Now that I'm developing Supermodel instead of Long Live the Princess (though LLtP will get a patch), everything feels very different. Considering my priority in these early phases is to perfect the card game part of it as much as I can, most of my time is spent simply playing the game, looking at the data from my playtest, and tweaking based on the results. I almost never did anything like that with LLtP, but Supermodel is forcing me to use an actual spreadsheet to keep track of things.
It's refreshing and fun, and kind of stressful. But that last part is partly due to the game itself, which is very intense. It's incredibly frightening to develop a game like that from scratch since you never know if the ideas in your head will be fun to play until you actually have the game fully implemented in front of you. And sure, I've made changes to the game mechanics since my first playtest. But damn, I'm happy to report that the card game is actually fun to play right now, and that gets me all excited to share the prototype later.
I think a lot of people are going to be pleasantly surprised by this game. The track record for Ren'py card games isn't exactly good, but I'm trying to break free from that and show what Ren'py really can do if you squeeze it.
And for the record, the card game is only a small part of the overall experience of Supermodel. This will still be a full-blown visual novel, and the card game will be optional.
