Ren'Py Of Devotion and Despondence [v0.2.18] [Earliestbird]

[telefonomusica]

I forgot to mention the art style chosen, I am not a particular fan of ai generated things because they usually lack coherence, in this case however the surreal style fits well with the setting, also ai art is getting better so maybe it will become more popular in general, as for this game certain subtle imperfections fit with the theme of an ever shifting world.

 

[Earliestbird]

Now that the naming issue is mostly resolved,

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I can express my opinion of the game, the writing is solid, it decribes the scene well and the tone is set clearly,
the story is in an early stage and I personally have not gotten far yet but it does seem interesting,
the "lore" of the world for lack of a better term is intriguing,
it reminds me of a better executed CoC with the whole shifting world kind of deal,
in that game it was mentined once and then ignored for the most part.

I wont speak much of the gameplay elements because it is still early,
I do aggree that they need rebalancing, but to me personally they are secondary,
also if the gameplay gets in the way of fun you can just cheat,
the actual content of the game however cannot be changed that way so it is more important,
the one exeption is saving, I feel like not allowing to save during exploration is a bad decision,
the inability to save during combat is normal but outside of it you should be able to save everywhere otherwise it is just frustrating to find the options that you actually want,
especially with such criptic writing, it sets the mood well but from a gameplay perspective it does not allow clear jidgement.

On the topic of content a warning about the sexual ecounters would be nice,

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the writing in the scene is good but the content is personally disgusting so I could not enjoy it,
a content filter could be a solution but a simple warning before the scenes would be enough and I suppose easier to implement,
during that scene your character clearly likes it but I did not and that breaks immersion, more agency would also be nice,

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but that would be harder to implement than a simple warning.

Now on to the topic of romance, I have very high standards for that so take what I say as a suggestion and information about how peaple could react, I have not found any romance yet, so what I say is more for future reference and applies in general, to me the most important part of romance is loyalty and exlusivity, if she has sex with someone else then its cheating,

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this is a delicate topic and I have been burned before, the definition of a certain achronym is very discussed arround here but in the end I have my opinion and that is precisely why I ask for clarification now to determine what games are for me, but that is going too off topic, for this game specifically I just want to warn the dev that romance is a delicate matter and that unlike many belive, and also the reason I was misunderstood, it is not a certain 3 letter tag that sould indicate exlusivity but the harem tag, because a harem needs a focal point, I also have opinions about that but I will leave them out for now.

I apologize for the rant and the wall of text, I am trying to improve but i am not a professional wirter, I hope the dev takes this as more of a suggestion than an actual rewiew, and maybe as an occation to better clarify the aim of the game, not regarding story spoilers of course, also as a last thougth

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Also it is late so exuse my grammar.

No problem at all, I always welcome detailed feedback!

I will consider allowing save anywhere outside of combat, I initially disabled it due to technical issues but I'll see if I can work around it (the escape menu kind of broke the UI).

Okay, so here's my counter rant about romance (and Raven). I despise cheating and anything that has to do with it. The game will not have any of that. And I also have a very high standards for writing not just romance, but characters in general - which is why I think the idea that a character being untamable and unpredictable would somehow make them prone to cheating... is an absolutely ridiculous way to look at things.

Humans are complex. You can't just shove a person under a tag - like being wild and free-spirited - and assume they would approach everything in that manner. (One of the reasons I dislike tropes like "tsundere" and such.) There are hundreds of variables that clash with hundreds of different variables, and personality is an end result that can only be vaguely described, but never exactly determined.

Maybe an untamable person like Raven deeply years to take down roots, excited to discover a part of herself that she'd never faced before. Maybe she can be both confident and shy, delighted and fearful at the same time - confident in trying to pursue what she wants, shy when approached in a manner that puts her offguard, and both delighted and fearful of the prospect of falling in love. Even if she is a wilder spirit than most, this does not make her unpredictable in every aspect of her life. It only makes her human, just like any of us.

I've seen shy and gentle people cheat behind their significant others' back. I've seen unpleasant and vulgar men be faithful to their wives, and I've even seen people of all genders leave their loved ones without any conceivable reason. Life can throw curveballs that we have no idea how we will react to and maybe not even make much sense of it afterwards.

So, no. Raven's personality does not make her "prone to cheating". D'Alena's silent personality does not make her any less expressive. The MC's introverted nature does not make him bad at social situations. They are each part of a much larger puzzle and it is my duty as a writer to get inside their heads and see the world through their lens.

But now that the rant is over... yes. All the girls will be loyal to the main character, and they will discuss their relationship like reasonable adults, when the time comes. No, the lore will not make cheating a literal impossibility (like making the MC the only male in existence) because that would be awful and lazy writing.
Cheating will not happen because people who are devoted to each other simply don't do it.

 

[deepglugs]

Good to see more AI-assisted work! Looking forward to trying this out.

 

[wiseold6996]

Now that the naming issue is mostly resolved,

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I can express my opinion of the game, the writing is solid, it decribes the scene well and the tone is set clearly,
the story is in an early stage and I personally have not gotten far yet but it does seem interesting,
the "lore" of the world for lack of a better term is intriguing,
it reminds me of a better executed CoC with the whole shifting world kind of deal,
in that game it was mentined once and then ignored for the most part.

I wont speak much of the gameplay elements because it is still early,
I do aggree that they need rebalancing, but to me personally they are secondary,
also if the gameplay gets in the way of fun you can just cheat,
the actual content of the game however cannot be changed that way so it is more important,
the one exeption is saving, I feel like not allowing to save during exploration is a bad decision,
the inability to save during combat is normal but outside of it you should be able to save everywhere otherwise it is just frustrating to find the options that you actually want,
especially with such criptic writing, it sets the mood well but from a gameplay perspective it does not allow clear jidgement.

On the topic of content a warning about the sexual ecounters would be nice,

Spoiler

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the writing in the scene is good but the content is personally disgusting so I could not enjoy it,
a content filter could be a solution but a simple warning before the scenes would be enough and I suppose easier to implement,
during that scene your character clearly likes it but I did not and that breaks immersion, more agency would also be nice,

Spoiler

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but that would be harder to implement than a simple warning.

Now on to the topic of romance, I have very high standards for that so take what I say as a suggestion and information about how peaple could react, I have not found any romance yet, so what I say is more for future reference and applies in general, to me the most important part of romance is loyalty and exlusivity, if she has sex with someone else then its cheating,

Spoiler

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this is a delicate topic and I have been burned before, the definition of a certain achronym is very discussed arround here but in the end I have my opinion and that is precisely why I ask for clarification now to determine what games are for me, but that is going too off topic, for this game specifically I just want to warn the dev that romance is a delicate matter and that unlike many belive, and also the reason I was misunderstood, it is not a certain 3 letter tag that sould indicate exlusivity but the harem tag, because a harem needs a focal point, I also have opinions about that but I will leave them out for now.

I apologize for the rant and the wall of text, I am trying to improve but i am not a professional wirter, I hope the dev takes this as more of a suggestion than an actual rewiew, and maybe as an occation to better clarify the aim of the game, not regarding story spoilers of course, also as a last thougth

Spoiler

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Also it is late so exuse my grammar.

Then we just have to tame her

 

[telefonomusica]

No problem at all, I always welcome detailed feedback!

I will consider allowing save anywhere outside of combat, I initially disabled it due to technical issues but I'll see if I can work around it (the escape menu kind of broke the UI).

Okay, so here's my counter rant about romance (and Raven). I despise cheating and anything that has to do with it. The game will not have any of that. And I also have a very high standards for writing not just romance, but characters in general - which is why I think the idea that a character being untamable and unpredictable would somehow make them prone to cheating... is an absolutely ridiculous way to look at things.

Humans are complex. You can't just shove a person under a tag - like being wild and free-spirited - and assume they would approach everything in that manner. (One of the reasons I dislike tropes like "tsundere" and such.) There are hundreds of variables that clash with hundreds of different variables, and personality is an end result that can only be vaguely described, but never exactly determined.

Maybe an untamable person like Raven deeply years to take down roots, excited to discover a part of herself that she'd never faced before. Maybe she can be both confident and shy, delighted and fearful at the same time - confident in trying to pursue what she wants, shy when approached in a manner that puts her offguard, and both delighted and fearful of the prospect of falling in love. Even if she is a wilder spirit than most, this does not make her unpredictable in every aspect of her life. It only makes her human, just like any of us.

I've seen shy and gentle people cheat behind their significant others' back. I've seen unpleasant and vulgar men be faithful to their wives, and I've even seen people of all genders leave their loved ones without any conceivable reason. Life can throw curveballs that we have no idea how we will react to and maybe not even make much sense of it afterwards.

So, no. Raven's personality does not make her "prone to cheating". D'Alena's silent personality does not make her any less expressive. The MC's introverted nature does not make him bad at social situations. They are each part of a much larger puzzle and it is my duty as a writer to get inside their heads and see the world through their lens.

But now that the rant is over... yes. All the girls will be loyal to the main character, and they will discuss their relationship like reasonable adults, when the time comes. No, the lore will not make cheating a literal impossibility (like making the MC the only male in existence) because that would be awful and lazy writing.
Cheating will not happen because people who are devoted to each other simply don't do it.

I did not expect such a detailed response to that specific part of the rant, I did say that the issue can be resolved by good writing, I aggree on all that you said about peaple and personality, but I also think that realism is not as important in games, if I wanted realism I would look elsewhere, still a well witten character can be good regardless.

My worry is that different peaple have different definitions of cheating, and I cannot know for certain if it coincides with mine, for exeample even if it technically is not cheating any kind of sexual interaction between a girl and someone who is not MC I personally consider as cheating if she was a love interest or superfluos if she was not, any sexual interaction that does not involve MC to me varies between useless to disgusting, the same goes for certain kind of content, to me immersion is important and if the MC reacts in a way i do not aggree with it breaks immersion, I see sex as part of romance and sex without it is meaningless and disgusting, so a more free love approach disgusts me as well, I am too early in the game to determine what kind of interactions there are going to be and a clarification would probably be too much of a spoiler, the game has been enjoiable so far but it takes very little to ruin it for me, it is not meant as an offence, I simply am this way.

Anyway as long as the girls are not sexually active with others in the timeframe of the game I should be fine, my comment on Raven was mostly to explain that peaple have different opinions on romance and someone could enjoy the free spirited approach where as long as she loves you she can have sex with whoever but to me that is disgusting, usually a character described like her is very open sexually and sleeps arround easily, and that is not cheating if she is not in a relationship, but it is for me, so if her character is different than I guess time will tell, still the game has a solid fundation, I hope my rant was not too bad, still I feel like it was needed, I ask for clarity so it is important I also provide clarity, my opinion may differ from yours but I still whish you good luck in your endeavors.

 

[Earliestbird]

Nah, you have nothing to worry about. No sleeping around, no making the other person jealous, none of that bullshit. Just good old wholesome (and dramatic/moving/emotional) romance.

 

[JohnF95zone]

My worry is that different peaple have different definitions of cheating

Sir, you don't have to worry about different definitions of cheating or any other tags because the site has its own definition here where game threads should abide by. Players can report missing tags and/or wrong tags being applied to a game threads.

Anyway, Earliestbird already given clear cut answer regarding the game contents which basically is wholesome romance. I just want to add general information about the tags, which members of this site should be aware of.

Site definition of Cheating

• Cheating [A significant other having sex with someone other than their partner.]

(It does not even have to be related to the MC or LIs at all.)

 

[Otherguy2012]

Can you explain the combat system a little bit?
For example an enemy has 3 stats(they all seem to) they are 8,5,2 (just an example). I can do 4 damage with my next strike. Which is the most effective to hit,or does it even matter? I thought reducing an area to zero would end the fight faster,this does not seem to be the case though. Tips hints on combat(yes I have lost enough I am unsure I even want to continue playing).

 

[Otherguy2012]

Maybe you came across a bug? I'm sorry but there's not a single enemy in the game that could possible deal more than 30 damage in a single turn. The average enemy damage output is around 11~ per turn if they get lucky rolls. I have the data in front of me. The Stalker is the only current enemy with an excessively high damage range (2-13, 0, 2-13) but with only 40 health, it can be killed in a few turns.

But to be sure I just quickly ran through most enemy types in the game, using a character with 3 ARCA (+2 ARCA from the ruins upgrade) and here are the damage numbers I took from each combat encounter:
Trinity-Arm: 8 hp lost (with 15 shield)
Claw-Hand: 9 hp lost (with 15 shield)
Stalker: 16 hp lost (with 15 shield)
Portal Guardian: 31 hp lost (with 25 shield)

(You can also make use of the PHYS strike to block an especially large attack.)

Enemies dealing 70-100 damage in a single turn definitely seems like a bug to me, one that would be my highest priority to fix!

Ok, I just saw this post after posting my last one.
What would the damage be if you had ARCA 1 and shield 10? Because I have a feeling many players(myself included) have encountered enemies without having 3 ARCA and 15 shield. Can you break down the combat mechanics for us? It would make it easier to understand why I keep dying. I have never made it past some points without dying and know there is much more to the game than I have seen.

 

[Porthas]

Earliestbird

Wow, this is definitely a project I'd be interested in. So many wonderful tags. Since it's so early in development, I'm not going to critique the game, rather make humble requests.

And they are nothing but requests, I totally respect the dev's right to make what they want, and to put in as much work (or not) as they want. A lot of people are making these as a hobby, I get it.

The requests are put in spoilers, in case you're not interested. Which would be fine if you're not.

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Anyway, I'm getting carried away here.

 

[Xhak]

purple prose, but not without hope
but a simple clue for the developer
a woman's butthole is not the first thing he would notice in that position.

 

[Creiz]

Did you compile Stable Diffusion yourself? I can't find a place that lets me put titties.

All those AI Image generation companies are a bunch of puritans, damnit.

BTW nice game indeed. Not just the art, but the whole mechanics and writing. Easily top tier.

Sounds a bit presumptuous in certain places lmao but hey, who cares? You deserve the right lol

 

[Fruzsina]

Potentially looks like a really really really good game, i might give it a test for it later, but not now. The development feels a little early, to invest the hope. Good luck with your project!

 

[caju]

I see the game differently than most of the screenshots other players posted.
Renpy has always hated me.
Some games work some dont.
Best of luck to the developer.

 

[anon6076]

This ai-art is really great. Please provide details.

 

[lostscot]

Did you compile Stable Diffusion yourself? I can't find a place that lets me put titties.

Would love a 32-bit version so we can play it on Mac via porting kit!

 

[Malkovichi]

Omg. This AI art is terrible tendency in game dave. Looks bad. Very bad

 

[unholy baker]

Humans are complex.

Hottest take of the year. But seriously though, the writing is great - and I think will take this game far. The world itself is interesting, and poses challenges the likes of which I haven't seen in any other story of the kind.

I'm not sure how I feel about the "pay essence to touch" mechanic, as essence is quite plentiful in the current state of balancing, so the cost is quite trivial. I also have some worries regarding D'alena turning out to be a stereotypical dandere, but we've seen nothing of her development so far, and Raven is pretty neatly done, so I'm going to wait and see.

And lastly.. congratulations! As someone that's been "thinking" about making a game in the past few months, I know what that involves. Really solid release so far! If I were not a mere student atm, I'd definitely throw some coffee money your way.

 

[Earliestbird]

Ok, I just saw this post after posting my last one.
What would the damage be if you had ARCA 1 and shield 10? Because I have a feeling many players(myself included) have encountered enemies without having 3 ARCA and 15 shield. Can you break down the combat mechanics for us? It would make it easier to understand why I keep dying. I have never made it past some points without dying and know there is much more to the game than I have seen.

Enemies don't have attributes like PHYS or ARCA, those are player-only stats. PHYS increases your strike + cleave damage, ARCA your warp + magic abilities damage (and gives 5 shield).

Enemies have armor, minimum damage, and maximum damage for each of their 3 bodyparts. You can see these stats when you click on each part. They also have arcane resistance, which applies to all bodyparts at once.

Generally, PHYS builds are more straight forward / brute force where you can always block your opponent's largest strike, and burst down the enemy with cleave. But they lack any sort of shield, which means the longer the fight lasts, the more they're gonna get hurt.

ARCA is all about slowly chipping away at the enemy, debuffing them, and try to weather the difficult early combat with their shield. After they applied some instability stacks, more options open up for them. But remember, they can still use the PHYS strikes to block large incoming enemy attacks.

 

[Earliestbird]

Did you compile Stable Diffusion yourself? I can't find a place that lets me put titties.

All those AI Image generation companies are a bunch of puritans, damnit.

BTW nice game indeed. Not just the art, but the whole mechanics and writing. Easily top tier.

Sounds a bit presumptuous in certain places lmao but hey, who cares? You deserve the right lol

I mostly used the Unstable Diffusion discord bots, check it out (as well as my own discord, I think the UD link is somewhere in there, but google should direct you to the right place)