IvoryOwl

Active Member
Mar 29, 2017
761
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Because there's conflict in the game. There's got to be something, even a placeholder (which the current system most definitely started as).

I personally think that Inno would be well-served to question whether her choice of the "Captain Planet" elements is really the best way to go. For instance, if all weapons do damage to the target's aura, then why do you need forceful, flaming, freezing and poisoned weapons? The target isn't actually being cut, burned, frozen or poisoned. Just have weapon damage.

This division isn't even appropriate for magic. To belabor a point, if your "Fireball" damages your opponent's aura and doesn't actually burn them, in what sense is it even a Fireball? Have magic that actually fits with the whole non-lethal combat thing. Enchantments, illusions, transformations (imagine the Flash spell reflavoured as the caster temporarily transforming away their opponent's eyes), summoning, curses.

And of course, the outcast of the combat system: lust damage. The simple fact that a lust-damage based combatant is best served concentrating on magic (ie. the magic lust attack is better than the lust lust attack) should be enough to show how broken it is.

This is why I am so pissed off when Inno devotes time to tinkering with combat or magic. The whole thing's going to have to be overhauled anyway. Just get the main story in place with the current placeholder system, work out the final confrontation, then work out combat and magic and Perks and balancing then.
Now that I think about it, you have a point... It feels like she decided to add a bunch of RPG elements just because they are a staple in most RPG games. It really doesn't fit the setting nor the lore aside from flavor and giving the illusion of creating a personalized character build. This is yet another feature of the game that sooner or later needs to be revamped (again). Just like the whole fetish thing, which ATM doesn't really do much. And all the other shallow systems that went nowhere.

Inno needs to stop and take a good look at the overall state of the game and the product she wants to deliver because even though this is an alpha, LT has been in development for 5 years and we still have a lot of basic systems as placeholders. You can't build good walls on shaky foundations. She needs to think long-term.
 
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tehlemon

Well-Known Member
Jan 26, 2021
1,224
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Now that I think about it, you have a point... It feels like she decided to add a bunch of RPG elements just because they are a staple in most RPG games. It really doesn't fit the setting nor the lore aside from flavor and giving the illusion of creating a personalized character build. This is yet another feature of the game that sooner or later needs to be revamped (again). Just like the whole fetish thing, which ATM doesn't really do much. And all the other shallow systems that went nowhere.

Inno needs to stop and take a good look at the overall state of the game and the product she wants to deliver because even though this is an alpha, LT has been in development for 5 years and we still have a lot of basic systems as placeholders. You can't build good walls on shaky foundations. She needs to think long-term.
Don't worry, she'll take six weeks off to think about it. Then a couple weeks off because she was stressed about being six weeks behind. Then we'll spend four months of silence while she's reworking a simple system only to have anyone who understands what's happening realize that the hard systems are never going to....

We've already done all this.

I think the best we can hope for is that we actually get game content, because unless contributors fix all those systems they're not going to be fixed.
 
Feb 2, 2021
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Don't worry, she'll take six weeks off to think about it. Then a couple weeks off because she was stressed about being six weeks behind. Then we'll spend four months of silence while she's reworking a simple system only to have anyone who understands what's happening realize that the hard systems are never going to....

We've already done all this.

I think the best we can hope for is that we actually get game content, because unless contributors fix all those systems they're not going to be fixed.

Lmao at this point I'm tempted to learn how to program (more than just the rudimentary garbage I currently know) just to spite Innoxia and make a better version of their game in half the time. It would be incredibly petty, but I'm very, VERY tempted to do it. At the same time though, my ADD ass probably couldn't focus on a task like that for longer than a few hours without getting distracted lmao.
 
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Astcit

Member
Jan 14, 2021
443
833
For a game that is completely free to download and play, with tons of customization options done right (which a fuckton of other so called 'games', and the sea of unending VN crap this site is submerged in, can barely even get near of), a quite ok story and quest progression, and cool map and rpg-like systems, people sure do love on hating and hammering down this game.

I don't know the dev, nor understand why people bash on so much about the time it takes between releases. Could be that it is written in the most god awful unoptimized language ever made by mankind, JAVA, or any other reason really. But again, it's free and a lot better, by far, than a lot of (even paid) porn 'games' out there.
 

EmDotRand

Active Member
Sep 7, 2020
862
1,416
Because there's conflict in the game. There's got to be something, even a placeholder (which the current system most definitely started as).

I personally think that Inno would be well-served to question whether her choice of the "Captain Planet" elements is really the best way to go. For instance, if all weapons do damage to the target's aura, then why do you need forceful, flaming, freezing and poisoned weapons? The target isn't actually being cut, burned, frozen or poisoned. Just have weapon damage.

This division isn't even appropriate for magic. To belabor a point, if your "Fireball" damages your opponent's aura and doesn't actually burn them, in what sense is it even a Fireball? Have magic that actually fits with the whole non-lethal combat thing. Enchantments, illusions, transformations (imagine the Flash spell reflavoured as the caster temporarily transforming away their opponent's eyes), summoning, curses.

And of course, the outcast of the combat system: lust damage. The simple fact that a lust-damage based combatant is best served concentrating on magic (ie. the magic lust attack is better than the lust lust attack) should be enough to show how broken it is.

This is why I am so pissed off when Inno devotes time to tinkering with combat or magic. The whole thing's going to have to be overhauled anyway. Just get the main story in place with the current placeholder system, work out the final confrontation, then work out combat and magic and Perks and balancing then.
That reminds me, why isn't magic incorporated in sex beyond a few special scenes and fluid TFs? Imagine freezing your partner in place, or water whipping them, or cleaning them off halfway through the encounter if they aren't into cum play, etc? Hell your elemental can't even join in.
 
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Sarkath

Active Member
Sep 8, 2019
535
912
Lmao at this point I'm tempted to learn how to program (more than just the rudimentary garbage I currently know) just to spite Innoxia and make a better version of their game in half the time. It would be incredibly petty, but I'm very, VERY tempted to do it.
To be honest and kind of blunt: I'd strongly suggest checking your ego first. The traps Inno found herself in are common beginner's blunders, and the only reason LT even got to the stage it's currently in is due to a dogged refusal to give up and an insistence on pushing forward regardless of (or, more likely, ignorant of) the potential consequences. You can't just learn to program and immediately jump into a project like this, otherwise you'll end up with LT (or, depending on your tenacity, something less than LT).

If you want my advice and you still to go ahead with this: spend some time learning the tools first. Just spend a few months, maybe a year making little utilities and programs. Game modding is another good way to get yourself started. If you're into Minecraft, make a few silly mods for it. Doesn't really matter what you do, just expose yourself to code (giggity). The more variety, the better. This will strengthen your foundations and let you know if it's a road you really want to continue driving down.

As you do this, steadily increase the scope of your projects. This will give you a better grasp on how to fit the various pieces together. With that knowledge in mind, start planning out your game. Document what you want it to be from an outside-in perspective (desired features and functionality, what platform(s) it'll run on, etc), then shift your focus to figuring out how, from a programmer's perspective, how you plan to implement this and fit it all together. Spend at least a few weeks with a pen and paper (or a tablet and stylus, whichever you prefer) and sketch all of this out. It takes a while to properly plan a project, but the more you do in advance the easier it will be to apply it in practice.

With proper planning I know you'll be able to pull it off. If you just fire up IDEA and start coding, you're very likely to code yourself into a corner.


*To put the sheer size of LT's code base into perspective, Lilith's Throne contains 39.3% more lines of code than .

For a game that is completely free to download and play, with tons of customization options done right (which a fuckton of other so called 'games', and the sea of unending VN crap this site is submerged in, can barely even get near of), a quite ok story and quest progression, and cool map and rpg-like systems, people sure do love on hating and hammering down this game.
I'd say it's mostly due to release targets slipping by months on a fairly routine basis, sometimes in favor of extremely niche features like armpit sex. Promises broken due to wildly shifting focus and/or poor time management, basically, and the fact that it's become such a consistent issue.

That said, content for LT has been continuing to steadily trickle out. Things could be so, so much worse.

Could be that it is written in the most god awful unoptimized language ever made by mankind, JAVA
Java and the JVM are fine and have been for a long time. LT, as it's currently written, would have performance issues regardless of what it was written in.
 

tehlemon

Well-Known Member
Jan 26, 2021
1,224
1,563
Lmao at this point I'm tempted to learn how to program (more than just the rudimentary garbage I currently know) just to spite Innoxia and make a better version of their game in half the time. It would be incredibly petty, but I'm very, VERY tempted to do it. At the same time though, my ADD ass probably couldn't focus on a task like that for longer than a few hours without getting distracted lmao.
Funny enough, my ADHD ass is working on exactly that. I'm making engine progress at a rapid pace, even with my only really working on this in my free time when not otherwise wrapped up in something else. But it's definitely not a beginner project. And I'm probably years away from having a fully fledged game with content and all the systems I wanted to create.

Combat systems are breaking my brain. I can't think of a good way to build a combat system that's advanced enough to be interesting, while still being scalable and reasonable for a text adventure game.

Stupid combat systems...

But what I really enjoy doing is the sim side of things. I think I've been spending too much time on blaseball lately, because I've suddenly accepted that you can make a sim as weird and complicated as you want, and if you don't suck at programming it'll still work. Shit, just look at stuff like dwarf fortress. It really shouldn't be as awful as LT ended up being.

For a game that is completely free to download and play, with tons of customization options done right (which a fuckton of other so called 'games', and the sea of unending VN crap this site is submerged in, can barely even get near of), a quite ok story and quest progression, and cool map and rpg-like systems, people sure do love on hating and hammering down this game.

I don't know the dev, nor understand why people bash on so much about the time it takes between releases. Could be that it is written in the most god awful unoptimized language ever made by mankind, JAVA, or any other reason really. But again, it's free and a lot better, by far, than a lot of (even paid) porn 'games' out there.
Have you tried, IDK, reading the complaints?

We're pretty straight forward with the issues we have with the game and its development. And please stop with that "for a free game bla bla bla" stuff. It's a product that she's selling. She makes a living off developing this game. This is her job, and she wants our money. Treat it as such.

That reminds me, why isn't magic incorporated in sex beyond a few special scenes and fluid TFs? Imagine freezing your partner in place, or water whipping them, or cleaning them off halfway through the encounter if they aren't into cum play, etc? Hell your elemental can't even join in.
IDK. There's so much you can do with magic and sex. I'm assuming its because the magic system is tied to the combat system, and all that shit is basically placeholder systems. Maybe it's a "thing we'll figure out once the engine works" idea.

I'd love to see it, but we need kneecap sex first, obviously.

To be honest and kind of blunt: I'd strongly suggest checking your ego first. The traps Inno found herself in are common beginner's blunders, and the only reason LT even got to the stage it's currently in is due to a dogged refusal to give up and an insistence on pushing forward regardless of (or, more likely, ignorant of) the potential consequences. You can't just learn to program and immediately jump into a project like this, otherwise you'll end up with LT (or, depending on your tenacity, something less than LT).
This. All my this.

I'm a decent programmer and even I'm struggling trying to deal with this stuff consistently. You have to be *very* forward thinking with your design process, and careful with your implementation. And its really hard to know what traps you're creating for yourself without knowing about them in advance, which a new programmer likely won't. Hell, I've definitely walked into a few.

With proper planning I know you'll be able to pull it off. If you just fire up IDEA and start coding, you're very likely to code yourself into a corner.
I'd also add: prototype, prototype, prototype.

Test things, build small chunks and figure out what works and what doesn't. Create ways to test things efficiently. Create extreme and unrealistic examples. If you're going to create a map system, create it as a standalone tool that you can do crazy things with. Generate 100k x 100k square maps so you can see how it'll fuck up your memory. Build small things to see what works and what doesn't.

Plus its a lot of fun.

*To put the sheer size of LT's code base into perspective, Lilith's Throne contains 39.3% more lines of code than .
That both doesn't seem realistic, but also makes perfect sense. I wonder how it'd compare if you took all the scene text out.

Java and the JVM are fine and have been for a long time. LT, as it's currently written, would have performance issues regardless of what it was written in.
Yeah, Java isn't the problem. Java works fine. Probably not the best pick, but text adventure games should be simple. We've been making them since the 80s. Some with more complexity and better performance on way worse hardware. Java isn't the issue here.
 

poopypoopy

New Member
Aug 13, 2018
6
0
Is it just me or the underage stuff got removed in the latest version? I can't make an underage character or have other underage nps to spawn either in the menu
 

Astcit

Member
Jan 14, 2021
443
833
And please stop with that "for a free game bla bla bla" stuff. It's a product that she's selling. She makes a living off developing this game. This is her job, and she wants our money. Treat it as such.
Really? Because I'm pretty sure I paid absolutely nothing for the game that I downloaded on the dev own site, which btw links also to the game source code for anyone to download and do whatever with it.
How many downloads the source or prebuilt packages have versus how many people pay to support it?

I'm not white knighting the dev, not defending lazyness or lack of commitment with the support (especially monetary) random people puts into something. I'm just saying people complain as if they suddenly own that whole thing, just because they on their own volition decided to donate (key word here, donation) some money to some random project.
 
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tehlemon

Well-Known Member
Jan 26, 2021
1,224
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Really? Because I'm pretty sure I paid absolutely nothing for the game that I downloaded on the dev own site, which btw links also to the game source code for anyone to download and do whatever with it.
How many downloads the source or prebuilt packages have versus how many people pay to support it?

I'm not white knighting the dev, not defending lazyness or lack of commitment with the support (especially monetary) random people puts into something. I'm just saying people complain as if they suddenly own that whole thing, just because they on their own volition decided to donate (key word here, donation) some money to some random project.
So basically all I'm getting here is that you don't understand how the free to play business model works despite it being the most commonly used model for porn games and, you know, games in general.

Cool.

It's still a product. She's still making a living selling it. Both the game and developer are still open to criticism by customers and perspective customers.

Is it just me or the underage stuff got removed in the latest version? I can't make an underage character or have other underage nps to spawn either in the menu
That was you using a pedo mod. Its never been part of the base game. Pretty sure that mod isn't allowed on discord anymore or I'd tell you to check the discord for it. I don't have a link.
 

Fuzzcat

Active Member
Oct 27, 2017
624
664
The traps Inno found herself in are common beginner's blunders, and the only reason LT even got to the stage it's currently in is due to a dogged refusal to give up and an insistence on pushing forward regardless of (or, more likely, ignorant of) the potential consequences. You can't just learn to program and immediately jump into a project like this, otherwise you'll end up with LT (or, depending on your tenacity, something less than LT).
LT and SfP (Strive for Power) started roughly at the same time.
Maverik (SfP) was a newbie (admitted by himself), and learned what and how, eventually "abandoning" SfP. It was at his limit, and he saw it, deciding to cut for safety and start fresh. Painful, but the best route, imho.
Inno on the other hand, it's stubborn as hell. I don't she should "abandon" LT, since her system is much more flexible, but it's her own stuborness to accept help and LISTEN to what fans/modders/coders say that is slowing the progress. That's why she gets "ill" often, she's burned out... precisely that's what Mav tried to avoid.

Combat systems are breaking my brain. I can't think of a good way to build a combat system that's advanced enough to be interesting, while still being scalable and reasonable for a text adventure game.
Pshaw.
Fuck combat system.

My idea (for my -never realized- game) was to have skills. And when it's clobbering time, you get options based on those skills.
So, you have "ambidexterity" and "Boxing"... you get 2-3 options related (say, a jab-n-punch, rabbit punch, hook-n-uppercut) and they work as "paths", just using the player's smartness. You're not gonna use a rabbit-punch against a Lamia, so best chose another option or else...
If you only have "Boxing", you get a 1-2 options (say uppercut, hook).
Same way, you get defensive skills.

I think it's better to deal with options and branches (albeit time-consuming and tedious) rather than find a mathematical formula and try to keep the game balanced around it.
 
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Sarkath

Active Member
Sep 8, 2019
535
912
I'd also add: prototype, prototype, prototype.

Test things, build small chunks and figure out what works and what doesn't. Create ways to test things efficiently. Create extreme and unrealistic examples. If you're going to create a map system, create it as a standalone tool that you can do crazy things with. Generate 100k x 100k square maps so you can see how it'll fuck up your memory. Build small things to see what works and what doesn't.
+1

To add to this: never be afraid to scrap a prototype! Failure is pretty much inevitable, but the ability to learn from your failures ultimately makes you stronger in the end. Even if the lesson is simply "this approach is untenable," you've still taken something out of the experience.

That both doesn't seem realistic, but also makes perfect sense. I wonder how it'd compare if you took all the scene text out.
That 470K KLoC figure only includes the Java source. I intentionally left out the XMLs, SVGs, etc. IIRC, if you include all that it brings the total somewhere up to the 510-520K range.

There's some scene text in the class files, but that doesn't account for anywhere near 100K lines.

LT and SfP (Strive for Power) started roughly at the same time.
Maverik (SfP) was a newbie (admitted by himself), and learned what and how, eventually "abandoning" SfP. It was at his limit, and he saw it, deciding to cut for safety and start fresh. Painful, but the best route, imho.
Inno on the other hand, it's stubborn as hell. I don't she should "abandon" LT, since her system is much more flexible, but it's her own stuborness to accept help and LISTEN to what fans/modders/coders say that is slowing the progress. That's why she gets "ill" often, she's burned out... precisely that's what Mav tried to avoid.
Good on Mav. It's not an easy decision, that's for certain, but sometimes it's the best one.

I'd say it would be nigh impossible for LT to take the nuclear approach at this point, but there are definitely some systems that need to be gutted and revamped. I think it's just modular enough to make an approach like that feasible, but at the same time it's a lot of hard work that nobody really wants to do, and the more the game advances the harder it's going to be.
 

NoStepOnSnek

Well-Known Member
Apr 29, 2018
1,167
1,286
That was you using a pedo mod. Its never been part of the base game. Pretty sure that mod isn't allowed on discord anymore or I'd tell you to check the discord for it. I don't have a link.
Shit like that was never on discord and is in fact on the shortlist of things that get you out the door real quick. Afaik one of the chans spawned it.
 

anon707

Member
Jun 13, 2018
295
548
Now that I think about it, you have a point... It feels like she decided to add a bunch of RPG elements just because they are a staple in most RPG games. It really doesn't fit the setting nor the lore aside from flavor and giving the illusion of creating a personalized character build. This is yet another feature of the game that sooner or later needs to be revamped (again). Just like the whole fetish thing, which ATM doesn't really do much. And all the other shallow systems that went nowhere.

Inno needs to stop and take a good look at the overall state of the game and the product she wants to deliver because even though this is an alpha, LT has been in development for 5 years and we still have a lot of basic systems as placeholders. You can't build good walls on shaky foundations. She needs to think long-term.
This is why I felt its best to just start this whole thing from near scratch. She's already created the world and characters and (at least I hope) knows what to do with them and where to go and how to end the story and all the personal characters arcs so none of that would actually be lost. But the game from top to bottom either needs to be fixed, finished, or pulled out of her spaghetti hard code. I think if any project manager worth their salt looked this game and saw that half the core systems were either W.I.P.s that have been W.I.P.s for years or just straight up broken he would have decided that this iteration of the project needs to be scrapped and start over.

I know exactly where people are coming from when it comes to wanting to push the game's story forward since pushing it forward entails new features and new content thats meaningful, but this is still a GAME, and the GAME parts has still yet to be figured or fixed. Im much more in favor or having this game start over than pushing forward an underdeveloped fetus to graduate college. I dont know why people would rather have Inno reach the end of this story on the back of W.I.P. poorly thought out version of a combat system and then wait for said system to get completed, thats backwards to me. Make the GAME first.
 

SordidDreams

Member
Jul 27, 2019
255
282
I dont know why people would rather have Inno reach the end of this story on the back of W.I.P. poorly thought out version of a combat system and then wait for said system to get completed, thats backwards to me. Make the GAME first.
Because the story is what they're invested and interested in, and making the game first would mean they'd have to wait longer for the thing they want. That line of argumentation is 100% based on selfishness.
 
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IvoryOwl

Active Member
Mar 29, 2017
761
1,411
This is why I felt its best to just start this whole thing from near scratch. She's already created the world and characters and (at least I hope) knows what to do with them and where to go and how to end the story and all the personal characters arcs so none of that would actually be lost. But the game from top to bottom either needs to be fixed, finished, or pulled out of her spaghetti hard code. I think if any project manager worth their salt looked this game and saw that half the core systems were either W.I.P.s that have been W.I.P.s for years or just straight up broken he would have decided that this iteration of the project needs to be scrapped and start over.

I know exactly where people are coming from when it comes to wanting to push the game's story forward since pushing it forward entails new features and new content thats meaningful, but this is still a GAME, and the GAME parts has still yet to be figured or fixed. Im much more in favor or having this game start over than pushing forward an underdeveloped fetus to graduate college. I dont know why people would rather have Inno reach the end of this story on the back of W.I.P. poorly thought out version of a combat system and then wait for said system to get completed, thats backwards to me. Make the GAME first.
I'm one of the people who advocated for more story and if things are to remain as they are then I stand by that choice. Modders can add and fix a lot of things but the story and lore will always be Inno's unique trademark (unless it's so bad we're better off without it). But even I can see the current state of the game and its pitfalls and how much of an ache it will be to fix them all.

Even though it pains me to lose 5 years of progress, starting from scratch would be the best solution long-term, for the sake of the game and for the sake of the developer's health (and sanity). Despite my moaning and grievances I still want the game to move forward and be finished at some point in the future, preferably within my lifetime. It's the only one of it's kind with a fuck ton of potential. But if that's not going to happen then let the game follow it's course and hope the community takes the reins when the developer decides to quit.

I'll say it outright - right now, I don't have high hopes of the game ever being finished. From a technical standpoint, the massive amount of memory leaks and constraints on the system (bad optimization and planning overall) means it will eventually reach a critical point where it will not be possible to expand anymore because it has become an unmanageable and unplayable mess. We're not even halfway through development and we're already seeing clear signs of this.

Inno is 100% free to prove me wrong and make me eat my words, I'll gladly do so. But until then, it's not a good perspective to have (especially because it detracts future investors) and it must be even worse for the developer to hear people say they have little faith in the future of the game.
 
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