Ren'Py A Tale of One City [v3.7] [Project Blossom]

[Sick&Alone]

i'm going to look into that, thanks

Linux is *FREE*! (CAN't BEAT THAT!)

I recommend Xubuntu. Runs very fast [OMG *LIGHTENING* compared to win 10!] even on slightly older hardware.
PM me if any Q's [I'm not an expert tho

--->>> You can DUAL BOOT Linux + windows.
(BTW ever heard of Android? Google Chrome books? Both run on LINUX!)

 

[SSfamer]

I`m playing 2.2 but can`t find the june

 

[hammerva]

This game just drives you nuts for no reason. i am trying to get to the next level of Kimmy and it tells you to take a nap on late morning or noon on Saturday only. Every time I do I either get no message or messages from family members. Is there a level I am supposed to be at with someone before I can get to this

And the Mrs Miller thing is a pain too. There has to be a specific day or position to get to the next level because can't do it

 

[Alex84]

Mymy It's probably a bug, but I'm at Mrs. Miller's event 14 (look around house, especially bathroom...) I have visited the bathroom in her house, at all times of the day, nothing happens! Even in the early morning, where it shows her to be in the bathroom, there is not interaction, only the options shower/leave.

 

[CRat]

@ Mymy
Feedback thoughts on development.
Trying to improve player experience is a great idea. Applause to your team. And given that this is your first game, extra applause.
1. Sick&Alone is right. Plan, then plan some more, and them maybe plan a bit more. S&A is also right that interesting is good, but complicated isn't always good.
1.1 If you want to add complications make sure there is a good payoff for the players for following the confusing trail of breadcrumbs. The payoff can be an extra sex scene, an extra character, an extra power, etc. But making a game complex, just to make it complex just invites players to play a game that's easier to solve. There was an Avalon Hill game called Squad Leader that presented WWII combat at the individual soldier level up to and including rules for when a machine gun jammed. I was impressed as hell at the work that went into it, but I never wanted to play it.

2. Don't just storyboard, flow the events in a planning tool that will allow you to visualize the dependencies. The only way (as the developers) to ensure that we have to do something because it makes sense for the story is to be hyper aware of what we have to do and why we have to do it. Having a strong understanding of the interactions between the stats achievements, the character achievements, and other dependencies will allow you to reduce the dependencies to just the plot necessary ones.
2.1 As much as possible keep the protagonist character consistent. If he's a creep with 90% of the women, he has to have a fantastic reason that players understand for him to not be a creep with the other 10%. If he's just slowly getting more corrupted, then the early women should be treated better than the later ones. The more consistent the protagonist (and the overall story), the better the immersion in the game.

3. Quality of life (QOL) features for players are a must. Part of grind is not just that we have to go to work for a week, but we have to do all the clicks and watch all the images load every time (similar for a lot of the travel). After a few repeats of working we've seen them all. Having a work all day button is a QOL feature. I can go to work, I can get credit for attending and earn money, and it takes one click for the entire day. (And it's ok if using a work all day button means I miss a special event at work, that becomes a player choice on which quest to focus on.)

4. Bug hunts are a must on reported bugs. If you're not going to hunt a bug that's reported, be sure to post a comment saying that bug will be addressed in the future (or won't be addressed because . . .).

5. Think about the games that you enjoy - adult or otherwise. Think about the games you tried and quit right away. Add more features that helped you put a game in the first set and remove any features that are define the second. If you make a game that you enjoy playing without any cheats, chances are you've made a good game for players.
5.1 A large number of cheats required to succeed in a game or being requested for a game (or finished saves) are a sign that getting through the game is too hard - could be grind, could be difficulty, could be complexity, etc. So as long as those requests pop up frequently from many players, they're a hint that the game may be too hard (must be taken with a grain or two of salt - some folks want zero effort and should probably just go to a porn site instead of a porn game site).

That's it for now. If any of this is helpful and you'd like more comments, suggestions, etc. I'm happy to blather at you here in the flow or via PM.

 

[Mymy]

@ Mymy
Feedback thoughts on development.
Trying to improve player experience is a great idea. Applause to your team. And given that this is your first game, extra applause.
1. Sick&Alone is right. Plan, then plan some more, and them maybe plan a bit more. S&A is also right that interesting is good, but complicated isn't always good.
1.1 If you want to add complications make sure there is a good payoff for the players for following the confusing trail of breadcrumbs. The payoff can be an extra sex scene, an extra character, an extra power, etc. But making a game complex, just to make it complex just invites players to play a game that's easier to solve. There was an Avalon Hill game called Squad Leader that presented WWII combat at the individual soldier level up to and including rules for when a machine gun jammed. I was impressed as hell at the work that went into it, but I never wanted to play it.

2. Don't just storyboard, flow the events in a planning tool that will allow you to visualize the dependencies. The only way (as the developers) to ensure that we have to do something because it makes sense for the story is to be hyper aware of what we have to do and why we have to do it. Having a strong understanding of the interactions between the stats achievements, the character achievements, and other dependencies will allow you to reduce the dependencies to just the plot necessary ones.
2.1 As much as possible keep the protagonist character consistent. If he's a creep with 90% of the women, he has to have a fantastic reason that players understand for him to not be a creep with the other 10%. If he's just slowly getting more corrupted, then the early women should be treated better than the later ones. The more consistent the protagonist (and the overall story), the better the immersion in the game.

3. Quality of life (QOL) features for players are a must. Part of grind is not just that we have to go to work for a week, but we have to do all the clicks and watch all the images load every time (similar for a lot of the travel). After a few repeats of working we've seen them all. Having a work all day button is a QOL feature. I can go to work, I can get credit for attending and earn money, and it takes one click for the entire day. (And it's ok if using a work all day button means I miss a special event at work, that becomes a player choice on which quest to focus on.)

4. Bug hunts are a must on reported bugs. If you're not going to hunt a bug that's reported, be sure to post a comment saying that bug will be addressed in the future (or won't be addressed because . . .).

5. Think about the games that you enjoy - adult or otherwise. Think about the games you tried and quit right away. Add more features that helped you put a game in the first set and remove any features that are define the second. If you make a game that you enjoy playing without any cheats, chances are you've made a good game for players.
5.1 A large number of cheats required to succeed in a game or being requested for a game (or finished saves) are a sign that getting through the game is too hard - could be grind, could be difficulty, could be complexity, etc. So as long as those requests pop up frequently from many players, they're a hint that the game may be too hard (must be taken with a grain or two of salt - some folks want zero effort and should probably just go to a porn site instead of a porn game site).

That's it for now. If any of this is helpful and you'd like more comments, suggestions, etc. I'm happy to blather at you here in the flow or via PM.

Hey! thanks for the great comments!

I'd like to go over the things you mentioned and will reflect them to our future updates.

1. With the planning- yes, you guys are right. We've had some problems with our planning and project management since we started our renewal process. Much works added and too limited time, then we poorly responded to the situation by just speeding up the process.

The complexity on story conditions, stats, all other features in the game had certain schedules to be presented plus payoffs but we failed to deliver them in time. In last March, we came to a conclusion that the battle mode was a failure and had to come up with some changes to the game that would get us more stable with our patreon support. Our initial (and still) goal with it is to secure around $3k that would get us the minimum amount to support the living while making the game. So, we decided to leave the battle for the time being and started working on renewal process. And, as we rushed ourselves in the process, we did miss a lot of details and so on.

With the story condition, we originally planned it to be intertwined to a certain point of a story arc. We thought it'd bring more realistic gameplay but we are currently reviewing the idea as we see much negative experience from many of you.
We might even fix or remove the dependency on early phase of the game but we'll have to think more with extensive planning.

With the stats and some RPG type of development in the game, we planned to give much bonus in battle and events. (both story and random) So, as the users progresses in the game, they get to have much easier time in winning those and better results in the events. And, provided harder opponents from time to time in the story or some specific locations. This part is very much undone so far, and we'd like to hear more from you guys as we are not sure what to make of it yet to be real honest.



2. Story (UI & Consistency)
First the UI and general planning, I've already mentioned in the above that we need to work on some of the dependencies and too much complexity. In addition, we do feel like the game lacks a better way of showing users how these stories are related to each other. We do already have game progress panel in the profile page but it seems like it's just not enough.

And, consistency- with the mysterious event 4-1, users take over the MC in the game, and I intended that from that point on, users get to choose to be either gentle or cruel to the other characters.
So, the MC that users play through prologue to chapter 3 is pretty much a wimp as you've seen and he slowly corrupts after certain series of events related to the mysterious man. Then you take over him and do whatever you want to do with his life.
And, you (users) could be just users who plays the MC or could be MC's alter-ego. This point hasn't been carried well in the story and even if it had I'm not sure if it solely solves the problem with the game. So, we've been working on some early part of the story so far.




3. QOL
This one is much easier to address for now, as we've already done some works that are to be added in the next update. (Feb /public-March) First, we are going to provide a skip day function in bedrooms that MC can sleep. (MC's, guestrooms, and beach house) This will let users skip the day without missing the work with minimum bonus in job accomplishment.
And, as I mentioned in my previous post, we are also going to add skip the day's work in the office (skipping to late afternoon) but it'd take a little more time cuz we're still making the random events sets to be put in the feature.

We are also working on some UI changes and some of those changes could affect QoL but not much to be shared on this regard so far. We'll re-do the character profile pages, and other than aesthetics, we might provide more infos or so on.

Few people asked me if I'm going to add these features to be patreon-only contents, and No, I won't. Regardless of how much of a trouble we are in financially, the basic features in the game should stay that way I believe. And, I don't think that it's a sound idea in terms of boosting the support either. And, I'm still keeping in my mind the promise I made to some of you 2 years ago when we decided to remove the anti-cheat in the game.



4. Bugs
We've been adding the fixes to the bugs for the whole time but haven't really provided you with what's been fixed and what hasn't. This is a big miss and we'll try to make some format to provide some infos on that. But I hope you be more patient with us as we have too many balls to juggle right now. We had a shit-quality with our QA for past years and we aim this April or May that we enhance this part of the process as we'll be done with much chunk of what we are doing right now.



5. Features Planning & Balancing
Well, features planning is still on much discussion within us so I don't have much to give you yet, but we welcome any opinions for surely.

On balancing, we've been putting much thoughts to it for past few months.
We are currently trying to quicken the prologue and first 2 chapters pace.
Other than that, we are trying to make the stat grind funner or less-grinding but we need more plan with it.


More suggestions, opinions, thoughts, all these are welcomed and very much needed. I hope to hear more from you!

 

[Dropdude]

Mymy

I'm sorry, but an uncaught exception occurred.

While loading <renpy.display.im.Scale object at 0x00000000291b7d90>:
  File "game/map.rpy", line 1766, in script call
    ' '
  File "game/map.rpy", line 6790, in script call
    " "
  File "game/map.rpy", line 1663, in script call
    ' '
  File "game/story/coleagues/c1_story.rpy", line 10952, in script
    me "Hey, good morning."
KeyError: <renpy.display.im.Image object (u'\u2026day/1/prologue/4.jpg') at 0x00000000291b7dd0>

-- Full Traceback ------------------------------------------------------------

Full traceback:
  File "game/map.rpy", line 1766, in script call
    ' '
  File "game/map.rpy", line 6790, in script call
    " "
  File "game/map.rpy", line 1663, in script call
    ' '
  File "game/story/coleagues/c1_story.rpy", line 10952, in script
    me "Hey, good morning."
  File "renpy/ast.py", line 921, in execute
    renpy.exports.say(who, what, *args, **kwargs)
  File "renpy/exports.py", line 1373, in say
    who(what, *args, **kwargs)
  File "renpy/character.py", line 1266, in __call__
    self.do_display(who, what, cb_args=self.cb_args, dtt=dtt, **display_args)
  File "renpy/character.py", line 930, in do_display
    **display_args)
  File "renpy/character.py", line 666, in display_say
    rv = renpy.ui.interact(mouse='say', type=type, roll_forward=roll_forward)
  File "renpy/ui.py", line 299, in interact
    rv = renpy.game.interface.interact(roll_forward=roll_forward, **kwargs)
  File "renpy/display/core.py", line 3377, in interact
    repeat, rv = self.interact_core(preloads=preloads, trans_pause=trans_pause, pause=pause, pause_start=pause_start, **kwargs) # type: ignore
  File "renpy/display/core.py", line 3906, in interact_core
    self.draw_screen(root_widget, fullscreen_video, (not fullscreen_video) or video_frame_drawn)
  File "renpy/display/core.py", line 2605, in draw_screen
    renpy.config.screen_height,
  File "render.pyx", line 495, in renpy.display.render.render_screen
  File "render.pyx", line 266, in renpy.display.render.render
  File "renpy/display/layout.py", line 884, in render
    surf = render(child, width, height, cst, cat)
  File "render.pyx", line 170, in renpy.display.render.render
  File "render.pyx", line 266, in renpy.display.render.render
  File "renpy/display/layout.py", line 884, in render
    surf = render(child, width, height, cst, cat)
  File "render.pyx", line 170, in renpy.display.render.render
  File "render.pyx", line 266, in renpy.display.render.render
  File "renpy/display/layout.py", line 884, in render
    surf = render(child, width, height, cst, cat)
  File "render.pyx", line 170, in renpy.display.render.render
  File "render.pyx", line 266, in renpy.display.render.render
  File "renpy/display/screen.py", line 704, in render
    child = renpy.display.render.render(self.child, w, h, st, at)
  File "render.pyx", line 170, in renpy.display.render.render
  File "render.pyx", line 266, in renpy.display.render.render
  File "renpy/display/layout.py", line 884, in render
    surf = render(child, width, height, cst, cat)
  File "render.pyx", line 170, in renpy.display.render.render
  File "render.pyx", line 266, in renpy.display.render.render
  File "renpy/display/layout.py", line 1337, in render
    st, at)
  File "render.pyx", line 170, in renpy.display.render.render
  File "render.pyx", line 266, in renpy.display.render.render
  File "renpy/display/image.py", line 505, in render
    return wrap_render(self.target, width, height, st, at)
  File "renpy/display/image.py", line 308, in wrap_render
    rend = render(child, w, h, st, at)
  File "render.pyx", line 170, in renpy.display.render.render
  File "render.pyx", line 266, in renpy.display.render.render
  File "renpy/display/im.py", line 627, in render
    return cache.get(self, render=True)
  File "renpy/display/im.py", line 295, in get
    surf = image.load()
  File "renpy/display/im.py", line 893, in load
    child = cache.get(self.image)
  File "renpy/display/im.py", line 362, in get
    self.kill(ce)
  File "renpy/display/im.py", line 374, in kill
    del self.cache[ce.what]
KeyError: <renpy.display.im.Image object (u'\u2026day/1/prologue/4.jpg') at 0x00000000291b7dd0>

Windows-10-10.0.19041 AMD64
Ren'Py 7.5.1.22070801
A Tale of One City 2.2
Sun Feb  5 09:41:54 2023

 

[mike11]

game is a good game but like a lot of games, the bugs make it unplayable. i am playing on mac so meeting June is impossible with that bug.

 

[cemozdemir46]

I`m playing 2.2 but can`t find the june

+1

 

[Mymy]

Mymy It's probably a bug, but I'm at Mrs. Miller's event 14 (look around house, especially bathroom...) I have visited the bathroom in her house, at all times of the day, nothing happens! Even in the early morning, where it shows her to be in the bathroom, there is not interaction, only the options shower/leave.

I've sent my message to my friend to look into it as soon as he wakes up. Sorry for the inconvenience.

game is a good game but like a lot of games, the bugs make it unplayable. i am playing on mac so meeting June is impossible with that bug.

We've solved the issue but I believe we don't have a fix for Mac version yet. I contacted my friend to get to it as soon as he wakes up.

 

[Mymy]

+1

Download the 0.1 hotfix in the front page!

 

[tulius1234]

kinda of boring...too much effort to keep the job and to grind stats...

 

[Mymy]

kinda of boring...too much effort to keep the job and to grind stats...

I'm sorry.
There's chance that this game is not your cup of tea even after the renewal is done if you don't like keeping the job and stuff.

 

[Sick&Alone]

I'm sorry.
There's chance that this game is not your cup of tea even after the renewal is done if you don't like keeping the job and stuff.

Everybody really needs to keep in mind:
1) This is still *VERY* early versions [not even *HALF* done yet, right Dev?]
Content---lots of it---will still be added. (just takes time)
2) This is the *1st* Project these guys have done! So give them a break----& some grace.

Part of what we do, is *TEST* stuff out---& figure out what works, what doesn't, what's broken, what can be improved---& HOW.

If it's BORING [& ANYTHING that takes time can get boring!] What would *YOU* do [if you were the Dev] To make it *LESS* boring?
[having done several (OMG! 5?) play-throughs from the start, most of the 1st [70] days R *NOT* boring [Dependencies, bugs/errors, etc all covered in my other posts----& yes those can get very frustrating!]

(Disclaimer: I usually "skip"/FF [hello it's RENPY!] many repetitive scenes/videos---eg, travel/check-in/"work"/etc)

So, perhaps I should ask:
[V 2.2----W updates/fix/etc]
Anybody find it boring who's done *ALL* avail Quests? [every girl who has Hints/Events]

 

[Sick&Alone]

ok was looking at DL clean 2.2 v
but,
why is MEGA 11.7 GB, & GOfile 12.6 GB?

 

[CRat]

@ Mymy

I don't know what development process you're using, but some variant on Agile may help you. (I hope this is all redundant for you, but if not . . .)

It seems that you have most of the game story in mind for how the game should go.
From there, you have a variety of features needed to implement that story.
For each of the features you should have a set of development stories that describe the who, what, etc. of the software needed to implement the feature.
Each of the development stories should be assessed for how much effort is required to add the content to the feature.
Each of the development stories should be assessed for how high a priority it has (typically for the users but sometimes back end fixes get a high priority even though users won't know their experience was improved).

When you go through your development plan that way, you'll have a list of what's important to work on and what might be low hanging fruit (not a high priority, but very easy to complete).

Then you figure out how much time/effort you have available to you (realistically - allowing for day jobs, significant others, and any other demands on your time) to figure out how much of the plan you can accomplish in the next time period (2 weeks, a month, etc.). The shorter the time period you plan against the more likely your planning will be accurate.

Then select your items to complete based on importance and effort. And then stick to the plan.

If you're working in one or two week increments you'll be able to let your patreon supporters know what you're doing and why. Then as you complete things you can post the successes. Some of the work will be visible in the game, some won't (well I suppose having fewer bugs counts as visible ).

This type of approach will also let folks know you're still working on the game even if there isn't a new release. (Agile targets rapid releases, but at more than 10g I doubt anyone wants to download every day).

Hope this is useful.

 

[Wick_master]

Mymy

I'm sorry, but an uncaught exception occurred.

While loading <renpy.display.im.Scale object at 0x00000000291b7d90>:
  File "game/map.rpy", line 1766, in script call
    ' '
  File "game/map.rpy", line 6790, in script call
    " "
  File "game/map.rpy", line 1663, in script call
    ' '
  File "game/story/coleagues/c1_story.rpy", line 10952, in script
    me "Hey, good morning."
KeyError: <renpy.display.im.Image object (u'\u2026day/1/prologue/4.jpg') at 0x00000000291b7dd0>

-- Full Traceback ------------------------------------------------------------

Full traceback:
  File "game/map.rpy", line 1766, in script call
    ' '
  File "game/map.rpy", line 6790, in script call
    " "
  File "game/map.rpy", line 1663, in script call
    ' '
  File "game/story/coleagues/c1_story.rpy", line 10952, in script
    me "Hey, good morning."
  File "renpy/ast.py", line 921, in execute
    renpy.exports.say(who, what, *args, **kwargs)
  File "renpy/exports.py", line 1373, in say
    who(what, *args, **kwargs)
  File "renpy/character.py", line 1266, in __call__
    self.do_display(who, what, cb_args=self.cb_args, dtt=dtt, **display_args)
  File "renpy/character.py", line 930, in do_display
    **display_args)
  File "renpy/character.py", line 666, in display_say
    rv = renpy.ui.interact(mouse='say', type=type, roll_forward=roll_forward)
  File "renpy/ui.py", line 299, in interact
    rv = renpy.game.interface.interact(roll_forward=roll_forward, **kwargs)
  File "renpy/display/core.py", line 3377, in interact
    repeat, rv = self.interact_core(preloads=preloads, trans_pause=trans_pause, pause=pause, pause_start=pause_start, **kwargs) # type: ignore
  File "renpy/display/core.py", line 3906, in interact_core
    self.draw_screen(root_widget, fullscreen_video, (not fullscreen_video) or video_frame_drawn)
  File "renpy/display/core.py", line 2605, in draw_screen
    renpy.config.screen_height,
  File "render.pyx", line 495, in renpy.display.render.render_screen
  File "render.pyx", line 266, in renpy.display.render.render
  File "renpy/display/layout.py", line 884, in render
    surf = render(child, width, height, cst, cat)
  File "render.pyx", line 170, in renpy.display.render.render
  File "render.pyx", line 266, in renpy.display.render.render
  File "renpy/display/layout.py", line 884, in render
    surf = render(child, width, height, cst, cat)
  File "render.pyx", line 170, in renpy.display.render.render
  File "render.pyx", line 266, in renpy.display.render.render
  File "renpy/display/layout.py", line 884, in render
    surf = render(child, width, height, cst, cat)
  File "render.pyx", line 170, in renpy.display.render.render
  File "render.pyx", line 266, in renpy.display.render.render
  File "renpy/display/screen.py", line 704, in render
    child = renpy.display.render.render(self.child, w, h, st, at)
  File "render.pyx", line 170, in renpy.display.render.render
  File "render.pyx", line 266, in renpy.display.render.render
  File "renpy/display/layout.py", line 884, in render
    surf = render(child, width, height, cst, cat)
  File "render.pyx", line 170, in renpy.display.render.render
  File "render.pyx", line 266, in renpy.display.render.render
  File "renpy/display/layout.py", line 1337, in render
    st, at)
  File "render.pyx", line 170, in renpy.display.render.render
  File "render.pyx", line 266, in renpy.display.render.render
  File "renpy/display/image.py", line 505, in render
    return wrap_render(self.target, width, height, st, at)
  File "renpy/display/image.py", line 308, in wrap_render
    rend = render(child, w, h, st, at)
  File "render.pyx", line 170, in renpy.display.render.render
  File "render.pyx", line 266, in renpy.display.render.render
  File "renpy/display/im.py", line 627, in render
    return cache.get(self, render=True)
  File "renpy/display/im.py", line 295, in get
    surf = image.load()
  File "renpy/display/im.py", line 893, in load
    child = cache.get(self.image)
  File "renpy/display/im.py", line 362, in get
    self.kill(ce)
  File "renpy/display/im.py", line 374, in kill
    del self.cache[ce.what]
KeyError: <renpy.display.im.Image object (u'\u2026day/1/prologue/4.jpg') at 0x00000000291b7dd0>

Windows-10-10.0.19041 AMD64
Ren'Py 7.5.1.22070801
A Tale of One City 2.2
Sun Feb  5 09:41:54 2023

I think I need to know more about the bug.
Could you give me your save file?

 

[Wick_master]

game is a good game but like a lot of games, the bugs make it unplayable. i am playing on mac so meeting June is impossible with that bug.

+1

I fixed the mac version Link.
Now you can play the game without any problems.

 

[AlCapwnd]

Stuck on Company part 24. Talk to the receptionist... shes not there from the time work start to closing... where is she?

 

[Wick_master]

Stuck on Company part 24. Talk to the receptionist... shes not there from the time work start to closing... where is she?

Did you apply the hot fix 0.1? We fixed that bug.

Hot Fix 0.1
Win/Linux: MEGA
Description: Same as when you apply update-only files.
Copy and paste the files into your game folder.
(A Tale of One City v2.2/game)