VN Ren'Py Friends in Need [Ch.10 v0.71] [NeonGhosts]

[52637]

Machete I don't wanna be "that guy", but I noticed several times you write "lecit" when you mean "legit", as in legitimate. There's no C.

I guess it's not your main language, sorry if I offend.

 

[Ottoeight]

The game is great how it is, it doesn't need changes imo. Basically there are three paths:
- Dark, fast and nasty. Expect dead ends with the girls or worse.
- Corruption, this is the middle ground. Sort of use the girls but give them something so they stay around.
- Romantic, fee fees talks and walks in the park

Everyone should know by now how the western vn scene works. There are two types of devs, big updates one time a year or shorter ones every 2 or 3 months, Neon is the later. Players can wait until the game is finished or wait a few updates before playing again if they think updates are short.

Anyway, NeonGhost is doing great for a new dev imo.

I think we might add a "just friends path".

 

[Machete]

FIN is very obviously not the type of game you are describing. It's a non linear story where decision matters and you have to actually think as a player as opposed to clicking through text until a false decision is presented.

I totally agree. As i mentioned i think in my first post on the topic, i think Friends is Need might very likely be my favored game on this site. And i was very much looking forward for this release. But i've seen red flags in this last release and therefore i wanted to provide a strong feedback. Not because i'm pissed and i wanted to complain but because i feel protective toward a project i strongly appreciate and respect.

My point was to say "Hey NeonGhost, i know you are doing a very honest and entusiastic job here, but i think you might be heading to this counterproductive direction and those might be the consequencies on the quality of the game".

That's why they call them feedbacks, because they are meant to spot existing or potential problems in order to correct them when it's still possible.

Machete I don't wanna be "that guy", but I noticed several times you write "lecit" when you mean "legit", as in legitimate. There's no C.

I guess it's not your main language, sorry if I offend.

Be my guest being that guy I know i make a shitload of typos and genuine errors. While i'm very familiar with english i have very little chances to 'produce english' by writing or speaking it. And i very seldom doublecheck what i write, lazy me. And sometimes also i honestly think that some word is spelled in a way while it's actually another. I tend to italianize english a lot.

 

[depeche mode]

britanni, ashe risa harem when

 

[CrazyRabbit]

I didn't follow all the (unwarranted I'm sure) drama this update triggered and my search was ambiguous so if I understood completely :

We got the next update but only for the vanilla version. And it'll come next on the "classic" version ?
Or should I just play the vanilla one ? Does it take up where we left off ? (I have no dark path taken anyway)

 

[soprano31]

(I have no dark path taken anyway)

 

[armond]

I didn't follow all the (unwarranted I'm sure) drama this update triggered and my search was ambiguous so if I understood completely :

We got the next update but only for the vanilla version. And it'll come next on the "classic" version ?
Or should I just play the vanilla one ? Does it take up where we left off ? (I have no dark path taken anyway)

Nikki cut off guys hand and revealed she's his father, woops, spoilers. As I'm sure you can surmise, this was a little devisive.

 

[CrazyRabbit]

View attachment 3223770

Have you no what now ?

Nikki cut off guys hand and revealed she's his father, woops, spoilers. As I'm sure you can surmise, this was a little devisive.

Oh, a classic Monday morning for MC then ?

 

[Mesmerizet]

I think this is exactly the problem.

In the route i'm playing MC is the nice guy, he's in great relationship with Nikki, he spent the night with Ashe, great relationship with her too, he is in the good guy route with Brittani, all perfectly lecit choices, but having choosed the reception brat at the end of last chapter i got exactly 0 content.

Just the dumb influencers, a chat with Brittani slut mother (and barely any interaction with Brittani, sure none sexy), and not even anithing to do with Pepper in cam.

Zero content.

I think the game it's cutting out the player too early for perfectly reasonable and lecit choice and this can derail the experience midgame. I've seen it happen to other games, that started well and ended very lame with basically a couple of hours of click forward with nothing happening and then a 'very satisfing' bad ending. Maybe because you chosed the route of a girl who's plot has been sidelined (an nothing suggester you shouldn't have had) or because you choiced to gift a girl chocolate instead of flowers early in the game again with no indication of that being the wrong choice.

With a much branching game like yours, Neon Ghost (which by the way is a great thing) you need to be able to recover interactions later in the game, or be in some solid route that happens even if your go through sideroads.

If some early choice close entire routes and the player is left with nothing to do the experience turn frustrating very quick.

Mine is not a critic, it's a concerned feedback having just had a not so good gaming experience (again with choices by no mean terrible).

Well I chose Risa too, and I have to say that Risa would be worth it (future scenes hopefully haha)

 

[Dr.Slime]

Quick FYI to touch on some comments I saw.

Not Enough Sex: No, there's not a ton of sex content in this one. Nicki has two alignment-dependent scenes, Ashe has a short one, Brittani has some teasing, and Pepper has some webcam content. I said this a few times over the last month, and over on my pages, but the original plan was for this to be part of a larger chapter, which would have included three more sex scenes at various points on the light/dark axis, and some big story developments for Gabby. But, I got in the weeds with the update, and would have needed to push the release date back by at least a month, and likely more. Which leads me to my next point..

Too Short: See my comment about getting in the weeds. Basically, my decision to end the last chapter with the player in several very different circumstances (Sleeping alone, sleeping with Nicki, sleeping with Ashe, sleeping with Risa..) along with several other modifiers (Did you know Pepper is a camgirl? Did you know Nicki left? Was Ashe happy with you when she slept over? Is Carolina and Maya happy with you?) just wound up being more work than anticipated. So, an update with almost 900 renders can be played through one time, and you may only see 450 of those.

Do I Need to Wait for the Next Two Official Releases? Not really. The new stuff will come after the events of 0.55, and it's just my attempt to put a nicer bow on the end of the chapter. I'll release that stuff as a patch for people who don't want to re-download the whole update.

Dubya-tee-eff, No More Dark Content? Not really.. Again, this has been a converstion before. I was warning of this even before the last update, and everyone was saying it'd be the death of the game and blah blah blah.. Then the Ashe chapter came out, and I think people realized the truth was more nuanced. My goal has never been to force people into the box of being a good guy. Just that there be realistic consequences for being a bad guy. Consequences =/= punishment, by the way. Learning that Brittani's mom is basically willing to sell her to you is a consequence of being a bad guy, feeding into the dark path. But, so is driving off Nicki, and dealing with the repercussions that come with that. I just want to explore what happens to a Guy who's basically constantly lashing out at the people around him. While he may drive a lot of people away, that doesn't mean everyone will be in a position to leave immediately, and it doesn't mean he might not attract other like-minded people.

Also, to be perfectly blunt, it's never been my intention to write pure misery porn. I've played games that went that route, and I don't think there's any real meat on that bone. I'm trying to make like.. Breaking Bad, not A Serbian Film.

Also, also? Even the vanilla paths for characters will get trimmed a bit, just based on what the story needs. Like, Nicki's around all the time because she's your assistant. How much do we really need to see a Carolina who's been relegated to a friend path? Not much, I'd reckon.

Now, I also think it's worth noting that Not Enough Sex/Too Short are the direct results of me trying to address other critiques I'd previously gotten. People complained that the story wasn't moving fast enough. Okay, now we have scenes advancing the story of Pepper's bruises, your relationship with Nicki, your relationship with Ashe, Brittani's relationship with her mom, the future of your collaboration with Brittani, another glimpse at a place MC's invested in, a look at the downside of fame with being stalked by internet oddballs, a look at Alex's past, the idea that MC's going to learn some self-defense, Maya and Carolina's relationship with MC being dependent on how MC's treated Nicki, the photo mystery having another clue put into place, and more stuff besides. Story movement tends to come at the expense of long sex scenes.

People also dinged me for only presenting the 'illusion of choice.' Well, now the game radically diverges based on what you chose last chapter. But again, that does come at the expense of having one long, mostly linear update.

I'm not putting the blame on people who commented asking for more story/more choices, by the way. Ultimately, I'm the one who made the thing, for good or ill. But, sometimes I like to take these things as a challenge, and use them as inspiration to try new things. It's not always successful!

If I had put this update out as I envisioned it, with sex content for Risa and Mason, and double the renders/story stuff, I feel a lot of these complaints would be moot. But, I've only got so many hours in a day, which I can only devote a few of to game development. So, I made the best thing I could with the time alloted to me, and got it into my paying supporters' hands, because I feel like I owe it to them. I've always said I don't want to be a dev who dithers around for a year or more and then puts out a single update.

Do you man for my end i asked about nsfw scenes just so i know the update Is indeed or in need version, but now that i know.
Also ditching scenes for Story wise i'm 100% with you on this , like the people before said it's Adult visual novel that has some lewd scenes on it not the opposite .
So good work i didn't have yet time to play it but keep it up.

 

[armond]

View attachment 3223770

The fault was not mine, pervert-kun must answer

 

[depeche mode]

how do you get ashe and brittani scenes in whatever the fuck update is this one-.

 

[novaen]

What did we get on the 2023-12-30 update?

 

[GamerMcGameFace]

Any chance of Nikki come back? I’d been looking forward to her scheduled anal rapes with each update.

 

[MilesEdgeworth]

My favorite part about this game is that to get a girls full story you have to choose the right path. Wont affect your enjoyment of the game if you don't, you just wont find out all there is to know about that particular girl

 

[razien]

what is the difference of 0.8 version and 0.4 new version?

 

[Raizen84]

what is the difference of 0.8 version and 0.4 new version?

It is the continuation of the story after sex with Ashe and you decide whether to go visit Nicki or Risa, the best option is Nicki if you want to see sex

 

[Raizen84]

I will only say that the sexual scene with Nicki in the dark route was hotter than the vanilla, but the story at breakfast with her was better in the vanilla because it made me laugh, when the protagonist asked her to be his girlfriend and began to feel bad because he didn't respond immediately XD.

One flaw I see is that there are too many options with each female character and it closes your option to see another character as happened in version 4 and in this one after the scene with Ashe and visiting Nicki or Risa.

I think that the dark route should not simply be content of rape, humiliation and being a fucking cretin with Nicki, it may be that this route will focus on Bdsm, for example, where the MC was the one in charge as the alpha male hahahaha.

And try to add many new characters because that would lengthen the story more, as happened with Big Brother is a good example.

 

[razien]

I will only say that the sexual scene with Nicki in the dark route was hotter than the vanilla, but the story at breakfast with her was better in the vanilla because it made me laugh, when the protagonist asked her to be his girlfriend and began to feel bad because he didn't respond immediately XD.

One flaw I see is that there are too many options with each female character and it closes your option to see another character as happened in version 4 and in this one after the scene with Ashe and visiting Nicki or Risa.

I think that the dark route should not simply be content of rape, humiliation and being a fucking cretin with Nicki, it may be that this route will focus on Bdsm, for example, where the MC was the one in charge as the alpha male hahahaha.


And try to add many new characters because that would lengthen the story more, as happened with Big Brother is a good example.

thanks for the info

 

[DatGuy20]

Also something i noticed when i was doing another playthrough before this update dropped. you can threaten Ashe to come with you to your house in Chapter 2 and as long as u have just enough dark points she treats you lovingly which is really weird cause like i just said, you threatened her to even come with you.