Ren'Py Four Elements Trainer [v1.0.8c] [Mity]

4.50 star(s) 273 Votes
Discussion Reviews (273)
IdarksoulsI

IdarksoulsI

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Jun 26, 2017
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yel said:
I'm guessing you don't know much about how programming works but you can't just "hire a new guy" and expect them to take over programming a game, it's nowhere near that simple. It would take a long while to sift through all the old code and that's if it's commented well enough for the person to work on it, if it's not commented then god save whoever is going to take over because they're in for a fun time.

Unless you mean hiring a 2nd coder, in which case yes, that could work, but then you have the exact same issues, and it would take time to get the other coder up to speed in how the 1st coder wants things done etc etc.

In other words, the programmer taking like 2 weeks off or whatever is hardly an issue compared to replacing a programmer altogether.

If you ask me though, if I was working non-stop since the start of this game without a holiday, I'd be fucking destroyed. It's no wonder he's burning up. He deserves a 2-3 month holiday if you ask me..
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Limezero said:
I'm guessing that your guess is incorrect, given that I AM a programmer (and someone familiar with FET's code for that matter), but I understand what you're getting at. Obviously it's not just a swap-in replacement, and even someone working on a relatively simple project like a Ren'Py VN would need weeks if not months to familiarize themselves with the existing codebase. Same with hiring a second coder, unless they're working on distinct parts of the game independently (e.g., someone on the map system and someone else on the minigames), it tends to become a managerial clusterfuck, especially with small "internet" projects.

On the other hand, that's still better than the alternative of having NO programmer at all. The worst case scenario we're looking at here is basically "guy takes 2 months off, decides that he's done anyways and quits". Hence why it makes sense to plan for that possibility, however remote, just in case. The team having a budget of 20k and only two members is kind of an anomaly.

I'm also a bit cynical when it comes to believing that he's been spending these grueling, 80 hour work weeks nonstop for the past 4 years just to make the game happen, given the amount/quality of the writing and the code, but let's not get into that. I genuinely do hope he takes the time he needs and things can get back to normal.
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I liked both of your comments because both of them are true. Nothing really qualifies me to be a judge on that, I have zero experience with programming or project management. But, right now I'm working on a mod for FET and because of that I had to dig into the code. There isn't a single line commented (I was surprised when I looked into Star Channel for the first time because Akabur has a comment on every line) but with enough time one can manage to play with the code and even fix some minor things. As long as I'm staying away from the mini games I'm pretty confident to put out some nice scenes.

So yes, it's probably not that easy to replace the coder but it's also not that hard either. The fact he's responsible for big parts of the story and the game flow in general is probably the bigger issue here.
Balrog said:
Older Jinora's haircut is so fucking ugly, LOK really fucked up on that.
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Thank god I have no problem with that. But I can relate, I had problems with some of Toph's expressions because they reminded me of someone I know in real life.
 
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witteb

Member
May 3, 2019
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wait hold on, why woud anyone use his index finger to scroll. So does that mean he's using his thumb to left click. I thaught that everyone uses his middle finger to scroll.
 
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Barkin 10

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Dec 27, 2016
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witbe said:
wait hold on, why woud anyone use his index finger to scroll. So does that mean he's using his thumb to left click. I thaught that everyone uses his middle finger to scroll.
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You thaught wrong. The index finger is more coordinated and more controllable than the middle finger. It can easily make that small jump from wheel to left click on something.
 
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Deleted member 436513

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IdarksoulsI said:
There isn't a single line commented (I was surprised when I looked into Star Channel for the first time because Akabur has a comment on every line)
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I think that's mostly to do with Ren'Py stripping out comments and turning them into blank lines when compiling things to .rpyc-s, rather than the code not being commented. The "leaked" sources in the .zip that's been left in the game for the last couple updates have them at fairly regular intervals. If anything that's probably the one thing NOT wrong with the code, next to the leviathan issues like every source file being in the same directory, the game not being planned with a replay/scene playback system in mind, or the classic "fifty two elif statements" meme (card4.rpy is a fun one if you haven't seen it yet).

That said, it's worth noting that the game is REALLY modular given its book-based nature, meaning that basically none of the code from the Katara/Azula/etc. chapters has been touched since forever. Every new feature or route that's implemented gets neatly stitched onto the end, and they all live happily in their separate worlds. FET's a giant fucking pile of spaghetti code, sure, but strangely enough this makes it a non-issue. Development is effectively re-started at the beginning of every new route, so as long as the previous chapters are functional you can forget about the whole thing and leave it there as a black box.

It's also why the issue of hiring a new coder is weird to me, if they aren't planning on refactoring the whole game or adding something like a replay system that would require going back to track down some scenes and edit them, there isn't really anything TO familiarize yourself with. Same with minigames, you could hire a new guy to do something like the previously mentioned CCG, have him complete it, and then literally just DRAG AND DROP IT into the game without a hitch.
 
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Pr0man

Pr0man

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Jul 23, 2017
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Limezero said:
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Well, it's entirely possible that after they complete the game in its entirety, that there will be extra updates working on earlier books to a certain degree - it was stated in comments left on patreon by MITY a couple times (that's been quite a while though, so don't actually quote me on that) that they might do some touching-up of older content, but not entire reworks from what I remember. So the question is rather: "To what extend is stuff happening after the game is technically speaking done?"

But by the looks of it this also means that the coder is doing these whole book segments all by himself without much attention to modularity within the book, but rather only cares about it all functioning with the remainder of the game. If the code for each book by themselves is an actual mess but works with the remainder of the game, getting in an extra coder there seems to be doing more harm than good at that point.
 
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Deleted member 436513

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Pr0man said:
Well, it's entirely possible that after they complete the game in its entirety, that there will be extra updates working on earlier books to a certain degree - it was stated in comments left on patreon by MITY a couple times (that's been quite a while though, so don't actually quote me on that) that they might do some touching-up of older content, but not entire reworks from what I remember. So the question is rather: "To what extend is stuff happening after the game is technically speaking done?"

But by the looks of it this also means that the coder is doing these whole book segments all by himself without much attention to modularity within the book, but rather only cares about it all functioning with the remainder of the game. If the code for each book by themselves is an actual mess but works with the remainder of the game, getting in an extra coder there seems to be doing more harm than good at that point.
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IMO it's worth thinking about FET as if Mity has released four separate games so far, titled "Katara Trainer", "Toph Trainer" and so on. It makes more sense that way too, why the hell would you need to worry about the love system's variables that Azula Trainer had when that game was finished years ago, and you're now working on Korra Trainer. Similarly, why the hell would you go back and work on the mooselion game in Katara Trainer to fix some minor bugs when you haven't touched it in years and the next update of Korra Trainer is eagerly awaited by the fans.

Modularity also comes naturally to things like minigames, since what you're doing on the Ren'Py level is effectively telling the system "go run this thing, and once it's done we'll continue things back here". You could even go on the Lemma forums, find a complete minigame that somebody else wrote and integrate it into FET with three lines of code and about fifteen minutes of work. The logic of e.g., a crab battle or a poker minigame has nothing, and SHOULD have nothing to do with the actual flow of the game, or the map system, or the day night cycle, or whatever else. At most you'll be displaying some porn scenes or setting some variables like the player's money.
 
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Trello

Newbie
Jan 15, 2018
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Limezero said:
I'm guessing that your guess is incorrect, given that I AM a programmer (and someone familiar with FET's code for that matter), but I understand what you're getting at. Obviously it's not just a swap-in replacement, and even someone working on a relatively simple project like a Ren'Py VN would need weeks if not months to familiarize themselves with the existing codebase. Same with hiring a second coder, unless they're working on distinct parts of the game independently (e.g., someone on the map system and someone else on the minigames), it tends to become a managerial clusterfuck, especially with small "internet" projects.

On the other hand, that's still better than the alternative of having NO programmer at all. The worst case scenario we're looking at here is basically "guy takes 2 months off, decides that he's done anyways and quits". Hence why it makes sense to plan for that possibility, however remote, just in case. The team having a budget of 20k and only two members is kind of an anomaly.

I'm also a bit cynical when it comes to believing that he's been spending these grueling, 80 hour work weeks nonstop for the past 4 years just to make the game happen, given the amount/quality of the writing and the code, but let's not get into that. I genuinely do hope he takes the time he needs and things can get back to normal.
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Yeah I see your point, hopefully we don't need the worst case scenario but I suppose it's a good idea to have one plotted out in case it is necessary.

I must admit, I never realised it was literally two people working on the game. On one hand they're probably both VERY rich from making this and on the other they must be very tired from just being two people working on a game with such a large scale as this.

The quality of the game both from a code and writing perspective is incredibly impressive given that side of things. Seeing the update above it looks like we're getting there anyways :D
 
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4.50 star(s) 273 Votes