Second version of Lifepath is still in the file, just not linked to anything so one would hope he can just pick it up. Of course this is Crush we're talking about, the Todd 'I Can't Tell If It's Incompetence or Malice' Howard of this space.
HTML Female Agent [v1.20.1p] [Crushstation]
Yeah, when i said Kate enters university i meant there's a bit of early content in there and then it just died.
- Mar 26, 2017
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- Female Agent is an enormous dynamic world
- You can walk all the way through Bangkok
- Go where you want, do what you want
- Female Agent will have 200 endings
- The game has over 200 encounters, all handcrafted
It just works
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- Sep 12, 2021
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SEE THAT ABANDONED APARTMENT BUILDING? YOU CAN CLIMB IT!
Now, in all fairness to Crush, he always said that he wanted to reintegrate the lifepath before starting the the Bangkok story proper. So you can't fault him for that. Then again, I am not sure he realizes that people expect faster results, considering that lots of the story and content already exists.
The question remains, how much of the previous content will be part of the "new" path and how on earth he is tying different choices and skills into the numerous mechanics that exist in the actual novel uh game. We all know the answer. It will take him like six months to realize that it doesn't work and he has to do it all over again.
At this point I really would not be shocked, if he was inspired by Cassies Blue Swallow and in two years FA starts with a prologue where we see flashbacks of Kates lose content and her being the mother of a newly created character, who will be the actual protagonist.
The question remains, how much of the previous content will be part of the "new" path and how on earth he is tying different choices and skills into the numerous mechanics that exist in the actual novel uh game. We all know the answer. It will take him like six months to realize that it doesn't work and he has to do it all over again.
At this point I really would not be shocked, if he was inspired by Cassies Blue Swallow and in two years FA starts with a prologue where we see flashbacks of Kates lose content and her being the mother of a newly created character, who will be the actual protagonist.
Honestly he should just make the lifepaths thing and then write little missions like he did for that Christmas bonus or whatever that was. It would keep it more fresh as a write and he could do different projects and not feel tied to Bangkok. He could *COUGH* just make the Bangkok mission sweet and short (LOLOLOL) and then have continuing spy adventures etc. in the framework he's created.
Yeah - now that he's established that stand-alone episodes are a thing - he could just write the parts he has ideas for as stand-alone features and sort out how they connect to each other later. He's been teasing a handful of named episodes since at least autumn 2022, so it seems like he has a pretty good idea what happens in them. Why can't he just write these named episodes as stand-alone ones?
Why does he feel the need to write about every single shift anyway?
Literary techniques for skipping over boring, repetitive parts do exist and he's displayed some familiarity with them by managing to write about Kate's time in college without describing in great detail every single lecture she attended.
I was getting used to my work as a topless waitress at the Hard Cock Café. Getting groped by countless men became my new normal and daily grind. Every night my skimpy g-string was soaking wet. Sometimes it ended up stuffed in my mouth by Conor, who would fuck me and give me money afterwards. Still, becoming a bargirl was a line I would not cross. That's where I would draw the line. No, not me. Never! There was no sign of Devilfish either.
Until, one night, three months later ...
Not great, but took me about 5-10 minutes to write.
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As long as money keeps coming in, Crush will not change anything and the lifepath "rework" will be another year (or two) of milking his patrons. The only way to spring him to action is hurting his pocket. But with his blind loyal fans, I don't see it happening.
Because the most basic premise of storytelling is "show, don't tell". So, the game shows what's supposed to be important part of the experience, the continuous escalation of the situation MC is in, instead of just summing it up with a snippet like the one you've produced and skipping to "and then three months later".
If you have parts which read as "repetitive and boring" then that's problem with writing of these scenes, because they aren't supposed to be boring. And if all you can think of is to just skip them, then that's basically admission of defeat, and a sign of potential issue with pacing of your story.
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Fair enough, I suppose, but since Crush says he's struggling with making barmaid shifts between more important story beats exciting ("I realised that I was repeating story beats we've already had"), why not just gloss over these barmaid shifts - and write the parts that do advance the heroine's corruption?
Crush (12 March 2024)
I’m working on it full time every day to get it ready for testing and release. The problem has been that what I’ve been producing has felt boring and I fucking hated it. (And myself ) I was really worried that I actually couldn’t pull off another barmaid shift and make it sexy, which is a problem because the story’s not ready for the heroine to make the jump to bargirl yet.
I realised that I was repeating story beats we’ve already had – the initial shock of the job itself (omg I’m topless! omg I’m on camera! etc). Unfortunately the solution to this wasn’t as simple as my original plan (“do it again, but this time in fuck-me boots”). Skinnying down the length was an important step, but it's not the whole solution.
Barmaid shifts becoming repetitive betrays a lack of imagination. You can have events and special days. If one day of the week is especially slow the girls go fully nude. Body paint jerseys if there is some big sportsball game. Add an interesting group of patrons to cause trouble, sailors on leave or something.
I mean yes, this is one way to deal with it. Another would be to introduce new elements to alleviate repetitiveness, like the poster above suggests. And finally, yet another way would be to recognize that "story is not ready for heroine to make jump to bargirl" is entirely arbitrary, and actually making this jump without necessarily dragging out the story with weeks and months of regular bar shifts first... may be for the best -- this is, ultimately, a spy story and these tend to be fast-paced.
Of course, that last approach requires some desire to actually finish the story, as opposed to perpetual development. /s
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It's also an excuse for Crush.
He'd just have to write let's say 10 small barmaid events that randomly get activated during the week.
Afterwards he can add more as the game progresses.
Obviously give the player options of what to do with them.
Drink with the annoying tourists, go back home with one of them....... whatever.
Just give the player something to do for in between versions.
And with every story release he could add a few small events that fire randomly that the player could have.
Other twine games have that, for some reason some people say this would be impossible in this one.
I mean what it should be between those story beats is the game. Make shifts into a repetitive sandbox event in which you interact with the location and its characters. Stuff like Young Maria or those types of games come to mind. I've spent hours in those types of games chasing nothing but a slightly different porn GIF and watching fake numbers increase so I can buy a new shirt or something.
For example after your first linear shift you enter a 'shift hub' where you have to earn x amount of money or y amount of a character's trust to get deeper into the bar's organization which, when those variables are met, will then trigger the next linear story beat. A corruption system could slowly unlock more depraved interactions MC is willing to take with Bar patrons to earn more tips or trust etc.
The fact that there is no economic pull or system in the game and little reason for one since MC is actively able to tap her agency for resources is problematic IMO. Give MC a fixed stipend from the agency and then add more need for money. There's a clothing system, let MC earn money at the bar and use it to buy new clothing. Give the clothing stats that make MC earn more tips. Make MC have to pay rent. Make the local cops or gangsters shake MC down for bribe money or favors outside of the Agency's knowledge.
For example after your first linear shift you enter a 'shift hub' where you have to earn x amount of money or y amount of a character's trust to get deeper into the bar's organization which, when those variables are met, will then trigger the next linear story beat. A corruption system could slowly unlock more depraved interactions MC is willing to take with Bar patrons to earn more tips or trust etc.
The fact that there is no economic pull or system in the game and little reason for one since MC is actively able to tap her agency for resources is problematic IMO. Give MC a fixed stipend from the agency and then add more need for money. There's a clothing system, let MC earn money at the bar and use it to buy new clothing. Give the clothing stats that make MC earn more tips. Make MC have to pay rent. Make the local cops or gangsters shake MC down for bribe money or favors outside of the Agency's knowledge.
Sounds somewhat like the training scenes from the lifepath. They weren't very good
He simply doesn't know how to connect his little side missions with the bigger picture down the line, mostly because there is no bigger picture other than becoming a bargirl and eventually devilfish. He can't work towards a goal, if he doesn't know what the goal is or how he can get there.
Quite frankly, if he was smart he would do what some of you already suggested. Treat the barmaid part of the game as some sort of framework. Toss in some random one liners that require a choice and these choices give you a modifiers to your stats. Not that those mean anything anyway, but that is a different story. Then, every couple of months open up a scene along the lines of:
"and after x months of grinding an opportunity presented itself".
Mission A, B, C.
Now give the player a choice between several side missions and focus on the side mission. Once the player has completed said mission, it is back to grinding until another opportunity arises which lets you pick from another list of missions. Could be the same missions that you didn't chose last time, could be different ones. Could be ones that he has written in the meantime.
By doing so you would completely forego the need to connect everything in a linear way and you would give the player some actual agency in how they want to play and in what order. You could simply let them play episodes in a random order at any given time and you could write these episodes in a way that you see fit. Not fancy writing a certain story this month? Okay, lets write a different episode and introduce that into the game. While that wouldn't progress the story, it would certainly add content and add more width, rather than depth, if you know what I mean. Either way, you could always add more missions to this stage of the game without compromising the bigger picture.
Eventually you need to complete a certain amount of episodes or gather information that is only available in some episodes, but not in others and once you have done that, progress the story to the next stage. In the meantime the players can experience a variety of missions in a way that the players chose, not Crush. There is no need for linear writing in this format other than that he needs to add a progression point at some point.
Right now he is completely effed, because he can only go in one direction and he doesn't know how to get there.
Quite frankly, if he was smart he would do what some of you already suggested. Treat the barmaid part of the game as some sort of framework. Toss in some random one liners that require a choice and these choices give you a modifiers to your stats. Not that those mean anything anyway, but that is a different story. Then, every couple of months open up a scene along the lines of:
"and after x months of grinding an opportunity presented itself".
Mission A, B, C.
Now give the player a choice between several side missions and focus on the side mission. Once the player has completed said mission, it is back to grinding until another opportunity arises which lets you pick from another list of missions. Could be the same missions that you didn't chose last time, could be different ones. Could be ones that he has written in the meantime.
By doing so you would completely forego the need to connect everything in a linear way and you would give the player some actual agency in how they want to play and in what order. You could simply let them play episodes in a random order at any given time and you could write these episodes in a way that you see fit. Not fancy writing a certain story this month? Okay, lets write a different episode and introduce that into the game. While that wouldn't progress the story, it would certainly add content and add more width, rather than depth, if you know what I mean. Either way, you could always add more missions to this stage of the game without compromising the bigger picture.
Eventually you need to complete a certain amount of episodes or gather information that is only available in some episodes, but not in others and once you have done that, progress the story to the next stage. In the meantime the players can experience a variety of missions in a way that the players chose, not Crush. There is no need for linear writing in this format other than that he needs to add a progression point at some point.
Right now he is completely effed, because he can only go in one direction and he doesn't know how to get there.
The funny thing about his desire to go back to the lifepath system is that the lifepath system was all about character-building. The idea was that you made choices that shaped your character and so developed a particular set of skills that would (presumably) shape your career as an agent: Were you the academic high-flyer who spoke loads of languages and knew loads about other cultures, or were you the rebellious chick who played in a band and felt at home in clubs?
Fast forward a few years and there's no real skill system anymore so what's the point of having different character builds? I remember the lifepath system allowed you to basically develop a college years body-count that would shame the Israeli army and that kind of character is supposed to slot into a novel where the main character gets freaked out over sucking a dick?
This is just an excuse: 'Sorry guys... no update this month but I've been working really hard on re-tooling the lifepath system. Also I fell down a mine and have cat aids. Please increase patreon. Me sick'
Fast forward a few years and there's no real skill system anymore so what's the point of having different character builds? I remember the lifepath system allowed you to basically develop a college years body-count that would shame the Israeli army and that kind of character is supposed to slot into a novel where the main character gets freaked out over sucking a dick?
This is just an excuse: 'Sorry guys... no update this month but I've been working really hard on re-tooling the lifepath system. Also I fell down a mine and have cat aids. Please increase patreon. Me sick'
I'm happy for you if you enjoy this sort of experience, but it's exactly the kind of dumb grind that makes many people hate the "sandbox porn games" with white-hot passion. Wasting hours for mere crumbs of content is not what they find fun at all.