HTML Female Agent [v1.20.1p] [Crushstation]

[vicaddict]

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.

 

[CreativeCritic2]

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'

 

[ffive]

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.

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.

 

[Deleted member 487846]

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.

This "game" already has curmbs of content for one that was in development for nearly 7 years, at least if it had a system like that it would help tie in that so called skills and stat system which should be able to speed up development (like that would ever happen) allowing more content to be made for the "game" :/

 

[ffive]

This "game" already has curmbs of content for one that was in development for nearly 7 years, at least if it had a system like that it would help tie in that so called skills and stat system which should be able to speed up development (like that would ever happen) allowing more content to be made for the "game" :/

There's no skills and stats system to speak of in the game, so there's nothing such addition would help with. You wouldn't speed up development but the opposite: you'd slow it down for the time needed to re-implement the "skill system", then the time needed to implement these grind crumbs, and finally you'd get the game with even more stretched out content crumbs that they are already. It's like, lose-lose-lose scenario. Or, to better drive the point home, like the Summertime Saga "tech update" which was supposed to "speed up development" too, except it's been two years in the making with no progress to actual game in this time.

 

[Mr_Ainz]

How difficult is it to introduce some sort of plot twist tho? Devilfish doesn't need to be the end.

- "Hey you can actually get to the objective earlier than expected"
+ "Finally I can end this"
- "Oh no it turns out we only caught this one chess piece but we can continue and get all of them. You in?"

 

[Senor Smut]

Again though, this isn't about Crush making progress or finishing the game. This is about Crush making excuses not to make progress or finish the game so his cult can keep giving him money for nothing. I strongly believe that at first he genuinely wanted to make a game, but once he discovered the fact that Patreon disincentivizes people from finishing projects, he settled comfortably into the scam rut. He has no desire to leave that rut, and he absolutely will not do so until people stop paying him to not produce. He'd find his motivation PDQ if his monthly receipts dropped by 80%.

 

[Ulyx]

Again though, this isn't about Crush making progress or finishing the game. This is about Crush making excuses not to make progress or finish the game so his cult can keep giving him money for nothing. I strongly believe that at first he genuinely wanted to make a game, but once he discovered the fact that Patreon disincentivizes people from finishing projects, he settled comfortably into the scam rut. He has no desire to leave that rut, and he absolutely will not do so until people stop paying him to not produce. He'd find his motivation PDQ if his monthly receipts dropped by 80%.

Exactly!!!

 

[Blockout]

How difficult is it to introduce some sort of plot twist tho? Devilfish doesn't need to be the end.

- "Hey you can actually get to the objective earlier than expected"
+ "Finally I can end this"
- "Oh no it turns out we only caught this one chess piece but we can continue and get all of them. You in?"

If you've seen a single James Bond film you are obviously already far more qualified than Crush.

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.

Wait what.

You dislike erotic events that fire between the week while the MC might do spy stuff on one night?

 

[ffive]

Wait what.

You dislike erotic events that fire between the week while the MC might do spy stuff on one night?

That wasn't about my tastes specifically. But even though i do play sandboxes, no, i don't think much of having to click through week(s) of repetitive snippets between actual plot parts. Does it genuinely sound like actual fun to you? Like, did you think the mad libs in the early build of this game, the ones where you'd get to hit on random people in the club or whatever it was, they were actually erotic? Would you still think the same after reading them for the 30-50th time, while waiting for your MC to maybe again do spy stuff on one night? Or would you just mechanically click through them at that point?

(and they do have to repeat, otherwise this is no different work from what Crush is doing already, which is writing one-off barmaid shifts)

Also, i was responding specifically to idea of "a repetitive sandbox event in which you interact with the location and its characters. (Spending hours for) nothing but a slightly different porn GIF and watching fake numbers increase so I can buy a new shirt or something."

 

[Leiafanman]

Well again, that's what makes it a game instead of a linear novel. You can't do much more with Twine anyway. I like Crush's writing, but he's been struggling with the game part of it and having a tiered grind is one way to do that...I mean didn't most of us start our western H game journey with crap like Princess Trainer?

Not to say it's good, but it's something to wile the hours away and immerse in the world more.

 

[Ripe]

That wasn't about my tastes specifically. But even though i do play sandboxes, no, i don't think much of having to click through week(s) of repetitive snippets between actual plot parts. Does it genuinely sound like actual fun to you? Like, did you think the mad libs in the early build of this game, the ones where you'd get to hit on random people in the club or whatever it was, they were actually erotic? Would you still think the same after reading them for the 30-50th time, while waiting for your MC to maybe again do spy stuff on one night? Or would you just mechanically click through them at that point?

(and they do have to repeat, otherwise this is no different work from what Crush is doing already, which is writing one-off barmaid shifts)

Also, i was responding specifically to idea of "a repetitive sandbox event in which you interact with the location and its characters. (Spending hours for) nothing but a slightly different porn GIF and watching fake numbers increase so I can buy a new shirt or something."

Some grind is unavoidable if you're going to have a game... if you're going to have a linear novel (visual or kinetic) then that is another thing, but in that case you don't really need Lifepath and whole lot of other stuff Crush wasted months (if not years) so far. And you certainly don't need multiple months between updates for an almost completely text-based novel because there will be no gameplay, no meaningfull choices, no branching paths and just a single ending.

The skills and stats from original Lifepath worked fine and were decent idea, but Crush had no idea what to do with it because he designed it without having any idea what his "game" is supposed to be and how that "game" will use those stats and skills. And he still have no idea what to do with them so reintroducing it now is rather pointless and serve nothing other then yet another excuse for not moving the plot forward (which is something else Crush have no idea how to do).

 

[robin312]

And you certainly don't need multiple months between updates for an almost completely text-based novel because there will be no gameplay, no meaningfull choices, no branching paths and just a single ending.

I think it's obvious that FA is dead. Crush is trying to simulate some activity to justify funding and to keep hope that something will be miraculously changed in the future and all his promises will be implemented

There are no miracles in our world. Crush doesn't want to change anything in his work process, because it means introducing new people into development process and then, as a result, uncovering what he is basically do nothing

I know, this is extremely sad, but life is life

face it

 

[ffive]

Some grind is unavoidable if you're going to have a game... if you're going to have a linear novel (visual or kinetic) then that is another thing, but in that case you don't really need Lifepath and whole lot of other stuff Crush wasted months (if not years) so far.

Well, you definitely don't need the lifepath to have a game about female spy, this is true. That said, grind and linearity are not related -- you can have non-linear VN without grind and a lot of them are exactly that. So the idea the grind is unavoidable if you want a non-linear game is simply false.

(you can also have a linear RPG with shitload of unnecessary grind and there's plenty of them, too, but that's another story)

 

[asdfasdf12341234ACSACA]

I think it's obvious that FA is dead. Crush is trying to simulate some activity to justify funding and to keep hope that something will be miraculously changed in the future and all his promises will be implemented

There are no miracles in our world. Crush doesn't want to change anything in his work process, because it means introducing new people into development process and then, as a result, uncovering what he is basically do nothing

I know, this is extremely sad, but life is life

face it

Don't worry, he and his defenders will come out and say "That's such a silly thing, how could it be dead, now that it's getting exciting and there are so many things to explore?"

The reality is, this project is almost 7 years old, and even for a creator, it's genuinely hard to keep interest for that long, especially when you yourself don't see that much progress.

 

[Ripe]

Well, you definitely don't need the lifepath to have a game about female spy, this is true. That said, grind and linearity are not related -- you can have non-linear VN without grind and a lot of them are exactly that. So the idea the grind is unavoidable if you want a non-linear game is simply false.

(you can also have a linear RPG with shitload of unnecessary grind and there's plenty of them, too, but that's another story)

VN's are not games... they are, as their name clearly state novels. Whether they are completely linear or even non-linear doesn't matter. And those RPG's you mention are not actual games... they are VN's masquerading as RPG's (especially ones made in RPGM who are nothing but walking simulators).

Do you need Lifepath and skills and stats to have a game about female spy? Yes, you do. You don't need it for VN about female spy where everything is scripted and "player" imput doesn't matter.

 

[ffive]

VN's are not games... they are, as their name clearly state novels. Whether they are completely linear or even non-linear doesn't matter. And those RPG's you mention are not actual games... they are VN's masquerading as RPG's (especially ones made in RPGM who are nothing but walking simulators).

The RPGs i mention are games like Baldur's Gate, Mass Effect, KOTOR, all Final Fantasy games etc, and any other RPG in existence which follows a predefined plot the player has no real control over nor branching to speak of. But sure, go ahead and argue these aren't real games. This is nothing but a "no true Scotsman" fallacy you're employing.

Not to mention this is completely pointless argument. Does anyone perusing this thing actually care whether it's a "game" or "novel" they are fapping to, and they'll zip up and leave if it's the latter? Because such concept is entirely meme-worthy.

Do you need Lifepath and skills and stats to have a game about female spy? Yes, you do.

An utterly absurd claim. Have fun arguing how e.g. No One Lives Forever isn't a game about female spy because it doesn't have Lifepath. Or skills and stats for that matter.

Just because Crush had silly idea of having few hours long sequence for what's a single-screen character creation, if that, doesn't make such element mandatory. That's just a gimmick.

At the most basic level the game can simply present the player with choices their character can take, without artificially blocking some of them. The player still would need multiple playthroughs to explore all possibilities, without having to repeatedly go through a long sequence which doesn't have anything to do with being an actual spy doing the spy work.

 

[Ripe]

The RPGs i mention are games like Baldur's Gate, Mass Effect, KOTOR, all Final Fantasy games etc, and any other RPG in existence which follows a predefined plot the player has no real control over nor branching to speak of. But sure, go ahead and argue these aren't real games. This is nothing but a "no true Scotsman" fallacy you're employing.

I thought we are talking stuff that can be found on this site, not mainstream games... but fine, we can talk about them if you insist. Since the only one of those I played was KOTOR (and KOTOR 2) I can say that while those games still have predefined plot, choices made by player in them still matter and they do have multiple endings (even if it's just Good vs. Evil ending) meaning there is a branching paths in them.

Not to mention this is completely pointless argument. Does anyone perusing this thing actually care whether it's a "game" or "novel" they are fapping to, and they'll zip up and leave if it's the latter? Because such concept is entirely meme-worthy.

I agree that your argument is pointless... whether people care if something is "game" or "novel" doesn't matter as long as people enjoy them. That does not chance the fact that they are two very different things that do tend to attract different people.

 

[Senor Smut]

...

I agree that your argument is pointless... whether people care if something is "game" or "novel" doesn't matter as long as people enjoy them. That does not chance the fact that they are two very different things that do tend to attract different people.

That's entirely true, but it's not even the main reason we need to differentiate between them in this case. Novels require no mechanics and no variables, you just get a story and you progress through it like a paper novel or a movie. Games require mechanics that A) have to be devised and balanced, B) implemented across the whole game, and C) have a meaningful impact on play. That's a lot of work, and it's compounded by the fact that Crush would need to retrofit those mechanics to everything that's happened up to now, which not only requires the labor of coding but also the labor of writing many variations of, and alternatives to, a huge number of situations past, present, and future. Crush is a man who is either a complete scammer or paralyzed by the prospect of writing more than ten words a week, and either way this is 100% guaranteed to bring to a halt whatever notional progress is being made.

I've said that it would take two years for him to finish implementing the lifepath, but upon reflection I think that it might easily be four or five years even for a halfassed rendering to be completed. This is a guy who hasn't produced a meaningful update in...what, seven months now? Even someone who works faster and is both honest and competent might well conclude that it would be easier and faster just to start the project over from scratch than take on the awkward and frustrating task of figuring out how to apply all the mechanics he's introduced and abandoned both to everything that has come before and everything that will come in the future as well as writing who-knows-how-many variations of scenes he's already written, provide new paths in already existing material that would open or close depending on your variables. And we all know Crush loves to restart this game.

Again, the main problem with the lifepaths isn't that it's not required for the novel that this venture currently is, it's that it would be an effort toward converting a half-written novel to a game, with all that entails. Half a dozen personality types (which is what he's established the lifepath would produce) require not just half a dozen variations of each scene, but half a dozen alternate paths through major sections of the game, with unique scenes in each and...well, look, Crush can't even write a consistent portrayal of one personality type, how's he gonna handle six? He can't handle writing scenes to progress the default, so he's suddenly going to handle his workload sextupling?

Diversion into lifepaths is just Crush's way of throttling back expectations to zero and keeping that sweet, sweet Patreon tit squirting the milk for another ten years or more.

 

[YellowShoes]

That's entirely true, but it's not even the main reason we need to differentiate between them in this case. Novels require no mechanics and no variables, you just get a story and you progress through it like a paper novel or a movie. Games require mechanics that A) have to be devised and balanced, B) implemented across the whole game, and C) have a meaningful impact on play. That's a lot of work, and it's compounded by the fact that Crush would need to retrofit those mechanics to everything that's happened up to know, which not only requires the labor of coding but also the labor of writing many variations of, and alternatives to, a huge number of situations past, present, and future. Crush is a man who is either a complete scammer or paralyzed by the prospect of writing more than ten words a week, and either way this is 100% guaranteed to bring to a halt whatever notional progress is being made.

I've said that it would take two years for him to finish implementing the lifepath, but upon reflection I think that it might easily be four or five years even for a halfassed rendering to be completed. This is a guy who hasn't produced a meaningful update in...what, seven months now? Even someone who works faster and is both honest and competent might well conclude that it would be easier and faster just to start the project over from scratch than take on the awkward and frustrating task of figuring out how to apply all the mechanics he's introduced and abandoned both to everything that has come before and everything that will come in the future as well as writing who-knows-how-many variations of scenes he's already written, provide new paths in already existing material that would open or close depending on your variables. And we all know Crush loves to restart this game.

Again, the main problem with the lifepaths isn't that it's not required for the novel that this venture currently is, it's that it would be an effort toward converting a half-written novel to a game, with all that entails. Half a dozen personality types (which is what he's established the lifepath would produce) require not just half a dozen variations of each scene, but half a dozen alternate paths through major sections of the game, with unique scenes in each and...well, look, Crush can't even write a consistent portrayal of one personality type, how's he gonna handle six? He can't handle writing scenes to progress the default, so he's suddenly going to handle his workload sextupling?

Diversion into lifepaths is just Crush's way of throttling back expectations to zero and keeping that sweet, sweet Patreon tit squirting the milk for another ten years or more.

Its just a scam, he is making 5k a month in Patreon, and every major update this shit gets is like 5 scenes max. Like there is no personal life excuse, since he makes more than enough money to live of this, and even hire help.