first time I saw this game I was in highschool. now I finished university. damnnnn
Same my man (or woman), same.
Let me add on to what was said.
I don't want to bash the devs. After all this time this is counterproductive. I do think some people have rose-colored glasses indeed when it comes to 0.8. While 0.8 imo was great narratively and the basic mechanical side of gameplay was fine, the corruption was done well and so on, it also had a lot of repetitive boring mini-games where you kept doing the same thing just to have minor changes from day to day and a story-"event" every few days. Frankly, once the character-rigs and 3d models are set up, technically story events should be producable very quickly. CGs and unique animations are often the bottleneck of games such as this, but on the narrative side there is a lot that can be done rather quickly, epecially if your pre-plan the different paths, characters and interactions beforehead. They had more than enough time to do all of that. Even if there are changes throughout development and if scenes are added as ideas for new kinks to include or new elements to add, the base narrative structure should be decided on, and so simple dialogue should be "easy" to do. Im putting it in quotation marks becuase obviously inspirational and creative work can't be done on a conveyer belt, especially if its supposed to be done right. One might spend 2 weeks without coming up with anything good from a writing perspective, then spend the next 2 days doing work equvialent of the last 2 months. It happens. You can't put creativity on a set schedule. That being said, creative work is, especially writing, is also non-linear and that is one of it's strong points. Being able to produce months worth of work in a manner of days is an advantage. Organizing the storyboarding process properly will lead you to always have some good narrative to add with the next patch. Which I do not see happening as much here.
Honesty, if I was making a game (and yes Im not, because I am doing my degree, Im working and I have other hobbies in my free time). But if I was making a game and Id have trouble to keep up with animation, CGs etc because understabably they take a lot of time and polish, here would be my steps:
1. Define my base story. What is the "main path" I want to establish for my character? The main story. Then most important characters. Most important evironments. Side characters, later environments. Included fetishes. Interactions and dialogue (vague) that would lead to those fetishes dymanically. The progress of the MC towards corruption. Do I have a dom and sub path? A nympho vs. monogamy path? Do I have different character paths? Different factions to gain reputation with and support? Lay the foundation
2. Obviously you need to lay the mechanical foundation. That means, establishing basic rigs, character models and the most basic animation elements. Backgrounds, controls, interaction functions, gameplay systems (corruption meter, decision trees, whatever else you need)
3. Now I can establish the first CGs and animations for the demo. In that capacity I would also try to make sure to produce the most reusable animations first.
4. Once we are at this step development goes accoring to the production of new animations and CGs. But while this is going on, I can create as much story as I want. Getting to know main and side characters, talking to them, getting to know their character types. A dialogue can be just as spicy as an h-scene if it manages to inspire the fantasy and the player to imagine further actions, especially if there are implications in the dialogue and if the dialogue is long and rich. Minor events like the likable male character who is a potential partner for the MC having cheeky and wholesome conversations and interactions with the MC, her opinon of them changing/improving, them overcoming some hurdles together and starting to like each other. Or the despised character that the MC hates harassing her and slowly but steadily gaining control over her. Like using the MCs weaknesses against her, using her friends against her, blackmail, using their power to force her to do things, seeding thoughts into her to make her more submissive. I can go on, that goes for any type of character you can imagine really. Be it the dominant male, the submissive male, the wholesome relationship, the naughty nymomaniac, the thug-type male the honest-to-a-fault, the old geezer or the immature pervert. There is so many types and a lot one can set up and establish through simple day-to-day dialogue improvements. This is the "filler" content of a game, but it also is a neverending source of material for people to fall in love with the world, immerse themselves, play out different paths, discover new things and to bide the time till that next CG or animation loop is done. It doesn't matter if it's a fade-to-black and we play out the scene in text-form withou an animation. Hell even if they slightly alter the text later to suit the cg/animation h-scene better once it's done, that's fine too.
The bottom line is, just ADD SOMETHING. Add material that the player can use their own imagination on to make something out of it. Sure there will be more than enough people complaining that there "are no scenes yet" "no animations yet" "not many CGs or visual material yet". But right now what you have is prople complaining that there barely is any content AT ALL. And that is the issue. Most people who followef this project for years are just weary of the fact that we have waited so long and we are not even back at the point we were when 0.8 came out and the game got "rebooted".
I do also believe that there are a good deal of people here having too high expectations due to the development taking as long as it does. and with each month/year that passes people stack their expectations higher because they expect something as a reward for their patience and "if it takes longer, it must be better". But those people will ultimately end up disappointed no matter how good the game ends up being in the end.
At the same time, it is absolutely understandable why a lot of people are looking at these latest updates and say "yes, while I am glad there are updates and that
something is added, it's just... not enough. This stems from a lot of different reasons, some of which I jsut mentioned above. It's a hard situation to be ijn really, cause I believe at least part of the community wants this game to succeed, but after so much time just keeps reconfirming their own belief that nothing is going to come of it at this pace.
And I have to agree. I understand 100% that only so many CGs and animations can be produced in a certain timeframe. But once you got the base animations and character models down for your main characters and most important side characters, I implore you to not be too afraid to release content patches that only update the story/events/dialogue without adding new animations. It might be annoying and disappointing at times, but if this is the ONE thing holding you back, don't let it stop you. It literally is the most slow thing about game development imo, and it certainily is a very common bottleneck. So find ways to circumvent the problem while still giving your animators and CG artists the necessary time to do their work properly.