me an incredible amount of time to get anywhere with it, (think 2-3 versions of the same thing). I was hoping that this new system would help alleviate those problems by accounting for variations, (think 1 version that changes based on what your actions/stats/whatever are). So, getting rid of the Phase system would require a day by day system, which should be time based, requiring you to do certain things to unlock more and more options for you as the days go along (aka. variation), as opposed to waking up the next day and getting a bunch of new content (which sounds good but requires time to write 2-3 versions of the same thing). What helps with variations? Statistics; how strong you are, how smart you are, how persuasive you are. And story markers; whether or not you've found out a certain thing about a certain person, whether you've done something before, etc.
What does this mean?
You lose instant gratification for a more complex story. Writing it the old way, would require more and more things to be added on as the days goes along. Good for you, bad for me. Writing it like this, all (most) variations are written the first time around, just hidden behind flags and gates. Good for you, good for me. I was hoping that the variations in the sex scene would give you direct control of what you wanted to do. If you were particularly good at any sexual stat, you'll exploit it on your partner and be rewarded accordingly. Also, it would make it so that you would never be reading the same thing two times in a row, although that's apparently what people are getting anyways. I understand it's not extremely good right now but it shows a lot of promise.
Can't it be a hybrid?
Not really. So, the new system spits out options depending on where your character is in the world. If you're home and the time is 8AM, then your family members are home and you can interact with them accordingly. The old system placed you at home and limited your options to that one starting point. Without a time system, there would really be no way to to account for all the crazy things that can happen. Basically, it's content on top of a time system vs. content that leads to more content. Incorporating code in the old story would technically work, but would require an entirely different system than the ones I've done in terms of accounting for what changes what.
What did I have in mind?
I wanted to make a looping system where the day would be hour based and have your limitations based off of where you are and what time it was. Depending on where you are in the world you would have your normal CYOA type options including movement options to encourage exploration. Every time you had positive interaction with a family member/friend/stranger, their affection for you would rise based off of how handsome/beautiful/charismatic/smart you were. And based off of their affections and your own stats, you could try and convince them to have sex with you in various ways, not unlike Ver002. BUT, where Ver002 gave you a number of incorrect and correct options, NO(almost none) options would be inherently correct or incorrect, giving you wildly new outcomes with the same options. Instead of waking up the next day stronger/smarter, you would need to work at it, via Sims style training and be able to keep your increased stats from day to day while everyone else stayed the same. Options would be opened to you gradually as you found out more and more things about the people who live in and outside of your town.
It is definitely different from what most of you have read, but I don't think it's a bad direction to take the game. Everything's still there, it just doesn't account for a time skip like the last story would have had.
Where do I plan to take the game version?
Honestly, I wanted this to be an alternative to a lot of gender-bending, furry and anthropomorphic games out there. Where it is based in reality and gradually winds up being some kind of weird, twisted, time-bending, sci-fi, smut story. Games I had in mind are: Corruption of Champions, Flexible Survival, Robozu and Cursed. They're not perfect games and neither will mine be. But in terms of content, I think mine would set it apart from everything else out there. Suggest me a game if I missed anything.
I suppose since I've been relatively quiet on the matter, it's surprising for many of you that I'm pushing the game version of it and it may be what's upsetting. Honestly, it's the best way I've figured out how to account for variations in the story and is not necessarily a bad thing.
The bottom line:
I'm okay with pressing on with the current planned format, perhaps dialing down on some of the "gameplay" aspects of it and making it more linear? I'm also okay with writing the story as one linear choose-your-own-adventure starting and looping on Phase 4 (the phase where you have godlike powers), because I really don't want to do Phase 1-3 just as an intro. We'll see though. I'll make my decision based on the first 100 surveys answered, so if you want to have a say please take the survey here: https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/N9T3DH6
Edit: Thank you for the comments, it's very heartwarming. As of right now, there are 48 entries on the survey so it will remain open. A small update on what I'm doing is that I updated Twine to the most current version, hoping that it will fix the inability to save. Good news is; it totally did. I was really stressed out about it because I didn't know why it wouldn't work as intended. Bad news is; it broke the (print:) function of the game, calling up an actual printer function instead of displaying your stats in the confirmation of character screen and whenever you pressed the "Stats" button. It's been noticed by the developer of Harlowe so I assume it would only be a matter of time before a new update fixes it. It will hopefully address the problems with the lack of a back button but keep in mind, I'll only allow people to save at certain points, including world exploration, first key scenes and wherever I see fit. The goal of the save function is to have a place to return to if you shut the game off, not to have a foot in the door and repeatedly try to do one thing over and over. I suppose it could always be abused to do just that, but the main thing I want to push is that you (your character) is relieving the day over and over and have to deal with your successes and failures accordingly. There will always be optional content that has 100% chance of success and will be there if you just want a quick romp, (prostitutes, Johns). I will most likely be lenient with it during the beginning unfinished world, letting you save wherever you want, but with time and more content, it will gradually become constrained to world exploration.
Thursday, December 10, 2015
Hot pocket
Hello folks, get it while it's hot.
Download it at @MediaFire or @Mega.nz. Alternatively, play it here @textadventures. (there is currently an error with textadventures. I'll put it up at a later date.)
Keep in mind, that this is an early test demo and is not polished at all. In fact, the Kelly-James scene is not yet integrated in. There is a female masturbation scene however and some different character customizations which is worth checking out. I'll release another version later that includes it.
I'm actually surprised how many bugs I was able to find while play testing, so I suspect you all will find a lot more. I am unhappy with the current stat tracking system because it's really complicated and confusing for me to program/set up the flags for. I may need to find a better solution for that later or just need to suck it up and do all the hard programming.
So, there's a certain structure I tried to follow when writing this. To create variations, it's basically 1 of 3 paragraphs randomly, followed by another random 1 of 3 then changing emotional states at the very bottom. Not all paragraphs are equal, not all of them are great and there may be some inconsistencies from one to another, I'll admit that. But I think it's varied enough that you won't be bored until the 5th, 6th time around.
Hmm, with this release I'm not really expecting any praises, I'd just like to know what you all think. There's a "game mechanics" button at the bottom of the front page that helps explain some of the systems that are going into the game. I welcome all discussion on what you hope will be in the game, what you think should be added, what's bad about it currently and all other comments, questions or concerns.
In order to keep things civilized, I'll be creating a new page for you all to post bugs, typo's, inconsistencies and whatever else on that page. Please don't post it here or it will be deleted and most likely ignored.
Edit: Haha, yeah, I found a lot more game breaking bugs, most of which I thought I took care of already. Instead of releasing yet another (probably still) broken version, I'm going to hold off until I have the Kelly-James scenes completed before pushing out the next demo version.
Edit 2: Keep in mind this is an early test version of the character creation, customization, masturbation scene and ONE (broken) sex scene between Kevin-Judy. There is LITERALLY nothing else.
Download it at @MediaFire or @Mega.nz. Alternatively, play it here @textadventures. (there is currently an error with textadventures. I'll put it up at a later date.)
Keep in mind, that this is an early test demo and is not polished at all. In fact, the Kelly-James scene is not yet integrated in. There is a female masturbation scene however and some different character customizations which is worth checking out. I'll release another version later that includes it.
I'm actually surprised how many bugs I was able to find while play testing, so I suspect you all will find a lot more. I am unhappy with the current stat tracking system because it's really complicated and confusing for me to program/set up the flags for. I may need to find a better solution for that later or just need to suck it up and do all the hard programming.
So, there's a certain structure I tried to follow when writing this. To create variations, it's basically 1 of 3 paragraphs randomly, followed by another random 1 of 3 then changing emotional states at the very bottom. Not all paragraphs are equal, not all of them are great and there may be some inconsistencies from one to another, I'll admit that. But I think it's varied enough that you won't be bored until the 5th, 6th time around.
Hmm, with this release I'm not really expecting any praises, I'd just like to know what you all think. There's a "game mechanics" button at the bottom of the front page that helps explain some of the systems that are going into the game. I welcome all discussion on what you hope will be in the game, what you think should be added, what's bad about it currently and all other comments, questions or concerns.
In order to keep things civilized, I'll be creating a new page for you all to post bugs, typo's, inconsistencies and whatever else on that page. Please don't post it here or it will be deleted and most likely ignored.
Edit: Haha, yeah, I found a lot more game breaking bugs, most of which I thought I took care of already. Instead of releasing yet another (probably still) broken version, I'm going to hold off until I have the Kelly-James scenes completed before pushing out the next demo version.
Edit 2: Keep in mind this is an early test version of the character creation, customization, masturbation scene and ONE (broken) sex scene between Kevin-Judy. There is LITERALLY nothing else.
Saturday, December 5, 2015
Well, I tried
I was hopefully going to release a demo version of the game today, but got caught up in some stuff this week. It'll probably take me a few days into next week to finish and release a test build with the beginning character customization, a masturbation scene and one sex scene between Kevin-Judy and Kelly-James. It's mostly finished, the hardest thing being making the first part of any one thing/scene/system. But, once I think something is finished, I remember that I have to add trackers into everything. And once I start building the trackers in, I realize that I need different systems to help account for all variations/flags/story, all compounding and taking an annoyingly long amount of time.
What I will be calling Ver002.5 will be a blog exclusive release, because it seriously is just a test build, so keep an eye out for it this upcoming week. I want the first official build to have the city movement system fully fleshed out, and a "lite" complete version of Judy and James' day, which will require a lot more work. Until then.
What I will be calling Ver002.5 will be a blog exclusive release, because it seriously is just a test build, so keep an eye out for it this upcoming week. I want the first official build to have the city movement system fully fleshed out, and a "lite" complete version of Judy and James' day, which will require a lot more work. Until then.
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