EvolutionKills

Well-Known Member
Jan 3, 2021
1,109
3,598
I wanted to like this, but it's just not doing it for me.

Up front, the game isn't bad. It is competently put together, grammatical errors are at a minimum, and nothing is egregiously offensive or bad. But at the end of the day, the game has no meat on its bones. The characters aren't characters, they're largely dolls you're watching someone else play with.

MC? Tabula rasa. Olivia? Generic hot girl. Emily? Generic shy girl. They have no background, no real personality, no real motivation, no conflict, no drama. You just grind through the same actions over and over again to gain affection/lust, then unlock a new scene, rinse and repeat. The game has a premise (quarantine), and that's about it. Nothing in the game gives any light to the inner lives of the 'characters' involved, and thus they completely lack character.

Is the MC even employed? What is their education level? Do they have family? Do they like cats or dogs? Favorite music genre? Do they even have a personality? I don't think 'being a lech' alone counts as a personality.

Olivia needing to shore up her Instagram followers with content is less a goal or motivation than it is a pretext for the conveniently already in place photo studio. Emily has literally no reason to have anything to do with it, she just goes along with it cause you got enough points by washing the dishes. There is nothing here to get emotionally invested in. There are other sandbox games with entire harems full of compelling characters, and this game can't seem to breath life into just two or three of them.

So in the end, the experience isn't terribly dissimilar from just watching a Honey Select lets-play. The game here is all grind to get to erotica scene involving 'characters' you don't care about. It has no soul.
 

Demoness_Kiss

Forum Fanatic
Jun 9, 2017
5,267
7,208
I wanted to like this, but it's just not doing it for me.

Up front, the game isn't bad. It is competently put together, grammatical errors are at a minimum, and nothing is egregiously offensive or bad. But at the end of the day, the game has no meat on its bones. The characters aren't characters, they're largely dolls you're watching someone else play with.

MC? Tabula rasa. Olivia? Generic hot girl. Emily? Generic shy girl. They have no background, no real personality, no real motivation, no conflict, no drama. You just grind through the same actions over and over again to gain affection/lust, then unlock a new scene, rinse and repeat. The game has a premise (quarantine), and that's about it. Nothing in the game gives any light to the inner lives of the 'characters' involved, and thus they completely lack character.

Is the MC even employed? What is their education level? Do they have family? Do they like cats or dogs? Favorite music genre? Do they even have a personality? I don't think 'being a lech' alone counts as a personality.

Olivia needing to shore up her Instagram followers with content is less a goal or motivation than it is a pretext for the conveniently already in place photo studio. Emily has literally no reason to have anything to do with it, she just goes along with it cause you got enough points by washing the dishes. There is nothing here to get emotionally invested in. There are other sandbox games with entire harems full of compelling characters, and this game can't seem to breath life into just two or three of them.

So in the end, the experience isn't terribly dissimilar from just watching a Honey Select lets-play. The game here is all grind to get to erotica scene involving 'characters' you don't care about. It has no soul.
This.gif
 
  • Like
Reactions: EvolutionKills

Tukann

Tukann Games
Game Developer
Jul 21, 2022
247
930
I'd really like to know where my damn saves are located.. saved all last play through went to reload and bam gone.\
Like with any HTML game, you might run into trouble if you use incognito mode depending on your browser, because this feature may delete the cache or prevent it from being saved. I suggest saving to a file if you're using incognito mode.
 

Tukann

Tukann Games
Game Developer
Jul 21, 2022
247
930
Why did you do this:

View attachment 2316688

I really liked the fact that you could choose which girl to go for, I don't like Olivia. Any chance you can separate the two again? Or do you hardcore plan on threesome content later and won't be doing solo routes anymore?
I can't. I want the girls to interact together and I can't have that if players don't progress both their stories.
 

Tukann

Tukann Games
Game Developer
Jul 21, 2022
247
930
I wanted to like this, but it's just not doing it for me.

Up front, the game isn't bad. It is competently put together, grammatical errors are at a minimum, and nothing is egregiously offensive or bad. But at the end of the day, the game has no meat on its bones. The characters aren't characters, they're largely dolls you're watching someone else play with.

MC? Tabula rasa. Olivia? Generic hot girl. Emily? Generic shy girl. They have no background, no real personality, no real motivation, no conflict, no drama. You just grind through the same actions over and over again to gain affection/lust, then unlock a new scene, rinse and repeat. The game has a premise (quarantine), and that's about it. Nothing in the game gives any light to the inner lives of the 'characters' involved, and thus they completely lack character.

Is the MC even employed? What is their education level? Do they have family? Do they like cats or dogs? Favorite music genre? Do they even have a personality? I don't think 'being a lech' alone counts as a personality.

Olivia needing to shore up her Instagram followers with content is less a goal or motivation than it is a pretext for the conveniently already in place photo studio. Emily has literally no reason to have anything to do with it, she just goes along with it cause you got enough points by washing the dishes. There is nothing here to get emotionally invested in. There are other sandbox games with entire harems full of compelling characters, and this game can't seem to breath life into just two or three of them.

So in the end, the experience isn't terribly dissimilar from just watching a Honey Select lets-play. The game here is all grind to get to erotica scene involving 'characters' you don't care about. It has no soul.
Confined and Horny isn't a VN. My inspirations for the game are sandbox heavy games like Big Brother. My plan is to have a sandbox game with a lot of interactivity and replayability. I will progressively enrich the characters stories but this will never be the main focus. MC is a representation of the player, like in modern RPGs, most of his lines are choice based. I don't plan of giving MC a backstory. I'm sorry if the description mislead you. I will try to make it more clear what the game is about.
 

EvolutionKills

Well-Known Member
Jan 3, 2021
1,109
3,598
Confined and Horny isn't a VN. My inspirations for the game are sandbox heavy games like Big Brother. My plan is to have a sandbox game with a lot of interactivity and replayability. I will progressively enrich the characters stories but this will never be the main focus. MC is a representation of the player, like in modern RPGs, most of his lines are choice based. I don't plan of giving MC a backstory. I'm sorry if the description mislead you. I will try to make it more clear what the game is about.

Well, thanks I guess. At least now I know now not to get my hopes up. Personally, I don't see the appeal of that whatsoever. Without a story to give context to get invested in, well, why am I playing your game instead of just playing Honey Select? Even if I liked those character designs, I could just make close approximations of them and sex them up all I wanted without needing to spend time washing dishes. At this point, all your game is doing is adding a layer of grind and calling it 'replayability'.

No hate, seems like a good gig if you can get people to actually pay you for that. I just don't get the appeal.
 
  • Haha
Reactions: Demoness_Kiss

Tukann

Tukann Games
Game Developer
Jul 21, 2022
247
930
Well, thanks I guess. At least now I know now not to get my hopes up. Personally, I don't see the appeal of that whatsoever. Without a story to give context to get invested in, well, why am I playing your game instead of just playing Honey Select? Even if I liked those character designs, I could just make close approximations of them and sex them up all I wanted without needing to spend time washing dishes. At this point, all your game is doing is adding a layer of grind and calling it 'replayability'.

No hate, seems like a good gig if you can get people to actually pay you for that. I just don't get the appeal.
The story is MC and the girls living together and finding feelings for each other during a pandemic. I don't think I'm a good writer. If I tried to write a fancy story with a big scope, cliffhangers etc... it would very probably end up with the common tropes of the genre (school drama, mafia, superpowers, magic etc...). I don't want that. I might be in the minority on this but this is the kind of stuff I skip when playing games like Harem Hotel. I know if I force myself to include something I don't like, it will probably end up being not good, so I'd rather stick to the current setting.
 

EvolutionKills

Well-Known Member
Jan 3, 2021
1,109
3,598
The story is MC and the girls living together and finding feelings for each other during a pandemic. I don't think I'm a good writer. If I tried to write a fancy story with a big scope, cliffhangers etc... it would very probably end up with the common tropes of the genre (school drama, mafia, superpowers, magic etc...). I don't want that. I might be in the minority on this but this is the kind of stuff I skip when playing games like Harem Hotel. I know if I force myself to include something I don't like, it will probably end up being not good, so I'd rather stick to the current setting.
Since you brought it up...

I unironically play Harem Hotel for the story and characters. The lewds are a fun bonus, in that the game just doesn't fade to black like some chaste film for a general audience when some tits are on screen. But the only reason I care about that game and keep going back to it update after update is because I'm enamored with the characters. I like the cast, their personalities, and the adventures they go on. Just making a copy of Lin or Kali in Honey Select would have almost zero appeal, because Honey Select would strip that simulacrum of everything that makes that character fun and unique in the first place. I don't enjoy the lewds cause I think Kali's curly black hair and nerd glasses are sexy, I enjoy the lewds cause I like Kali as a character.

But again, no hate. If you know what your limits are, you know what you want to make and enjoy, and there is an audence for it? More power to you. I'm not here to tell you that you're wrong for doing that. I'm not your dad.
 

Tukann

Tukann Games
Game Developer
Jul 21, 2022
247
930
Since you brought it up...

I unironically play Harem Hotel for the story and characters. The lewds are a fun bonus, in that the game just doesn't fade to black like some chaste film for a general audience when some tits are on screen. But the only reason I care about that game and keep going back to it update after update is because I'm enamored with the characters. I like the cast, their personalities, and the adventures they go on. Just making a copy of Lin or Kali in Honey Select would have almost zero appeal, because Honey Select would strip that simulacrum of everything that makes that character fun and unique in the first place. I don't enjoy the lewds cause I think Kali's curly black hair and nerd glasses are sexy, I enjoy the lewds cause I like Kali as a character.

But again, no hate. If you know what your limits are, you know what you want to make and enjoy, and there is an audence for it? More power to you. I'm not here to tell you that you're wrong for doing that. I'm not your dad.
You're comparing Confined and Horny to a 5 year old game though. Harem Hotel's characters aren't very deep, especially in the early stages. With Kali for example (an inspiration for Olivia's character actually), before you go to her dad's house, all you do is progressively corrupt her. There will be more story and character development, but the game is a few months old. I'd rather make sure I 100% like what I already have before building on it. I already changed some of the story. You talk about Emily
You don't have permission to view the spoiler content. Log in or register now.
. Also you may not have gotten to that part yet but
You don't have permission to view the spoiler content. Log in or register now.
. I'm really not sure about that part and I don't know if I'll keep it in the game.

To sum up, I want to have a good base before really going forward with the story, and I plan on keeping the setting simple and somehow realistic.
 

EvolutionKills

Well-Known Member
Jan 3, 2021
1,109
3,598
You're comparing Confined and Horny to a 5 year old game though. Harem Hotel's characters aren't very deep, especially in the early stages. With Kali for example (an inspiration for Olivia's character actually), before you go to her dad's house, all you do is progressively corrupt her. There will be more story and character development, but the game is a few months old. I'd rather make sure I 100% like what I already have before building on it. I already changed some of the story. You talk about Emily
You don't have permission to view the spoiler content. Log in or register now.
. Also you may not have gotten to that part yet but
You don't have permission to view the spoiler content. Log in or register now.
. I'm really not sure about that part and I don't know if I'll keep it in the game.

To sum up, I want to have a good base before really going forward with the story, and I plan on keeping the setting simple and somehow realistic.
I think you're underselling Kali and crew. Yeah, as per standard sandbox tropes, there is some grinding to reach gameplay milestones. But it's not all just grinding, and then a lewd scene. HH spends a lot of text on world building. Your first encounter with Kali happens in her room while she's losing a PC game and having a meltdown. It's establish in short order that she both has a well-to-do family, and that she's currently semi-estranged/rebelling against them. The MC has a chance to respond (empathy/neutral/lech), and then we get even more world building (The Capitol, elves, she hacks androids, has a sister, is unemployed). That's all in your first encounter with her. HH is littered throughout with these smaller pieces of narrative. It is not all just grinding, sex, then eventually we meet Kali's dad; he's setup from your very first conversation with her, and meeting him is a payoff later in the narrative. So before I've done literally any grinding for Kali, she's already got a solid foundation to build her character upon. Is it high art? Certainly not. But she has enough there to hook the audience in and draw them further into the world, and her little piece of it. All of this is after the game's prologue, establishing the MC as the grandson of the late owner and new manager of the hotel, and that we've already both met Lin and established that she's kind of an awful cook (in addition to be our personal elven slave).

That being said, I actually agree with the change you made to Emily. Having that sort of financial leverage can lead to a really gross power dynamic, especially if that isn't your intention. So, probably a good idea there. The problem is that you didn't have anything better to replace it with, and instead of removing it entirely once the justification had been undermined and excised, you still have her doing it but now with seemingly zero reason. It's arguably better (or less problematic), but ultimately still unfulfilling. If you don't want to scrap the photoshoots entirely, that's on you to invent a new worthwhile context. There are ways you could make it work. Maybe she has self-esteem or body image issues, and including her in the activity the MC already does with Olivia could be a way for the MC to use positive reinforcement and encouragement while also getting close to her (with there being a fine line to be drawn between being empathetic and endearing, and being a creepy lech). But that would probably require really committing to the bit with her being reserved or shy, and being more of a slow burn; probably not washing the dishes a dozen times and eating her out in the living room.

Also, I'd probably avoid Olivia having an existential crisis about slut shaming out of nowhere if the game hasn't put in the narrative work to get there and support it. Cause from what I've seen, she takes little to no coaxing to play with the MC's dick. Now I don't have a problem with folks having casual hookups; but her crying after sex is gonna feel like it is coming right out of left field. Her entire personality is 'generic hot chick' or 'generic e-girl'. Having her freak out against the stereotype you've written her into is going to feel like an unearned 'gotcha' moment. I'm not saying that you can't have her be slutty, or eventually be upset about acting slutty; but you gotta put the narrative legwork in beforehand. You're gonna have to figure out ways to flesh out her personality, include scenes that hint that she might be putting on a front or is acting for show. It needs to be hinted at that she might have doubts or regrets about what she has been doing, is doing, or might do in the future.

When if comes down to it, if you want more interesting characters, you're gonna have to put the work in. That's going to require among other things, more to your game than the current 'grind until lewd' loop you have right now. You'll need plenty of smaller scenes and interactions to flesh things out; being quizzed by Olivia in the kitchen about the number of ribs humans have is not meaningful character building. You have snippets of the right idea, with scenes like when the MC eavesdrops on their phone conversations. But again, it comes down to what you want. Characters take work to make. Right now you have a premise (not a story or a plot, but a premise), a grindy gameplay loop, and two good looking Honey Select dolls. It's ultimately up to you, and the work you're willing to put into it, if they'll ever be anything more than that.
 
Last edited:

Tukann

Tukann Games
Game Developer
Jul 21, 2022
247
930
I think you're underselling Kali and crew. Yeah, as per standard sandbox tropes, there is some grinding to reach gameplay milestones. But it's not all just grinding, and then a lewd scene. HH spends a lot of text on world building. Your first encounter with Kali happens in her room while she's losing a PC game and having a meltdown. It's establish in short order that she both has a well-to-do family, and that she's currently semi-estranged/rebelling against them. The MC has a chance to respond (empathy/neutral/lech), and then we get even more world building (The Capitol, elves, she hacks androids, has a sister, is unemployed). That's all in your first encounter with her. HH is littered throughout with these smaller pieces of narrative. It is not all just grinding, sex, then eventually we meet Kali's dad; he's setup from your very first conversation with her, and meeting him is a payoff later in the narrative. So before I've done literally any grinding for Kali, she's already got a solid foundation to build her character upon. Is it high art? Certainly not. But she has enough there to hook the audience in and draw them further into the world, and her little piece of it. All of this is after the game's prologue, establishing the MC as the grandson of the late owner and new manager of the hotel, and that we've already both met Lin and established that she's kind of an awful cook (in addition to be our personal elven slave).

That being said, I actually agree with the change you made to Emily. Having that sort of financial leverage can lead to a really gross power dynamic, especially if that isn't your intention. So, probably a good idea there. The problem is that you didn't have anything better to replace it with, and instead of removing it entirely once the justification had been undermined and excised, you still have her doing it but now with seemingly zero reason. It's arguably better (or less problematic), but ultimately still unfulfilling. If you don't want to scrap the photoshoots entirely, that's on you to invent a new worthwhile context. There are ways you could make it work. Maybe she has self-esteem or body image issues, and including her in the activity the MC already does with Olivia could be a way for the MC to use positive reinforcement and encouragement while also getting close to her (with there being a fine line to be drawn between being empathetic and endearing, and being a creepy lech). But that would probably require really committing to the bit with her being reserved or shy, and being more of a slow burn; probably not washing the dishes a dozen times and eating her out in the living room.

Also, I'd probably avoid Olivia having an existential crisis about slut shaming out of nowhere if the game hasn't put in the narrative work to get there and support it. Cause from what I've seen, she takes little to no coaxing to play with the MC's dick. Now I don't have a problem with folks having casual hookups; but her crying after sex is gonna feel like it is coming right out of left field. Her entire personality is 'generic hot chick' or 'generic e-girl'. Having her freak out against the stereotype you've written her into is going to feel like an unearned 'gotcha' moment. I'm not saying that you can't have her be slutty, or eventually be upset about acting slutty; but you gotta put the narrative legwork in beforehand. You're gonna have to figure out ways to flesh out her personality, include scenes that hint that she might be putting on a front or is acting for show. It needs to be hinted at that she might have doubts or regrets about what she has been doing, is doing, or might do in the future.

When if comes down to it, if you want more interesting characters, you're gonna have to put the work in. That's going to require among other things, more to your game than the current 'grind until lewd' loop you have right now. You'll need plenty of smaller scenes and interactions to flesh things out; being quizzed by Olivia in the kitchen about the number of ribs humans have is not meaningful character building. You have snippets of the right idea, with scenes like when the MC eavesdrops on their phone conversations. But again, it comes down to what you want. Characters take work to make. Right now you have a premise (not a story or a plot, but a premise), a grindy gameplay loop, and two good looking Honey Select dolls. It's ultimately up to you, and the work you're willing to put into it, if they'll ever be anything more than that.
I mostly agree with what you're saying. Right now you get some information from listening in on their phone conversations and from them talking about each other. I actually added a dialogue sprite system with this update just so I could add more small story-driven interactions without having to redo the whole scenes every time I decide to change something. I think having the photoshoots as a way for Emily to get out of her shell works, maybe with some push from Olivia. The trivia minigame, Emily's jokes and the "you look good" interactions I added to have more repeatable dialogue. I hate it in sandbox games when in free roam npcs have only one line.
 

riccardoilgrande

New Member
Oct 25, 2020
10
3
In my modest opinion you are doing a Great work! Olivia is one of the hottest characters of all the games that I played. Keep going like these!
 
  • Like
Reactions: Tukann

Tukann

Tukann Games
Game Developer
Jul 21, 2022
247
930
Confined and Horny v0.7:

- Fully revamped notebook
- New Emily scene
- Full remaster of Olivia gaming scene
- Added minigame to Olivia gaming boobjob scene
- Added minigame to Olivia gaming cuni scene
- Big code rewrite, should make further progress easier
- Rewritten some scenes
- Completely rebuilt the timing minigame (I hope it fixes the issue some people seemed to have on iPhones)
- Improved fap minigame, now faster
- Performance improvements for Android app
- Added fail safe to prevent memory leaks on some browsers
- Added warning message on browsers that don't support the webp image format
- Added option to edit the player name in the intro in case of mistake
- Typo fixes
- Bug fixes

Confined Lover Tier and above:
- Added minigame to Olivia bonus kitchen scene

Confined Admirer Tier and above:
- Two new pictures to collect from Emily
 
  • Yay, new update!
Reactions: Reij and Dagoraath

hhhhh77

New Member
Mar 27, 2018
6
0
Can I ask if there is a way to find and free download all the models (like buildings and ambients) for the honey select 2 / StudioNEOV2 editor to create images for games?
 
4.20 star(s) 22 Votes