VN Ren'Py Karlsson's Gambit [v0.8.31 TestB] [Grym Gudinna Games]

[kinkyshin]

No offense.

None taken.

I try to argue based on how variables are used in the current script, not how they are named and might be used in future updates. If the variable has an impact on Dominique in future updates, I will respect that in the future when I have the update.
I posted the two dialogs who change based on player choice how Dominique treats the injured worker in E7. That's all I found in current scripts. Maybe we get more player options to influence her in future updates.

Okay, but... if the variables are 'dominiquegood' and 'dominiqueevil', surely we can make some pretty safe assumptions on what they represent based on their names?

Dominique to Cole :

Spoiler

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I would expect Kane to have a bonus with Dominique due to being Cole's son, but I don't remember such a reaction by her in the game.

Well, I don't really know what you mean by "bonus with Dominique due to being Cole's son" but in the same scene that you referenced, she also asks Kane what he knows about his father and then says she heard that he was an impressive man and that Kane would've been proud to see him in action. Doesn't that count?

Also, slightly unrelated but I've always thought it's weird though that none of the Karlssons (except Olivia) will tell Kane what his father's name is WHILE simultaneously being surprised that Callista never told him. Feels like these two things should contradict one another Ah, never mind. Just realized that they're not surprised that Callista didn't tell him his father's name. They're surprised that she didn't tell him about his father while just excluding his name. But now that I think about it further, I think I know why she didn't tell him.

 

[harsha_26]

Imho :
What about "neutral" Veronica who invented or perfected the shock chips which cause the sub characters so much pain and keep slaves from revolting? In one canon scene in season 1 she used deafened slaves to clean her office.

Elena is reported as sadistic and evil in the past. If the player chooses a "good" Olivia who saves Seth, Elena will abstain from evil actions for Olivia but that does not mean that she repents her past crimes. If necessary she would likely kill an unlimited number of people to help Olivia win the Gambit. (motherly love)
Edit : If sub Kane rejects Olivia's and Elena's offer for cooperation at the end of E8.1 (elenasubsponsor), there is an (optional) punishment event at start of E8.2 with Elena and Sam punishing Kane for not pledging loyalty to Olivia (pegging, spanking).

A lot of shy and less dominant characters are used in the sub path to "learn" domination which can be funny.
The society is hierarchical, so the girls get trained to lick (or suck) the ones above and whip the ones below or make them lick them.

Yvette and Astrid are the only "Karlsson" main characters who seem not evil. Astrid likely has no option to be evil due to her illness, the cryo sleep and the search for a cure which is more important than sadistic fun.

I think Evil Elena is canon and flows better in the story, because, her redemption path doesn't looked that convincing. It felt inconsistent and not have enough build up to have a impact in players (especially the ones who already played her evil paths in sub routes) those who want to give her a chance to redeem, especially the dom players.

In other games, I may have said that "Well, it isn't happened in my canon path, so who cares", but in this game, whether you play those routes or not, characters will do some things no matter what (example: Dominique), the only difference is whether you are included in that path or not.

So, yeah, whether you want to do for personal revenge or just want to deliver some kind of "eye for an eye" justice to slaves, I think, atleast for me, evil dom is my canon. Sorry guys, you may have your own reasons to see this game in different eyes, but not me. And I admire Tess for making this game where my hidden emotions coming out so well that weren't part of me normally lol.

The only disappointment is, this "eye for an eye" justice thing wont see it's true potential because of demon path ban. But, that is only for me. I can perfectly understand if other evil dom players are not into extremes.

 

[MilesEdgeworth]

I think Evil Elena is canon and flows better in the story, because, her redemption path doesn't looked that convincing. It felt inconsistent and not have enough build up to have a impact in players (especially the ones who already played her evil paths in sub routes) those who want to give her a chance to redeem, especially the dom players.

As much as I hate it, Olivia being good due to MOY's teachings and turning Elena makes more sense for the story then Olivia just suddenly turning to the dark side cuz she's in power

 

[harsha_26]

As much as I hate it, Olivia being good due to MOY's teachings and turning Elena makes more sense for the story then Olivia just suddenly turning to the dark side cuz she's in power

Yes, Good Olivia suddenly turning evil doesn't makes much sense, same as Evil Elena turning suddenly good doesn't make much sense. Atleast to me.

 

[Meiri]

Yes, Good Olivia suddenly turning evil doesn't makes much sense, same as Evil Elena turning suddenly good doesn't make much sense. Atleast to me.

Well, I think Olivia makes sense if you see it as her feeling she's been lied to all her life after the big reveal. I see her as acting that way to get revenge on Callista in her head, at least it's the first person I see this version of Olivia blaming.

Elena is harder to justify because, bad habits don't die fast. It would make more sense for her to initially act as a corrupting influence to try to undo Callista's education, which would help in corrupting Evil Olivia, while a good Olivia would slowly help Elena see the error of her ways.

In my opinion, at least, everything with Elena in the game seems to happen way too fast.

 

[harsha_26]

In E8.1 at the end of the script there is an easter egg for k1pro only.

label finalboaty:
...
    if k1pro:
        $ tesssubeyes = True
...

label eastereggfork:

    if tesssubeyes:
        jump subeastereggt
    elif True:
        jump endeight
      
...

Spoiler: Easter Egg

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I hope Tess breaks immersion like this above for dom players too, when we get into Z5 in evil mode.

 

[Ricthequick]

I hope Tess breaks immersion like this above for dom players too, when we get into Z5 in evil mode.

How would she do it?

The breaking of the 4th wall in that example was to jusity an upcoming end-game status, and she was telling us to "keep a separated save for it" (because there's no coming back, the game ends).

How would you implement it in the other direction without being at the end of the game?
It's been explained multiple times how even with the most perfect accumulation of dominant points, Kane will never really have the same position the Karlsson have "right now", and the peak of his "power" would be at the end of the game.

Not trying to cause a ruckus, but again what would a breaking of the 4th wall once the game is over mean? Who should it involve? Olivia? All the Karlsson ladies? Every single female on the planet/island/spaceship/whatever?

 

[MilesEdgeworth]

Yes, Good Olivia suddenly turning evil doesn't makes much sense, same as Evil Elena turning suddenly good doesn't make much sense. Atleast to me.

Elena being inspired by her daughter makes some sense if you think about the fact that Elena's whole life has been about finding and connecting with her daughter, but it does take a while as shown by the fact that choice nets you the least amount of positive points.

 

[kinkyshin]

I think Evil Elena is canon

Absolutely shocked to hear this from you. Shocked.

Jokes aside, I definitely think it's too soon to say if Elena's redemption arc makes sense or not yet...

As much as I hate it, Olivia being good due to MOY's teachings and turning Elena makes more sense for the story then Olivia just suddenly turning to the dark side cuz she's in power

If we assume that she spent a year under Alexander, then perhaps she's been good or evil for a while now? Who knows what sort of nonsense he may have filled her head with during that time.

Elena being inspired by her daughter makes some sense if you think about the fact that Elena's whole life has been about finding and connecting with her daughter, but it does take a while as shown by the fact that choice nets you the least amount of positive points.

Has she? I thought Elena was under the impression that Olivia was dead - not missing.

Also, Elena's devotion to her daughter gives off crazy vibes IMO

Spoiler

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[MilesEdgeworth]

If we assume that she spent a year under Alexander, then perhaps she's been good or evil for a while now? Who knows what sort of nonsense he may have filled her head with during that time.


Has she? I thought Elena was under the impression that Olivia was dead - not missing.

Also, Elena's devotion to her daughter gives off crazy vibes IMO

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Even if one subscribes to the agent Olivia theory, it would make no sense for Alexander to send her away to get raised by Callista just to do away with all her teachings. If that was the case he wouldve kept her on the island.

You're right, Elena is absolutely unhinged. She is fixated on Olivia's happiness which is why it makes sense that she's malleable to whatever morality that Olivia wants her to be.

 

[f96zonetrooper]

Okay, but... if the variables are 'dominiquegood' and 'dominiqueevil', surely we can make some pretty safe assumptions on what they represent based on their names?

That's the problem with the game ... it is full of nicely named variables that are mostly used once to store a value which is never read later on, so they do not affect the story. To take into account different values of variables Tess would have to write way more dialog variations and fork the game more ...

When I started to play this game back in 2020 I expected that all those variables would somehow affect the gameplay. Now 5 years later I am cautious with any variable in the game.

Spoiler

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[f96zonetrooper]

The breaking of the 4th wall in that example was to jusity an upcoming end-game status, and she was telling us to "keep a separated save for it" (because there's no coming back, the game ends).

You have to keep separate saves anyway for all the paths if you want to see all the scenes. Even on sub path there are some separate events for k1 and k2 vs k3 and k4.
If you start k4 and promote to k5 later you missed all the events which happened on the k5 and k6 path so far, so you need saves for k4, k5, k6 to cover the early game ... and good/evil Kane vs good/evil Olivia adds more complexity later on.

It's been explained multiple times how even with the most perfect accumulation of dominant points, Kane will never really have the same position the Karlsson have "right now", and the peak of his "power" would be at the end of the game.

The dom and sub points in early game can trigger some events in prison and cause dialog variations, eg when Pat talks about Kane, but Kane's first ranking (k4-k6) is based on "slavepoints" earned in the tests and not on dom/sub points. Strategic dialog choices like choosing "elena_mentor" are more important than dom and sub points to get K6.

Afterwards the game is split into the dom path (K5, K6, ...) and sub path (K4, ...), and dom and sub points are no longer evaluated while the VN follows almost kinetically the two paths.

It is a huge misunderstanding to believe the dom and sub points from early game would affect the later game (after the k4-k6 ranking) in any way. That misunderstanding is caused by the way dom/sub/good/evil points were prominently introduced by Tess in E1 back in 2020.

 

[kinkyshin]

That's the problem with the game ... it is full of nicely named variables that are mostly used once to store a value which is never read later on, so they do not affect the story. To take into account different values of variables Tess would have to write way more dialog variations and fork the game more ...

When I started to play this game back in 2020 I expected that all those variables would somehow affect the gameplay. Now 5 years later I am cautious with any variable in the game.

Right, I don't disagree. It is possible that the variables dominiquegood and dominiqueevil get thrown out the window like so many other variables have...

What I've been saying repeatedly though is that Cole will be the one who ultimately decides if Dominque can be redeemed or not (as was heavily implied by Tess) and that some conditions and variables MIGHT influence whether he can or cannot do this. And the variables most likely to be relevant in this case (in my opinion) are: dominiquegood, dominiqueevil, fakerevolutionunlock (or Kane being good/evil in general).

It really wasn't meant to be a big deal lol

 

[f96zonetrooper]

This week's Corporate Development Memo is out and it is public, so everybody can see it (and images are safe-for-work).
(There might be nsfw images on discord later ...)

You must be registered to see the links

 

[Ricthequick]

You have to keep separate saves anyway for all the paths if you want to see all the scenes. Even on sub path there are some separate events for k1 and k2 vs k3 and k4.
If you start k4 and promote to k5 later you missed all the events which happened on the k5 and k6 path so far, so you need saves for k4, k5, k6 to cover the early game ... and good/evil Kane vs good/evil Olivia adds more complexity later on.



The dom and sub points in early game can trigger some events in prison and cause dialog variations, eg when Pat talks about Kane, but Kane's first ranking (k4-k6) is based on "slavepoints" earned in the tests and not on dom/sub points. Strategic dialog choices like choosing "elena_mentor" are more important than dom and sub points to get K6.

Afterwards the game is split into the dom path (K5, K6, ...) and sub path (K4, ...), and dom and sub points are no longer evaluated while the VN follows almost kinetically the two paths.

It is a huge misunderstanding to believe the dom and sub points from early game would affect the later game (after the k4-k6 ranking) in any way. That misunderstanding is caused by the way dom/sub/good/evil points were prominently introduced by Tess in E1 back in 2020.

Uh? Why are you answering to me with this?

Everyone who has played this AVN more than once know all the stuff you posted, the K1 path is (was?) a very unique one, that's why it could make sense (and it was fun the 1st time I unlocked it) to see the breaking of the 4th wall.

There's only 1 reason why it made sense

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No other rank has anything similar, that's why I was asking the person who wanted the same "breaking of the 4th wall" from Tess, how they would make it work for a Z5 rank.

 

[harsha_26]

How would she do it?

The breaking of the 4th wall in that example was to jusity an upcoming end-game status, and she was telling us to "keep a separated save for it" (because there's no coming back, the game ends).

How would you implement it in the other direction without being at the end of the game?
It's been explained multiple times how even with the most perfect accumulation of dominant points, Kane will never really have the same position the Karlsson have "right now", and the peak of his "power" would be at the end of the game.

Not trying to cause a ruckus, but again what would a breaking of the 4th wall once the game is over mean? Who should it involve? Olivia? All the Karlsson ladies? Every single female on the planet/island/spaceship/whatever?

First of all, it's a joke.
And more over, If K1 immersion break is just a way to tell the game over is ahead (that is end of game ahead for K1), then Tess herself breaking immersion just before the end of evil dom Z5 (that is end of game) would be what i'm expecting lol.

 

[harsha_26]

Even if one subscribes to the agent Olivia theory, it would make no sense for Alexander to send her away to get raised by Callista just to do away with all her teachings. If that was the case he wouldve kept her on the island.

You're right, Elena is absolutely unhinged. She is fixated on Olivia's happiness which is why it makes sense that she's malleable to whatever morality that Olivia wants her to be.

Then it's not real morality. She just bends according to her daughter. No real character. So, the players who want to give elena a chance to be their fav character, she isn't doing much to convince them on both ends. Paritcularly for dom players who had a knowledge of how evil she is in sub path (by choices).

 

[Ricthequick]

First of all, it's a joke.
And more over, If K1 immersion break is just a way to tell the game over is ahead (that is end of game ahead for K1), then Tess herself breaking immersion just before the end of evil dom Z5 (that is end of game) would be what i'm expecting lol.

What would you like to see in it?
I'm not being cheeky or anything I'm actually curious what you'd like to see in that scene, mine wasn't a poke at you, just curiousity, because (and this is personal opinion) breaking the 4th wall is always risky, it doesn't go down well with many folks.

 

[kinkyshin]

Damn, it's so obvious but did we all somehow miss that Cassandra is clearly a spy for the DeKocks, which finally explains the wonky Cassandraloyal variable (Olivia can get Cassandraloyal early, which changes dialogue between her and Cassandra, and then later she has a second chance to get it, but it doesn't change anything after that... yet)

I always thought the surprised face she makes here is weird but was wondering what sort of significance it could have. (Certainly not the first time that Tess has done this)




I mean, there's not really any other way he could know, right?

 

[Stan5851]

View attachment 5361155

I mean, there's not really any other way he could know, right?

If we assume that this is the case, then it means that DeKocks is more foolish than I thought. Because with that very phrase, Stefan completely exposed Cassandra in front of Kane, and therefore in front of the Karlssons (considering how many cameras/special equipment are installed on this island).