Ren'Py Lessons in Love [v0.48.0] [Selebus]

[aramaug]

Guys, we're almost at the next update. Time for predictions/hopes, what are you most looking for/dreading in update 0.43?

Sana's event should be interesting since we're probably going to see her directly interact with Pareidolia for the first time. Is he going to talk to her as himself? As "her brother" (we might even get a model for him if he appears to her like Sekai does for Akira)? Or does the event's subtitle ("Two-Headed Horse") refer to the Emissary of Pegasus and he's going to pretend to be HOPE like he did for Yasu?

Spoiler

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Based on her previews, she might not end up in the school for her TSS, but it will be interesting if she does. Noriko and Futaba were there as unwelcome guests, but Sana would probably be invited by Pareidolia. Will he let her find out about Maya Prime?

I'm also looking forward to Tsubasa's events because I have no idea what to expect from them. Unless there are previews I missed, we only got one image for the two of her events and it showed essentially nothing. I hope that means something consequential is going to happen that Sel didn't want to reveal beforehand.

I'm hoping we get some reactions from other characters about Niki moving in (especially poor Sara), but given the way Sel handles new subplots I'm worried nobody will find out until sometime after the reset.

 

[hcguy]

Of all the scenes I would like to have seen, Rika finding out that his name is Akira would be pretty much at the bottom of the list. I think we can safely assume that one of the other members of their group referred to him as Akira at some point offscreen.

 

[Moonflare]

Someone raised the point of Sekai's surname a while back, and what if it's Shiawase?

Spoiler: Wake me up when it's over

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I mean, there is the old theory about white rabbits being associated with Sekai. Or rather, Sekai Shiawase. If that was the case, it would make Sekai a part of the simulation characters (characters with alliterative names).

aramaug pointed out that the Shiawase group was also a part of the Pareidolia Mall sequence, but that is the event I hate the most in this game, so I'm not going back just for that.

Edit: Shiawase can literally mean happiness, and given that Sekai experienced trauma in her home enough to despise her surname, it would make sense that her surname meant happiness. She dropped it and chose instead the title "the girl who cannot breathe" in opposition to the forced veneer of happiness thrust upon her (that made her unable to breathe).

It would also fit with her pursuit of trying everything to be happy and never achieving it before Akira, it would literally be in her name.

At the very least the Shiawase group seems to be in charge of the simulation, after all, it fits that the "Happiness group" would have the slogan "remember to smile".

 

[Comiies]

Someone raised the point of Sekai's surname a while back, and what if it's Shiawase?

Spoiler: Wake me up when it's over

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I mean, there is the old theory about white rabbits being associated with Sekai. Or rather, Sekai Shiawase. If that was the case, it would make Sekai a part of the simulation characters (characters with alliterative names).

aramaug pointed out that the Shiawase group was also a part of the Pareidolia Mall sequence, but that is the event I hate the most in this game, so I'm not going back just for that.

Edit: Shiawase can literally mean happiness, and given that Sekai experienced trauma in her home enough to despise her surname, it would make sense that her surname meant happiness. She dropped it and chose instead the title "the girl who cannot breathe" in opposition to the forced veneer of happiness thrust upon her (that made her unable to breathe).

It would also fit with her pursuit of trying everything to be happy and never achieving it before Akira, it would literally be in her name.

At the very least the Shiawase group seems to be in charge of the simulation, after all, it fits that the "Happiness group" would have the slogan "remember to smile".

On the topic of Sekais surname being Shiawase.We know that her relationship with her parents was so bad that not only did she completely cut them off but she abandoned her original surname and took on the Arakawa surname.In trying to support Moonflares theory i ask myself one simple question.We know that toukas family are the most powerful in Kumon-mi and that Ayames is a close second but have we ever seen even a mention of a third family? I mean the Tsumiokas(Was that their name?) and Ayanes family are a force to be reckoned with and weve seen mentions of their prestige multiple times but,to my knowledge there has been NO mention of a "Shiawase" group.

Now this can mean a couple of things.

1)Im retarded and ive missed mentions of such group
2)Moonflares theory is false
3)(The actual fun option)Sekai was the heir to the Shiawase group.Due to trauma and an overbearing enviroment(We can draw pararells with Toukas family and how she is treated as the heir,especially since she is a woman) Sekai decided to completely cut them off.The family,now without a heir collapsed and the other 2 families consumed the remains.

 

[Moonflare]

On the topic of Sekais surname being Shiawase.We know that her relationship with her parents was so bad that not only did she completely cut them off but she abandoned her original surname and took on the Arakawa surname.In trying to support Moonflares theory i ask myself one simple question.We know that toukas family are the most powerful in Kumon-mi and that Ayames is a close second but have we ever seen even a mention of a third family? I mean the Tsumiokas(Was that their name?) and Ayanes family are a force to be reckoned with and weve seen mentions of their prestige multiple times but,to my knowledge there has been NO mention of a "Shiawase" group.

Now this can mean a couple of things.

1)Im retarded and ive missed mentions of such group
2)Moonflares theory is false
3)(The actual fun option)Sekai was the heir to the Shiawase group.Due to trauma and an overbearing enviroment(We can draw pararells with Toukas family and how she is treated as the heir,especially since she is a woman) Sekai decided to completely cut them off.The family,now without a heir collapsed and the other 2 families consumed the remains.

In Japan there's only one surname so she'd have abandoned her original surname regardless. The thing about her surname comes from Karin's father saying that she refused to be called by her surname during her highschool days.

The Amamiya and Tsukioka families are emergent families, getting most of their money from the bubblewrap business (which is recent). The Amamiya family stagnated, while the Tsukioka family spread out to other enterprises. Bubblewrap by itself seems more like a joke than anything else, and might very well be a bogus event that only exists inside the simulation, same as the space war.

Following that logic, the Shiawase group might be a powerful family that is real (opposed to the Amamiya and Tsukioka's fake existence), and it exists outside the simulation (not being mentioned inside the simulation, since it's outside of it), and yet blending in their fingerprints (their banners are everywhere with remember to smile, and entities also use their slogans - also not discounting that there is a workplace, employees and, well, all these people have to be working for some group).

 

[Antosha]

Someone raised the point of Sekai's surname a while back, and what if it's Shiawase?

Spoiler: Wake me up when it's over

You don't have permission to view the spoiler content. Log in or register now.

I mean, there is the old theory about white rabbits being associated with Sekai. Or rather, Sekai Shiawase. If that was the case, it would make Sekai a part of the simulation characters (characters with alliterative names).

aramaug pointed out that the Shiawase group was also a part of the Pareidolia Mall sequence, but that is the event I hate the most in this game, so I'm not going back just for that.

Edit: Shiawase can literally mean happiness, and given that Sekai experienced trauma in her home enough to despise her surname, it would make sense that her surname meant happiness. She dropped it and chose instead the title "the girl who cannot breathe" in opposition to the forced veneer of happiness thrust upon her (that made her unable to breathe).

It would also fit with her pursuit of trying everything to be happy and never achieving it before Akira, it would literally be in her name.

At the very least the Shiawase group seems to be in charge of the simulation, after all, it fits that the "Happiness group" would have the slogan "remember to smile".

Not to get pedantic or anything (because I never do that) but S and Sh aren't exactly alliterative, nor are Se and Shi represented by the same hiragana. Just saying.

 

[Moonflare]

Not to get pedantic or anything (because I never do that) but S and Sh aren't exactly alliterative, nor are Se and Shi represented by the same hiragana. Just saying.

Neither are To and Tsu from Tojo Tsuneyo. So it all still fits, either by a flexible interpretation of alliterative Japanese or that the rule itself as it's applied in LiL is already broken.

Edit: guys, we made it to 43k comments just before 0.43 \o/

 

[shmurfer]

I had nothing against him doing the care packages, that said, DRM aside.
It was an ok decision to honor his patrons in a business way of thinking.

But him crawling on his knees and begging for moony, for the bonus anims, which are kinda bland, if not stock, feels like he tanked at the stock market or something worse and needs the money.

Don't forget part of adding the care packages was so he could claim the game has ** by f95 standards and tried yelling it out loud so the mods had to remove the game from the site. It wasn't purely business benevolent. And of course when it didn't work he started getting bored of them, swapping to a system that only provides the reward if enough people pay for it (bonus animations per pledge stretch goal)

For all you peeps that have seen the care packages,are they worth it? Cause ive been thinking of checking them out but going through the hoops of disabling DRM sounds like a pain

I mean im not but if the process of removing DRM is easy then why not?

You can get most of what you're after just opening the base files and then looking at the scripts for the dialogue. Most of it is phone pic tier conversation. I tried asking if anyone knows how the DRM works, as in does it mark your saves but no one could answer. In theory you could create a second instance of the game, put the patched DRM into that install, and view the packages, then go back to the base install to play the game.

Big problem with how easy the DRM is to remove is it re-enables itself every update (I'm assuming this based on how many people who aren't randoms getting bit by the DRM after every new update). There's also the idea that he could add a new DRM check every update. It's really not worth the risk imo. If you're gonna pull the trigger back up all your saves before you do it.

 

[Fire Lord Zuko]

the Pareidolia Mall sequence, but that is the event I hate the most in this game, so I'm not going back just for that.

You hate “Amy” the worst in the whole game?? Out of all the events? I… would not have expected that. Kinda shocks me, since “Amy” is by far my favorite Happy Event in the entire game, and actually is up there with one of my favorite events for how unique it is.

Maybe I’m just a sucker for liminal spaces and pondering what must have happened to Amy and her timeline.

And that music tho!

“A happy face makes a happy place. Please remember to smile.”

 

[Moonflare]

You hate “Amy” the worst in the whole game?? Out of all the events? I… would not have expected that. Kinda shocks me, since “Amy” is by far my favorite Happy Event in the entire game, and actually is up there with one of my favorite events for how unique it is.

Maybe I’m just a sucker for liminal spaces and pondering what must have happened to Amy and her timeline.

And that music tho!

“A happy face makes a happy place. Please remember to smile.”

I hate it because I always get lost in the damn thing, you can't even follow a simple spreadsheet like the reset events (and it's not included in it) - the event itself is good but I hate the mechanic so much it taints it for me.

 

[Antosha]

Neither are To and Tsu from Tojo Tsuneyo. So it all still fits, either by a flexible interpretation of alliterative Japanese or that the rule itself as it's applied in LiL is already broken.

Edit: guys, we made it to 43k comments just before 0.43 \o/

Fair point.

So... yet another nail in the Sel-is-fallible coffin?

I hate it because I always get lost in the damn thing, you can't even follow a simple spreadsheet like the reset events - the event itself is good but I hate the mechanic so much it taints it for me.

Case in point.

I hated playing that one with a burning passion. Even playing it with the code open was a headache. Wasn't this supposed to be, I don't know, fun? Or at least engaging?

 

[Moonflare]

Fair point.

So... yet another nail in the Sel-is-fallible coffin?



Case in point.

I hated playing that one with a burning passion. Even playing it with the code open was a headache. Wasn't this supposed to be, I don't know, fun? Or at least engaging?

No, it's supposed to be immersive but only following Selebus skewed philosophy of frustrating immersion that adds almost nothing worthwhile and detracts from the writing vs rely on his writing with convenient gameplay like any sane game designer, instead of overall disliked gimmicks.

 

[Antosha]

You hate “Amy” the worst in the whole game?? Out of all the events? I… would not have expected that. Kinda shocks me, since “Amy” is by far my favorite Happy Event in the entire game, and actually is up there with one of my favorite events for how unique it is.

Maybe I’m just a sucker for liminal spaces and pondering what must have happened to Amy and her timeline.

And that music tho!

“A happy face makes a happy place. Please remember to smile.”

I usually love liminal spaces — and this game is full of many spectacular examples. But playing your way through that one made me almost break my CTL key. And that's with the code open.

 

[derekthered56]

Wasn't this supposed to be, I don't know, fun? Or at least engaging?

Where in the world did you get this idea?

 

[Antosha]

No, it's supposed to be immersive but only following Selebus skewed philosophy of frustrating immersion that adds almost nothing worthwhile and detracts from the writing vs rely on his writing with convenient gameplay like any sane game designer, instead of overall disliked gimmicks.

I mean, I did post an apology for him on a similar issue not long ago. I guess I shouldn't get snarky here.

 

[Antosha]

Where in the world did you get this idea?

God, I don't know. Good question.

 

[crustlord12]

I hate it because I always get lost in the damn thing, you can't even follow a simple spreadsheet like the reset events (and it's not included in it) - the event itself is good but I hate the mechanic so much it taints it for me.

I was working on my own linear mod (that I stopped because someone already made one for the game) but unlike theirs, I absolutely hate the reset events and allowed skipping through them... Amy just plays each room back to back there were like 20 different rooms! Ridiculous.

I usually love liminal spaces — and this game is full of many spectacular examples. But playing your way through that one made me almost break my CTL key. And that's with the code open.

Funny that I've spoken to a few people who don't know this (cough cough fd) but hitting the Tab key once is an auto-skip button so you don't have to hold down Ctrl

 

[Moonflare]

I mean, I did post an apology for him on a similar issue not long ago. I guess I shouldn't get snarky here.

I find it to be a very different issue though. You're not making your reader change the way they read in order to advance the story.

What happens in the Amy event is that he takes his gameplay move of "keep clicking random places until you trigger an event" to the max. You can't select different parts of the Mall on a wheel as you do for general exploration of Kumon-mi. Instead you have an old school "go a cardinal direction on a forest", which even then would be better because at least there'd be always the same four possibilities.

The general exploration is already a dated and dumb idea imo, and to an extent he seems to relent a bit on that on recent updates because most events have been either obvious or automatic/chained.

As always, in theory it might be appealing, but fact of the matter is that there's very little to be gained from "wow, I finally found that I had to go to the dorms on a tuesday afternoon when Molly's affection was higher than 72 but lower than 75" vs just stating in a menu where you need to go, or having a pop-up "there's a new event available", as a lot of games do.

 

[Riolol]

I thought I was the only one who hated the mall. So many were singing it's praises at the time.

 

[Antosha]

I was working on my own linear mod (that I stopped because someone already made one for the game) but unlike theirs, I absolutely hate the reset events and allowed skipping through them... Amy just plays each room back to back there were like 20 different rooms! Ridiculous.

Funny that I've spoken to a few people who don't know this (cough cough fd) but hitting the Tab key once is an auto-skip button so you don't have to hold down Ctrl

I didn't know that.

Though I don't usually like to auto-skip — in theory, I want to be able to stop and check things out if they're, you know, interesting.