VN Ren'Py Being a DIK [v0.10.1] [Dr PinkCake]

[Cabin Fever]

I looked this up out of curiosity.

• Episode 1 of Acting Lessons dropped May 2018.
• Ep 2, mid-May.
• Ep 3, mid-June.
• Ep 4, mid-July.
• Ep 5, mid-August.
• Ep 6, mid-September.
• Ep 7, mid-October.
• Ep 8 (final), December 2018.

Eight episodes in eight months. I know; it’s hard to imagine lately!

While Dr. PinkCake was dropping those last episodes, he was simultaneously developing Being a DIK. He completed four episodes—the entirety of Season 1—in 2019. I get why it took him longer to work on Being a DIK: more paths, mini-games, and detail.

He’s since slowed down a lot. Partly because of perfectionism, and partly to milk (and potentially lose) patrons. But that quarterly schedule shows us what he’s truly capable of.

View attachment 3459670

Here we go again with the false math.

Not all episodes are created equal. There are more content in a single episode of season 3 than the ENTIRE season 1. And more than the ENTIRE AL game. So no, he hasn't slowed down.

Look, I'm not a fan of the long wait. I'm on record multiple times on this forum stating that the more recent episodes should be broken down into multiple smaller episodes so that there is a more steady stream of new content. But any suggestion of DPC slow down, or milking, is entirely bs.

 

[weirdscix]

Snippets from a recent Q&A with DPC

After a release/during beta you mention you start planning development on the next episode and events that will be covered in the episode. Is there a flow you follow? Like do you develop the episode in the order of events that will happen chronologically, or do you tackle the larger scenes/scenes you are looking forward to the most to develop in that episode?

Yeah, there is an established workflow. I want to stay efficient and I want my hardware to work 24/7. The flow comes naturally through that desire. I've got a master document for the game that contains everything from minor to major events, entire dialogue trees or just single jokes. I look at this document and extract what I need to build a new episode. It's a document that grows and shrinks during development as new ideas are added and used. When the game is complete, I expect the document to be empty, as I want to cover everything I've written.


I know you take your time for the creation of a new episode that you need and the results prove that it is the right way. But i must admit that roundabout one year between episode 9 and 10 was a long wait for me. Do you think about strategies to shorten this time without pressuring yourself?

I always try to optimize my workflow, but I can't work more or faster than I already do. I'm working at full capacity, and this is what it will be like until the game is completed.

I can't create the same quality episodes without cutting content or rushing the development, and I don't want that. The long development times don't bother me. Making games of this quality takes time and even back when I made Acting Lessons and released one episode per month, some players wanted me to put out episodes even faster - it's ridiculous when you think about it.

 

[UrFriend]

I think one of the main reasons updates take so long is the amount of branching or stuff like that and I would much rather lots of branching than the typical trash game on here which has such riveting choices as 'do you want to see this sex scene?'

And when comparing Acting Lessons to BaDIK development time people seem to forget the difference in overall quality of the game. Some may not like mini-games, but they do add some actual gameplay to the game (except for the claw machine one, that thing is straight up cursed) and considering Renpy's limited capabilities DPC is milking this engine dry.

 

[ReallyNotTimmy]

…the typical trash game on here which has such riveting choices as 'do you want to see this sex scene?'

Tell me about it. I played a game last month where all the “choices” were a big joke. The choice would change one line of dialogue, then the story would continue just the same as if you’d made the other choice. And in some places, there was only one choice. Just a button to press before the game proceeded.

Plus the characters were annoying and the story made no goddamn sense. The images looked good, but there was no animation nor music, so there’s no reason it should’ve been as big a download as it was.



Unless the app is actually a Trojan horse… but I deleted it after I grew bored, so maybe that won’t be a problem later.

 

[Joshy92]

Tell me about it. I played a game last month where all the “choices” were a big joke. The choice would change one line of dialogue, then the story would continue just the same as if you’d made the other choice. And in some places, there was only one choice. Just a button to press before the game proceeded.

Plus the characters were annoying and the story made no goddamn sense. The images looked good, but there was no animation nor music, so there’s no reason it should’ve been as big a download as it was.

View attachment 3459721

Unless the app is actually a Trojan horse… but I deleted it after I grew bored, so maybe that won’t be a problem later.

Yeah it's one of my biggest pet peeves.
Thankfully BaD has a good amount of branching.

 

[ChipLecsap]

I looked this up on Dr. PinkCake’s Patreon blog out of curiosity.

• Episode 1 of Acting Lessons dropped May 2018.
• Ep 2, mid-May.
• Ep 3, mid-June.
• Ep 4, mid-July.
• Ep 5, mid-August.
• Ep 6, mid-September.
• Ep 7, mid-October.
• Ep 8 (final), December 2018.

Eight episodes in eight months. I know; it’s hard to imagine lately!

While Dr. PinkCake was dropping those last episodes, he was simultaneously developing Being a DIK. He completed four episodes—the entirety of Season 1—in 2019. I get why it took him longer to work on Being a DIK: more paths, mini-games, and detail.

He’s since slowed down a lot. Partly because of perfectionism, and partly to milk (and potentially lose) patrons. But that quarterly schedule shows us what he’s truly capable of.

View attachment 3459670

Here we go again with the false math.

Not all episodes are created equal. There are more content in a single episode of season 3 than the ENTIRE season 1. And more than the ENTIRE AL game. So no, he hasn't slowed down.

Look, I'm not a fan of the long wait. I'm on record multiple times on this forum stating that the more recent episodes should be broken down into multiple smaller episodes so that there is a more steady stream of new content. But any suggestion of DPC slow down, or milking, is entirely bs.

OMG, both are you are Fake.

DPC was a A Part-time developer, before Badik episode 5. Episode 5 from start to finish was the first episode when he worked at as a Full Time Game developer, . Everything before that, including the whole , and entire Acting Lessons was made while he had a " Rel life Job", and game development was just a Side gig for him, and in fact, he worked faster when game development was just a hobbie project to him. Kind of Ironic.

So, Yeah in fact he is working slower now, with much more time, and way , way better equipment, because it is in his interest to not make it fast.

 

[Darkwen]

Here we go again with the false math.

Not all episodes are created equal. There are more content in a single episode of season 3 than the ENTIRE season 1. And more than the ENTIRE AL game. So no, he hasn't slowed down.

Look, I'm not a fan of the long wait. I'm on record multiple times on this forum stating that the more recent episodes should be broken down into multiple smaller episodes so that there is a more steady stream of new content. But any suggestion of DPC slow down, or milking, is entirely bs.

Ep10 by it self is bigger then some finish games here, DPC would be better serve if he would stick to ep 7 or 8 size sure some eps might feel smaller or maybe not as much time with some girls but it would even out over time and besides it would likely mean more ep's

 

[ChipLecsap]

Ep10 by it self is bigger then some finish games here, DPC would be better serve if he would stick to ep 7 or 8 size sure some eps might feel smaller or maybe not as much time with some girls but it would even out over time and besides it would likely mean more ep's

another thing to consider , since its seem to be used as a defense that ep 9 and 10 has more " content" than the entire first season, the first 4 episode, is that, while in render count it does get bigger, both has over 5000 render both , but in those 2 episode and with 10.000 Render, are really much more actually happend than the firt 4 episode ?

 

[Darkwen]

another thing to consider , since its seem to be used as a defense that ep 9 and 10 has more " content" than the entire first season, the first 4 episode, is that, while in render count it does get bigger, both has over 5000 render both , but in those 2 episode and with 10.000 Render, are really much more actually happend than the firt 4 episode ?

9 didn't really move the story any but 10 did actually move things forward but I do agree with the point I think your making in that the story was moving faster when he was doing less renders

 

[Geralt From Rivia]

He’s since slowed down a lot. Partly because of perfectionism, and partly to milk (and potentially lose) patrons. But that quarterly schedule shows us what he’s truly capable of.

View attachment 3459670

But the thing is that he didn't lose patrons. After Ep.8, DPC reached a plateau at an average of 13k patrons, and now after a record-breaking wait for Ep.10, he has broken the record, reaching 19k patrons.
So it seems his audience is okay with this long wait scheme.

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[Joshy92]

9 didn't really move the story any but 10 did actually move things forward but I do agree with the point I think your making in that the story was moving faster when he was doing less renders

To be fair look at any TV show or movie all the good shit happens near the end the rest is just useless filler.

 

[Darkwen]

To be fair look at any TV show or movie all the good shit happens near the end the rest is just useless filler.

Yeah but what is filler really? We going from A to B there got to be a journey other wise moves and story driven shows would only be 15 to 30 minutes and shows would what be just 2 or 3 eps at the most

 

[ChipLecsap]

To be fair look at any TV show or movie all the good shit happens near the end the rest is just useless filler.

yeah, this kind of not really a good example to be comparable

 

[Joshy92]

Yeah but what is filler really? We going from A to B there got to be a journey other wise moves and story driven shows would only be 15 to 30 minutes and shows would what be just 2 or 3 eps at the most

To me filler content is stuff like mini games or useless sex scenes with ugly old cows like madam rose.
And any girl you can't end up with romantically.

And shows can't be two or three episodes how would studios milk their audiences dry then?

 

[Ray_D]

To be fair look at any TV show or movie all the good shit happens near the end the rest is just useless filler.

Knowing how to handle that is what differentiates a good series from a bad one. And unfortunately DPC is not good at that.

 

[Darkwen]

To me filler content is stuff like mini games or useless sex scenes with ugly old cows like madam rose.
And any girl you can't end up with romantically.

And shows can't be two or three episodes how would studios milk their audiences dry then?

Pretty much no one likes Madam Rose but she isn't slowing things down and the mini games aren't slowing down things what is slowing things down is DPC wanting to make everything bigger and bigger and animations of Zoey running thought the woods or the preps taking a walk plus his own milking scams he try to shove down our throats

 

[Geralt From Rivia]

There DPC Cult cock suckers

Ironically, without them the game wouldn't exist.

 

[Joshy92]

Ironically, without them the game wouldn't exist.

It always makes me laugh when people make fun of patrons do they not realise no patrons no game?

 

[ChipLecsap]

Pretty much no one likes Madam Rose but she isn't slowing things down

, yes she does, those 3 scenes alone was probably at least a month. Making the Renders, the animations, the script, and everything for just those 3 useless scene.

 

[Darkwen]

Ironically, without them the game wouldn't exist.

Well what is the real numbers because the jump he gets from ep 10 or 9 doesn't really count because most likely are just buying the update then leaving until the next one which is pretty smart on there part, it the base number that really keeping this going