VN Ren'Py Fleet Morals Development Thread

[skirtchaser]

FLEET MORALS​

Hi you fine folks,

I decided three days ago that I will try my hands at this fun. I'm not completely new to 3D art, but I mostly work with Blender and have only been experimenting and learning DAZ3D for a little under a year now. That being said I'm committed to pulling through with this and I want to do a good job.

So far I have mostly worked on folder structures, created characters, plotted out a story line for the intro / v0.1 and started rendering a handful of renders, but also clean background to superimpose characters on top later should I need the same scene again. I think this will make for much simpler development and variance when it comes to those in-between conversations that would take more time to render individually than to take rendered parts and combine them in Photoshop.

Right now my whole computer setup is a bit underpowered so I'll take any speedups I can get, maybe that changes over the course of this development. Maybe not, making money isn't my main goal here but of course it would be sweet to pay for a proper GPU or something in the long run.

Anyway, so far the story line follows Laura, a recent recruit aboard the Republic Fleet command vessel "Defiant". The Republic is at war with "The Conglomerate" which provides a nice background story with lots of potential for adventure, treachery, secrets and of course intergalactic politics because we all are here for the plot, right? Over the course of the game we will see her make it out of training and follow her carve her path through the hierarchy, meet and converse with plenty of different people in addition to a core group of recurring characters.

A big fleet vessel like this has a lot of room for people, romances, choices and consequences. I'm excited about it.

I hope you enjoy this thread, I'll attach some renders that I have so far and hope to see you around as I work on and update this project.

IMAGERY
​

 

[skirtchaser]

The game is making solid progress, I worked mostly on getting the story and writing forward, only did two more renders. I noticed right away how quickly a story can spiral outwards in terms of complexity, I have a party scene at the end of the first chapter and man that was a lot of work. Also a lot of fun though.

Right now I'm pretty much done with the least-complex version of the chapter, but that means there are only a handful of choices in there and two possible sex scenes that I want to extend once the actual chapter is playable. There's a choice to be made about the career path following the first chapter, but right now there is only really one option and a second that pretty much just delays having to make a choice.

All of which is to say that I feel good about the progress I made, I'm pretty sure I'll have a playable version up by the end of the month, latest.

 

[skirtchaser]

I redid the female character seen in the last image above, I wasn't quite happy with her. Means I'll have to redo the renders with her in it, but it's early enough in development to make drastic changes.

 

[skirtchaser]

And here are some more character renders that I like quite a bit.

 

[skirtchaser]

I have made great progress these past few days, finishing nearly the whole writing and a good 60% of the renders I need for v.01. I have reduced complexity quite a bit since the goal is to have a fully playable version up and running first.

That means that I will go in after v.01 is published and vastly extend the choices in the first chapter when it comes to possible career choices and dialog options. It's already pretty complex as it is, I feel like this game will be honstly fun to play once it grows. Also I started working on the two sex scenes already accessible in the first chapter, just need to finish the renders now.

 

[osanaiko]

Looking good so far!

One small piece of advice - your last few renders in the thread would benefit from some more directed lighting on the character's faces - the backgrounds are often brighter than the characters who should be the focus of the image.

Note that this doesn't mean you need spotlights on everyone's face, but a combo of a side light and a softer broad light from above near the camera viewpoint will help the character's face's pop out.

Here's a quick couple of renders to show what i mean:

1. Just using environment dome and emissive scenery lights:



2. Adding a 3 point light set focused on the girl's face:

 

[skirtchaser]

Looking good so far!

One small piece of advice - your last few renders in the thread would benefit from some more directed lighting on the character's faces - the backgrounds are often brighter than the characters who should be the focus of the image.

Note that this doesn't mean you need spotlights on everyone's face, but a combo of a side light and a softer broad light from above near the camera viewpoint will help the character's face's pop out.

Here's a quick couple of renders to show what i mean:

1. Just using environment dome and emissive scenery lights:

View attachment 768370

2. Adding a 3 point light set focused on the girl's face:
View attachment 768372

Thank you, I hope to have a playable game soon!

As for the feedback I get that but I'm unsure there. On one hand I fully agree that the renders turn out pretty dark, on the other that is intended as those are evening / night shots or the dark, thick forest. Often times I like the way the shadows play on the faces / characters. But I get what you mean, maybe I should still redo those renders and make them brighter.

Thanks for the feedback, I'll experiment with that a bit more. I'm getting to the sex scene renders now which is the last real piece of work, after that I just need a few more renders in between. Two sex scenes in the first version, one male and the other female.

 

[Morgan42]

View attachment 767298
View attachment 767299

This corridor asset is great, I'm using it too.

 

[skirtchaser]

This corridor asset is great, I'm using it too.

I like it a lot as well, can double or triple in use depending on how you frame the camera. I just saw your game thread the other day, interesting project you have going on there.

 

[osanaiko]

As for the feedback I get that but I'm unsure there. On one hand I fully agree that the renders turn out pretty dark, on the other that is intended as those are evening / night shots or the dark, thick forest. Often times I like the way the shadows play on the faces / characters. But I get what you mean, maybe I should still redo those renders and make them brighter.

You can always change the color of the lights to make it a "night scene" - blue/purple spotlights or emissive panels. I just feel that the images are missing a focus point.

Anyway, good luck and looking forward to see the first release.

 

[skirtchaser]

You can always change the color of the lights to make it a "night scene" - blue/purple spotlights or emissive panels. I just feel that the images are missing a focus point.

Anyway, good luck and looking forward to see the first release.

That is a good point, I'll try that. Thanks again, it helps to get feedback on what looks off.

 

[skirtchaser]

I tried my hands at some banner art and this took waaaaay too much time.

 

[skirtchaser]

So I'm not quite sure how to add my game to the forum, I'll have to go through the instructions tonight but it's done, the first version is ready to play.

You must be registered to see the links

State of the game so far:

• 103 renders
• 900 lines of code
• Fully playable first chapter
• Groundwork laid for three or four different career paths, currently one set up that I want to follow primarily before adding additional ones.
• Two sex scenes, one masturbation scene that can happen, surrounded by some dialog choices.
• Karma system implemented, not used much yet though.
• Ground work laid for a romance option with the fleet admiral, but that will be a slowly developing thing over the course of a few chapters and connected with an interesting plot line.

Lots of work to be done still of course, here's a small log of upcoming to-dos:

• Some scenes could use more renders from different angles
• Some dialog does not branch out a lot / feels a bit linear
• I purposefully limited career path choices to one, this will be extended in the upcoming releases but for now it drastically reduces complexity so I can keep the project under control and build up some story progression before I branch out.
• Story progression of course, I have mapped out how the next chapter will progress and I have a pretty cool story line that I am excited to work on.
• I took out one of the male characters as a possible sex scene for this release, but I want to make that available in the next one as well.

 

[Morgan42]

So I'm not quite sure how to add my game to the forum, I'll have to go through the instructions tonight but it's done, the first version is ready to play.

You must be registered to see the links

State of the game so far:

• 103 renders
• 900 lines of code
• Fully playable first chapter
• Groundwork laid for three or four different career paths, currently one set up that I want to follow primarily before adding additional ones.
• Two sex scenes, one masturbation scene that can happen, surrounded by some dialog choices.
• Karma system implemented, not used much yet though.
• Ground work laid for a romance option with the fleet admiral, but that will be a slowly developing thing over the course of a few chapters and connected with an interesting plot line.

Lots of work to be done still of course, here's a small log of upcoming to-dos:

• Some scenes could use more renders from different angles
• Some dialog does not branch out a lot / feels a bit linear
• I purposefully limited career path choices to one, this will be extended in the upcoming releases but for now it drastically reduces complexity so I can keep the project under control and build up some story progression before I branch out.
• Story progression of course, I have mapped out how the next chapter will progress and I have a pretty cool story line that I am excited to work on.
• I took out one of the male characters as a possible sex scene for this release, but I want to make that available in the next one as well.

How many renders are you shooting for for the first release?

 

[skirtchaser]

How many renders are you shooting for for the first release?

Hey, I never caught your message. I think the total came out to be around 103 if I recall correctly.

Now I'm busy working on v0.2, I am just about done with the writing process and starting to work on some renders. This one turned out pretty large and will probably take some 150+ renders, that will be a huge amount to pose and render. That being said I'm excited how the story develops, I feel that it's quite interesting.