VN Ren'Py Not Going Back [Ch.3.1] [Cicada]

[cicadaNGB]

First playthrough here, and as of writing, I’m right at the part where Tegan approaches MC during the pool party at PSY house. Had to force my morals not to two-time her and Mia, good girl !.


My favorite main girls so far, in order: Imogen, Mia, Tegan.

• Imogen, feels the most fleshed out at this point. Every convo between her and the MC has this natural rhythm where they both open up, and honestly, their chemistry feels the strongest of any pairing so far. Plus, she’s gorgeous.
• Mia, seems like the most obvious “main girl” of the game right from the start. There’s a hint of some trauma so that might be something.
• Tegan, is probably the least developed when compared to Mia and Imogen. At first, I misjudged her as just the “slutty” type, but to my surprise, she’s not. Her personality comes across as genuinely likable. That said, the chemistry build-up with her pretty much only sex driven up until this point in my saves.

Thank you for the comment! Those three do generally seem to be the most popular of the main girls. I'm glad you like the interactions with Imogen, some of her conversations have been my favorites to write. Mia was the first character I made for the game, so especially early on she gets a lot of the screentime as a result because a lot of the original ideas were built around her. Although thinking about it Alice was the second character I made for the game, and she's had about the opposite amount of screentime. So maybe it's not quite that simple. And for Tegan you've pretty much got exactly what I'm aiming for with her character: seemingly carefree and fun but with more depth once you get to know her. Thanks again for playing!

 

[FatGiant]

So if you are paying attention to lists, here's mine:

Alice.

The rest are completely irrelevant. All are interchangeable. None of them matters. Even Alice doesn't matter.

There's no reason to invest any time or any emotional capital in this game. It's just a cheaters engine, with a taste before you buy buffet. It means exactly, Zero.

Peace

 

[cicadaNGB]

Well...just finsihed, have to say pretty impressed.

I'm the opposite when it comes to hidden depth and complicated LI's...far too many devs do it now...a trope in and of itself. Sometimes it's nice to just have a simple, uncomplicated, no issues LI. Just a nice simple romance. Not everyone has issues, trauma, is fucked up (in fact, the vast majority of people don't)....it's tiring dealing with all this shit, especially if you have to in RL, in an AVN...just a few girls who have no issues. Simple can also be extremely interesting and satisfying....

Thankfully...(so far at least)...there's no dumb mob/crime/murder/mystery/drugs plots....another trope of modern AVN's and devs insterting X drama for the sake of it. As this proves, you can have a very good story without all that crap being shoehorned in to cover up a lack of interesting story and writing skill and still be interesting to play. So good job there.

I would say my only complaint so far (other than the usual side girls can be more interesting than mains syndrome lol) is the overall pacing of the main 8 LI's. Difficult to make decisions on some when you literally barely have any interaction with them at all. Like I love Alice, love her model...but at this point, why should I not be commiting to say Mia or T over her? We literally know nothing about her. Same with Ava....how do I know I will like her more than any others when...well...there really is nothing with her? Two conversations, one you can completely miss anyway? I get it's by design but doesn't really help really for me.

Other than that...decent guys around (the PED's aside lol)...they actually feel like real people and not just comedy acts or antagonists 'for the sake of it'...they are not just cardboard background characters, so excellent job there too.

Look forward to seeing more, keep up the great work cicadaNGB

Thank you for playing, I'm glad you enjoyed! I did want to try and balance the levels of depth for characters. Like you say, not everyone has problems, and some LIs will be fairly straightforward romance stories. Others will have greater levels of drama to their paths, though. But it's nice to see you've enjoyed what's there so far with regard to the story, a common criticism is that the story and interactions so far aren't particularly engaging enough to carry things so it's always nice to see people who've liked it. And there definitely won't be any future plot related things related to drugs and murder in this game at all. Definitely not ...

Your complaint is valid, and one I expect to hear a lot more, because there isn't going to be an equal amount of content for each LI in the game. I find it kind of arbitrary sometimes when games try and balance the amount of content between LIs, and it leads to forced conversations, situations, scenes, whatever that disrupts the overall narrative, usually to its detriment (some games do nail a balance, though). So I knew early on that some girls will have significantly less screentime than others. But the hope is that when they do get their time it's worth the wait. And the facet of not knowing whether or not you might like x over y is there to kind of mirror real life. Sometimes you don't know if a better option is there, so you sometimes have to risk saying yes or saying no to someone else to explore that option. Sometimes it'll work out great, sometimes it won't. So for instance if someone already knows they like Mia or Tegan, but have an interest in Alice or Ava too, they've got to decide whether it's worth it to pursue that interest or not. (the advantage of it being a game is you can replay if you like, but for a natural first playthrough i wanted players to have these thoughts. though i get how it can be deterring as well)

And I'm also glad to see more appreciation for the male characters. In many ways some of them are as important to the game as the LIs, from my perspective, so again it's nice to see that comes across in their depth and personality, for the most part.

Thank you again for playing, and for your kind words. I'm looking forward to getting more updates out, so I hope you'll enjoy them as much!

 

[Crowangel]

i seem to be missing one scene in chapter 2 the just relax titled one.. anyone can tell me whos the scene and why it was missed when i played through.. i thought id set up routes for all so its baffling

 

[jadepaladin]

i seem to be missing one scene in chapter 2 the just relax titled one.. anyone can tell me whos the scene and why it was missed when i played through.. i thought id set up routes for all so its baffling

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[Crowangel]

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still speed running back through but think might have solved the issue (i think i loaded a save point from a diff save that took place after refusing her in the gym showers) but will see

 

[TheNowhereWolf]

Looking like Imogen is my favorite here, she's definitely the most interesting LI for me so far and she's kind of a cutie. I imagine the little rat Christian will be a headache on her route though. I do feel like, even though there's not much with her yet, Rainn might be a close 2nd.

Need to see more from the others but I'm looking forward to more of Ellie, the twins and Jess. No idea if Jess is really a LI but I remain optimistic.

 

[MiltonPowers]

Looking like Imogen is my favorite here, she's definitely the most interesting LI for me so far and she's kind of a cutie. I imagine the little rat Christian will be a headache on her route though. I do feel like, even though there's not much with her yet, Rainn might be a close 2nd.

Need to see more from the others but I'm looking forward to more of Ellie, the twins and Jess. No idea if Jess is really a LI but I remain optimistic.

Main Girls are Tegan, Ava, Mia, Bobbie, Bonnie, Alice, Ellie, Imogen.

There is 8 paths/endings with the MG, but there is also a 9th path, where you don't pursue any of the MG, and can work towards being with one or more side girls in that path. So you can be with them, but you won't have that 'official' relationship with them or a dedicated ending.

 

[Joshy92]

So every girl in the banner in the OP is a LI?

 

[Maviarab]

So every girl in the banner in the OP is a LI?

Correct.

 

[cicadaNGB]

cross posting a dev log from itch. kinda big news

Hello!

Attached below are preview images for the next update.

Attached

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is a public dev log from Patreon. You don't need to be a member to view it. It's a longer, more detailed version of this post if you're interested.

Currently I've rendered 3 out of the 12 scenes for the next update. So I'm on paper a quarter of the way through, although as scenes 1 and 2 are probably the shortest two this isn't exactly an accurate measurement. But still useful as a rough guide.

I have fully written over half of the next update, with every scene at least planned out and partially written (a couple are only just started, though, admittedly).

The important information from the above public Patreon post is that for at least the next month, more likely until the end of the year I'm going to be working on this project full time. More details in the above post.

I'm very grateful to those of you here reading this. Thank you for taking an interest in the game, and allowing me to take a risk in devoting more time to something I'm incredibly passionate about.

Dev logs will resume here roughly at the end of every month to give a general idea on how things are going, but if you want more regular updates and previews I post weekly dev logs on Patreon (paid tiers only) as well as a special 4K render each week (top 3 tiers only). So if you're interested in that sort of thing I'd love it if you'd join.

Thanks!

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[DIKHammer]

I am super late on getting massively into this one. First playthrough kinda alright second playthrough really got me into this AVN.

I also see justaphase, MiltonPowers, & Dessolos here so I know I am in the right place.

Gives me kind of an Intertwined/College Kings cross feel here.

This might be some of the best rendering of some of the girls. Also I find all the girls to be at least semi complex and not one dimensional which I super appreciate. I def need a few more playthroughs. Have my Mia, Imogen, Tegan, manwhore/fuckboi (SG), & Bobbie paths setup and done.

Am I just missing much content for Ava, Alice, Ellie, & Bonnie? or do they not have a lot of content so far, I saw something about an Ava scene? but I think I fucked up a variabel somewhere on her path and just converted that to manwhore playthrough

 

[cicadaNGB]

I am super late on getting massively into this one. First playthrough kinda alright second playthrough really got me into this AVN.

I also see justaphase, MiltonPowers, & Dessolos here so I know I am in the right place.

Gives me kind of an Intertwined/College Kings cross feel here.

This might be some of the best rendering of some of the girls. Also I find all the girls to be at least semi complex and not one dimensional which I super appreciate. I def need a few more playthroughs. Have my Mia, Imogen, Tegan, manwhore/fuckboi (SG), & Bobbie paths setup and done.

Am I just missing much content for Ava, Alice, Ellie, & Bonnie? or do they not have a lot of content so far, I saw something about an Ava scene? but I think I fucked up a variabel somewhere on her path and just converted that to manwhore playthrough

Hey thanks for playing! Glad you stuck around for a second playthrough, and it's nice to hear that multiple playthroughs were worthwhile!

College Kings was absolutely an inspiration in the origins of NGB, it was one of the first AVNs I played. I actually never played Intertwined until March 24 (according to my saves in that one) so the direct influence there isn't as big, however I aspire to that game's level of branching and choice consequence. At any rate it's certainly a good game to be compared to, so thanks!

My favorite games have a lot of depth both in story and characters (although a lot can be said for more casual games, too). But I knew I wanted the world to feel alive and real with what I was making, so having each character feel complex was important to me, I'm glad that comes across.

Yes, Alice, Ellie, Bonnie don't have a lot of content yet. There's a couple of small scenes with Alice you could miss (studying in ch1 and a library scene in ch3) but nothing major. And there is an Ava scene you could miss, it's her doing the PSY house tour instead of Tegan. If your not study partners with Tegan you get it automatically; if you are study partners with Tegan you get the option to say no to hanging out with her after class, which leads to the Ava tour instead (but blocks off the first Tegan scene).

Thanks again for playing, it's much appreciated!

 

[MiltonPowers]

I am super late on getting massively into this one. First playthrough kinda alright second playthrough really got me into this AVN.

I also see justaphase, MiltonPowers, & Dessolos here so I know I am in the right place.

Gives me kind of an Intertwined/College Kings cross feel here.

This might be some of the best rendering of some of the girls. Also I find all the girls to be at least semi complex and not one dimensional which I super appreciate. I def need a few more playthroughs. Have my Mia, Imogen, Tegan, manwhore/fuckboi (SG), & Bobbie paths setup and done.

Am I just missing much content for Ava, Alice, Ellie, & Bonnie? or do they not have a lot of content so far, I saw something about an Ava scene? but I think I fucked up a variabel somewhere on her path and just converted that to manwhore playthrough

 

[camube]

Hey thanks for playing! Glad you stuck around for a second playthrough, and it's nice to hear that multiple playthroughs were worthwhile!

College Kings was absolutely an inspiration in the origins of NGB, it was one of the first AVNs I played. I actually never played Intertwined until March 24 (according to my saves in that one) so the direct influence there isn't as big, however I aspire to that game's level of branching and choice consequence. At any rate it's certainly a good game to be compared to, so thanks!

My favorite games have a lot of depth both in story and characters (although a lot can be said for more casual games, too). But I knew I wanted the world to feel alive and real with what I was making, so having each character feel complex was important to me, I'm glad that comes across.

Yes, Alice, Ellie, Bonnie don't have a lot of content yet. There's a couple of small scenes with Alice you could miss (studying in ch1 and a library scene in ch3) but nothing major. And there is an Ava scene you could miss, it's her doing the PSY house tour instead of Tegan. If your not study partners with Tegan you get it automatically; if you are study partners with Tegan you get the option to say no to hanging out with her after class, which leads to the Ava tour instead (but blocks off the first Tegan scene).

Thanks again for playing, it's much appreciated!

hello!

i'd like to ask how many chapters do you plan to have and do you have a plan to put the game on steam eventually?

 

[3J1E]

Yes, Alice, Ellie, Bonnie don't have a lot of content yet. There's a couple of small scenes with Alice you could miss (studying in ch1 and a library scene in ch3) but nothing major. And there is an Ava scene you could miss, it's her doing the PSY house tour instead of Tegan. If your not study partners with Tegan you get it automatically; if you are study partners with Tegan you get the option to say no to hanging out with her after class, which leads to the Ava tour instead (but blocks off the first Tegan scene).

Thanks again for playing, it's much appreciated!

I haven't actually played the game yet, it's been on my list to try, but with Alice and Ellie particularly do you mean that they don't have much content in terms of sex scenes yet or that they just don't generally feature much in the game at all?

I usually don't properly try games until the LIs I'm interested in have a decent amount of content, and prefer slow burn LIs so that often takes a long time! Been keeping an eye on this as it feels like a game I'd really like, but if Alice and Ellie hardly feature at all after three chapters it could be a long wait! Not a problem though, would rather wait and have them develop at the right pace.

 

[cicadaNGB]

hello!

i'd like to ask how many chapters do you plan to have and do you have a plan to put the game on steam eventually?

Hi! So, there's going to be 11 updates for the game, and (technically) 11 'chapters'. But not quite in the traditional way. I'll be able to make things clearer in the future after a certain chapter release but right now I don't want to spoil anything by explicitly outlining the plan. But I guess the key thing is there are 11 planned updates.

My original plan for any Steam release was going to be to wait until the game was finished and release it as a finished product on Steam, but after talking to people and getting advice I'm leaning more towards 2 steam releases instead: chapters 1-5 as part 1 and the rest as part 2. I'm hoping to release the next update, some time shortly after launch the steam page (assuming I'm able to) and have it release there alongside the chapter 5 release.
I don't know if this is actually what'll happen, but as I say after talking with some people we came to the conclusion this is probably the best way of going about things. But it is subject to change

 

[cicadaNGB]

I haven't actually played the game yet, it's been on my list to try, but with Alice and Ellie particularly do you mean that they don't have much content in terms of sex scenes yet or that they just don't generally feature much in the game at all?

I usually don't properly try games until the LIs I'm interested in have a decent amount of content, and prefer slow burn LIs so that often takes a long time! Been keeping an eye on this as it feels like a game I'd really like, but if Alice and Ellie hardly feature at all after three chapters it could be a long wait! Not a problem though, would rather wait and have them develop at the right pace.

Both. Right now neither of them have any sex scenes, Ellie has a bit more dialogue but those 2 are the least featured main LI so far. And without wishing to explicitly spoil future content plans, those 2 are the LIs whose first sex scenes come the latest into the game. I've mentioned before that unlike some game here there definitely isn't an equal balance of content between LIs, because, for me personally, that sometimes leads to forced interactions that don't necessarily suit the character's personalities/stories or whatever (like you said about them developing at the right pace). But yeah, their amount of content will increase as time goes by, but the more reclusive/shy girls will end up with less screen time generally overall. (and it may not be the easiest to get or stay on their paths either)

 

[camube]

Hi! So, there's going to be 11 updates for the game, and (technically) 11 'chapters'. But not quite in the traditional way. I'll be able to make things clearer in the future after a certain chapter release but right now I don't want to spoil anything by explicitly outlining the plan. But I guess the key thing is there are 11 planned updates.

My original plan for any Steam release was going to be to wait until the game was finished and release it as a finished product on Steam, but after talking to people and getting advice I'm leaning more towards 2 steam releases instead: chapters 1-5 as part 1 and the rest as part 2. I'm hoping to release the next update, some time shortly after launch the steam page (assuming I'm able to) and have it release there alongside the chapter 5 release.
I don't know if this is actually what'll happen, but as I say after talking with some people we came to the conclusion this is probably the best way of going about things. But it is subject to change

you cant do early release anymore on steam apparently. so might wanna do Season 1 and Season 2 like other games have done
so many games ended up being abandoned these days i'll buy the game once you listed it on steam, even if it's just "season 1"

 

[cicadaNGB]

you cant do early release anymore on steam apparently. so might wanna do Season 1 and Season 2 like other games have done
so many games ended up being abandoned these days i'll buy the game once you listed it on steam, even if it's just "season 1"

Yeah that's what I've heard from other people. To be fair it seems like things are changing pretty frequently with what is and isn't allowed these past few months, and I don't imagine it clearing up any time soon. But, you can only work with the info you're given, so right now that's pretty much my plan: season 1 chapters 1-5, season 2 the rest. I've already paid the steam fee and starting setting the page up a while back but because of the no early access thing you mentioned actually releasing there has to wait (although people say to have the page up for at least 9 or so months anyway before actually releasing to get wishlists etc.)

We'll see how it goes, it's at least a year away I imagine so a lot of things could change in that time. Appreciate you saying you'd buy it when the time comes, that sentiment means a lot!