VN Ren'Py Being a DIK [v0.11.1] [DrPinkCake]

[felicemastronzo]

What some people seem to keep forgetting is that the time passed within the story is currently quite short; and most of the characters haven’t known about Maya’s problems for very long.

The mc's only known Maya for about 2 months, since they've only just sat their midterms, and he's only known about her dad's black mail for about half that time.

Since he's known, the mc has also been dealing with heaps of other shit, and hardly spent much time considering Maya's predicament (a huge amount of his time has been dealing with his own issues, like repairing the mansion and fucking as many girls as he can ).

Derek has known the longest, but he's not exactly reliable; he's definitely not someone we'd expect to be dispersing sound financial advice.

I'm not sure how long Josy's known about the blackmail for, but she's even complained that Maya isn't trying to solve her own problems. They've been fighting and bitching with each other half the time.

So even though we, the readers, have had ages to discuss the issue, the characters in the story have not.

To make matters worse, Maya had dreamed up her hairbrained scheme of joining the HOTs and having them pay for her tuition, so she put all her eggs into that basket, only to have it fall through. By then she'd pretty much wasted the first month of college without even considering other avenues for solving her situation.

Then after sulking and wasting more time, Maya is now relying on Sage trying to help her.

I wouldn't call this bad writing, I'd say it is Maya's fault for being dumb (she was deliberately written that way). She's been called out for it by Josy:

Spoiler: Josy's not impressed

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And the mc's had a go at her for constantly dramatizing it all:

Spoiler: Stop whining Maya

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If anything, DPC has managed to characterise most of the prominent characters quite well. They have a few inconsistencies (proving they're not just computer programs... well actually... they are ), but on a whole each character is defined well enough that we come to expect certain behaviour from them.

So it's not shitty writing that in the stretch of roughly a couple of months, a handful of characters, who have been dealing with numerous distractions, haven't come to the rescue and solved all of Maya's problems yet.

Personally I find it quit perplexing that anyone can work their way through this game, pay full attention to everything it has to offer, and turn around and suggest the game has shitty writing.

Of course the game isn't perfect, but the detail, foreshadowing, dialogue, and direction are so far above most of the competitors here, I wonder where these critics are getting their reference for what good AVN writing is.

On the management of the characters I agree with you completely, they should simply be accepted with their imperfections, which ultimately define all of us, or do you think you are a list of merits?

sure when we get away from the characters, let's say the side plot, of stuff "not well written" there is different, but let's say it's side dish.
and the reference there is the simple and banal logic

 

[sixart]

Well said.

A true SIMP indeed

 

[felicemastronzo]

Well, lets be fair, would you rather play a game that's mostly about the legal correctness of contracts, financial aid options for the educational system, unavailable LI's because they're working 24/7 to support themselves, but has good writing by those standards although there's really nothing happening....

Or do you want to play BaDik or whatever other game that has an interesting story?
I dunno, sometimes you should really just accept some parts of the story are not exactly 100% real life proof, in BaDik this mostly happens for story reasons, so i don't see any problems....

just keep it at the edge of the narrative

no one wants to know how the wicked witch poisons the apple, but if you show me the recipe and the doses I have to ask myself some questions

 

[vogelbeest]

There simply needs to be a reason for Maya to pursue the free tuition, one that can't be solved in any simple way.
The point of Maya's blackmail is, it is tied to Maya ultimately being in a situation she has to choose to have sex with an old man in order to solve her problem. Maya's blackmail is tied to Burke's free tuition scheme and any end to either storyline is the end of the other, they will be solved in the story by the same events and Burke's exposure... Quinn may be redeemed or not, but even the restaurant is simply part of that storyline...

Could DPC have done it different? Yeah, he could have written a blackmail version where Quinn somehow gained photo's or a video of Maya having sex with somebody that's not MC or Josy.... In other words NTR... But even that would have had some additional weak points being discussed in extreme, besides ofcourse the usual NTR bash yo mama anti or pro bull shite...

Without Maya wanting that tuition there is no reason to even have the restaurant storyline other then for some lewds for a Dik affinity player and there's no point for the Burke sex for tuition storyline other then some restaurant girls being happy with the deal and a reason for Mona to leave. These storylines only are relevant for the threat they represent for Maya to get tuition.

 

[vogelbeest]

no one wants to know how the wicked witch poisons the apple, but if you show me the recipe and the doses I have to ask myself some questions

I see all this talk here about inheritances whether coming from a Burgmeister or not, perhaps gave you some wrong idea's....
Seriously, do not start feeding people poisoned apples! If you're entitled to any inheritance simply being patient is enough!

 

[sixart]

DavDR: I'm a dedicated Sage fan...
Arigon: Bella is my soul/sole reason...

Me:
View attachment 1741266


Carol in my mind, Bella in my heart


Maya be filled with gratitude, knowing you guys here are deeply concerned and have been discussing, month after month, her tuition problem.

Please don't throw me onto that pile of #&@$ who waste their time on this As long as I'm not abducted by aliens and get experimented on... there won't be such an occasion where I care for such meaningless things

" Carol in my mind, Bella in my heart " Still... like a true champ of SIMP where the cherry on top comes across via Baracks Simping

 

[OFT]

You think DPC has ever adjusted the story because someone guessed the plot point?

He probably spends hours at his desk cursing dalli-x's name

DPC when he has a brilliant idea for a plot twist:




DPC when he reads the same thing in a Dalli post:

 

[znar25]

Jill pretends to be upset but she gets off on it and watching Bella and MC.

 

[godkingxerxes]

shazba TimHawk and others defending DPC's "writing".

DPC's writing is not good. I am giving you that straight up. He gives it to you straight up that his writing is his weak point in interviews with him. He can not follow logic/tell his tale to save his life. His story AL was terrible except for the wingman, and his story here is laughable except for the wingman. His MC's are particularly unlikable, and yes, his writing of Maya and her situation is completely stupid. This is supposed to be an American college. In all American colleges that are not rip off's like say tRump university, there are ways for students to get financial assistance if they are in need. Maya's "bank" problem is a money problem. The college financial folks can assist her in finding alternate means of funding her education with, or without her father.

DPC is a master at his renders, animations, and picking music that fits his art. He pretty well sucks at writing a coherent story.
Peace

He said he isn't good at writing lewd scenes, not writing in general.

When you open your post with bullshit, the rest becomes irrelevant.

I do agree the drama behind Maya is poorly written from a logical side, because the loan the way she describes it, can't happen.

But... look at her fans, look at how many people feel sorry for her, how many want to help her and save her, that is who she is written for, the target audience Pinkcakes was aiming for with Maya are white knights, I think he's successfully hit that mark.

If you write a character to appeal to certain people and those people like the character, that's good writing is it not?

 

[TimHawk]

Actually, I am not a lawyer, my room mate from college was, I am an engineer.

See ? Thats what you get for keeping the son of a gun alive, now people confuse you 2 all the time.

 

[znar25]

The rest of the novel may resolve well if you pick Bella and just a lot of click through for a predictable, happy ending. But as one of the many paths, I think it is worth it. And, Bella is worth it. I would think of that fan art with MC, Bella and their daughter on the beach. One of many possible happy endings. I have multiple saves of multiple paths of the novel, so, I am OK with that....

 

[shazba]

Look, you can keep defending DPC, but the crux of the matter is that 4 people (MC Maya Josy Sage), some of who (Sage) is proclaimed to be smart by someone who looks smart (Bella), have spent considerable amount of time trying to solve a problem, and no one even suggested that Maya go talk to the school financial office to understand her situation, before going to Sage's parents and asking them to cough up tens of thousands of dollars.

They don't need to solve the problem for her in that time frame. But if no one suggests during the entire month (per your timeframe above) that she should do the painfully obvious thing that can help, that's shitty writing.

On my "bad writing" critique, that really comes from two angles - one is that if the writing of the work is okay to good elsewhere, then the shitty part becomes obvious. I assume you can tell the potato is overcooked even if the steak is done right. Second, there are many, many, many AVNs that have great writing. Many of them are translated from Japanese - Ever 17, Baldr Sky, etc. (Japan has had an active AVN industry for 40 years) but even some on this site is pretty good, like Good Girl Gone Bad. That game is quite lacking in the graphic department, but the writing/branching/mechanics/player freedom is very advanced.

The crux of the matter is no one has spent any time trying to do anything related to Maya's predicament other than get Maya into the HOTs.

That was Maya's plan. She didn't ask for anyone to help her in regards to her loan issue until the HOTs free tuition evaporated.

That was right at the end of episode 6. That was a year ago for us. Not that long ago for the Scooby Gang.

As soon as she mentioned it to Sage, Sage figured her parents could help out. I'm not sure where you're getting the idea that they will just outright pay for Maya's tuition, because no one in the game has suggested that. But Burke is high up in the college administration, so maybe he can help, some how.

Given how Sage is loath to ask her parents for any help, she could have tried other avenues to assist Maya, but she figured her parents were the best option.

That's definitely not a stretch of the imagination that a young adult might speak with their parents before they start running around making appointments with legal aide.

My month time frame was for the mc alone, and you may have noticed, he's been serious fucking preoccupied, as I already outlined. Sage just found out about it, Derek is an idiot, and we don't know about Josy.

Personally I think it's comprehension that's the issue here, not the writing...

shazba TimHawk and others defending DPC's "writing".
DPC's writing is not good. I am giving you that straight up. He gives it to you straight up that his writing is his weak point in interviews with him. He can not follow logic/tell his tale to save his life. His story AL was terrible except for the wingman, and his story here is laughable except for the wingman. His MC's are particularly unlikable, and yes, his writing of Maya and her situation is completely stupid. This is supposed to be an American college. In all American colleges that are not rip off's like say tRump university, there are ways for students to get financial assistance if they are in need. Maya's "bank" problem is a money problem. The college financial folks can assist her in finding alternate means of funding her education with, or without her father.

DPC is a master at his renders, animations, and picking music that fits his art. He pretty well sucks at writing a coherent story.
Peace

Those who don't like DPC's writing always say that DPC said it's his weak point. That's a really bad take from what he said:

Do you feel limited when writing due to your choice of using only monologue and dialog to describe what's happening? For action, you rely completely on the visuals, which becomes especially apparent during sex scenes. Wouldn't you sometimes like to use more detailed text or rich descriptions to go deeper into the scene?​

​

No, I don’t feel limited by that choice of writing style, but, yes, I do miss out on painting the scene further than visuals go. When writing a book, detailed text and rich descriptions are necessary, and I felt that the game being a visual novel, didn’t need that narrative. It removes some of the immersion when a narrator describes a scene's details versus the character saying, thinking, or expressing it through body language.​

​

My chosen writing method plays to my strengths, as I see writing as my biggest weakness. Even though I constantly try to improve my writing, I think I lack the skill set needed to write a novel in the way you're describing. ​

He's not saying he can't write a story plot. He even said his chosen method of writing plays to his strengths, i.e. character dialogue with visuals. The writing that he admits he's not good at is the descriptive style story telling (which he avoids altogether).

This has nothing to do with creating an actual storyline which he does really well purely dialogue. When it comes to a visual novel, I really like this dialogue only approach, I can't stand the visual novels that try to describe the sex scenes, they are truly cringeworthy.

Once again, this issue is comprehension, not writing.

She does if her daddy isn't paying.
She needs funding for college. Whether it is spending money or dorm/tuition money, the girl needs money. At a minimum the college will have resources to assist students in finding jobs. Whether those are workstudy type jobs does require financial aid evaluations being performed. If her father is being a douche, this won't qualify her for much of course, but they would still help her find a non hoe job.

Her issue is her dad has threatened to withhold her funds. It's a threat, and as far as I'm concerned, it's a bluff. She'd be paid up for the first semester already most likely.

Just like how Jill simply stood up to Tybalt and his bluff turned to shit, I believe Maya will eventually do the same thing.

Actually, I am not a lawyer, my room mate from college was, I am an engineer.
However, yes you are correct that there is that nagging poor representation of how the funding for the college would go, but still, she is cut off, so she is going to need money, and she could go to the college to discuss at least the possibility of work around town or other places.

The poor representation is from Maya's mouth. There is nothing to corroborate what her father has told her. Probably because it's bullshit. He's bluffing/threatening her to force her to do something. She's just too inexperienced to realise what he's told her is horseshit.

 

[OFT]

ISABELLA is cold and distant; Bella is passionate and caring, humorous and playful though

That is the most succinct and accurate description I've read on this site.

 

[sixart]

That is the most succinct and accurate description I've read on this site.

View attachment 1741352

Another true SIMP

 

[sixart]

He's not saying he can't write a story plot. He even said his chosen method of writing plays to his strengths, i.e. character dialogue with visuals. The writing that he admits he's not good at is the descriptive style story telling (which he avoids altogether).
This has nothing to do with creating an actual storyline which he does really well purely dialogue.

In all fairness whoever read it back then and did not understand these words are not worth the time since this was pretty much self explanatory... Are you smarter than a fifth grader - should we ask now

 

[fool1200]

I dont even now how you managed, but the entire Sage storyline of Ep08 is about her JUST finding out, how the fuck does that translate to a "considerable amount of time" ?

Maya says to the MC that she has not had any experience with financial matters her entire life and the MC says he doesnt know either. They're 18 year old kids.

And I have no idea how the "school financial office" is gonna help her ? What is there to understand, Maya told the MC that her problem is at the bank level, not the school level, so what are they gonna do ? I don't even see any world where they would care, they're getting paid, they wont give a frigg about Maya's family problems.

And Maya didnt come up with the plan to go to Sage's parents, she even refused to tell Sage about her problems to begin with. It's Sage, after beeing persistent, to finally learn about Maya's problem and then SAGE decides that thats what she wants to pursue.

Look, you can keep criticizing DPC's writing, but you should have at least a rough idea what he actually wrote before you do so and then come up with sound solutions not stuff that would actually make the writing worse.

Here is an analogy to show you what's going on more plainly: You friend is seriously troubled by her broken iphone, and tried to get a replacement phone through some ridiculous means and failed. You want to help her and have known this issue for a month. How long do you need until when you come up with the genius idea that maybe she should take the phone to the shop and see whether it can be fixed? Not only you have known this problem, but there's another person (Josy) who knew just as long or longer (let's still say it's a month) and genuinely wants to help. How long would she come up with that suggestion? There's another person (Sage) that recently knew about this but really wanted to help, talked to her for a few hours, and now wants to get her parents involved even though she doesn't want to ask them for more stuff. You don't think Sage's first question would be "have you taken the phone to the shop to know what the specific issue is"?

And how the school financial office is gonna help her? Seriously? I thought it's very clear to everyone involved that Maya doesn't really have a full picture of what is going on. You need to understand the problem before solving it. And the school financial office/treasury/bursar (each school calls it differently) is responsible to charge the tuition. Going there will be the natural first step to get some important answers, in particular, who has been paying Maya's tuition (is it her dad? or the student loan bank actually has been paying?). And they can do much more than providing answers - they deal with student loan issues all the time, maybe they can quickly isolate the problem by making a few phone calls.

By the way, you seem to have the wrong idea about university admin. They absolutely care about keeping the admitted students with the school. Often times there's human decency of wanting to help, but absent that, they still want to charge the student for the sweet tuition money for the next semester. And you can't do that if the student drops out. In plainer terms - if Maya's dad misappropriates Maya's student loan funds, then the dad will keep the money that the school deserves. And I'm sure the school does not want that.

"Maya told the MC that her problem is at the bank level" - sure, because Maya totally knows what's going on? Even if you believe that, why didn't anyone suggest her to talk to the bank? Again, "talk to X" would be the first step that anyone wants to help will suggest, just so that they can understand what the problem really is. The fact that no one suggested that, is just the author putting on idiot ball and railroading the plot.

 

[OFT]

Another true SIMP

Your post relies upon the supposition that there can be an excessive amount of affection towards Bella.

There cannot.

 

[PashafromRussia]

I don't see any problems with Maya at all. The game presents her as a naive fool, under the strict control of her father. He suppresses her will and her dreams, she is afraid of him and it is not surprising that she signed the contract without reading it and so on. Since Maya is naive fool from the country of affectionate puppies and cute fairies, she thinks that someone will solve her problems for her.
Her father solved problems for her. It is very difficult for her to become independent. She really believes that someone in HOTs will provide her with free tutuion, she believes that Burke and Sage will help her, believes that she will date Josie and die with her on the same day.
Does that make her a naive fool? Yes.
Makes her a bad character? No.
Everything related to Maya is a matter of taste. Some people like stupid blondes, and some don't.

 

[shazba]

Here is an analogy to show you what's going on more plainly: You friend is seriously troubled by her broken iphone, and tried to get a replacement phone through some ridiculous means and failed. You want to help her and have known this issue for a month. How long do you need until when you come up with the genius idea that maybe she should take the phone to the shop and see whether it can be fixed? Not only you have known this problem, but there's another person (Josy) who knew just as long or longer (let's still say it's a month) and genuinely wants to help. How long would she come up with that suggestion? There's another person (Sage) that recently knew about this but really wanted to help, talked to her for a few hours, and now wants to get her parents involved even though she doesn't want to ask them for more stuff. You don't think Sage's first question would be "have you taken the phone to the shop to know what the specific issue is"?

And how the school financial office is gonna help her? Seriously? I thought it's very clear to everyone involved that Maya doesn't really have a full picture of what is going on. You need to understand the problem before solving it. And the school financial office/treasury/bursar (each school calls it differently) is responsible to charge the tuition. Going there will be the natural first step to get some important answers, in particular, who has been paying Maya's tuition (is it her dad? or the student loan bank actually has been paying?). And they can do much more than providing answers - they deal with student loan issues all the time, maybe they can quickly isolate the problem by making a few phone calls.

By the way, you seem to have the wrong idea about university admin. They absolutely care about keeping the admitted students with the school. Often times there's human decency of wanting to help, but absent that, they still want to charge the student for the sweet tuition money for the next semester. And you can't do that if the student drops out. In plainer terms - if Maya's dad misappropriates Maya's student loan funds, then the dad will keep the money that the school deserves. And I'm sure the school does not want that.

"Maya told the MC that her problem is at the bank level" - sure, because Maya totally knows what's going on? Even if you believe that, why didn't anyone suggest her to talk to the bank? Again, "talk to X" would be the first step that anyone wants to help will suggest, just so that they can understand what the problem really is. The fact that no one suggested that, is just the author putting on idiot ball and railroading the plot.

You're assuming Maya knows which financial institution she's got a loan through. Her dad would have had her sign a bunch of papers, she trusted him at the time, and now she doesn't know what the fuck is going on.

Her dad has told her that if she doesn't do what he's telling her to do, he won't give her the funds to continue paying for college.

He's also told her that she won't be able to get another loan as she's already in debt.

He's also told her that if she doesn't pay off this existing debt, her credit rating will be shit and she's gonna struggle to get a loan for anything in the future.

To a young woman who isn't into finance, all of this sounds possible and so she's scared. She doesn't have the loan details on hand (why would her dad give her a copy of the loan if he intends to blackmail/bluff her?), so she's got no reference to work from.

You iPhone analogy is unfair. You forgot to mention that Sage's parents work for Apple and her dad is a high up in Apple's administration.

To me, this part of the plot will only become a contrivance if Maya explains the situation to Burke (and possibly Jade) and they don't see it for the illegal bullshit it is. The problem is, the preview showing Sage losing her cool makes me concerned that the meeting will be hijacked.

 

[OFT]

I don't see any problems with Maya at all. The game presents her as a naive fool, under the strict control of her father. He suppresses her will and her dreams, she is afraid of him and it is not surprising that she signed the contract without reading it and so on. Since Maya is naive fool from the country of affectionate puppies and cute fairies, she thinks that someone will solve her problems for her.
Her father solved problems for her. It is very difficult for her to become independent. She really believes that someone in HOTs will provide her with free tutuion, she believes that Burke and Sage will help her, believes that she will date Josie and die with her on the same day.
Does that make her a naive fool? Yes.
Makes her a bad character? No.
Everything related to Maya is a matter of taste. Some people like stupid blondes, and some don't.

The only real problem I have with Maya: