Ren'Py Abandoned Duality [v0.1.8] [Per<3rsioN]

[Alfius]

Yes the non repeatable part in vn is true.
Thought, most sandbox games are just grindy, stat grinding, love/lust/corruption point grinding etc. lots of repeatable scenes which change a bit with higher stats...which also means a lot of renders, yet barely any actual progress/content in the game and while grind leads to more playtime and let the game look bigger than it actually is, it is not enjoyable.
This is a major point why so many dislike sandbox games in the first place.

Even sandbox often come with different paths, or just 1-2 LI's get new content, u don't like the LI which gets content well no luck, u don't play the corruption route of these LI's no luck etc. there is no difference from a vn which updates only a certain path.

Most sandbox games here go like this:
-To progress with Girl 1 u need progress to event 12 of girl 2.
-To see event 12 of Girl 2 u need to have seen event 4 of girl 3, also u need item xy.
-To see event 4 of Girl 3 u need to to have seen event 5 of girl 4, on time xx, at day xx, u also need to have item xyz and the planets need to be in the correct alignment...additionally this event has only a 30% chance to trigger, so if u'r not lucky try it again, x-days later...

That pretty much makes the sandbox completly pointless, not to mention a grindy time sink and many games are not playable without a very detailed WT.


There are actually very few successful full-sandbox games, which are still in activ development.

-Big Brother is abandoned so are the most of it's clones...and it is a perfect example of a grindfest...which wasn't enjoyable in the last, u needed cheats to make it a barely enjoyable game.
-Milfy City is abandoned too

-Being a Dik & De Luca Family are VN's which have free roam parts, which is very different from a full sandbox game. Most like these games despite these parts, not because of them.

-Peasant's Quest & A struggle with Sin are RPGM games (i also would add Farmer Dreams and Renryuu: Ascension), very good one's imo.
But they are very different to play, compared to sandbox games like Big Brother...alas they are closer to 'real' games.
U have fighting, exploring, crafting, quests etc.
Not to mention that these games are probably the most time/work intensive ones (for the devs) and most good RPGM games here, are already in development for several years and are likely still in dovelopment for years to come.


Yeah thats already a point where 95%+ of the sandbox games here fail...

For story driven games or games which have a relative linear story, sandbox is simply not needed, it has no advantages over a simple vn. A simple vn is less work for the dev, less bugs do to the sandbox mechanisms and no grind and time sink for the player.

RPGM games aside, the only good sandbox games i can think of, are 'midnight paradise' and 'project atmosphere', that being said, even these games would be better without the sandbox imo, as the sandbox in these games doesn't add anything beneficial.

OK, I think I talked about this topic enough.
Bottom line is both formats can produce good games and both can produce terrible games.

From a dev that knows how to program, sandbox makes more sense as your investment in the game is more into coding and logic then into rendering. (Of course you still need to render a lot, but you get more bang for your buck per render, if you catch my drift.) The big pitfall of Sandbox is striking a balance between grind and good enough hints in your game so that the players does not get stuck.

If you are a novice dev, and more of an artist, maybe a VN makes more sense, but to move the story forward, you need to do a ton of renders.

I can list a ton more very good sandbox games, those ones were just at the top of my head.
Having said that, of course there are some awesome VN's as well.
(But they do seem to have a larger abandon rate....I suspect the the time investment for those is substantially more then a Sandbox)

In any case, I think I said what I wanted to say. This will be my last post on this topic on this thread

 

[Raziel_8]

You like "The Twist" don't you?

The Twist
But there are plenty of other games which are like that....still remember a stupid alarmclock from ''Max's Life''

 

[solomongundi]

how much content in this first release?

 

[Joshua Tree]

The Twist
But there are plenty of other games which are like that....still remember a stupid alarmclock from ''Max's Life''

Just sounded like you where quoting from the walkthrough for "the twist", hehe

 

[DrakoGhoul]

Oh, boy. I see Big Ass, Incest, Milf and a Corruption tag. The ultimate assembly of tags to get me to try any game. That sandbox tag though . Well it's 4 great tags against 1 so i guess It'll be fine as long as it's not too grindy.

The story on the other hand I'll have to play and see. Not bashing or anything but it's seems like a rather cookie cutter story, description wise. I'll play and see what direction it's going for personally. The women look interesting as well. With all of this said I'll give it a try.

 

[drhotrod]

Getting an error with Ruca in the morning kitchen scene when I choose the options - Compliment her --> Nice. Ruca then is shown in a kissing pose. I get the following :

I'm sorry, but an uncaught exception occurred.

While running game code:
File "game/locations.rpy", line 304, in script call
call lockeddoor from _call_lockeddoor
File "game/locations.rpy", line 304, in script call
call lockeddoor from _call_lockeddoor
File "game/locations.rpy", line 304, in script call
call lockeddoor from _call_lockeddoor
File "game/locations.rpy", line 446, in script call
call lockeddoor from _call_lockeddoor_5
File "game/locations.rpy", line 446, in script call
call lockeddoor from _call_lockeddoor_5
File "game/locations.rpy", line 391, in script call
call lockeddoor from _call_lockeddoor_3
File "game/locations.rpy", line 446, in script call
call lockeddoor from _call_lockeddoor_5
File "game/locations.rpy", line 391, in script call
call lockeddoor from _call_lockeddoor_3
File "game/locations.rpy", line 391, in script call
call lockeddoor from _call_lockeddoor_3
File "game/locations.rpy", line 446, in script call
call lockeddoor from _call_lockeddoor_5
File "game/locations.rpy", line 391, in script call
call lockeddoor from _call_lockeddoor_3
File "game/locations.rpy", line 446, in script call
call lockeddoor from _call_lockeddoor_5
File "game/locations.rpy", line 446, in script call
call lockeddoor from _call_lockeddoor_5
File "game/locations.rpy", line 446, in script call
call lockeddoor from _call_lockeddoor_5
File "game/locations.rpy", line 391, in script call
call lockeddoor from _call_lockeddoor_3
File "game/locations.rpy", line 446, in script call
call lockeddoor from _call_lockeddoor_5
File "game/locations.rpy", line 391, in script call
call lockeddoor from _call_lockeddoor_3
File "game/locations.rpy", line 391, in script call
call lockeddoor from _call_lockeddoor_3
File "game/locations.rpy", line 446, in script call
call lockeddoor from _call_lockeddoor_5
File "game/locations.rpy", line 304, in script call
call lockeddoor from _call_lockeddoor
File "game/locations.rpy", line 446, in script call
call lockeddoor from _call_lockeddoor_5
File "game/locations.rpy", line 221, in script call
call screen playerhousescrn
File "game/locations.rpy", line 446, in script call
call lockeddoor from _call_lockeddoor_5
File "game/locations.rpy", line 391, in script call
call lockeddoor from _call_lockeddoor_3
File "game/locations.rpy", line 391, in script call
call lockeddoor from _call_lockeddoor_3
File "game/locations.rpy", line 221, in script call
call screen playerhousescrn
File "game/locations.rpy", line 391, in script call
call lockeddoor from _call_lockeddoor_3
File "game/locations.rpy", line 446, in script call
call lockeddoor from _call_lockeddoor_5
File "game/charRUCA.rpy", line 1477, in script
jump rucacooking1d
ScriptError: could not find label 'rucacooking1d'.

 

[RogDodge]

Good renders, promising, how to advance time?

I've found going to the Living room and watching TV does the trick.

 

[EthanHunt95]

Now I'm not recommending, wait for next 2more updates came after anything to say.....
This dating sim, focusing one girl in each update ummm cough* cough* Smells like someone Lol....
Anyway best of luck Dev....

 

[Xabder]

the aunt is hot af
best of luck dev!

 

[levinkevin122]

How can i see angie's boobs??
i'm stuck on that

 

[CellStudios]

Seems like a really good game so far ( not played through it all ), but I feel like the dev has fell victim to the "free-roam" bug, I play these games because I want a story and the story is just getting lost through hours of clicking through rooms, would really be a 1000% better if it was just a linear story with a few options to determine which way your character goes ( in terms of progression/outcome, not actual location ).

 

[Farnuge]

This might be the most ridiculous statement I've seen on this site and that says a lot...

Facts always confuse people who cannot understand them.

 

[House Of Black]

Can you switch this game to a VN? Thanks.

 

[weretiger]

Great game so far. Thank you for sharing. The patch seems to have a mistake: the MC is called a few time sister instead of brother...

 

[somebodynobody]

Per<3rsioN

I would recommend that once you learn a "schedule", their icon and maybe a ? (if there are multiple locations they could be) shows on the map areas. So it is still a sandbox, but your character has an "idea" of where to go for certain people.

If you open the phone and do something on it, but are also in a room where there is a clickable like Ruca or something similar, once you get out of the phone the things are not clickable and you must leave that area first before being able to click. Example is go into kitchen in afternoon and Ruca is sitting there, open phone, open walkthrough for Ruca, go back and leave phone, can't click Ruca now.

With Ruca in love with MC all Flirting works fine except Casually, unsure if bug or intended.

Ruca finding MC's underwear in bathroom still says "to have his Nephew find his". Should be Aunt.

Craving the smell of his boy's. (should be "her" since it is referencing June the sister/mother.)

because she trust me so much (trusts)

Angie's questions should be "Physical details."

The walkthrough would be more helpful if there was a "key" for it to explain what the colors mean. Most are easy to guess, but then there is Grey. Is that just unseen or is that not in the game yet? etc.

If you are high enough perversion and choose sleezeball at cafe. image 'angiecafeannoyed' not found. (Angie at the time was soulmate 110ish, worried early 20s, sexual high 40s)

Post completing Tiffany, MC can ask for a new photo, but he doesn't do that. It acts like she propsitioned him for the photo and he says not now.

 

[mochamas23]

Good luck , image i like

 

[YuNobi]

Seems like an issue with the textbox, perhaps try to re-download the game.
If you look inside "gamedirectory/game/gui" you should find a file named texbox.png. That image should look black with neon purple borders. If it looks any different, that's the issue.

textbox.png is there and is the correct image. I am using JoiPlay on Android; I tried normal and 32-bit versions, being sure to delete the persistent saves, with no change.

 

[McZoy]

Gonna have to disagree. From a Dev perspective Sandbox type games are a no-brainer.
In a straight VN, playtime is extremely short with all sex scenes not repeatable.

So for a dev, a VN = Lot's of work with very little playtime.
If you do multiple paths in your VN, it's even worse. You could bring out an update and the path the player is on could get no content.

A lot of the most successful games on here are Sandbox games (In fact now that I think about it almost all of the most successful games are either Full on Sandbox or partially Sandbox)

Big Brother
Man of the House
Milfy City
Being a Dik (Partial)
De Luca Family (Partial)
Personal Trainer
Summertime Saga
Cure my addiction
Wicked Rouge
Peasant's Quest
A struggle with Sin

To name a few.

Yes, there are some very successful VNs too (City of Broken Dreams, Light of my Life etc.), but I would say that most abandoned games are VNs, as they are a lot more work for a lot less playtime for the player.

The key is to limit the grinding and very good hint system. The player should never feel stuck at some point in the game.

Hi, many thanks for your comments. I do not want to argue but IMO big brother was a boring grindy game and you can play milfy city only because of the mod. Both of them abandoned. I do not play Being a dik anymore as gradually gets quite boring. I have never tried all the other mentioned games but in any case many games are successful because of the mods. A good navigation system is always an advantage. Probably is a matter of taste and the time you have to spent. KR

 

[McZoy]

Yep, I have a couple of friends here. Even if the game is 10/10 and sandbox is actual sandbox and not freeroam they won't play it at all

Hi, IMO there are partially sandbox excellent games like timestamps and midnight paradise. Good navigation system is very important game element.

 

[giovi96goblin]

someone with the full save or a walkthrough?