Unity Lethal Fantasy (Giantess, Rougelite) [Game Dev Diary]

[LadyEbony]

Was doing some behind-the-scenes stuff with converting the .pmx files into proper .fbx files and all the issues that arise from that. It's all boring, stupidly annoying, and at one point I had a crisis thinking that I messed everything up. Typical game dev stuff.

I redid the step/stomp collider so they could carry a "shockwave" of sorts. The video below is how that's gonna be used. It's for fun animation polish.

My current goal is to create a varied enough map for the demo. I predict a month for something that I would be satisfied enough with. Then another 2 weeks or so to bring everything together for a simple concept demo. Well that's the goal anyway.

Spoiler: Shockwave

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[HaruGrad]

This sounds like a really promising concept, I'm excited to see where you will take it.

(Also, you mentioned up there, the idea to implement multiplayer (at some point far in the future) for the memes. If that would become reality, I know at least three people who would be willing to pay AAA-money for it. The multiplayer-niche for fetish games is sadly way to barren... and even discouraged... I don't get the dunking on, shouldn't fetishes be something that is supposed to be enjoyed together?)
(I have seen the reasonings but I say, could we just... not? Video Games and fetishes are places for my fantasies, I'll prefer to keep the awkwardness for the real life.)

So yeah. Non-VN or RPGM giantess game with proper Gameplay and chances of Multiplayer? Revolutionary! Count! Me! In!

 

[LadyEbony]

This sounds like a really promising concept, I'm excited to see where you will take it.

(Also, you mentioned up there, the idea to implement multiplayer (at some point far in the future) for the memes. If that would become reality, I know at least three people who would be willing to pay AAA-money for it. The multiplayer-niche for fetish games is sadly way to barren... and even discouraged... I don't get the dunking on, shouldn't fetishes be something that is supposed to be enjoyed together?)
(I have seen the reasonings but I say, could we just... not? Video Games and fetishes are places for my fantasies, I'll prefer to keep the awkwardness for the real life.)

So yeah. Non-VN or RPGM giantess game with proper Gameplay and chances of Multiplayer? Revolutionary! Count! Me! In!

This is only my opinion but porn/fetish games are primarily an artistic medium and very rarely a programmer medium. And multiplayer is one of the hardest things to code properly. It's probably why we don't see much multiplayer H games. Also there may just not be enough interest. I can spend a month of development time for multiplayer only for the majority of players to not even try it for whatever reason.

That being said, I would like to implement multiplayer at some point if there's enough interest, even if I know that implementing said feature in the middle of a project is an absolutely terrible idea. I just want to create the base game first.

 

[LadyEbony]

Week one of setting up props in houses. Added some lights, added some more animations for small objects to bounce and fling when the shockwaves are close. Internally I finished house 1, hope to finish two more houses for next week.

Also worked on some performance stuff by culling and disabling the animations of the inside furniture of a house if the player is not near it. Very necessary. I can now litter houses with all sorts of props, animations and such and not be afraid that I would completely lag the game.

Spoiler: Some Niceness

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[LadyEbony]

Well I had a busy and sick week.

I added an audio system so similar overlapping audio would diminish in volume. Also added some new sound effects for stomping and building destruction. This is all so there isn't an overwhelming assault to your ears just cause the giantess destroyed 3 buildings at the same time.

Also added the proper Unity terrain. Huge pain in the ass, terrain doesn't take kindly to URP shader graphs. But because I added the Unity terrain I can add small bits of dirt path along the stone paths based on the village's generation. That was like 2 months of on-and-off research to solve that. Unity docs are ass.

And one new building interior variant. I promised two but the previous two features was very time-consuming. I also have to create another system if I want to add more variety sized buildings. Always new systems.

Anyway a lot of things coming together. That one month-ish estimate for the public super pre-alpha demo is certainly a possibility.

Spoiler: Progress Stuff

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[LadyEbony]

Nothing much to report this week. Had to setup some code to create "zones" for buildings of different sizes to be automatically plopped down. Took me some time. Also holidays how could I forgotten about the holidays. That takes up a lot of time too.

I'll wait for next week to show the final result. I think it'll be a lot cooler to see it all together.

 

[LadyEbony]

Update a day later than usual. Anyway good progress being made. Besides some trees and rocks in between the buildings (which is quick), I consider the map generation good enough for the demo. Well I need to add audio which probably gonna be a bit slow but it is what it is. After that is some minour gameplay stuff and cleaning up the giantess' animations. I'm predicting end of January for the free public demo.

Next week is my holidays, no update. Wait for next next week.

Spoiler: Progress Stuffs

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Spoiler: Gameplay Discussion

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[LadyEbony]

Long vacation. Anyway, been adding more detailed destruction for the buildings, adding some sounds, some dirt piles, some optimizations, etc.

Below is the showcase of that

Spoiler: More Destruction

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And this is a showcase of all the tedious work I've done with decorating the house interiors. The great thing about DunGen, the framework I'm using to create the random towns, is that once I do the tedious setup process, adding different variations is very quick.

Spoiler: Interior gachagacha

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When it comes to the town, I'm fine with it for now. The doors don't open right now but that can wait. I need to return to the giantess and fix her walking animations, give her some face animations, etc.

 

[LadyEbony]

My plans for the free demo release at the end of January is still happening. I just recently got a lot more free time for this project so I hope to create an even better demo by then.

I'll be sticking with the minigame approach for this game, or perhaps scenarios is the better word. Depending on the scenario, the player may be more or slightly less in danger so the expected playtime per scenario may vary. I'm also thinking of adding optional and simple cutscenes+VN during the sequence of switching scenarios. It's to add a bit more flavour to the game without too much time and effort.

 

[defnotalt]

It's rare these days to see a R-18 game dev spend so much time on trying to make the gameplay as fun and engaging as possible. I don't particularly care about giantess fetish stuff that much, but this dev log has made me interested in the game just in terms of gameplay alone.

If you keep at it, this might become one of those games that attract players purely based on gameplay fun, and R-18 being secondary or a bonus.

Seeing as so much of the environment can be destroyed, how heavy do you expect it to be on an average PC? Are you testing it on a high-end GPU?

Looking forward to further progress!

 

[LadyEbony]

It's rare these days to see a R-18 game dev spend so much time on trying to make the gameplay as fun and engaging as possible. I don't particularly care about giantess fetish stuff that much, but this dev log has made me interested in the game just in terms of gameplay alone.

If you keep at it, this might become one of those games that attract players purely based on gameplay fun, and R-18 being secondary or a bonus.

Seeing as so much of the environment can be destroyed, how heavy do you expect it to be on an average PC? Are you testing it on a high-end GPU?

Looking forward to further progress!

I have been testing on a generally high-end PC. I admittedly haven't tested on an average PC yet, but I have some friends to ask for performance checks. I've been testing on the Unity Editor which automatically adds extra processing time and I'm still getting 100+ fps when my village explodes.

All that being said, even if all fails, I've designed the game from the start for the quality of rendering and destruction to vary based on numerous factors. I can just force the quality to the lowest and boom, the game will look like ass, but it will sure as hell run on lower PCs.

 

[LadyEbony]

A heavily condensed recap of my week.

I spent a stupid amount of time in figuring out how you are supposed to import .pmx (mikumiku models) into Unity properly, amongst other model/animation stuff. I thought I solved the conversion problem before but as it turns out the models were always bugged. Apparently the VRChat gamers already solved that problem years ago. Lucky me.

I also changed the giantess model from Flandre to Kiritan. I needed a model with a much easier skirt to work with for cloth physics. I think I already said this before but, adding functionality for the player to add any model in game (if they follow some steps that is) sounds feasible now. That's cool.

The rest of time was me fixing up the walking animation, polishing it a bit, and getting the feet to move back to the idle position. Sound real simple, and honestly the final code was simple-ish, but the process to the final code was not. Long story short, it works.

Also I never enabled the post processing to the in-game camera. So that was a thing. I gotta play more with the post processing effects to make the game even more visually distinct.

Oh and I gave her a projectile.

Spoiler: Projectile

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[donttalktomeeee]

Love the preview content already! Also are you planning or considering adding scenarios where the player shrinks like a debuff?

 

[LadyEbony]

Love the preview content already! Also are you planning or considering adding scenarios where the player shrinks like a debuff?

I would love to add a specific scenario/event for shrinking stuff. I don't think it can be a generic debuff since it would make the game way too unplayable. Gotta be designed around ya know. I probably can't finish the event before the end of the month release but for future release I would love to.

 

[LadyEbony]

Slightly earlier dev post.

I've been testing out the current gameplay to see where it stands. How does it feel to grab loot when a giantess is walking around ya know. Well the result is slightly unexpected I believe.

Small maps aren't the way to go. The gameplay ends too quick. Big open maps aren't the way either. It's too easy to dodge the giantess. Big maps with single disconnected branching paths that occasionally connects back to other paths is the way to go.

First the big map, it's actually not that big in principle. The giantess destroys so much that the map is actually quite small. I thought at first that the player would feel bad for their houses (their loot) to be destroyed, but it's actually the opposite. I placed loot in every house so there's actually too much loot. But since the giantess destroys many of the houses, it's actually kinda relieving instead. And of course visually, it's cool to see the houses get destroyed even disregarding the giantess fetish part.

Second the branching paths, it limits the player's movement in a good way. The player is forced to enter dead-end paths which increases the chances of getting blocked/cornered by the giantess. I also gave the giantess a 50% chance to take a path nearest to the player. And despite all that, you still have enough time to get out of the way, somewhat narrowly. It's not enough "near miss" that I'd like but it's close.

Overall, the current gameplay is working well for how bare it is. I got 10ish days to spice up the gameplay or visuals however I can.

 

[LadyEbony]

For my video, I present the only reason that a big map could work without major lag. Simple culling. If a tile could never be visible within a specific area (cause of the tall castle walls), just don't render it. Usually Unity does this for you but since for reasons, I had to do it myself. Not even Lethal Company does culling which is why Titan can be so lagging.

One issue, the giantess's legs just kinda clip into the castle walls. I wanna fix this but it sounds so annoying that I'll leave that for later.

Spoiler: Advanced Algorithms at Work

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[defnotalt]

Spoiler: Advanced Algorithms at Work

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Is the size of the giantess in that video the one that will be used for gameplay? She's massive lol I feel like she could wreck a quarter of the city with a carefully calculated stomp

It could be interesting to see different sizes of giantess, with maybe more difficult stages having bigger variants.

Overall looks really promising. Looking forward to the first demo!