Others OverSoul [vPre-Alpha-4] [DAIMOND]

[riadhloch]

Thanks for showing me an example. I most likely won't be able to write at this level, but I'll try to do what I can.

Ehhh. I don't know about that. Please don't sell yourself short.

While I don't want to make this game thread all about Fenoxo's legacy -- and while I do have a rather fond history with their games going back years and years -- I would nevertheless disagree with that excerpt provided being an example to emulate in your prose.

Allow me to elucidate and please forgive me as I'm about to be rather pedantic. In the sample from CoC2, the lauded description is, "Full, black lips curl into a smile, drawing your attention to her slitted, faintly-glowing yellow eyes bathed in a black sea of charcoal shadow."

For me, this sentence is rather flawed in several respects: it's 1) ostentatious while also being repetitive; 2) inconsistent in style; 3) doesn't make logical sense.

1) bathed in a black sea of charcoal shadow. The effort is admirable, but the author effectively used 'black' to describe 'black' three times. Black is black. Charcoal is black. Shadow can be inferred to be black.

I think what the author is trying to describe here is that the character's sclera is so dark it isn't even reflective. In my opinion, a better interpretation would have been something like, "yellow eyes bathed in a dark sea devoid of light," or something to that effect. There are lots of ways to imply color without becoming overwrought. Furthermore, personally I'd avoid using 'black' in this depiction again as I'd already used it to describe her lips.

2) full, black lips...faintly-glowing yellow eyes. This CoC2 selection is arguably purple prose, but every author has the right to be flowery in their descriptions should they choose to (see: Rothfuss, GRRM, etc.). Be that as it may, they're inconsistent. Instead of "black lips" and "yellow eyes," they could have used "Full, ebony lips" and "faintly-glowing, amber eyes" or even "lambent, amber eyes" to stay true to their desired style.

3) The logic of the description is flawed in my opinion in several areas. As the reader, I have to assume that the "black sea" is the sclera of the character, but that's confusing as they've also just described "slitted, yellow eyes." Are the eyes yellow, or black? Is it that the slits -- their pupils -- are yellow? It isn't clear and I'd propose that it pulls the reader out of the moment. Additionally, "black lips" would draw my attention away from the upper half of a character's face, not towards it. Perhaps it's just me, but lips make me think of teeth, or a flickering tongue, or the shape of a jawline or neck, or perhaps cheekbones, which then in turn could lead to eyes. Eyes could even distract from the lower half of the face.

If I were tasked with rewriting this single sentence in what I assume to be the author's intended style, I would do something like:

Full lips the color of ebony curl into a sly smile, but your attention is drawn away from their alluring promise by her eyes. Lambent, amber slits wrapped in dark, inky orbs that seem to drink the light, they capture you with their mystery and cold regard.

It's a bit much, but I think it follows what that author seems to be going for, and that's okay if they are! It's their style.

Just like it's okay to explore your own style, if you can forgive any possible perception of patronizing tone on my part.

TLDR; despite being beloved by many, CoC is not perfect and not necessarily something for you to hold on a pedestal. Write what you like. Find your own voice. Pick your own prose. You'll make mistakes but so long as you keep writing, I'm sure you'll get where you want to be.

 

[LoliNep]

wtf is this shit? this planning stuff fucking suck. Spent like 20 minutes trying to figure this out and i still cant pick an outfit.

 

[DAIMOND]

I'm not gonna lie, the UI is absolutely atrocious. I can't remember the last time I played a game where the UI had such little clarity.

The UI is mostly a placeholder for now, and there are plans to improve it in the future. Although if you can specify why you think it's atrocious and how to make it better then I'll appreciate it.

Ehhh. I don't know about that. Please don't sell yourself short.

While I don't want to make this game thread all about Fenoxo's legacy -- and while I do have a rather fond history with their games going back years and years -- I would nevertheless disagree with that excerpt provided being an example to emulate in your prose.

Allow me to elucidate and please forgive me as I'm about to be rather pedantic. In the sample from CoC2, the lauded description is, "Full, black lips curl into a smile, drawing your attention to her slitted, faintly-glowing yellow eyes bathed in a black sea of charcoal shadow."

For me, this sentence is rather flawed in several respects: it's 1) ostentatious while also being repetitive; 2) inconsistent in style; 3) doesn't make logical sense.

1) bathed in a black sea of charcoal shadow. The effort is admirable, but the author effectively used 'black' to describe 'black' three times. Black is black. Charcoal is black. Shadow can be inferred to be black.

I think what the author is trying to describe here is that the character's sclera is so dark it isn't even reflective. In my opinion, a better interpretation would have been something like, "yellow eyes bathed in a dark sea devoid of light," or something to that effect. There are lots of ways to imply color without becoming overwrought. Furthermore, personally I'd avoid using 'black' in this depiction again as I'd already used it to describe her lips.

2) full, black lips...faintly-glowing yellow eyes. This CoC2 selection is arguably purple prose, but every author has the right to be flowery in their descriptions should they choose to (see: Rothfuss, GRRM, etc.). Be that as it may, they're inconsistent. Instead of "black lips" and "yellow eyes," they could have used "Full, ebony lips" and "faintly-glowing, amber eyes" or even "lambent, amber eyes" to stay true to their desired style.

3) The logic of the description is flawed in my opinion in several areas. As the reader, I have to assume that the "black sea" is the sclera of the character, but that's confusing as they've also just described "slitted, yellow eyes." Are the eyes yellow, or black? Is it that the slits -- their pupils -- are yellow? It isn't clear and I'd propose that it pulls the reader out of the moment. Additionally, "black lips" would draw my attention away from the upper half of a character's face, not towards it. Perhaps it's just me, but lips make me think of teeth, or a flickering tongue, or the shape of a jawline or neck, or perhaps cheekbones, which then in turn could lead to eyes. Eyes could even distract from the lower half of the face.

If I were tasked with rewriting this single sentence in what I assume to be the author's intended style, I would do something like:

Full lips the color of ebony curl into a sly smile, but your attention is drawn away from their alluring promise by her eyes. Lambent, amber slits wrapped in dark, inky orbs that seem to drink the light, they capture you with their mystery and cold regard.

It's a bit much, but that I think it follows what that author seems to be going for, and that's okay if they are! It's their style.

Just like it's okay to explore your own style, if you can forgive any possible perception of patronizing tone on my part.

TLDR; despite being beloved by many, CoC is not perfect and not necessarily something for you to hold on a pedestal. Write what you like. Find your own voice. Pick your own prose. You'll make mistakes but so long as you keep writing, I'm sure you'll get where you want to be.

Thank you for writing such a detailed response. I'll keep that in mind.

wtf is this shit? this planning stuff fucking suck. Spent like 20 minutes trying to figure this out and i still cant pick an outfit.

I think there are enough complaints about the planning system that it should be considered a 'major issue' now...I'll make a 3rd hotfix that adds an option to set schedules and outfits automatically later today. Please stay tuned.

Thank you for the replies

 

[tryingthegames]

I like the concept. Happy to hear the dev is taking a look at the planning system. Having to choose tasks, locations for tasks, outfits for the tasks, for 14 time slots, all at once, is a giant hurdle. Very unlikely people are going to go through that many manual steps without messing up something. Especially since its once of the first things you do. I personally found myself just kind of sticking to the same plan every "month" so I didn't have to do it again (I did do 2-3 playthroughs to test things out.) This sort of system would probably make more sense as a day by day planner. It would let you get into the "action" quicker, break up the time spent planning, reduce time finding what dialog you missed setting, and let you adjust your tasks as your character's stats and relationships change.

Defaulting randomized clothes that fit the task requirement, when you don't specify an outfit, would go a long way. If the game remembered what outfit you chose last, for a given task, that could help too. I don't believe this would invalidate the clothing system, since it could still be ideal to wear the specific styles you want, and at higher qualities, which could still be done with manual outfit creation. On a side note, even when creating and picking an outfit for a task it can be confusing what is preventing you, since there are hidden underwear requirements that are not shown as required clothing slots.

In terms of the UI, reducing required user clicks, is key. One thing I suggest that when you make a choice for a task, and there is only one option on the following dialog (be it a skill, job role, or location), it should auto complete and save you some clicks. If my only option is home, don't make me click 3 times to select home. If my only option is cleaner, don't make me click 3 times to select cleaner.

It would also be nice if leaving a time slot blank would just treat it, or default it, as a relax phase. Once again, it reduces clicks, and is more functional than having your default be nothing.

 

[DAIMOND]

The thread is updated yet again with the 3rd hotfix. It addresses the main complaints toward this game (being frustrating to set schedules). Here is the changelog:

Spoiler: Changelog

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Hopefully, this will be the last hotfix for this version. As usual, you can give suggestions or bug reports here or on my Discord. Thank you for playing 'Over-Soul'

 

[coretex]

Giving this a try after watching the thread for a few days - first time trying to load, it wont launch.

Realizing you have this in raw python (vs renpy) and me normally running games from a network share and mapping the drive, I tried copying locally to a similar pathing but on a physical system drive, and it works. So if possible, request for functional enhancement for the game to work with standard (win/samba) network shares?

Also do you use any temp locations or %appdata% paths at all?

Thanks Daimond.

 

[DAIMOND]

Giving this a try after watching the thread for a few days - first time trying to load, it wont launch.

Realizing you have this in raw python (vs renpy) and me normally running games from a network share and mapping the drive, I tried copying locally to a similar pathing but on a physical system drive, and it works. So if possible, request for functional enhancement for the game to work with standard (win/samba) network shares?

Also do you use any temp locations or %appdata% paths at all?

Thanks Daimond.

I'm not sure how running the game from network share could make it unplayable, so I don't know if I can fix it. And no I don't use any. Thanks for the reply.

 

[coretex]

Well i have a clue at least,
Its trying to pull actual "physical/real" path vs the "logical" one of the mapped drive.
Running off a cmd window did output some errors. In short.. it doesnt like UNC paths, which doesnt surprise me. Even Renpy doesnt at times.

Spoiler: condensed

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So its trying to pull the full raw network path, vs the mapped drive pathing... else it would have been like G:\Games\etcetc.
I even tried a shortcut w/ the target and start in with the mapped pathing, same thing, so its something in the code.
Whether its fixable, no idea, dont know python very well. Hopefully a clue for an idea if one comes to you.

 

[Funny Asian Pirate]

Kinda reminds me of Newlife's weekly planning with the sex content and gameplay of something similar to Lilith's Throne.

 

[DAIMOND]

Kinda reminds me of Newlife's weekly planning with the sex content and gameplay of something similar to Lilith's Throne.

Yes, those two are my biggest inspirations for this game

 

[Polarthief]

What version are you playing?

Sorry I don't check F95 often enough so this is pretty late >_>;

It was Prealpha1-Hotfix1 according to my folder name, which should have been the latest version *at that time on the front page* of me posting that original review-ish message (I probably left the post about 30m after downloading?). I do now see Hotfixes 2 and 3 in the changelog on the front page, so my bad for the repeat bug reports

Hand and oral scenes aren't implemented yet. They're to be added in the next update, along with the option to automatically set schedules and outfits.

Sounds good!

Thank you for your reply, I appreciate it.

Happy to help!

 

[BubblesTheAllMighty]

Can you create your own NPC characters as well?

 

[Sharkie94]

Near unplayable because they game forces you to enact dozens of choices before you can proceed. And the UI doesn't help that at all, since it is usually several nested menus inside of eachother, rather just a list of drop down menus.

Character creation? You need to pick something for every single statistic- from ass size to when you are into middle aged women- before you can proceed. And you also need 3 personality traits, even though the game never tells you have a max of three until you hit the max.

Similarly, you need to plan out your week. Which means picking 7 different activities, even though you don't know what a single one of them does. I am not sure, you might need 7 evening activities, as well as locations for every activity too. I have been at the week screen for 10 minutes just trying to do a "find a job" button. I also assume that I have to pick out outfits for each of these options, although the game doesn't tell me that is the problem.

This game either needs be programmed to get a defaults answer ("medium sized ass", "just rest when I do not specify", "just the default outfit"), or at least something that highlights which of the dozens of choices I didn't fill in.

THIS!
I was about to hit quit and never look at the title ever again - when I read your reply.

 

[Sharkie94]

Promising...
But you gotta hide/streamline 90% of the interactions, because it's just a chore to play atm.

 

[DAIMOND]

Can you create your own NPC characters as well?

Not yet. Although I can add this system if there are demands for it.

Promising...
But you gotta hide/streamline 90% of the interactions, because it's just a chore to play atm.

If you can give examples of these interactions that need streamline, I'd appreciate it. Though I'm assuming that character creation is one of them -- There is already a plan to make that system and weekly/monthly planning easier to navigate in the next update. (You can already auto-set schedules, though. So you can do that for now and make manual changes afterward)

Thank you for the replies.

 

[coolbond]

any way to increase love currently?

 

[joeys88]

Not yet. Although I can add this system if there are demands for it.

Definitely would like a way to customize NPC generation. Like sliders for proportion of male/female, race, how common should x personalities be, etc.

 

[DAIMOND]

any way to increase love currently?

You'll be able to do it in Pre-Alpha3, where relationship & marriage system will be added.

Definitely would like a way to customize NPC generation. Like sliders for proportion of male/female, race, how common should x personalities be, etc.

I'm quite reluctant to add this. My vision is for Over-Soul to have multiple worlds, each with its own set of common races, personalities, sex ratios, cultures, etc. I can probably add it for now since worlds lore isn't established yet, but it will most likely has to be removed in the future.

Thanks for the replies.

Edit: Actually, I have an idea. I can make it so you can customize the generation, but ONLY for the starting world and not any other worlds. This will satisfy players' unique tastes and not interfere with my vision. I think I'll do this. Thanks for suggesting.

 

[Draconookie]

by the way if you are still not sure what pronouns to use for hermaphrodite characters what about they/them or shi/hir basically any gender-neutral pronoun or pronouns that are both male and female at the same time though pronouns could also be determined by how feminine or masculine a character is, and another thing is you could do similarly to what fenoxo and gang did in trials in tainted space in the language filter part of settings they allow you to choose what words you want to use to describe a certain kind of gender or genders so you could do something similar to give players the choice of what pronouns they want to use without you yourself having to stress over it so much also if you did not notice i am a major hermaphrodite/futanari fan

 

[DAIMOND]

by the way if you are still not sure what pronouns to use for hermaphrodite characters what about they/them or shi/hir basically any gender-neutral pronoun or pronouns that are both male and female at the same time though pronouns could also be determined by how feminine or masculine a character is, and another thing is you could do similarly to what fenoxo and gang did in trials in tainted space in the language filter part of settings they allow you to choose what words you want to use to describe a certain kind of gender or genders so you could do something similar to give players the choice of what pronouns they want to use without you yourself having to stress over it so much also if you did not notice i am a major hermaphrodite/futanari fan

Thanks for suggesting, but I've found the solution. I'll separate 'sex' from 'gender', which will determine your pronouns.