bruh you ain't lookin for a game you're lookin for a cg dump with some bits of text to get the context for a scene.
Totally agree.
There is no need for complicated branching storylines that make the slow development even slower, but some kind of player agency so that you don't feel like you are reading a novel is absolutely necessary imo.
And imo this needs to happen rather sooner than later. It's an illusion to believe that prolonging this will magically make it easier later on. On the contrary, the more isolated scenes there are, the harder it will be to combine them later on to a coherent story, especially at such a pace.
For example: I remember someone pointing out that the "x likes that" pop-ups are completely fake (it's a simple text and no variables are changed). Adding more and more scenes that aren't connected won't help.
I think both of these takes can be correct, depending on the circumstances. It does make things more complex if you’ll have to go back and add important paths later on, and if I was in Crush’s shoes, I would’ve struggled with both the motivation and the restrictions it would involve to go back and do it later. Other developers create and develop all the branches as they write their games, and in theory there’s no reason Crush couldn’t do the same. Prolonging the difficult parts rarely makes it easier.
I want to elaborate on this. If it is a visual novel, does Crush even have an outline of that novel or have the last 4-5 years been wasted recreating wheels and solving unnecessary tech problems? I'm not asking for a draft, just if an outline of story points for Day 1, Day 2, Day 3, etc exists. What percentage of the game has been planned?
Dont know if he had some sort of rough sketch of the whole story planned out. To my knowledge, he has never talked about that.
I agree. 1.15 came off as kind of rushed IMO. If Crush would've inserted some "intermezzo" content into Tuesday and Thursday
I just played 1.11 and if that was still in the game it would make Kates reaction more plausible. That version is about her uni years and if the player chooses her to be slutty there her reaction in HCC would be on point imo.
I've been following this "game" for yearsm and Crush used to post a lot here.
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You're right in a sense that writing takes a lot of time. But, generally, it only takes time when you're not inspired by the project you're working on or caving under pressure. To be honest, it isn't exactly that much of a complicated story he's writing even if we don't know where this is heading, it feels pretty straight forward.
Its not a movie screen play though. There's nothing like the level of dialogue or direction you'd expect here. The story isn't even that intricate.
OMG, seeing a sample of the writing is surprising. I know my friend Violet Kitten could write this better and in about 15 minutes. Given an hour she'd have varied and unique text for each option and have it coded.
Dude... I'm doing the exact same thing. I'm working on a project that I'll release only when actually ready. None of that pre-release, pre-alpha stuff. Of course that by making it this way I can also fall into that valley of eternal non-released projects but it's fine.You're right in a sense that writing takes a lot of time. But, generally, it only takes time when you're not inspired by the project you're working on or caving under pressure. To be honest, it isn't exactly that much of a complicated story he's writing even if we don't know where this is heading, it feels pretty straight forward.
I have a tendency to get obsessed with ideas and they're generally inspired by other work, be it movies, music or art. I would suggest that he watches something related to "spy dramas" (maybe Alias?) for inspiration, and focus entirely on writing and let someone else do the coding.
When I'm writing its because I have been inspired by something and that creativity flows naturally. In my experience, you have to write those ideas down immediately or risk forgetting them (a reason why I always have my phone ready to write something down).
This is the time you should be writing, sometimes regardless of the social situation you're in (at least write it down) - that is the hazard of this type of work. That is when creativity flows naturally, and when writing is fun. You have to hit that wave of creativity and it'll flow naturally.
Those ideas becomes rough drafts to start with but it helps when you're in that dry spot and have no inspiration or joy of working on a specific project. A draft is still a good start and rather than agonizing on one paragraph for weeks, you can spend that time rewriting and editing the ideas you've already written down. Trying to force that flow of creativity to come out for something you're not feeling the grove for is the main reason why some writers takes a disproportionate amount of time doing little work sometimes. Its not the writers fault per se. They're mostly just tunneled into that position by pressure from outside sources, be it family or monetary - the latter being the prime evil.
I've followed this game for a while now and I've always been impressed by the writing, especially the research/knowledge in the subject he puts in. I can see that he is someone who obsess over smaller but important details in expressing a scene. That is sometimes my biggest weakness in writing, because I have a hard time putting the scene inside my head on the canvas if you catch my drift. I use 3D rendering to get those scenes out on my own personal canvas, even if you have to adapt the information in your head to what assets is available in your programs.
Its a shame that the progress of the game is what it is. He's sort of stuck himself into a hole he can't get out of. I'm sure this is what he wanted to do for a living, or else he wouldn't spend so much time researching about the theme of his story. Its that or he has a backround in the subject at hand (maybe former SAS?).
I really liked the new style of the game (whatever version this is now) and had big hopes that it would release an episode every 2 months or so. It seems reasonable in my head. I've been working on my project for two years on my spare time and I have done close to 3000 renders - where most of the first six months was learning and becoming better at Daz Studio.
Since then I've been forced to redo my first half of my story because my renders from the beginning was not up to par with my latest (at the time) work. Now I've rewritten the story and redone the renders of that time (over 600 renders) over the past 3-4 months while having a regular job. If I can do that in that time with little experience, I think spending 5 months of this latest episode is a little excessive...
EDIT: Another point is the fact that I've worked on my project without releasing it as a early access or version 0.1 etc because of;
1: I don't like releasing half-finished work and I've played too many games like that (Games like BDIK is great because they release their work as episodes, which is much better IMO).
2: It puts unnecessary pressure on me and dampens creativity.
3: I'd rather release the full story and then work on improvements like adding animation, music and multi-choices story and eventually in-game systems.
Oh I always go back to Girl Life. Awesome game with an awesome team. I don't know how you people do it. And it's awesome to bring GL up because it kinda does what I was saying. I don't feel like your team get caught up in the details. You just write stuff, and sometimes it's not that tidy but it's completely fine (and always very hot). Girl Life can have quite a few disconnects between content, flow, pacing and stuff, but it's such a huge game that it's to be expected and at the end of the day it works perfectly.
indeed, better no choices game where dev is telling his story than fake choices-based game.
Maybe working in a team helps, one thing that I cannot recommend enough is getting second opinions about your writing. We tend to put everything through a proofreading stage and give the proof readers plenty of freedom to add some flair to text if it feels a little flat. Something I did was share writing between a couple of guys on TFGS who both run solo projects. We each gave honest and forthright feedback, suggesting what to cut and where to add more. Its a very useful process as it lets you know where to focus your efforts and most importantly see where you should stop refining. There is a point where the text is fine and all the re-writes in the world aren't going to make it noticeably better.
Wow, the guy can't even be arsed to update the description that's supposed to sell the project to potential new patrons every once in a blue moon... Can someone explain how that is not him whacking people upside the head with a "this project is in milking true believers mode" red flag?From the Project description said:
