VN Ren'Py Onhold The Spice Pirate [Prologue: Remastered] [Tak Mycket]

[DevinHesi]

06/05/2024 - Break Dev-Log #3
So the first playtesting build is out, and I want to say a massive thank you to those who have played it and given me feedback. If you want to join the playtesting team, or you're on the playtesting team and you haven't had the chance to play it yet, then it's not too late to give feedback (and join the playtesting team if you haven't already).

Armed with this new feedback, I've improved the UI (see below). Also made quite a few quality of life improvements and a few bug fixes as well.

In regards to the story, I received rather positive feedback on the overall story. However, the whole intro plot can be improved. I don't think it's bad or anything, it's just not great, meaning I want to improve it. There are really 3 ways I can do this:
Expand the intro (which is currently ~5 minutes long) to add more depth to it
Simplify the intro to focus on one thing, as at the moment, the players are introduced to 3 different major plot points in rapid succession
Or do a mix of both

I'm still thinking my way through this, and haven't yet made my decision on which direction I should take. I don't want to make any rash decisions so I'm going to do some more thinking and carefully weigh the pros and cons of each approach.

Anyway - that's a wrap up and I'll keep everyone updated.
New Main Menu:



New Game Menu:

 

[DevinHesi]

12/05/2024 - Break Dev-Log #4
Firstly, happy mother's day to all the amazing mothers out there.

Secondly - for the past week I have been working on improving the version I released to playtesters just under a week ago, and I am finally ready to move on.
I've been doing a bunch of re-writing and playtesting myself. The UI now looks cleaner as well and the dialogue flows much better. I have also lowered the stakes of a few of the early choices and expanded a few scenes.

I am now going to start on developing the next part of the story...

 

[DevinHesi]

18/05/2024 - Break Dev-Log #5
Past 6 days I have been quite busy with other commitments, but that hasn't meant I didn't get any progress done. I actually made quite a few changes to the overall plot, and here it is:

• I planned for MC to have a wife who died before the plot starts... but I scrapped that whole concept. The reason for this is that it's very hard to make people care about prior lovers which causes a disconnect between the player and MC's thoughts (which I don't want). On top of this, the plot could function without the dead wife so she no longer is part of the plot. So I removed all that.
• Playtesters would know the first scene, the MC wakes up with Mary in his bed. This is no longer the case... you still see the scene, it's just not the first scene anymore. This is because Mary's whole personality in the first version was a woman who had fallen for MC. Of course, there's much more depth to her than that, but I failed to show that in the first version. Thus, the opening scene is shown from Mary's perspective and it gives the reader an insight into who Mary is.
• Changed a few plot points to make sense. In the first version, Zelene was actually unaware of the arrangement until the very last moment. Now she's aware of it at the start of the story, as this makes more sense plot wise and made the character interactions more realistic as well... Just meant I had to change quite a few dialogue lines.
• Before, I had all the choices as booleans (True or False). Now they have 3 different modes - 0, 1 and 2. Practically, 0 means the choice hasn't happened, 1 means False and 2 means True. This change is for the journal that I plan on implementing.

Apart from that, I've also been working on the next part of the story... Should hopefully get another version out for playtesters soon... I also have 16 days left of my break - and after that ends I'll be making progress much faster.

 

[DevinHesi]

20/05/2024 - Preview Render...

 

[Krytax123]

20/05/2024 - Preview Render...

View attachment 3654417

Is that the princess? If so damn, the model looks way better now!

 

[DevinHesi]

Is that the princess? If so damn, the model looks way better now!

From what you understand, that's right, she really is beautiful now.

 

[Krytax123]

From what you understand, that's right, she really is beautiful now.

I love it, it was one of the bigger problems for me .. such an important character having such a weird face now shes beautiful!

 

[TakMycket]

Is that the princess? If so damn, the model looks way better now!

I can confirm that this is Zelene, who was the Princess in the old version. I'm glad you like the new model

However, as part of the re-work, the plot is also changing, and Zelene will no longer be a princess, and instead she'll be a high-ranking noble (a Governor's daughter to be exact).

There will still be a Princess LI you can romance - it just won't be Zelene.

 

[Krytax123]

I can confirm that this is Zelene, who was the Princess in the old version. I'm glad you like the new model

However, as part of the re-work, the plot is also changing, and Zelene will no longer be a princess, and instead she'll be a high-ranking noble (a Governor's daughter to be exact).

There will still be a Princess LI you can romance - it just won't be Zelene.

Yeah i dont mind her title, it was more about her importance for the story/the mc and their relation. I enjoy LI's like that and would have gone for her despite thinking the former model was rather ugly (sorry).

So this is just a very welcome surprise for me!

 

[DevinHesi]

22/05/2024 - Break Dev-Log #6

I finally discovered the lint feature in Ren'Py, meaning I can now give everyone an accurate overview of the amount of progress I've done. So the current numbers are:
305 renders
6,157 words of dialogue (that's dialogue only, no code is included in that count).
10 choices
0 animations

Note: there are new choices, it's just I deleted a few of the old ones due to change in script which is why the amount of choices stayed at 10.

I also got a moment of inspiration and wrote the new overview (and all the planned tags) which I'll post below after this dev-log.

For Playtesters
In terms of the immediate future, there are still quite a bit I want to do before I release the next version for you guys, so expect a new version in around a week's time.

Upcoming Release
I plan to have around 50k words for my first release (so I'm 12% of the way there). For comparison, an average novel has anywhere between 70k-120k words. It's taken me around a month of development to get to this point... BUT, I have hardly been working on TSP as I'm still on break, so late July is probably when people can expect the new version of TSP (which will contain a lot of content).

New Overview
The old King of Adristan is on his deathbed and the Princess is set to soon ascend the throne. However, lacking a husband and powerful allies, most consider the Princess unfit to rule and a succession war is looming on the horizon...

One individual who’s interested in the throne just happens to be your former captain, who is also the enigmatic Spice Pirate. After completing a seemingly innocent job, you become The Spice Pirate’s right hand man once again, thrusting you into the middle of an elaborate power play for the throne...

The Spice Pirate is a plot-centric AVN set in the early 18th century with minor fantasy elements. It’s a non-harem, slow burn AVN with a heavy focus on the development of romantic relationships. It also offers a tonne of replayability, with both your relationships and the overall plot being heavily influenced by your choices.

Note: The following tags are taken from the list of future planned tags on F95.

General Tags:
3D-Daz, Visual Novel, Adventure, Branching Routes, Drama, Fantasy, Male Protagonist, Medieval, Multiple Endings, Mythology, Romance, Slow Burn

Featured Kinks Tags:
Cheating, Impregnation, Interracial, Marriage, Male Domination, Netori, Pregnancy, Protagonist-Centric, Protagonist-Dom, Teasing, Vaginal Sex, Wholesome

Other Kinks Tags (kinks that will only happen a few times):
Anal Sex, Defloration, Exhibitionism

Character Tags:
Dark Skinned, Freckles, Hair-Blonde, Hair-Dark, Hair-Red, Hair-White, Maid, Royalty, Small Tits, Tsundere, Virgin

Notes:
All sexual acts depicted in TSP will include the protagonist and one other female character. This means no threesomes, lesbian, netorare, swinging, group sex, multiple penetration or anything of that sort. There will also be no incest, rape, sexual harassment or anything of that sort, as all sex depicted in TSP will be entirely consensual.

If you have any other questions regarding the content of TSP, don't hesitate to ask...

Also forgot the preview image...

 

[DevinHesi]

26/05/2024 - Break Dev-Log #7
Ever since last dev-log, progress has been slow, but there has been a very good reason for it. I had a bunch of deadlines this weekend and now I'm sitting here, relieved because now that's all over.

It's getting closer and closer to my return date to "proper development" (aka, working my ass off on TSP no matter what), which is the 3rd of June (and yes, there's a reason for that).

As for when playtesters can expect the next version to playtest, a long time. This is because I have decided to start the plot a whole week before I originally planned it to start in order to give more depth to a bunch of characters we meet in Rochdale. Hence, I'm currently working on quite a few new scenes to be inserted at the start of the story.
Normally, I would just release a version every two weeks for playtesters, but unfortunately, if I were to do that, there would be a massive jump between scenes which would feel a bit weird so playtesters will have to wait until I finish all these new scenes, which may take a while because it includes 2/3 lewd scenes (I'm still undecided if I'm going to have 1 or 2 Mary lewd scenes), and like always, quite a bit of branching. You'll only be able to get a max of 2 of these scenes in one playthrough, but word of caution... you may burn a few bridges if you do get both lewd scenes

Wholesome preview image...

 

[DevinHesi]

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31/05/2024 - Break Dev-Log #8

Currently, the numbers are looking like:

448 renders
10,931 words of dialogue
20 choices
0 animations

Getting back to work on TSP:
My break was scheduled to end on the 3rd of June, I'm going to move it forward so I start the grind tomorrow instead. In terms of daily goals, I want ~1k words done each day, so my goal for each week will be 7k minimum words done.
For those of you unfamiliar with my process (aka everyone), practically, what I do is have a outline for the overall plot, and an outline for each scene which has the beginning, middle, end and a few important points for each scene. I then write the script and create renders at the same time, based of the outline. So whilst writing these 1k words, I'll also be rendering daily.
This means some days it might be a real stretch to get over 1k, such as days when I'm working on an animation, lewd or combat scene, while other days that target should be a piece of cake.

I'll be releasing weekly dev-logs every Friday evening to inform everyone of my progress.

Animations:
Speaking of animations, I was debating whether or not to include them, and I've decided I will. The reason for this is based of my own experience, the lewd scenes do tend to be better when animated.

Next Release:
Still up in the air at the moment. I'm undecided how big I want the release to be at the moment... but the max number of words I'm thinking off is 50k. So the next release should be finished by the end of July or very early August at the latest.

Playtesters:
I'm actually thinking of releasing the next playtesting version quite soon, because I want feedback. So playtesters, you can expect to hear from me quite soon...

 

[DevinHesi]

09/06/2024 - Weekly Dev Log #1
I know in my last message I said I would release weekly dev-logs on Friday evenings... but I changed my mind. I will be releasing them Sunday evenings instead.

Progress:
202 renders
5,282 words
6 choices
0 animations

Yes, there is a perfectly good reason why progress went backwards.

Death of Mary + Candace:
I had planned for MC to start of in a relationship with a LI named Mary. Over the past month or so, I was working on scenes involving Mary... however, during playtesting her character was middling at best as well as part of an unpopular trope in AVNs. Thus, since I'm aiming for a quality AVN, I decided to scrap Mary, meaning the majority of scenes were scrapped as well.

Candace was another LI, who would provide an alternative early path to those who absolutely despised Mary. However, since Mary got scrapped, there was really no good reason to introduce Candace early, so all her current scenes got scrapped as well.

In the end, I ended up deleting ~350 renders, ~13k words and 14 choices, which is a lot — which explains why progress went backwards.

Other LIs:
Despite being unhappy with Mary's character, I'm extremely happy with Zelene (the Governor's daughter) and Lorelei (the princess LI). Both their paths are starting to form quite nicely, and I cannot wait for you guys to experience them.

Playtesters:
I know I said I would release a version soon... but deleting all those scenes threw a spanner into my plans. I will be releasing a playtesting version for you guys either tomorrow or the day after. I'm currently waiting for the renders to finish rendering, and then I'll do a bunch of personal playtesting before releasing it to you guys.

Next Week:
My goal remains to do 1k words a day. What I've found so far is if I'm purely writing and posing a scene, it's a very reasonable goal, however, when designing a new environment or playtesting, it does take quite a bit of work. But I remain committed!

Lorelei (Princess LI) plotting with King Lovell
Side Note: I am aware this render is a little pixelated... going to give it more time in the oven, but it's one of the few renders I have fully rendered for Lorelei at the moment.



MC and Zelene are getting to know each other while on their voyage

 

[| Vee |]

Blud you're being way too much impulsive and it's going to sting your health. In this whole span VN have gone throw many changes both major and minor. I liked the concept of the VN but you're changing many things over and over. I would suggest to take a break of a day or two than go back on story board, make a rough sketch of overall story and actually stick to it bcz as you now are moving it's exhausting for us to hear that this changed and a few days later that changes too so, I can imagine how exhausting it would be for you. You'll burn yourself. Take a break of day or two than stick to ONE of the story lines that you think is good.

Keep Growing!
Stay Healthy!

GOLDLUCK! TakMycket

 

[TakMycket]

Blud you're being way too much impulsive and it's going to sting your health. In this whole span VN have gone throw many changes both major and minor. I liked the concept of the VN but you're changing many things over and over. I would suggest to take a break of a day or two than go back on story board, make a rough sketch of overall story and actually stick to it bcz as you now are moving it's exhausting for us to hear that this changed and a few days later that changes too so, I can imagine how exhausting it would be for you. You'll burn yourself. Take a break of day or two than stick to ONE of the story lines that you think is good.

Keep Growing!
Stay Healthy!

GOLDLUCK! TakMycket

I hear what you're saying. I share many of your frustrations... I kept thinking to myself, why can't I stick to an idea? Why do I have to rework this aspect? I understand why you feel this way, because I've had the same internal debate with myself many times previously.

So what I ended up doing, was taking a two month break. It wasn't a full-on sabbatical — as I still worked a bit on TSP. During this time, I asked myself "What do I want in an AVN?". I felt as if in my previous versions, I was attempting to cater towards everyone. I thought I needed that token early sex scene, that token MILF character... I thought I needed a full on man-whore route to satisfy those fans who like a lot of lewds in their AVN.

I've now got a list of characteristics that I want TSP to embody, and if you scroll up, you'll see my discord post about the new overview and all the new kinks featured in the story. The most important part is TSP is going to be a Non-Harem Slow Burn AVN which focuses on Plot and Romance.

After I had determined what I wanted from my AVN, I then came up with this new plot-line (during my break), and I've got endings sorted as well as major plot points mapped out. However, that doesn't mean everything is set in stone.

Another mistake I made with my prior releases is the first time other people played the AVN was when I released it. Now I release a new version to my playtesting team (~10 people), every few weeks or so. The reason for this is I want to know what has worked and what hasn't.

The decision to remove Mary from the game came based of feedback from the playtesters and my own personal thoughts on it as well. Because Mary (or Candace) aren't a vital part of the plot, this means I could easily alter my current plot without changing too much.

I understand that re-works aren't popular among the AVN community, however, my goal is to release a top teir AVN. There are going to be bumps along the road as not everything I produce is of the same quality. This means that sometimes content that I make will get scrapped. I do want to assure you that from now on, the general plot will remain the same, but I'm committed to making slight alterations to it if those changes improve the overall quality of TSP.

I've learned so much over the past 6 months, and I will continue learning for years to come.

Hopefully this explains a few things and helps ease your concerns

 

[DevinHesi]

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16/06/2024 - Weekly Dev-Log #2

Progress:

347 renders
8,552 words
9 choices
0 animations

Only got about half the words done as I would have hoped for... but not all is doom and gloom. Had some fixing up to do after the latest playtesting version.

Playtesting Results:
The feedback was positive overall, but just like usual, there were a few things I needed to fix up.

The first thing that was pointed out was how jacked the MC was. I spent hours fiddling with sliders to create the MC's face... and completely ignored his physique, so the end result was a base model (for the body)... and the base model was quite jacked. A playtester pointed this out and I couldn't get it out of my head, so I ended up redoing the MC's model (changes to the body only) which resulted in ~130 renders needing to be changed. The MC is still fit and handsome... he's just no longer Arnold Schwarzenegger.

The other major critique was there was an apparent stiffness in the characters. Once again, the cause was probably me paying a lot of attention to a character's face and their facial expressions, and not really caring for the rest of the body. I'll admit it's probably still a work in progress, but I've definitely made strides in this area, and the characters are no longer completely stiff throughout the scenes.

But this is why I do the playtesting — so I get feedback and improve on the AVN before I release it to everyone.

Next Playtesting Version:
Will hopefully be out by the end of the week. I'm currently posing an action scene from scratch, which is taking some time as posing is yet another area my skills leave a little to be desired (but I'm getting there). After that, I've got three more scenes to do - one more "getting to know you" scenes between MC and Zelene, an interlude scene and finally, a really, really long lewd scene which is going to be hot (hopefully).

Next Week:
The goal is to get to ~16k words...

Elva Preparing for an Assassination:

 

[Dark Silence]

The first thing that was pointed out was how jacked the MC was. I spent hours fiddling with sliders to create the MC's face... and completely ignored his physique, so the end result was a base model (for the body)... and the base model was quite jacked. A playtester pointed this out and I couldn't get it out of my head, so I ended up redoing the MC's model (changes to the body only) which resulted in ~130 renders needing to be changed. The MC is still fit and handsome... he's just no longer Arnold Schwarzenegger.

The dev really needs to stop listenin to the scrawny nerd boys. Not many jacked MCs in AVNs. We need a few. Not all of us are scrawny guys.

 

[TakMycket]

The dev really needs to stop listenin to the scrawny nerd boys. Not many jacked MCs in AVNs. We need a few. Not all of us are scrawny guys.

Different people have different preferences... I get that. Personally, I couldn't care less about whether or not the MC was jacked or scrawny. I would say calling him scrawny is a bit of a stretch... but I will let you make up your own mind:



There are reasons for this change. Firstly, his clothes fit better, as before, the fit was rather unnatural. Secondly, it suits his character better. The MC has spent most of his life on board a pirate ship, sailing and plundering. It would make sense if he's fit and has some muscle... but having a body builder physique would be a bit of a stretch. Which is ultimately why I changed it.

But hey - I do get why some people will be disappointed with this change. One of my favourite MC's of all time (Rockford from Leaving DNA) is quite jacked.

 

[scaryterry19]

Were there gyms around that time period? Or is the MC logging trees around in his spare time (Commando style)? How the fuck would he be jacked then?

Anyways, TakMycket are you doing away with the opening scene with the older barmaid you can hook up with? The first image in the OP.

 

[TakMycket]

Were there gyms around that time period? Or is the MC logging trees around in his spare time (Commando style)? How the fuck would he be jacked then?

Anyways, TakMycket are you doing away with the opening scene with the older barmaid you can hook up with? The first image in the OP.

To answer your question... there will be no opening lewd scene with the older barmaid.