HTML Blue Swallow [v0.5F Hotfix 2] [Blue Swallow]

[ffive]

Alright, so it doesn't look like i'm just complaining, maybe something more constructive -- after having a look at the current implementation of the mind break thing, i feel like maybe part of the problem is that the way it works is a bit counter-intuitive? I'm thinking, maybe this approach could work better:

introduce new mind break:
* if corruption - mindbreak > confidence - stability

why like this:

Adding existing mind breaks to the equation makes it harder to acquire more, as each new one must overcome higher value than the ones before.

Basic confidence shields the person from thinking what they're doing is 'wrong'. And the way the game builds stability, it seems basically how much a character is accustomed to their life following a routine and avoids disturbances from it. This is why, imo, experiencing something out of the comfort zone should be harder on such characters, because it's simply something they've spend most of their life sheltered from. In contrast, for a character with low stability, who not only lives but maybe even looks forward to chaos, such kind of development is just Tuesday (or Xmas come early)

This change also has a (positive, imo) side-effect: the way character who experiences mind-break takes hit to their stability means they become more accustomed to unordinary effects in their life, meaning that it'll be harder for them to undergo another mindbreak, not easier. So it's not a downward spiral but the opposite, something the character grows more resilient to naturally.

And then (or even as a stand-alone change, if everything else is left intact as it is) i'd simply do away with the bad end part (game over if too many mindbreaks) or at the very least made it optional and opt-in rather than default. Maybe also make it a check against an arbitrary value rather than tied with any specific stat, and make the count something which you can reduce, or improve how many times you can 'survive' (with help from a psychologist or whatever. A potential common source of sexy content, too) An equivalent of "lives" in more generic games, if you will.

While none of this would do anything to address the core issue (some builds being better at handling the situations than others) maybe it'd at least alleviate the results a little..?

 

[Truth5eekker]

Yeah I don't have a issue with that some builds are maybe harder or certain outcomes are impossible for certain characters. Im fine with that its how builded my character. The issue lies there that it inherently unplayble if you don't have certain stats. Think about if BG3 or fallout(1) would give players a freedom of playing and building characters how they like and halfway through it game just tells the player actually you game ends here because you didn't have enough strength. No those games are designed so that every main mission is playable through one way or other in every build. Some situations maybe harder and some maybe impossible but the game is possible to finish.
And all this rambling is just because this is actually good game if these design choices are corrected or changed. And for me im not going to make new character or open a console to so that i can make it through. For me it takes a way the enjoyment of experience if in the end i just have to "cheat" to complete. So until there is design changes to game im going to steer away from this because for me its unplayble.

 

[BlandChili]

Can you stay "with" the childhood friend?

It seems that regardless of my choices (have tried both super-slut, monogamous-faithful and a playthrough somewhere in between the extremes) it seems that I only ever have the choice of either ending things after HS or keep texting, only for her to find herself a bf during college.

In addition to that, it seems like you have to have sex with someone in college? I was only given the option of either being with the roomie or with a person the frat-friend introduced you to.

 

[ffive]

In addition to that, it seems like you have to have sex with someone in college? I was only given the option of either being with the roomie or with a person the frat-friend introduced you to.

The game seems to determine the number of people MC slept with in college base on:

  $Stats.Traits['Easy'].value
+ $Stats.Traits['Risky'].value
+ $CC.maleReaction
- $Stats.Traits['Sophisticated'].value
- $Stats.Traits['Confident'].value
- $Stats.Traits['Stable'].value

And then you're given selection to pick from, based on activities and suchlike.

 

[ffive]

Hmm some inconsistencies early in Act 1:

in [ACTI001 - The Boys]:
<<if visited("PG002 - BoysSex")>>

The game uses this check to presume MC and the boys had sex before she went on the Eurotrip, but there is multiple instances in that scene where the player can end things before they escalate, and in fact the game will force to end things prematurely without certain traits/sex skills.

So then you potentially get a weird narrative how MC and Ethan have sex "for the second time" when it can in fact be very well their first ever. It also means that if MC does fuck Ethan then, he is never added to the List, because [ACTI001 - EthanSex] scene doesn't add him.

Probably would be better to check the body list if he's included there, and add him (and adjust narration accordingly) if he's not.

At the airport, the game prints this passage:

Swiping my messages away, there was a pang of regret that this was so abrupt -- it would be my first real big trip. And alone.

Etc even if MC has just got back from having spent a year in Europe, all alone. Maybe worth to check for these things.

Not to mention the things like the game stubbornly writing about MC's dad even if the background story has him set as never present in MC's life after having ditched her mom early.

 

[Fictionary]

Check the stats again: you will notice they're no longer what they were, but instead reverted to what they were at the previous scene, the one from first save.

Fixed! I no longer get this result when following your steps.
Hit me back up if I'm crazy and you see more interactions like this following our next release.

 

[CassieBare]

Alright, so it doesn't look like i'm just complaining, maybe something more constructive --

Thank you!

introduce new mind break:
* if corruption - mindbreak > confidence - stability

why like this:

Adding existing mind breaks to the equation makes it harder to acquire more, as each new one must overcome higher value than the ones before.

Basic confidence shields the person from thinking what they're doing is 'wrong'. And the way the game builds stability, it seems basically how much a character is accustomed to their life following a routine and avoids disturbances from it. This is why, imo, experiencing something out of the comfort zone should be harder on such characters, because it's simply something they've spend most of their life sheltered from. In contrast, for a character with low stability, who not only lives but maybe even looks forward to chaos, such kind of development is just Tuesday (or Xmas come early)

I don't actually hate this. Now the real question becomes, does that mean that a Claire that gets into the main game with a Stability of say...5 or higher (and with 0.6 it's almost impossible to get to the main game at 0 Stab; a lot more opps to raise it; and there's a warning AND 'easy button' to raise it to 3)...that it's essentially impossible to get Bad End?

I def do *not* want that. I'm aiming for something where 3 to...call it 10 breaks get a Bad End.

I *want* players to try to not just throw Claire into the meatgrinder. Otherwise, why write a story when it should just be 'Claire gets fucked. Claire sucks some cock. Claire gets fucked AGAIN!' like so so so many of the games on this site do?

And then (or even as a stand-alone change, if everything else is left intact as it is) i'd simply do away with the bad end part (game over if too many mindbreaks) or at the very least made it optional and opt-in rather than default. Maybe also make it a check against an arbitrary value rather than tied with any specific stat, and make the count something which you can reduce, or improve how many times you can 'survive' (with help from a psychologist or whatever. A potential common source of sexy content, too) An equivalent of "lives" in more generic games, if you will.

While none of this would do anything to address the core issue (some builds being better at handling the situations than others) maybe it'd at least alleviate the results a little..?

'Address the core issue' makes it sound like it's a bad thing to have dynamics that can make certain situations harder or easier. I'd argue that those dynamics make it a *game* rather than a click-through story with some floofy words for 'stats'.

Not sure I really understand what you mean by the 'check against arbitrary value' -- sounds like randomness? And I'm mooostly opposed to simple randomness.

And mindBreaks are essentially lives at the moment, which you can gain by increasing Stability or Confidence.

Again, most of the issues people are running into will be solved with the stat refactor happening during the 0.6 dev build I'm working on right now.

Believe me, I understand the frustrations and anger. It wasn't my intention. It will get better. I appreciate your patience and understanding as we develop the game.

 

[CassieBare]

Hmm some inconsistencies early in Act 1:

in [ACTI001 - The Boys]:
<<if visited("PG002 - BoysSex")>>

The game uses this check to presume MC and the boys had sex before she went on the Eurotrip, but there is multiple instances in that scene where the player can end things before they escalate, and in fact the game will force to end things prematurely without certain traits/sex skills.

So then you potentially get a weird narrative how MC and Ethan have sex "for the second time" when it can in fact be very well their first ever. It also means that if MC does fuck Ethan then, he is never added to the List, because [ACTI001 - EthanSex] scene doesn't add him.

Probably would be better to check the body list if he's included there, and add him (and adjust narration accordingly) if he's not.

At the airport, the game prints this passage:

Swiping my messages away, there was a pang of regret that this was so abrupt -- it would be my first real big trip. And alone.

Etc even if MC has just got back from having spent a year in Europe, all alone. Maybe worth to check for these things.

Not to mention the things like the game stubbornly writing about MC's dad even if the background story has him set as never present in MC's life after having ditched her mom early.

Appreciate these. Will look into rewriting and see that they're coded correctly.

I do hope your 'maybe worth to check for these things' is not attacking. I don't just write willy-nilly and hope it all works out. I spend time looking at the path to arrive at certain sequences and the opportunities for variation before and structure the beat out with the potential variations within prior to writing. Sometimes I miss some.

The dad being gone is one I've only recently had to shake my head at. It was a big oversight and I hope to be able to rectify it in this 0.6 dev cycle.

There's a LOT of content in this game and a lot of code. We do our best to ensure these thing don't happen, but they inevitably will.

 

[BlandChili]

I do hope your 'maybe worth to check for these things' is not attacking.

Given the degree to which ffive likes looking into the code, you can probably relax this accusatory approach to their comments.

People don't generally make attacks by giving you constructive, direct feedback.

 

[ffive]

I don't actually hate this. Now the real question becomes, does that mean that a Claire that gets into the main game with a Stability of say...5 or higher (and with 0.6 it's almost impossible to get to the main game at 0 Stab; a lot more opps to raise it; and there's a warning AND 'easy button' to raise it to 3)...that it's essentially impossible to get Bad End?

Hmm, i'm not sure if it's not possible with such setup, but i have a two-part point to consider:

It's not that hard to get in the main game at 0 or even less Stability: that save i included earlier, it's from my actual playthough, and as you can see, i have Claire at -2 stability early during the Euro trip, without doing anything special. The only reason she is at +1 entering Act 1 in my game is because i've picked a few events which did get her stability... but i could just as easily pick alternatives which would leave her at that -2 if not drop even farther. So with this in mind, to hear of stability of 5 or even higher, this is a very tall order for me, and something a person would seriously need to focus on getting, over their entire character creation part of the game. If they don't, then they're very likely to have similar stability to what they started with.

But then, here's the second part and the possible kicker: with the change i've suggested, the high stability would be actually detrimental, because it'd mean such habit-oriented person would be cracking easier when put in unexpected situation (the confidence - stability part of the check) It'd only be after their stability drops as result of cracking, that they'd actually start resisting (further) mind breaks... and it's something high enough accumulated corruption could still overcome.

I *want* players to try to not just throw Claire into the meatgrinder. Otherwise, why write a story when it should just be 'Claire gets fucked. Claire sucks some cock. Claire gets fucked AGAIN!' like so so so many of the games on this site do?

I get the sentiment, but i'd also have to acknowledge this is probably what quite a few of players seek and want, with it being (at least in part) a porn game and all. Even if i'm very sympathetic to trying to make a game that's more than that, you'll probably hear from people who want this kind of the meatgrinder and get disappointed if they're shoved into a Bad End situation. So it may be for the best to make this Bad End part optional, for people who seek extra challenge and a different experience.

I do hope your 'maybe worth to check for these things' is not attacking.

No, definitely not. I'm sorry if it comes across snarkier than i intended, text in general can feel quite colder than it really is. If i say "maybe", this is mainly because i realize how much work it all is and how things can easily slip and/or not make it in the schedule, with limited time available. And i only really bother with this sort of feedback for games which i hope to see finished because they're interesting enough i want to play through the whole thing.

 

[CassieBare]

Hmm, i'm not sure if it's not possible with such setup, but i have a two-part point to consider:

It's not that hard to get in the main game at 0 or even less Stability: that save i included earlier, it's from my actual playthough, and as you can see, i have Claire at -2 stability early during the Euro trip, without doing anything special. The only reason she is at +1 entering Act 1 in my game is because i've picked a few events which did get her stability... but i could just as easily pick alternatives which would leave her at that -2 if not drop even farther. So with this in mind, to hear of stability of 5 or even higher, this is a very tall order for me, and something a person would seriously need to focus on getting, over their entire character creation part of the game. If they don't, then they're very likely to have similar stability to what they started with.

But then, here's the second part and the possible kicker: with the change i've suggested, the high stability would be actually detrimental, because it'd mean such habit-oriented person would be cracking easier when put in unexpected situation (the confidence - stability part of the check) It'd only be after their stability drops as result of cracking, that they'd actually start resisting (further) mind breaks... and it's something high enough accumulated corruption could still overcome.


I get the sentiment, but i'd also have to acknowledge this is probably what quite a few of players seek and want, with it being (at least in part) a porn game and all. Even if i'm very sympathetic to trying to make a game that's more than that, you'll probably hear from people who want this kind of the meatgrinder and get disappointed if they're shoved into a Bad End situation. So it may be for the best to make this Bad End part optional, for people who seek extra challenge and a different experience.


No, definitely not. I'm sorry if it comes across snarkier than i intended, text in general can feel quite colder than it really is. If i say "maybe", this is mainly because i realize how much work it all is and how things can easily slip and/or not make it in the schedule, with limited time available. And i only really bother with this sort of feedback for games which i hope to see finished because they're interesting enough i want to play through the whole thing.

You're missing two things:
1. Act I sets all negative stats to 0.
2. As I mentioned earlier, 0.5F3 has a 'warning' inclusion in Act I if Stability or Confident is below 2 and gives the opportunity to hit an 'easy button' to raise either/both to 3 if the player wants.

So your save is no longer the current state of the game.

In the new coding (done it today), there are only a handful of events that lower Stab and quite a few that might increase it. So, if you get a Stab increase, it's very likely to persist to the main game. So getting there with 1, 2, 3 Stability is almost assured. Again, there's an 'easy button' as well. And there will now certainly be players who get to the main game with higher, especially ones that play HS > GY > Uni > Act I.

I did understand your code, but it wasn't my intention with the new coding so if I implemented it, I'd likely need to go back in and do another pass at changes.

Also, the early game of Act I is a unique situation (and the only one currently playable, because that's all that's written, though it's not all that I've written down and planned). The early stages of whoring herself out, etc, immediately Corrupt -- to get the player used to and understanding the concept as being 'in play'. As the game moves forward, there will be <<if>> conditions in those situations. A Claire that's easier won't Corrupt just sleeping around as an example.

it wasn't intended to mindBreak already and def not Bad End. I was aiming for 1, TOPS, before the game implements those <<if>>s in the later (0.7, 0.9) expansions.

I may consider the 'hardmode' on/off trigger maybe in another couple dev cycles, but right now I'm just trying to make it work. Especially on f95, I need some playtesters .

 

[BlandChili]

So with this in mind, to hear of stability of 5 or even higher, this is a very tall order for me, and something a person would seriously need to focus on getting, over their entire character creation part of the game. If they don't, then they're very likely to have similar stability to what they started with.

One of the more prudish Claire's i played had quite high stability by the point the spy stuff started.
Loving, eager parents, a middle-class background, active in her free time, successful academically, only had her friend for a lover then later the college roomie, didn't really partake in any craziness, although she did choose to focus on socializing in college rather than learning.

 

[ffive]

You're missing two things:
1. Act I sets all negative stats to 0.
2. As I mentioned earlier, 0.5F3 has a 'warning' inclusion in Act I if Stability or Confident is below 2 and gives the opportunity to hit an 'easy button' to raise either/both to 3 if the player wants.

So your save is no longer the current state of the game.

Well, i'd say the save represents the results of character creator of your game as it is currently, since it was produced by playing through the latest iteration made available. In fact, if the game proper has then to manually zero the negative stats, and/or allow player to force stability/confidence to certain levels, then it hints that my statement about these stats typically being pretty low out of the char creator wasn't really off -- otherwise the players wouldn't experience these problems with confidence/stability that called for emergency fixes.

But i understand you're also now making some changes to the char creator itself, with how the stability is modified, so yes, it's kind of a moot point and things will be different down the road.

One of the more prudish Claire's i played had quite high stability by the point the spy stuff started.
Loving, eager parents, a middle-class background, active in her free time, successful academically, only had her friend for a lover then later the college roomie, didn't really partake in any craziness, although she did choose to focus on socializing in college rather than learning.

Yup, that would certainly be a way to get high stability (along with things like sticking to the same hobby/activity throughout the char creator etc) But then on the other end you have all Claires who come from incomplete or dysfunctional families (or was adopted) and did the other things the game has offered them, that weren't spending all her time with the books. And then there's the in-betweens. So while it's possible to build your stability up, that's one end of the bell curve, and probably not something the game should be balanced around. fake edit: or it actually can be now considered as something that will become more of a norm, with the changes made for future updates.

 

[ffive]

One more minor thing about writing: MC's sexuality variable can be defined as either "straight", "lesbian" or "bi", but there's a number of situations in Act 1 where there's a check if $Body.sexuality == "bi" which is then treated as if MC is a lesbian rather than bisexual, with explicit dislike for having sex with men.

The result is especially silly in [M001 - Honeytrap] or during encounter with Chinese guy at the club, where passing the check for "bi" makes MC nearly retch at the thought of having sex with a guy, while both straight and lesbian MCs are more than happy with the prospect, because they're grouped under else clause.

edit: on a different note, gaining stats in Act 1 is currently disabled, because the widget which handles it is only ever invoked once at the very start of it (ACTI001 - Saying Goodbye) instead of place like the homebase screen. Not sure if intentional or oversight, but mentioning it just in case.

 

[Fictionary]

edit: on a different note, gaining stats in Act 1 is currently disabled

I would hope this is not true : O
but please send me a save of you entering Act I and at the end of it if your Stats truly are not changing.
edit: Or just your file in the middle of it would help as well.

 

[ffive]

I would hope this is not true : O
but please send me a save of you entering Act I and at the end of it if your Stats truly are not changing.
edit: Or just your file in the middle of it would help as well.

Well, maybe it's fixed in a more recent build that wasn't made public, but this seems to be the case in 0.5.3

I've attached a save from like 2-3 days into Act 1. You can see that coordination has enough exp accumulated to increase the value but it stays unchanged.

edit: i'd blindly guess this is because the modification performed one-time by the widget isn't included in the save, meaning the game only calls the associated function in the brief period after visiting the start-of-the-act passage and until a save is loaded. Might be better to put the level up directly in the stat object, so evaluation is performed automatically whenever exp field is changed..? This would also improve performance, because the check would be performed only on object which might potentially need it, and only when it's needed due to value change.

 

[dv8r]

I'm aiming for something where 3 to...call it 10 breaks get a Bad End.

I *want* players to try to not just throw Claire into the meatgrinder. Otherwise, why write a story when it should just be 'Claire gets fucked. Claire sucks some cock. Claire gets fucked AGAIN!' like so so so many of the games on this site do?

This is actually refreshing to me. I think the possibility of loss makes victory taste sweeter, and a playthrough becomes more thoughtful as the player won't just autospam whatever is the skankiest of choices.
That said, it's not surprising people might get really frustrated, especially in the 'porngame' genre.
Frustration happens when what one imagines or expects doesn't happen, the solution to that is simple; communication.
As long as the developer makes clear to the player the sort of game it is, how the game works, and the potential causes of loss, then dev and player are on the same page and frustration is kept to a minimum.

In any case, keep up the great work, I've been enjoying what I've played so far and am looking forward to seeing more because there's genuine quality here (and the sexspy genre is still really an untapped goldmine).

 

[Ragnar]

I *want* players to try to not just throw Claire into the meatgrinder. Otherwise, why write a story when it should just be 'Claire gets fucked. Claire sucks some cock. Claire gets fucked AGAIN!' like so so so many of the games on this site do?

With your punishment system in mind Players have to play a goody two shoes spy Claire to avoid dead ends.
I don't know if that's more fun than throwing her into the lap of debauchery.

 

[BlandChili]

With your punishment system in mind Players have to play a goody two shoes spy Claire to avoid dead ends.
I don't know if that's more fun than throwing her into the lap of debauchery.

I wouldn't mind the occasional situation where you could recover from a hard loss. I think it's fine with the occasional dead end too, in a way like dv8r said it makes success fun too, to know that there are risks.

I'm not usually big on non-con personally, but with specifically a spy theme, you'd want the occasional "escape" part too; think James Bond tied to a table as a laser slowly inches towards his torso but with sexual situations.
Instead of Claire just cracking and the game going "wuh-oh try again" every time, it would be nice to have that recovery section where you can attempt (and also possibly fail) to escape certain doom of various kinds if you want to.

 

[Ragnar]

I wouldn't mind the occasional situation where you could recover from a hard loss. I think it's fine with the occasional dead end too, in a way like dv8r said it makes success fun too, to know that there are risks.

I'm not usually big on non-con personally, but with specifically a spy theme, you'd want the occasional "escape" part too; think James Bond tied to a table as a laser slowly inches towards his torso but with sexual situations.
Instead of Claire just cracking and the game going "wuh-oh try again" every time, it would be nice to have that recovery section where you can attempt (and also possibly fail) to escape certain doom of various kinds if you want to.

I'm not against bad endings at all, bad ends can be great. I'm against a bad ending because you didn't raise some occult stat 1 hour ago.
Cyoa stories are about choices not about stats, you have several paths in front of you and some of them will end in a bad ending.
That is, you don't have to keep track of hidden stats because that's not fun at all.