Ren'Py Brothel King [v0.2] [Goldo]

[Sakalua]

If the new function has an outcome that a player wants to save-scum, it will just be an unused feature as soon as save-scumming is not possible and the outcome cannot be reversed. As the game is a singleplayer game, I do not even understand why save-scumming needs to be prevented.
To truly negate save-scumming, the negative and the positive outcome needs to be balanced/the impact of the outcome needs to be reduced. Or there need to be control over it.

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[Jman9]

As the game is a singleplayer game, I do not even understand why save-scumming needs to be prevented.

As a habitual savescummer, I do have an answer to that. You can save-scum to nudge the game in your favour , and you can save-scum it into something that was never even vaguely expected by the author.

My favourite example is from my other mod: there is a random number that controls whether a (potentially) very powerful enemy comes after you. You can control the circumstances surrounding that random number so that the enemy is not generated. You cannot just reload yourself out of those bad circumstances with enough patience. This is a core mechanic that the player must address, and he's free to savescum the less consequential stuff - like combat rolls, treasure looted, infamy gained and lost, etc - so he can do so.

YMMV, of course.

 

[Sakalua]

As a habitual savescummer, I do have an answer to that. You can save-scum to nudge the game in your favour , and you can save-scum it into something that was never even vaguely expected by the author.

Well, I do know how save-scumming can modify the intended experience of the developer. But does it really matter as long as the player is enjoying the game? I have also used save-reload "tactics", when random events occur (in other games), which are harmful to my gameplay experience. But just preventing save-reload tactics would not improve my gameplay experience. As long as I have the option to save-reload the game I have the following decisions:
a) I can play it the intended way and accept it.
b) I do not accept it and reload the game to the desired outcome.
If save-reload is not possible the decisions are changing to:
a) I can play it the intended way and accept it.
b) I do not accept it and stop playing this game.
Of course, you could also include option c) Using mods/Modifying the game files/Using cheats for both choice sets, but this would just remove the issue that leads to the choices.
In my opinion, the first choice set is always better, as long as there is not some sort of competition (multiplayer, ranking etc.). And I do not consider achievements as "competition". Players who dislike save-scumming can always choose option a. They would lose nothing, when save-scumming is possible. Also, there is a built-in cheat menu in the game. So I do think it would be a bit abitrary to prevent save-scumming but to have access to cheats.
Of course, the best result regarding game design is that the player wants to choose option a by himself.

 

[Jman9]

I have the following decisions:
a)
b) ... reload the game to the desired outcome.

I do not think you read my post very carefully. My answer was: there is a reason to disallow some save-scumming if you have three options instead of two:

1. Get a bad event, do not savescum, try to work a way out.
2. Get a bad event, savescum, details change but overall you're never going to get your desired outcome.
3. Get a bad event, reload, restrategise to avoid bad event.

This may not apply in all situations, to all players and all games. But it is an answer to your original question.

Of course, the best result regarding game design is that the player wants to choose option a by himself.

Not necessarily. I have had great fun with save-scumming to try and beat near-impossible odds, reach a high score, or solve some particular puzzle element. I've also had great fun without, sacrificing resources and appreciating the pain. All in single-player games. Again, YMMV.

 

[DougTheC]

Can we shut down the "

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" v0.15b for you?

I already did.

Yes, I verified that "Traplan" & "Brothel King" are now removed from Itch.io.

 

[Teron]

So I'll give it until the end of April. Then I'll have to start looking for an alternative home for BK. Sucks that a lot of content would get lost that way (especially the looong explanation I did on the lore and events - I foolishly didn't back it up).

I've only just had a look at some of the recent posts in here so I have no idea what's going on but, is this the page you're looking for?

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[Jman9]

Yes. Already spotted by __neronero, though.

 

[NSoull]

If the new function has an outcome that a player wants to save-scum, it will just be an unused feature as soon as save-scumming is not possible and the outcome cannot be reversed. As the game is a singleplayer game, I do not even understand why save-scumming needs to be prevented.
To truly negate save-scumming, the negative and the positive outcome needs to be balanced/the impact of the outcome needs to be reduced. Or there need to be control over it.

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Some devs are simply hell bent on trying to force the players to play the game how they think it should be played.
Personally, I think it is a bad mentality to have and it is even worse when they waste time trying to make systems to control the players when that time could have been used in improving the game.
Sadly, this is not unusual. Even outside of games like this.

 

[Jman9]

I happen to think that's a crap attitude to have as a player. Most games are not improved by be being converted into some freeform version of themselves. Tell me, do you decry platformers for 'forcing' you to platform?

All it does is add feature creep until the game loses its focus and becomes a poor imitation of itself, or just outright drives developers over the edge trying to satisfy everyone. It's a rare game that actually manages to get better as it adds player freedom upon player freedom.

If my game doesn't work the way I envisioned it to, why the fuck am I even continuing do (re)design it? I will once again quote the wise man: "La perfection est atteinte, non pas lorsqu'il n'y a plus rien à ajouter, mais lorsqu'il n'y a plus rien à retirer." Applies to games design just as well as it did to aviation.

I have personally witnessed several of my favourite franchises get ruined because designers thought it was a good idea to entertain your line of thought. I guess you can tell I'm still a little salty, especially when preached that this was a good thing. /rant over

 

[NSoull]

I happen to think that's a crap attitude to have as a player. Most games are not improved by be being converted into some freeform version of themselves. Tell me, do you decry platformers for 'forcing' you to platform?

All it does is add feature creep until the game loses its focus and becomes a poor imitation of itself, or just outright drives developers over the edge trying to satisfy everyone. It's a rare game that actually manages to get better as it adds player freedom upon player freedom.

If my game doesn't work the way I envisioned it to, why the fuck am I even continuing do (re)design it? I will once again quote the wise man: "La perfection est atteinte, non pas lorsqu'il n'y a plus rien à ajouter, mais lorsqu'il n'y a plus rien à retirer." Applies to games design just as well as it did to aviation.

I have personally witnessed several of my favourite franchises get ruined because designers thought it was a good idea to entertain your line of thought. I guess you can tell I'm still a little salty, especially when preached that this was a good thing. /rant over

I have no idea what you are talking about. Genuinely.
People are save scumming. That is their own personal enjoyment and it doesn't affect the game.
How does someone save scumming in their game affects your experience? How does it ruin YOUR game?

I think you severely misunderstood everything I said. I never suggested that the games should be changed. If anything, I said the opposite.
I said that it is a bad thing when devs waste their time trying to come up with mechanics to force the player to conform, like "anti-cheat mechanics", "traps" and so on. Especially on a single-player, non-competitive and leisure game like this.
To give examples:
Some devs in internal coding and mechanics to make sure someone didn't use cheat engine to edit their save. That is bad.
Developing features to stop someone from save-scumming. That is bad.
Punishing the players for not playing "properly". That is bad.
(This is all regarding SINGLE PLAYER games, of course)

I am not suggesting for things to be added. Not even changed. I never did.

Not a single thing you said there has anything to do with what I said.

 

[Jman9]

I have no idea what you are talking about. Genuinely.

This:

Some devs are simply hell bent on trying to force the players to play the game how they think it should be played.
Personally, I think it is a bad mentality to have...
...
I said that it is a bad thing when devs waste their time trying to come up with mechanics to force the player to conform, like "anti-cheat mechanics", "traps" and so on. Especially on a single-player, non-competitive and leisure game like this.

I suggest you re-read what I wrote. Maybe also go back a bit to where I admit to being tremendeous save-scummer.

How does it ruin YOUR game?

By bypassing my game design goals and therefore rendering a large chunk of related decisions meaningless. I shouldn't have included them in the first place if I wanted such a choice to be a viable.



Now, all this may or may not be applicable to a particular game's particular mechanics. In fact, I don't think it actually does for Goldo's new farm plans, which really shoudn't have such a giant incentive to savescum. But I very much dislike your general opinion and think it's plain wrong just as often as it's right.

Edit: Seeing these edits, it's clear that I misunderstood nothing. Your game design philosophy is deeply antithetical to mine.

 

[NSoull]

This:


I suggest you re-read what I wrote. Maybe also go back a bit to where I admit to being tremendeous save-scummer.


By bypassing my game design goals and therefore rendering a large chunk of related decisions meaningless. I shouldn't have included them in the first place if I wanted such a choice to be a viable.



Now, all this may or may not be applicable to a particular game's particular mechanics. In fact, I don't think it actually does for Goldo's new farm plans, which really shoudn't have such a giant incentive to savescum. But I very much dislike your general opinion and think it's plain wrong just as often as it's right.

You explained nothing mate. Lets start over in a more simple way:

All I said is that I dislike it when devs go out of their way to make cheating harder in single player games. How is this bad? I am not asking for the game to be changed. I am not asking for anything to be added.
If people figure out to cheat in a single player game, that is their own personal experience and it doesn't affect ANYBODY ELSE.

How does me using some dumb cheat to make my character stronger in a single player ruins the game? At worst, it will ruin my own personal experience and nobody else's.

 

[Jman9]

Let me try to explain to you as simply as I can, then. I am a humongous save scummer. I am also a pretty serious modder, verging on game dev. I want my games to have save-scumming without absolutely breaking the game.

Your line of thought is the exact opposite. Let people break the game, or not save scum at all. No third option. You get your way and I have a much harder time molding a game to my liking. Maybe it'll never click with me at all because of this.

If I share my mod, as I've done in the past a few times, and people find a way to circumvent some central game mechanic via save scumming, I want to close that down. Because it affects my game. Literally.

Cheating via data manipulation is a different thing. It literally bypasses the game's internal limits. Sometimes it's worth it (time doesn't grow on trees, debugging, testing builds, etc), mostly it isn't.

I also find that your game design philosophy regarding save scumming and player freedom flawed on a more fundamental level, but I think it's clear by now that you're not able or willing to discuss that in any depth. Which is fine by me. Agree to disagree and leave it at that.

 

[goldo00]

Some devs are simply hell bent on trying to force the players to play the game how they think it should be played.
Personally, I think it is a bad mentality to have and it is even worse when they waste time trying to make systems to control the players when that time could have been used in improving the game.
Sadly, this is not unusual. Even outside of games like this.

I think you're being too absolutist about it. One quote I like on game design is, "given the opportunity, many players will optimize the fun out of the game entirely".

I don't think you could argue that having save-scumming active in, say, darkest dungeon or Faster Than Light would improve those games in any way, just because they're single-player. Of course, BK is not a rogue-like, so I am generally very liberal with save-scumming. But for some specific issues, such as dice rolls, I prefer to lock the player out of that option, simply because reloading a saved game endlessly until you get the best roll isn't fun. In a game like BK featuring lots of random generation, you could easily grind the whole experience to a halt by save-scumming all the time, for everything. Of course, you could argue it's the problem of the player if that happens, since because it's a single player game, it only affects their own experience.

But if I can nudge the player in the right direction to make it easier on themselves, why not do it?

 

[Jman9]

...simply because reloading a saved game endlessly until you get the best roll isn't fun.

I've had tremendeous fun with it in a number of games, BK included. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

But if I can nudge the player in the right direction to make it easier on themselves, why not do it?

Because it's not your job to nudge players. It's to incentivise their choices. Save-scumming is a choice between spending more of your your personal time on drudgery for a little-to-moderate amount of extra resources, usually. If it becomes either useless or mandatory to save-scum, you've taken choice away.

I don't think you could argue that having save-scumming active in, say, darkest dungeon...

But you can save-scum in DD? Not a lot and it's too much of a pain to do regularly, but you can reload failed dungeon runs, accidental crappy hires, etc. Even failed (boss) battles if you go a bit behind the game's back. I've done it quite a few times when I was not in the mood to run the dungeon again and put up with Wilbur's bullshit once more, for no extra fun.

 

[You-San]

pls can someone help me with this? im suck at this kind of thing.

PS: thanks

 

[Jman9]

pls can someone help me with this?

Ren'Py Version: Ren'Py 7.4.10.2178

Update (and install the game and patch properly). We're on at least 7.4.11 now.

 

[Jman9]

Sent a PM to Goldo, because otherwise there might be drama coming...

 

[NSoull]

Before anything else, I have been playing BK since the first version I saw back in the HHS forums. I really enjoy and appreciate the work you do.

I think you're being too absolutist about it. One quote I like on game design is, "given the opportunity, many players will optimize the fun out of the game entirely".

And if they deliberately do that, that is their own experience they are ruining. I am not saying cheating is good or bad, but each player has different definitions of how to have fun in a game.

I don't think you could argue that having save-scumming active in, say, darkest dungeon or Faster Than Light would improve those games in any way, just because they're single-player. But for some specific issues, such as dice rolls, I prefer to lock the player out of that option, simply because reloading a saved game endlessly until you get the best roll isn't fun.

This brings back to the previous argument. It is not up to you whether it is better or not, it is up to the player. The players will find their enjoyment in whatever way they personally prefer. If they can do that without affecting the experience of other people, I don't see the problem.

Take RPG games with stat-based choices. I am fine with building my character and playing the game naturally, but I also know people who like having all the choices available and max out their stats using save-editing or cheat engine. They don't like feeling locked out of stuff and prefer to play it this way. That is their business.
It doesn't affect my game or anyone else's. I disagree with them, sure, but it is none my business.

TL;DR: That is my bottom line. So long as people can do this stuff without affecting the experience of others or the development of the game (through game breaking exploits, holes in the code or or so on), I am fine with that.
If the way dice rolls worked and were being a genuine issue that could be fixed (and improved), then by all means. Fix it away. But I personally don't agree with changes that don't really improve the game and only serve as obstacles for people privately and harmlessly cheating.

 

[Guarsian]

But if I can nudge the player in the right direction to make it easier on themselves, why not do it?

This comes down to the idea of using "the carrot or the stick". Rather than dis-incentivizing save scumming, by introducing artificial hurdles that punishes everyone, incentivize the frugality of saves (meaning incentives the player to use saves sparingly rather than spamming saves). Perhaps some form of buff, or in game effect, or even some efficiency system for each "end day" that occurs without a save? Now this is only a thought, and may not be the right solution, but the train of thought in luring the player rather herding them is.