Yes, Cookiedraggy has mentioned that one reason for the change has been personal views on the story and character. However, I wish that was where it ended.
I cited different reasons because that was what's going on in my head at the time. I've always tried to be as transparent as possible with our work and decision making process. That doesn't mean all reasons are weighed the same and even that weighing can change as I mull things over. I think by the way I approached the whole topic it should be obvious that it was not an easy decision for me and I undersand that I didn't merely change a mechanic, I also disappointed people with a specific kink the game was serving, and that's totally understandable.
In game design, the best way to break out of an over-analyzing cycle is by just making the damn thing in different ways, playing it and seeing how it feels, and that's what I've been doing with this build.
It's because the developers have argued that getting rid of defeat-sex improves gameplay and opens up their creativity, that I feel it necessary to defend defeat mechanics. These arguments feel like heavy implications that this change was inevitable, and somehow objectively a better option. When, as many people have already mentioned, there are a multitude of games out there that work perfectly fine and have defeat-sex mechanics.
Please don't understand the change as me saying it's a bad mechanic or that moving away from it was inevitable. Early on I mentioned often that the project grew out of my personal love for these kinds of games.
In game design you will often come to a cross-roads and no matter which one you choose, both would lead to a good game at the end of the road.
I also agree that limitations are good for creativity. I'm working in pixel art and trying to keep my palette choices for rendering light and shadow as low as possible, I understand very well how limitations can be great for art.
Another thing I want to clear up is the whole dom/sub thing. I'm not saying that going forward Kinny will be dom only in all those situations. We're still going with what feels best for the given pairing and what our ideas for them are. I used "Domcaid" because giving Kinny weird names is kind of a meme in our community, it has no deeper implications for how we'll design the sex acts in general, other than having more options for the dynamics.
I hope this can settle soon and in the meantime I will continue to work on the game as hard and as best as I can. If you're disappointed with the direction we're taking things all I can ask is to try it again with fresh eyes after a couple of release cycles. But as I said, I also understand if the game is unenjoyable to you now.
