VN Ren'Py Friends in Need [Ch. 9 v0.60c] [NeonGhosts]

[NeonGhosts]

FYI: I posted a short story featuring Ashe's ill-fated attempt to pursue modeling over on Patreon and SubStar, for all patron tiers. This is similar to the previous story I posted with Viola, featuring several images interspersed with prose.

So I went the uh... "taboo" route with Viola, and that was mostly the end of it except a couple of internet pictures. Is there significantly more content with her on the vanilla paths?

The short answer is yes. I don't want to get into it too much, but the next couple updates will start to show that you can only be so much of an asshole, and still keep the girls in your orbit. That doesn't mean they're necessarily gone, but their appearances may be more limited.

I talked about this a bit on Discord, but the reasons for this are varied. The first big one is just that pruning a branch from a character's story will ultimately reduce my workload by.. A lot. For example, my current update has me juggling four simultaneous paths for Ashe (with friendship and love having a lot of overlap). Remove one of those branches, and development goes way faster. Multiply that by several characters, and it's exponential.

So, which one makes the most sense to cut off? I think it's the one where MC goes to prison or gets murdered by Ashe's vengeful Hulk of a father, if he continues to pursue it. This goes for most of the girls. At a certain point it strains credulity, and one begins to wonder why a girl would tolerate outright abuse, when she could just leave. Even using porn logic ("Well, you wouldn't want these pictures getting out..") only goes so far.

The other reason is that I feel I can really only push into those storylines so much, until the whole thing just becomes misery/torture porn. Which I'm frankly just not super interested in. I've played games like that, and after a while the whole thing just feels a bit gross.

By contrast, the corruption routes kind of let me have my cake and eat it, too. I get to write dark, kinky stuff, where the mood can be either kind of lighthearted, or more serious. Likewise, the love route lets me write romance, while occassionally subverting it and letting MC be a toxic partner.

Now, saying all that.. I still keep finding new ways to add dark scenes to the game. There's one in the next update that you can only get if you've played Ashe's friendship route up to that point. There's another that spans all four of her potential paths. So, the dark stuff isn't going away -- it's just that they'll usually be more like isolated, relationship-breaking incidents.

Emphasis on usually.

 

[Joshy92]

FYI: I posted a short story featuring Ashe's ill-fated attempt to pursue modeling over on Patreon and SubStar, for all patron tiers. This is similar to the previous story I posted with Viola, featuring several images interspersed with prose.

View attachment 2692017



The short answer is yes. I don't want to get into it too much, but the next couple updates will start to show that you can only be so much of an asshole, and still keep the girls in your orbit. That doesn't mean they're necessarily gone, but their appearances may be more limited.

I talked about this a bit on Discord, but the reasons for this are varied. The first big one is just that pruning a branch from a character's story will ultimately reduce my workload by.. A lot. For example, my current update has me juggling four simultaneous paths for Ashe (with friendship and love having a lot of overlap). Remove one of those branches, and development goes way faster. Multiply that by several characters, and it's exponential.

So, which one makes the most sense to cut off? I think it's the one where MC goes to prison or gets murdered by Ashe's vengeful Hulk of a father, if he continues to pursue it. This goes for most of the girls. At a certain point it strains credulity, and one begins to wonder why a girl would tolerate outright abuse, when she could just leave. Even using porn logic ("Well, you wouldn't want these pictures getting out..") only goes so far.

The other reason is that I feel I can really only push into those storylines so much, until the whole thing just becomes misery/torture porn. Which I'm frankly just not super interested in. I've played games like that, and after a while the whole thing just feels a bit gross.

By contrast, the corruption routes kind of let me have my cake and eat it, too. I get to write dark, kinky stuff, where the mood can be either kind of lighthearted, or more serious. Likewise, the love route lets me write romance, while occassionally subverting it and letting MC be a toxic partner.

Now, saying all that.. I still keep finding new ways to add dark scenes to the game. There's one in the next update that you can only get if you've played Ashe's friendship route up to that point. There's another that spans all four of her potential paths. So, the dark stuff isn't going away -- it's just that they'll usually be more like isolated, relationship-breaking incidents.

Emphasis on usually.

Does that part about the love route & toxic partner mean that the mc might be mean to the girls without the option to be nice or is stuff like that going to be up to the player?

Tbh I don't really like when Mc's are automatically mean in games.
That's just my opinion of course.

 

[NeonGhosts]

Does that part about the love route & toxic partner mean that the mc might be mean to the girls without the option to be nice or is stuff like that going to be up to the player?

Tbh I don't really like when Mc's are automatically mean in games.
That's just my opinion of course.

Nah, it’ll be stuff like we’ve already seen. Like MC snapping a pic of Ashe’s ass while they’re in the bedroom, or coming on Gabby’s face without her permission in the dressing room. Stuff like that!

 

[Joshy92]

Nah, it’ll be stuff like we’ve already seen. Like MC snapping a pic of Ashe’s ass while they’re in the bedroom, or coming on Gabby’s face without her permission in the dressing room. Stuff like that!

tbh I don't even remember seeing that stuff lol.
What I was meaning though is will Stuff like that be optional?
I would like to always be nice to the girls if possible.

 

[NeonGhosts]

tbh I don't even remember seeing that stuff lol.
What I was meaning though is will Stuff like that be optional?
I would like to always be nice to the girls if possible.

Yup, I try to always leave that stuff optional.

 

[Joshy92]

Yup, I try to always leave that stuff optional.

Thank's for letting me know
I know I sound picky lol

 

[fashtar]

No, no, you're not picky. You just prefer Nicki.

Hey, that rhymed.

 

[Master of Puppets]

It all depends on what you want to do with him. It seems that if you want to get rid of him it is beneficial to let him get into college. However, If you want to make him your henchman who you use and abuse like a hunchbacked spider-eating man-bitch as the evil version of Guy wants to do then holding his future hostage seems to be the way to do it.

Exactly, and if you are holding someone hostage, actually killing them loses you their value. If he actually does leak that video causing him to lose his place, what then does he have to threaten him with if he doesn't cooperate with whatever he wants him to do?

 

[Samuel Hidayat]

I think NTR is only when the MC is the one getting cucked

There was a reason why I typed Netori instead of NTR. Netori is when you, the player, are the bull, stealing another man's woman.

 

[Joshy92]

I just played that sex scene at Gabby's house
I like that there are a couple of ways to get that scene

Just another reason this game is one of the best on here.

Edit - I also just saw that Gabby Dressing room scene for the first time
That was really hot as well.
Tbh though I wanted the mc to Lick her arsehole that would have made it even hotter imo

 

[Ragnar]

FYI: I posted a short story featuring Ashe's ill-fated attempt to pursue modeling over on Patreon and SubStar, for all patron tiers. This is similar to the previous story I posted with Viola, featuring several images interspersed with prose.

View attachment 2692017



The short answer is yes. I don't want to get into it too much, but the next couple updates will start to show that you can only be so much of an asshole, and still keep the girls in your orbit. That doesn't mean they're necessarily gone, but their appearances may be more limited.

I talked about this a bit on Discord, but the reasons for this are varied. The first big one is just that pruning a branch from a character's story will ultimately reduce my workload by.. A lot. For example, my current update has me juggling four simultaneous paths for Ashe (with friendship and love having a lot of overlap). Remove one of those branches, and development goes way faster. Multiply that by several characters, and it's exponential.

So, which one makes the most sense to cut off? I think it's the one where MC goes to prison or gets murdered by Ashe's vengeful Hulk of a father, if he continues to pursue it. This goes for most of the girls. At a certain point it strains credulity, and one begins to wonder why a girl would tolerate outright abuse, when she could just leave. Even using porn logic ("Well, you wouldn't want these pictures getting out..") only goes so far.

The other reason is that I feel I can really only push into those storylines so much, until the whole thing just becomes misery/torture porn. Which I'm frankly just not super interested in. I've played games like that, and after a while the whole thing just feels a bit gross.

By contrast, the corruption routes kind of let me have my cake and eat it, too. I get to write dark, kinky stuff, where the mood can be either kind of lighthearted, or more serious. Likewise, the love route lets me write romance, while occassionally subverting it and letting MC be a toxic partner.

Now, saying all that.. I still keep finding new ways to add dark scenes to the game. There's one in the next update that you can only get if you've played Ashe's friendship route up to that point. There's another that spans all four of her potential paths. So, the dark stuff isn't going away -- it's just that they'll usually be more like isolated, relationship-breaking incidents.

Emphasis on usually.

That sounds great, I think writing 3 routes for each girl is too much. Good guy/Corruption is gonna be a lot of work already.
Some scenes in the game would be game over irl aready. Like going full rape train on Viola.
On the other hand writing believable corruption is hard. I mean while you can groom someone like Gabby or Viola because they're young and naive that won't work with Ashe or Nikki. But I think there are ways to make it believable with everyone. For example you can corrupt adult women with money, drugs and so on.

 

[PHIL101-YYouPPHard]

There was a reason why I typed Netori instead of NTR. Netori is when you, the player, are the bull, stealing another man's woman.

My bad, I'd never even heard of netori before, I read it as netorare.

The short answer is yes. I don't want to get into it too much, but the next couple updates will start to show that you can only be so much of an asshole, and still keep the girls in your orbit. That doesn't mean they're necessarily gone, but their appearances may be more limited.

I talked about this a bit on Discord, but the reasons for this are varied. The first big one is just that pruning a branch from a character's story will ultimately reduce my workload by.. A lot. For example, my current update has me juggling four simultaneous paths for Ashe (with friendship and love having a lot of overlap). Remove one of those branches, and development goes way faster. Multiply that by several characters, and it's exponential.

So, which one makes the most sense to cut off? I think it's the one where MC goes to prison or gets murdered by Ashe's vengeful Hulk of a father, if he continues to pursue it. This goes for most of the girls. At a certain point it strains credulity, and one begins to wonder why a girl would tolerate outright abuse, when she could just leave. Even using porn logic ("Well, you wouldn't want these pictures getting out..") only goes so far.

The other reason is that I feel I can really only push into those storylines so much, until the whole thing just becomes misery/torture porn. Which I'm frankly just not super interested in. I've played games like that, and after a while the whole thing just feels a bit gross.

By contrast, the corruption routes kind of let me have my cake and eat it, too. I get to write dark, kinky stuff, where the mood can be either kind of lighthearted, or more serious. Likewise, the love route lets me write romance, while occassionally subverting it and letting MC be a toxic partner.

Now, saying all that.. I still keep finding new ways to add dark scenes to the game. There's one in the next update that you can only get if you've played Ashe's friendship route up to that point. There's another that spans all four of her potential paths. So, the dark stuff isn't going away -- it's just that they'll usually be more like isolated, relationship-breaking incidents.

Emphasis on usually.

It seemed like you were putting in more subtle confirmations and warnings in these dark scenes of late. I guess it makes sense now. Can't say it isn't perfectly reasonable, just that when my Guy gets a game over, it'll feel like the end of an era But, I do understand especially your point about torture porn. I love a good... uh, grape scene as much as the next degenerate, but it has felt a little bad as of late going full-on piece of human shit on the girls after the nth time, considering they're so well-written. Haven't started corruption route yet, but that's probably more bearable for everyone long-term. Personally, I've always figured the kinds of people into the darkest sorts of scenes are usually more short-term minded anyways.

You know, instead of having a full on grape route, some games just sprinkle available grape scenes throughout the game which end in a game-over before starting you back where you made the choice. How do you feel about that? Maybe doesn't feel super organic from the player's perspective, or maybe feels like a cheap cop-out, but it does kind of work better for a realistic setting (not always, but usually). I feel like the benefit is that it allows you to write the full-on dark stuff for the purpose of popping a fucked-up boner if the mood strikes or even just satisfying a disturbed curiosity (lol) without committing fully to it, meanwhile the players can just play on the corrupt route and, if they feel like pushing it in one particular scene as a temporary "what-if route", they get to scratch that itch. Maybe that would drain the thrill from the scene, knowing that's temporary with no real consequences, I don't know. I mean, obviously you've already committed a dark route to the game, so no going back, but was curious if you liked that option in games or think it's clunky.

That sounds great, I think writing 3 routes for each girl is too much. Good guy/Corruption is gonna be a lot of work already.
Some scenes in the game would be game over irl aready. Like going full rape train on Viola.
On the other hand writing believable corruption is hard. I mean while you can groom someone like Gabby or Viola because they're young and naive that won't work with Ashe or Nikki. But I think there are ways to make it believable with everyone. For example you can corrupt adult women with money, drugs and so on.

Damn, if we can get one girl in the game addicted to drugs, that would be super hot. Hypothetically, I wonder which one would make most sense I guess Pepper maybe? Maybe not, though, she's a tough cookie. Perhaps Brit on her porn star route, cause she's gonna hate herself more than ever, poor girl... maybe Gabby, too? She seems sorta vulnerable to that. Cassie would be the most fucked up lol, but don't know enough about her yet. Can't picture any of the other girls falling down that hole, though. So, I guess my money's on Brit, then, with Gabby coming in second.

 

[NeonGhosts]

You know, instead of having a full on grape route, some games just sprinkle available grape scenes throughout the game which end in a game-over before starting you back where you made the choice. How do you feel about that? Maybe doesn't feel super organic from the player's perspective, or maybe feels like a cheap cop-out, but it does kind of work better for a realistic setting (not always, but usually). I feel like the benefit is that it allows you to write the full-on dark stuff for the purpose of popping a fucked-up boner if the mood strikes or even just satisfying a disturbed curiosity (lol) without committing fully to it, meanwhile the players can just play on the corrupt route and, if they feel like pushing it in one particular scene as a temporary "what-if route", they get to scratch that itch. Maybe that would drain the thrill from the scene, knowing that's temporary with no real consequences, I don't know. I mean, obviously you've already committed a dark route to the game, so no going back, but was curious if you liked that option in games or think it's clunky.

Generally speaking, I'm not a big fan of game-over decisions. I feel like they break immersion, and dictate the 'right' way to play. So, I try to write the story so that Guy's smart enough to realize, "Alright.. This puts me in jeopardy -- it's time to back off."

I also think it's worth showing that after you do something shitty to someone, they continue to have a life, and your decisions continue to reverberate through said life. If someone chose Viola's dark path, she's still out there in the world of the game living with it. So, her absence in that path says as much as her being present in the other ones.

 

[Master of Puppets]

Generally speaking, I'm not a big fan of game-over decisions. I feel like they break immersion, and dictate the 'right' way to play. So, I try to write the story so that Guy's smart enough to realize, "Alright.. This puts me in jeopardy -- it's time to back off."

I also think it's worth showing that after you do something shitty to someone, they continue to have a life, and your decisions continue to reverberate through said life. If someone chose Viola's dark path, she's still out there in the world of the game living with it. So, her absence in that path says as much as her being present in the other ones.

If you ask me, I think it would be highly preferable where possible for rape route endings to merge into corruption route rather than the girl just disappearing. Having to restart and not make the bad decisions is also immersion-breaking.

 

[TRKaiser]

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Better late than never, seen people were doing tiermaker a few pages back
His sister is like potential S-tier material too I think.... PLZ GIB MC SISTER Neonnnnn! lol

 

[TRKaiser]

Also now that I am all caught up in the chat... geez this game really needs someone to make it a walkthrough I gotta go back and do some more plays. I bet there is so many things in this game I haven't even seen and done even know exist for the amount of stuff Ilearn is possible in this thread. I mean my first play through I didn't even see Viola at all...
Or we need Sancho or another modder to save the day...

 

[Toni_I]

My bad, I'd never even heard of netori before, I read it as netorare.


It seemed like you were putting in more subtle confirmations and warnings in these dark scenes of late. I guess it makes sense now. Can't say it isn't perfectly reasonable, just that when my Guy gets a game over, it'll feel like the end of an era But, I do understand especially your point about torture porn. I love a good... uh, grape scene as much as the next degenerate, but it has felt a little bad as of late going full-on piece of human shit on the girls after the nth time, considering they're so well-written. Haven't started corruption route yet, but that's probably more bearable for everyone long-term. Personally, I've always figured the kinds of people into the darkest sorts of scenes are usually more short-term minded anyways.

You know, instead of having a full on grape route, some games just sprinkle available grape scenes throughout the game which end in a game-over before starting you back where you made the choice. How do you feel about that? Maybe doesn't feel super organic from the player's perspective, or maybe feels like a cheap cop-out, but it does kind of work better for a realistic setting (not always, but usually). I feel like the benefit is that it allows you to write the full-on dark stuff for the purpose of popping a fucked-up boner if the mood strikes or even just satisfying a disturbed curiosity (lol) without committing fully to it, meanwhile the players can just play on the corrupt route and, if they feel like pushing it in one particular scene as a temporary "what-if route", they get to scratch that itch. Maybe that would drain the thrill from the scene, knowing that's temporary with no real consequences, I don't know. I mean, obviously you've already committed a dark route to the game, so no going back, but was curious if you liked that option in games or think it's clunky.


Damn, if we can get one girl in the game addicted to drugs, that would be super hot. Hypothetically, I wonder which one would make most sense I guess Pepper maybe? Maybe not, though, she's a tough cookie. Perhaps Brit on her porn star route, cause she's gonna hate herself more than ever, poor girl... maybe Gabby, too? She seems sorta vulnerable to that. Cassie would be the most fucked up lol, but don't know enough about her yet. Can't picture any of the other girls falling down that hole, though. So, I guess my money's on Brit, then, with Gabby coming in second.

Adding drug addiction would be a complete new level. I'd like to see how such an idea could play out without being too unrealistic. I agree Pepper and Brit are logical choices, but you could add Ash and Viola, too. Let's see

 

[TigerWolfe]

I would like to chime in that I'd just like Guy to love his girls. Cause woo buddy some of y'all have kinks that make me sad irl. No shaming just really not for me, maybe also some puppy dogs and kitties, a few rainbows.

My brain does dark well enough when left to it's own devices. I want my escapism to be full of happy endings (of both varieties) and positive outcomes. I can handle a rough start, but not my MC making it worse for someone.

 

[Ragnar]

My bad, I'd never even heard of netori before, I read it as netorare.


It seemed like you were putting in more subtle confirmations and warnings in these dark scenes of late. I guess it makes sense now. Can't say it isn't perfectly reasonable, just that when my Guy gets a game over, it'll feel like the end of an era But, I do understand especially your point about torture porn. I love a good... uh, grape scene as much as the next degenerate, but it has felt a little bad as of late going full-on piece of human shit on the girls after the nth time, considering they're so well-written. Haven't started corruption route yet, but that's probably more bearable for everyone long-term. Personally, I've always figured the kinds of people into the darkest sorts of scenes are usually more short-term minded anyways.

You know, instead of having a full on grape route, some games just sprinkle available grape scenes throughout the game which end in a game-over before starting you back where you made the choice. How do you feel about that? Maybe doesn't feel super organic from the player's perspective, or maybe feels like a cheap cop-out, but it does kind of work better for a realistic setting (not always, but usually). I feel like the benefit is that it allows you to write the full-on dark stuff for the purpose of popping a fucked-up boner if the mood strikes or even just satisfying a disturbed curiosity (lol) without committing fully to it, meanwhile the players can just play on the corrupt route and, if they feel like pushing it in one particular scene as a temporary "what-if route", they get to scratch that itch. Maybe that would drain the thrill from the scene, knowing that's temporary with no real consequences, I don't know. I mean, obviously you've already committed a dark route to the game, so no going back, but was curious if you liked that option in games or think it's clunky.


Damn, if we can get one girl in the game addicted to drugs, that would be super hot. Hypothetically, I wonder which one would make most sense I guess Pepper maybe? Maybe not, though, she's a tough cookie. Perhaps Brit on her porn star route, cause she's gonna hate herself more than ever, poor girl... maybe Gabby, too? She seems sorta vulnerable to that. Cassie would be the most fucked up lol, but don't know enough about her yet. Can't picture any of the other girls falling down that hole, though. So, I guess my money's on Brit, then, with Gabby coming in second.

Well, I wasn't talking about something as dark as turning anyone into a crack whore, just a bit of fun with drugs to lower her defenses and then bam! Some regrets the morning after

 

[NeonGhosts]

If you ask me, I think it would be highly preferable where possible for rape route endings to merge into corruption route rather than the girl just disappearing. Having to restart and not make the bad decisions is also immersion-breaking.

I don't see the paths as compatible in that way. There are some things that should cause giant repercussions. A big reason I've said I plan to soften Nicki's first chapter, is that it's kind of dumb for her to come back in Chapter Two, if the player chose all the dark options in Chapter One.

Also? I'm already giving people an option, and off-ramps. Like, constantly. If someone wants to make a bad decision, they can live with it.

(Or run multiple saves. It takes about five minutes to ctrl-skip through the entire game.)