Ren'Py Abandoned Lab Rats 2 [v0.51.1] [Vren]

[waffel]

.... Okay. First, we are apart of his demographic, as his demographic is adult game players in general. You can narrow that margin down as much as you want, but adult game culture literally revolves around this forum. If this forum vanishes, the culture and market for adult games will decrease significantly. As a result, this forum does matter. Regardless of rather or not Vren actively participates or pays attention to the thread. As his patreons are very likely to view this thread at least occasionally, and what is said here can and will influence some of his "demographic". Thats even ignoring his potential "demographic" which almost certainly will pass through this thread at least once.

Secondly, ideas and testing implementations? ideas need time to mature? All hes doing is adding more ideas on top of ideas. He has not been updating them and barely has he fixed them. Those who are fixing and trying to keep this ship from sinking are the modders. Who are doing the majority of the work fixing tons of broken mechanics, events and "Ideas" that Vren has yet to fix. Oh, should I mention the modders also originated from this thread and that most players, "demographics" or not likely use those very same mods?

Well after all these years his only demographic are his patrons, nothing more, nothing less. They are keeping this project alive, all others don't really matter as they are not providing him with money, nor do they intent to.

The modders matter only if they are keeping his patrons glued to him, if not, they don't matter too, and my only gripe is that I suspect a lot of those who are unsatified, have no intent to monetary back the project whatever he changes, and they have certainly not come with constructive criticism either.

What we need are games with better mechanics and not the endless content pooping VNs we are seeing. Less story, more gameplay! We have too much story going on in most projects on this site, we need more games!

 

[SilentRunning]

Well after all these years his only demographic are his patrons, nothing more, nothing less. They are keeping this project alive, all others don't really matter as they are not providing him with money, nor do they intent to.

The modders matter only if they are keeping his patrons glued to him, if not, they don't matter too, and my only gripe is that I suspect a lot of those who are unsatified, have no intent to monetary back the project whatever he changes, and they have certainly not come with constructive criticism either.

What we need are games with better mechanics and not the endless content pooping VNs we are seeing. Less story, more gameplay! We have too much story going on in most projects on this site, we need more games!

Exactly.

And let's be honest here. Every game with actual game mechanics is completely hated by a a huge portion of the people that frequent this forum.

There are like a thousand games with no game mechanics. People can just go play one of them. Why spend so much time complaining about a game you don't like? Move on to something you do like.

At some point creators of games with any sort of game mechanic have to just ignore the endless complaints and make the game they want. Obviously, complaints aren't limited to game mechanic. All creators get bombarded with complaints, some more than others.

We need diversity. Creative games that try to do different things. What we don't need is more of the same, as there are already plenty of games that have literally nothing new to offer.

 

[Strec]

I completly agree with the 2 previous post but partly concerning the patreons thing for this reason:

Patreon induce pressure, a lot, (see Baal ^^) and added with the fact that Vren seems to have decided to deliver versions on fixed dates it results in unfinished versions like this one, half broken and giving a very bad image of the dev and a risk of some quitting.

The montly patreon system is hard, mainly for a solo dev, and a trimestrial patreonage would be a far better, letting the dev delivering versions at his pace and letting him polishing new versions.

 

[SilentRunning]

I completly agree with the 2 previous post but partly concerning the patreons thing for this reason:

Patreon induce pressure, a lot, (see Baal ^^) and added with the fact that Vren seems to have decided to deliver versions on fixed dates it results in unfinished versions like this one, half broken and giving a very bad image of the dev and a risk of some quitting.

The montly patreon system is hard, mainly for a solo dev, and a trimestrial patreonage would be a far better, letting the dev delivering versions at his pace and letting him polishing new versions.

I agree with you. Trying to do something creative is hard, and anytime something you want/enjoy doing gets turned into a job then a little of the joy dies. Burn out is real.

Imagine spending 2, 3, 4 years working with the same game. We're just tourists. We come and visit their games, but they have to live with their creations for a long time.

As you noted, about Baal, it is easy for people to judge his decision to move away from Superpowered, but he has to manage his own interest. If creators get forced into doing things they are not happy with then they will probably lose interest and quit entirely. They are human beings after all.

 

[chainedpanda]

What we need are games with better mechanics and not the endless content pooping VNs we are seeing. Less story, more gameplay! We have too much story going on in most projects on this site, we need more games!

I was planning to defend my stance, but honestly I just have to agree with this statement. No matter how much myself or anyone else complains, I require more gameplay. That is fundamentally the central reason for me playing this game to begin with, it has a good skeleton.

However, that said things are not going well for this game atm. I stand behind everyone else's criticisms. I look at this update as an attempt, or the start of fleshing out the empty late game content. However, I simply don't understand the need to focus on new gameplay elements when the old elements barely function as is. The dev should likely start looking to repair/update/upgrade old systems before adding even more systems on top of it. Other games with legit gameplay has died in the past due to this very reason.

 

[shooter682]

Did anyone try to play this on android??
I tryed 0.45 build on my TAB, but game just crashes after 3-5 sec afyer launch.
Just recently lerned about "joiplayer", gonna try this one too.

Soo... any good tryes??

I am currently running the mod version of .46.1 on my tablet now with the same results as my computer version. On tablet will only use the mod version since I cant use console commands on the tablet. For the best results download the game and mod with bug fix then use the console commands hints and edit the rpy files as mentioned along with the MOD Cheets character creation.rpy and easystart.rpy as you would like then follow the instructions to load to android device.

 

[Konano]

But I don't feel that the pregnancy is progressing

I tried to go far in time and no visual changes for pregnancy for any girl

 

[toolkitxx]

I was planning to defend my stance, but honestly I just have to agree with this statement. No matter how much myself or anyone else complains, I require more gameplay. That is fundamentally the central reason for me playing this game to begin with, it has a good skeleton.

However, that said things are not going well for this game atm. I stand behind everyone else's criticisms. I look at this update as an attempt, or the start of fleshing out the empty late game content. However, I simply don't understand the need to focus on new gameplay elements when the old elements barely function as is. The dev should likely start looking to repair/update/upgrade old systems before adding even more systems on top of it. Other games with legit gameplay has died in the past due to this very reason.

I think you guys have to keep in mind when development started for LR2, what the main goals where back then and where you are now with it.
The first version of LR2 came out around the very beginning of 2018 and back then up to roughly version 0.9 a lot if not most of the stuff he did was testing his own abilities plus trying some fancy tech stuff he hadnt done before but felt a need to dive into for future development of LR2. Another 10 or so releases then started putting some meat to the backbone in terms of some story content etc.

After that he basically started to leave his original path of the roadmap he had originally described. Quote ' v0.4 and beyond - There are several different major goals I want to tackle once we pass v0.3. The introduction of rival companies, with their own serum inventories and employees to poach, is one of the most interesting to me. I would also like to add an external threat to the company in the form of law enforcement who must be kept unaware, distracted, or bribed. Adding in the main five from the original game and sculpting an overarching story is also on my list of major tasks. '

So any kind of expectation has to be done with this radical change in mind. That roadmap was not part of the next 20 or so releases any more. Instead things started to iterate around certain mechanics which meant things where constantly being rechecked and rebalanced for quite some time. The latest changes should be seen as a return to some form of roadmap - probably not the original one anymore but most probably a atempt to return to a more structured release with a clear endgoal in mind.

 

[Strec]

The impression I have is that a lot of players are more in the mood of the easy stuff (for player, not for modders) of the current main mod and forget that the vanilla game is NOT the modded game.

In any case adding too much content (aka having more sex action after some click, hidden behind a pseudo story) without having a solid and interesting core and gameplay WILL transform LR2 in "one much renpy VN".

 

[lolylol33]

i came here to say great game ! but god damn a war been happening here :>

 

[waffel]

However, that said things are not going well for this game atm. I stand behind everyone else's criticisms. I look at this update as an attempt, or the start of fleshing out the empty late game content. However, I simply don't understand the need to focus on new gameplay elements when the old elements barely function as is. The dev should likely start looking to repair/update/upgrade old systems before adding even more systems on top of it. Other games with legit gameplay has died in the past due to this very reason.

I hope you will give it a chance, I have played it for about 8 hours over the past two days, and first and foremost this has been the closest I have ever come to bankruptcy since my very first game in 2018, I was so focused on trying the new system that I forgot Lily's instapic money -__-'
That is a good thing as I have never felt economically threatened before in this game, apart from my very first playthrough.

I am having a blast tinkering with contracts and switching serums around for profit without the feds snooping around. I am also researching way more different serum traits than I used to, and that means they are also available the day I need a special one done for my gals. Now it just happens naturally.

Another good part is that you get money quickly with the contracts system, so I am making much more money now in a shorter timeframe than the old system.

I think when this system is fleshed out, then it is time to balance all the other systems, beause this should be the main game-defining system, with the rest of them wrapped around this, and defined with this system in mind. This might also be why they feel unfinished, they need to be adapted to how the game plays, and that is this system.

The old serum system was way too simple and un-engaging for it to be the last iteration, this is a much better shot a long the way.

 

[Sankfang]

Does anyone know how to get Jennifer fired from her job? Do I not help her with her job interview or is it an option further down the line?

 

[Strec]

I think when this system is fleshed out, then it is time to balance all the other systems, beause this should be the main game-defining system, with the rest of them wrapped around this, and defined with this system in mind. This might also be why they feel unfinished, they need to be adapted to how the game plays, and that is this system.

For now the urgency is to balance the new system itself to permit the player to have quickly a stable base foundation, even if it don't make money in a first time it must be sufficient to elaborate planning and grow, eventually slow if the rng is bad and quicker if the rng is good.
Note: the money from contracts must also be reduced, managing an entreprise is not playing like in casino hoping a contract giving you 100x what you can gain in a week.

Actually it's not the case, it's like if the player did create an industry without any planning and even without having any solution to maintain it alive while he prepare future invests.

Imagine you create such a thing without any money left to start but the walls. You must go work for the baker for some time to buy the energy, to the motorcycle seller to buy the ingredients for potions and finally you prostitute at night to pay the employees?

I see 3 solutions to solve this problem :
1/ Having a far larger starting money to get at last a real working factory, even small

2/ Reduce or at least change the frequency of the prices decrease, for example weekly better than daily, to give you a chance to anticipate the next week.

3/ A mix of the 2 others.

For now the game, in this state, is a players killer and mainly a new players killer. In a game it's not fun and too frustrating to have so a hard start, difficulty must grow like a hill, not starting at the bottom of a mountain.

edit: I tryed to start with 10k to buy at least the basic level of some business policies and even like this it's hard and grindy and I'm not sure it will be viable seeing how the costs grows.
Note : I refuse to use the money tips existing, it would be not coherent in such a game, you create a factory and get 50$ from sis or searching a money bag to survive would break any immersion...

Just an example : you can expect to sell each day 10 serums for 3$ each and the base cost to make the facory working is 50$. Add the employees salary and do the math... no need to be a genius to see where it goes.

 

[Perdurabo]

It needs to be really plain that you NEED a high Cha+Marketing skill girl assigned to marketing ASAP. Even a lame serum is worth 70 bucks /if/ your market reach is far enough. But getting the reach that far takes quite a bit of effort. Enough that you need someone dedicated to the task.

Marketing used to be what I considered the last thing to staff. Now I'd say it's one of the first priorities.

 

[john doe]

I am encountering an error with the last step of the Mother Vaginal Taboo Break quest. I can access her post on her computer and then respond to it (via astroturfing and then DMing her) but then an unexpected error occurs. As near as I can tell it comes from using the term 'list' in something called:
"mc.business.mandatory_crises_list" which then supercedes the builtin function of the word 'list' as part of Renpy. This is in line 812 of the role_mother_taboo_quests file.

I thought that I might be able to fix this by just renaming "mc.business.mandatory_crises_list" to something else but I have been unable to find it anywhere. Can someone with more knowledge of coding help me out here?

EDIT: modifying line 812 to
"mc.business.mandatory_crises_list.append(decision_event)" (ie: adding in the '.append') seemed to fix things.

 

[kirkuloid]

Ran into this bug while doing the mom taboo quest of the forum post thing where she tries to seek advice online. I had just finished coaxing her forum post from my computer from my room when this bug popped up:

Spoiler

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[Jed]

After that he basically started to leave his original path of the roadmap he had originally described. Quote ' v0.4 and beyond - There are several different major goals I want to tackle once we pass v0.3. The introduction of rival companies, with their own serum inventories and employees to poach, is one of the most interesting to me. I would also like to add an external threat to the company in the form of law enforcement who must be kept unaware, distracted, or bribed. Adding in the main five from the original game and sculpting an overarching story is also on my list of major tasks. '

Interestingly enough, the only thing left on that roadmap that hasn't been done is the rival companies now that the government stuff is there with this release.

 

[JetGameZero]

ok I don't know what I'm doing wrong or if glitched but I'm stuck on serum research tier 0 and I think I've tried every combination to make the right serum to get to the next tier but none of them work anyone knows the right one because I'm stuck

 

[Warphorror]

A little clarification about how the aspect system works :
It says it simulates an offers/demands system but it's not. You never naturally recover from the loss of value from selling aspect (even if you cut the offer), what counter it is increasing the reach but the reach doesn't negate the number of aspect sold it divide it. Also notice it's the number of aspect point sold not serum containing that aspect, higher trait have an higher aspect value and will drain faster the value.
here's the formula for the mental aspect price : (self.mental_aspect_price*1.0)/(1+((self.mental_aspect_sold*1.0)/(self.market_reach*1.0)))
The mental_aspect_price will varies between 2 and 18 naturally (10 base value with +/- 2 each day up to a max var of 8) that value is divided by 1 + the rapport between aspect sold and reach. Now you must think that as long as you increase the reach than the number of aspect sold you're good and you wouldn't really wrong. In a linear system that continue for a while the difference between the aspect sold and reach will become proportionnally irrelevant, on the very long term you can expect the formula to be close to (self.mental_aspect_price*1.0)/2) as long as your increase in reach is superior or eaual to your increase in aspect sold.
An important think to take from that explanation is prepare your next Tier serum by recruiting new marketing if necessary since each serum created will increase the aspect_sold faster and favorise serum containing non specialised traits but diverse one in order to share the burden equally with the increase in reach, specialised serum or trait should only be use for contract of personnal usage.

Now the exploit to be rich : I showed you the formula for mental aspect and medical works the same way but there is an error for physical and sexual (I think) in favor of the player their formula is like this (self.physical_aspect_price*1.0)/(1+((self.physical_aspect_price*1.0)/(self.market_reach*1.0))) where aspect_sold has disappeared and replace with the somewhat constant aspect_price (varies around 10 between 2 and 18) but still divided by the reach which mean dividing a constant by an increasing number give a result that goes toward 0. Physical and sexual aspect have a lower starting selling value but their value will steadyly increase to the point of not being affected neither by the reach nor the number of aspect sold. Sell as many as you want and never be bothered with keeping up your reach.

Without the exploit/error the game would be way too punishing for fast producing and fast selling serum. In my first test I created a specialised medical first serum (didn't look into the code first) and quicly recruited a producer and supplier I was almost producing 3 batch a day (30+ production for a 40 batch) which mean I had at least 10 serum sold with a value of 3 medical aspect (30 aspect_sold per day) and no marketing girl the money I made per day was quickly divided by 2 but having a marketing girl at the begining really put a strain on daily finance.

 

[Aromabish]

I tried to go far in time and no visual changes for pregnancy for any girl

Pregnancy takes a long time to show up. If you want to speed up things, create serum with pregnancy hormones and give it to pregnant girl daily.