So... I have an idea for a game... but I believe it would be too complex to actually be made. Opinions?

[DaClown]

I don't think I necessarily agree with this statement. For example, one of the characters could be a playboy. Maybe his goal in life is to have a harem of women at his disposal. Playing the other 3 characters correctly will allow him to have his perfect harem ending where he gets to live with the women he wants. This would mean that you need to play with 3 characters in a certain way to give this character 1 ending but I still think that would be interesting. And each of the interaction of other characters count towards this.

This is an excellent example for us to talk about distinctly different outcomes.

As a detour, let's talk about a game in which there is a pool of NPCs that are potential members of a "harem" and there are say 4 playable characters that can end up with 0 to r members in their "harem" where r <= n and n is the total number of NPCs.

If there's one ending for each of the possible outcomes for a given playable character then we have to write and depict Sum(C(n,r)) total scenes for each playable character assuming order doesn't matter or 4 Sum(C(n,r)) for 4 total playable characters. If there's say 4 NPCs then this ends up being 4 (C(4,0) + C(4,1) + C(4,2) + C(4,3) + C(4,4)) = 4(1 + 4 + 6 + 4 + 1) = 4(16) = 64 possible outcomes. PC.A has to have depictions of the outcome where they get no partners, where they get 1 of 4 partner, where they get 2 of 4 possible partners, where they get 3 of 4 possible partners, and where they get all 4 possible partners. If PC.A gets 0 of 4 then PC.B can get up to 4 of 4, but if PC.A gets 1 of 4 then PC.B only can get 3 of 4; we still have to in development somehow construct the possibilities that may be unrealized in a given player's play through though.

If we end up depicting a joint ending based on the results of the individual playable character's endings then we actually end up depicting more than 64 possible outcomes because we have to depict cases like PC.A gets 0 out of 4, PC.B gets 0 out of 4, PC.C gets 0 out of 4, and PC.D gets 0 out of 4. If PC.A gets 4 out of 4 then all other playable characters get 0 out of 4 unless there is someway (NTR) to steal from PC.A. Assuming NTR is disabled and not developed then we would have one distinctly different outcome for each of the cases where a PC.x gets 4 out of 4. If the first PC labeled PC.A gets 3 out of 4 then PC.B can get 0 or 1 out of 4 and PC.C can get 0 or 1 out of 4 and PC.D can get 0 or 1 out of 4; this creates a set of outcomes which is {(3,0,0,0), (3,1,0,0), (3,0,1,0), (3,0,0,1)}; the set of joint outcomes for PC.A gets 2 out of 4 is much bigger.

It is possible that we fix the game so that the playboy getting his harem and all the other characters get nothing so we only have one end or we only have 5 possible endings (0, 1, 2, 3, or 4 out of 4), but we create a situation in which while we may implicitly or explicitly promise to the players that their favorite playable character can get their favorite NPC we're lying to them because 3 out of the 4 playable characters exist only to funnel NPCs to 1 of the (fixed) playable characters.

Which is precisely an example of this.

Either you're going to have extraneous playable characters or you're going to have quite a few outcomes that grows proportionate to the number of characters involved in the system of play.

And contrary to the explicitly stated objectives of the author:

the outcomes would need to at least feel/appear distinct enough from one another to justify multiple playthroughs and to be significant and apparent, otherwise, indeed the whole concept would be easily reduced into a limited set of completely railroaded endings, which would invalidate the player agency that made them choose one path over the other... which goes against my DnD player sensibilities and against the very purpose of having interconnecting storylines that affect one another significantly during playtime.

 

[ihl86]

This is an excellent example for us to talk about distinctly different outcomes.

As a detour, let's talk about a game in which there is a pool of NPCs that are potential members of a "harem" and there are say 4 playable characters that can end up with 0 to r members in their "harem" where r <= n and n is the total number of NPCs.

If there's one ending for each of the possible outcomes for a given playable character then we have to write and depict Sum(C(n,r)) total scenes for each playable character assuming order doesn't matter or 4 Sum(C(n,r)) for 4 total playable characters. If there's say 4 NPCs then this ends up being 4 (C(4,0) + C(4,1) + C(4,2) + C(4,3) + C(4,4)) = 4(1 + 4 + 6 + 4 + 1) = 4(16) = 64 possible outcomes. PC.A has to have depictions of the outcome where they get no partners, where they get 1 of 4 partner, where they get 2 of 4 possible partners, where they get 3 of 4 possible partners, and where they get all 4 possible partners. If PC.A gets 0 of 4 then PC.B can get up to 4 of 4, but if PC.A gets 1 of 4 then PC.B only can get 3 of 4; we still have to in development somehow construct the possibilities that may be unrealized in a given player's play through though.

If we end up depicting a joint ending based on the results of the individual playable character's endings then we actually end up depicting more than 64 possible outcomes because we have to depict cases like PC.A gets 0 out of 4, PC.B gets 0 out of 4, PC.C gets 0 out of 4, and PC.D gets 0 out of 4. If PC.A gets 4 out of 4 then all other playable characters get 0 out of 4 unless there is someway (NTR) to steal from PC.A. Assuming NTR is disabled and not developed then we would have one distinctly different outcome for each of the cases where a PC.x gets 4 out of 4. If the first PC labeled PC.A gets 3 out of 4 then PC.B can get 0 or 1 out of 4 and PC.C can get 0 or 1 out of 4 and PC.D can get 0 or 1 out of 4; this creates a set of outcomes which is {(3,0,0,0), (3,1,0,0), (3,0,1,0), (3,0,0,1)}; the set of joint outcomes for PC.A gets 2 out of 4 is much bigger.

It is possible that we fix the game so that the playboy getting his harem and all the other characters get nothing so we only have one end or we only have 5 possible endings (0, 1, 2, 3, or 4 out of 4), but we create a situation in which while we may implicitly or explicitly promise to the players that their favorite playable character can get their favorite NPC we're lying to them because 3 out of the 4 playable characters exist only to funnel NPCs to 1 of the (fixed) playable characters.

Which is precisely an example of this.

And contrary to the explicitly stated objectives of the author:

Firstly, from a number of scenarios point of view: we have a lot of scenarios indeed, I agree with your 16 possible outcomes for each MC. I don't understand what you mean by a joint ending. How would that look? we see all of them together at the same time? Why would anyone complicate themselves like that ? .

Now from a practical point of view: I don't think in a game like this, the point of the characters would be to have the same type of story i.e. getting a harem. For me, at least, that would be boring.
That would mean that only one of the characters (at most two) should be the harem getting type. The others should have some other type of experience and end goal. The way in which they influence each other would be that if MC 2 get with his dream girl, MC 1 can't have her in the harem. MC 3 maybe doesn't plan to get any girls, maybe he just sleeps around as means to an end (like in the case of the revenge story I was giving as an example). MC 4 could maybe even be a female and not compete for the same ideal. She could maybe have an ending with one of the harem girls, but she could/should influence the story in a different way. Maybe the way she influences the harem story is, if she doesn't sleep with one or two of the harem guy love interests, those girls would not be interested in a harem lifestyle as they are not ok enough with a bisexual lifestyle of whatever.
I guess my point is a resourceful composing of the story can create less possible endings while still keeping the storylines intertwined.

 

[DaClown]

How would that look? we see all of them together at the same time? Why would anyone complicate themselves like that ?

For the completionists, there is a satisfaction in seeing the specific combinations of outcomes depicted simultaneously. I noted that particular potential complication because it feels very much in the spirit of the original post. Where you at the end get to see how the choices of all the characters came together to create the end of the story for all the characters rather than the end of the story for a single character. That kind of thing is a big part of the appeal of Chrono Trigger and Persona 3.

Now from a practical point of view: I don't think in a game like this, the point of the characters would be to have the same type of story i.e. getting a harem. For me, at least, that would be boring.

I anticipated that particular critique after I had already posted.

It is possible that we fix the game so that the playboy getting his harem and all the other characters get nothing so we only have one end or we only have 5 possible endings (0, 1, 2, 3, or 4 out of 4), but we create a situation in which while we may implicitly or explicitly promise to the players that their favorite playable character can get their favorite NPC we're lying to them because 3 out of the 4 playable characters exist only to funnel NPCs to 1 of the (fixed) playable characters.

We can definitely reduce the number of outcomes we need to depict if the characters have different goals, but I didn't bother with explicating different objectives for the different characters.

Let's say that one of the four playable characters is the Pokemon Trainer type and gotta catch them all. Let's say that one of the playable characters is married to one of the NPCs and just wants to keep their partner. Let's say one of the playable characters doesn't get satisfaction unless they're NTRing people, so their whole thing is about stealing prospects from the Pokemon Trainer and the dutiful married couple. And for simplicity sake, let's say the final playable character actually represents a totally linear story and has one and only one outcome regardless of what the others do.

We already agree that with 4 NPCs in play that Pokemon Trainer has 16 end scenes. Married couple has at least two; marriage survives xor doesn't. NTR's number of end scenes varies between 1 and 16; I assume for our purposes though that NTR isn't actually interested in a Harem ending so we'll leave it vaguely at greater than 1 total outcome and less than 16. Linear character has one outcome. Total outcomes at this point is 16 + 2 + 2 to 15 + 1 or 21 to 34 endings.

The issue here is that Linear breaks the spirit of the whole game; they are an extraneous playable character in the scenario and are perhaps only interesting in so far as they potentially force constraints on the other three characters. Married Couple also aren't really in the spirit of the game though they do have interactions with Pokemon and NTR; to properly accommodate the interactions of Pokemon and NTR with Married Couple we'd probably want a lot more variations to the number of endings for Married Couple other than "they lived happily ever after xor Married Player lost their ex". Like at a minimum we'd want to know who the Married Player lost their ex to; I think it is pretty clear the losing the ex to the Pokemon Trainer is distinctly different from losing the ex to NTR; maybe there's outcomes where the married player loses their ex but their ex doesn't end up paired with either Pokemon or NTR; we just upped the count of outcomes from 2 to 5 (which adjusts the total outcomes above to 24 to 37 endings).

Furthermore, choosing the homogeneous multiple protagonist harem game example greatly simplifies what we have to consider with the NPCs because their only existent property is as a member or not a member of a given playable character's harem. If they have their own distinct outcomes and motivations and behaviors such that we might see an ending for each and every character then the picture gets way more complicated especially the more heterogenous the character's goals, methods, and outcomes are.

And I ignored polyamory and polygamy in my original example which would result in even more possible outcomes particularly for join outcomes of the 4 playable characters.

However we cut it the number of discrete outcomes is generally going to be proportionate to a binomial factor or the function C(n, r) if we don't trivialize outcomes of pairwise interactions between groups of characters.

 

[ihl86]

For the completionists, there is a satisfaction in seeing the specific combinations of outcomes depicted simultaneously. I noted that particular potential complication because it feels very much in the spirit of the original post. Where you at the end get to see how the choices of all the characters came together to create the end of the story for all the characters rather than the end of the story for a single character. That kind of thing is a big part of the appeal of Chrono Trigger and Persona 3.


I anticipated that particular critique after I had already posted.

We can definitely reduce the number of outcomes we need to depict if the characters have different goals, but I didn't bother with explicating different objectives for the different characters.

Let's say that one of the four playable characters is the Pokemon Trainer type and gotta catch them all. Let's say that one of the playable characters is married to one of the NPCs and just wants to keep their partner. Let's say one of the playable characters doesn't get satisfaction unless they're NTRing people, so their whole thing is about stealing prospects from the Pokemon Trainer and the dutiful married couple. And for simplicity sake, let's say the final playable character actually represents a totally linear story and has one and only one outcome regardless of what the others do.

We already agree that with 4 NPCs in play that Pokemon Trainer has 16 end scenes. Married couple has at least two; marriage survives xor doesn't. NTR's number of end scenes varies between 1 and 16; I assume for our purposes though that NTR isn't actually interested in a Harem ending so we'll leave it vaguely at greater than 1 total outcome and less than 16. Linear character has one outcome. Total outcomes at this point is 16 + 2 + 2 to 15 + 1 or 21 to 34 endings.

The issue here is that Linear breaks the spirit of the whole game; they are an extraneous playable character in the scenario and are perhaps only interesting in so far as they potentially force constraints on the other three characters. Married Couple also aren't really in the spirit of the game though they do have interactions with Pokemon and NTR; to properly accommodate the interactions of Pokemon and NTR with Married Couple we'd probably want a lot more variations to the number of endings for Married Couple other than "they lived happily ever after xor Married Player lost their ex". Like at a minimum we'd want to know who the Married Player lost their ex to; I think it is pretty clear the losing the ex to the Pokemon Trainer is distinctly different from losing the ex to NTR; maybe there's outcomes where the married player loses their ex but their ex doesn't end up paired with either Pokemon or NTR; we just upped the count of outcomes from 2 to 5 (which adjusts the total outcomes above to 24 to 37 endings).

Furthermore, choosing the homogeneous multiple protagonist harem game example greatly simplifies what we have to consider with the NPCs because their only existent property is as a member or not a member of a given playable character's harem. If they have their own distinct outcomes and motivations and behaviors such that we might see an ending for each and every character then the picture gets way more complicated especially the more heterogenous the character's goals, methods, and outcomes are.

And I ignored polyamory and polygamy in my original example which would result in even more possible outcomes particularly for join outcomes of the 4 playable characters.

However we cut it the number of discrete outcomes is generally going to be proportionate to a binomial factor or the function C(n, r) if we don't trivialize outcomes of pairwise interactions between groups of characters.

I think sometimes these games are more about the journey than the ending itself. So I don't think one ending would necessarily mean a linear story, it could still interact with the others and influence their lives, it could just be that in the end he doesn't really care for the common NPCs and he could remain with not shared NPC or something. I would still give him at least two or three endings (like if this one is the one with the revenge path, it's not really depending on how many NPCs he boned, but if he boned the right ones to get his revenge or not).
In your NTR character's story, his ending shouldn't be with how many of the NPC's he remains as you also stated. That would, I think, defeat the purpose. He could, for example have 2 endings with 2 of the NPCs if he somehow falls in love with them or something, he could have 1 to 4 endings where he remains alone in the end but slightly different depending on how many successful interactions he had and he could maybe have one or two ending where he gets himself killed or badly hurt because he NTRed the wrong guy or something. This would indeed accrue to around 10 endings or so.

In the end, I think you are right, in that the end number is proportionate to the function C(n,r) (I have to admit that my math is a little rusty as I haven't used it in more than 10 years so I can't see what the binomial factor for the endings could be). So we could get somewhere around 40 endings in our case, probably. If we base our numbers on what we established from the start.
But at the same time, I have played enough of single MC games with more than 4 NPCs in the harem list where you don't have 16 endings, which would ultimately mean that most if not all existing games reduce the number of possible outcomes without any downside to them. So I think that could be also applied here, to still keep this game in realm where it's realistic to still implement. Keep the interconnections and influences to the story but not necessary to the endings themselves.

 

[DaClown]

But at the same time, I have played enough of single MC games with more than 4 NPCs in the harem list where you don't have 16 endings, which would ultimately mean that most if not all existing games reduce the number of possible outcomes without any downside to them.

I wouldn't say "without any downside to them". Plenty of harem dating sims end up with a whole bunch of negative reviews that come from players that are disappointed that some specific combinations of conditions don't actually lead to the logical consequence the player wanted and expected from the premises (leaps of logic, non-sequitors, red herrings, content dead ends, or outright contradictions/continuity-errors).

The way they go from 16 outcomes to fewer than that with a single MC is by creating exceptions that disallow certain outcomes. The common trivialization that I have seen is by mapping the 16 possible outcomes to 3 or 10. No partners. Some partners; often this is a generic enough ending that for the most part they just swap the character art out for the specific partner you get and keep the rest the same. All partners. 10 endings would be no partners, one on one with any of the four prospects, a few pairs or throuples, and all. You only get the True Harem Ending by satisfying the conditions of all the prospects simultaneously otherwise it devolves to either a generic "you got some of the prospects but one (or more) got away" or "you got the one prospects but all the others got away" type ending.

Often times, getting all is dependent on some contingent pairing condition, so even though there are 4 possible NPCs there's actually for the purposes of calculating outcome totals only actually 2 or 3 NPCs. So you might for instance have a Red Oni and Blue Oni pair of NPCs where generally getting the Red Oni precludes getting the Blue Oni and vice versa, but the Red Oni and the Loves-All character when paired together allow you to get the Blue Oni too. Often the All condition only happens if a set of conditions are met that might otherwise result in you getting on 3 out of 4 if the characters where truly independent.

By binomial factor I meant

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; C(n,r) and bionomial coefficients are part and parcel of a logical tree structure and the general form of direct implications; they also substantially represent in numerical form computer programs and programmable strings.

And 64 endings might seem like a lot, but many games that are even moderately close to complete on this site have hundreds of scenes. Some of the grander examples have thousands of scenes.

 

[Cynicaladm]

Moreover I don't think there is such a large audience for this in the adult world community. If the game is completed and very well made, sure, probably on steam it could get a fanbase and it's just rewards, anywhere else, I don't know.
It would be a lot easier to make a stupid story, good graphics, Milfy City type of game or even multiple of those until one has success than this monster of an undertaking.

definitely, but that is the point of this exercise.. milfy city and other games already exist. those dynamics and mechanics are already available. the whole point of my original thought was to try something different... not to appease a non existent audience.

on the topic of multiple contemporaneous endings..

both you and daclown have mentioned competing end goals or end goals of one character being hampered by the final story of another.
but that would not occur if not in a transitory manner midway through the game.. because the game, as I envision it, has two phases.. one in which the characters move in individual/competing/parallel timelines towards their goals, and one in which only one of those characters's story is examined.
What I called the nexus event is what separates them.

Indeed the journey of exploration is what is the heart of the game, not so much the unlocking of achievements at the end of it.
so.. every character gets an initial description detailing in broad strokes what he is about, what his kinks are, what the potential explorations of those kinks might lead to. This doesn't mean that the character gets a laundry list of things with possible bad endings if he fails to do those things.
Say one of the characters lives with his family of hot babe sisters and is a horny student exploring what college has to offer.. the natural expectation is that incest will feature heavily in that MC's narrative.. why mention it otherwise? likewise, the implication is that hormones will make him try to nail anything that moves and is not vegetal in nature...
What it does not mean, is that the player somehow fails if the MC doesn't hook up with all of the sisters, his aunt, his grandma and so on.. it is certainly a possibility, but there would never be a result ending that says "oh..so you've hooked up with 2 out of 3 sisters... try again, you might get a full set".. the ending would be more in the vein of "as you grow into the man you feel you were always meant to be, your sister A remains a steady presence in your life, and your sister B is your side piece/occasionally joins in for threesome hanky panky.. sister C, last you heard, is following her dreams career in the company run by main character nr x, who in good time becomes her husband.. also get a load of all the students and teachers you're getting to fuck now!"...
If on the other hand you do manage to go Full House and get all of the Olsen sisters, the ending would reflect that and talk about one big happy family with lots of Little House on the Prarie meets Best Little Whorehouse in Texas times.

Neither are bad endings, because the point of the exercise would be the journey, the story, and emotional payload thereof


However, the above is moot, because, to go back to the competing end results between characters, those cannot be.
The game postulates that 4 characters lead 4 different lives with different objectives and evolutions and journeys through kink.
Those characters may ideed have objectives that are occasionally conflicting.. but conflict resolution would occur through narrative choices, leading each character down different paths towards other, new/different objectives.
That is probably not going to satisfy the completitionist, I agree.. but again, there is a next step to consider...

The nexus event.
the 4 different stories all lead up and progress to a certain point. That point is an event, a date, a moment of evaluation that each MC will experience. This may be one global event that touches and alters the lives of every MC and NPC in the game, or individual events that converge on the same moment in time. At that moment, the time will have come for the game to take stock, tally up what has been done so far, and determine the status of each active MC and NPC.
The choices made so far by the various main characters will be locked in and determine how the story progresses for all, but it is a limited "all", because only 1 of the main characters will continue exploring (and changing through player choices) the narrative further. This does not mean that you reach Nexus and get to see the ending montage of 1 character out of those you have played. it means that you pick one character and continue to play and explore further. A good idea would be to save and explore the stories further for each MC you have brought up to nexus.

The focus of the game, through playthroughs is always on one MC at a time, but the understanding is that until the nexus events, the player knows that running 1 or more further MCs after the one he is currently playing through might change the story for both.. until the nexus event.
once the nexus event comes, the player makes a choice as to which one of the characters he's played he wants to proceed with.
the other MCs stories, if any other have been explored, stops there... or rather, fades into the background, the outcome of that MC's play becomes less relevant than that of the NPCs he shares with the MC you have decided to stick with. The other, secondary NPCs and the other MCs might be occasionally mentioned in the further playthrough, but they become scenery.

To give you an example.. say that we like the story of the young student best.. say that his mother or elder sister works for another main character.
What happens at the nexus event?
Do you want to focus on the student? what can happen is the following:
1) you have played the student first.. then the other MC. the playthrough with the other MC has led the shared NPC either away or closer to the student. in the post-nexus play, the student will be confronted with how the interference of the second MC has affected his relationship with the NPC. he will get a chance to alter that relationship further.. by either changing the dynamic between them or validating it as is, or trying to undo what the second MC has done... either choice will lead to whatever the narrative will lead to.
2) you have played the student AFTER the other MC... the other MC might have initiated a relationship (sexual or otherwise) with the NPC, but the second playthrough of the player, with the student this time, has altered that relationship in whatever way suits the student MC best. at the nexus event, the preeminence of the student's choices is locked in and he will simply further explore his journey with that particular NPC unhindered by further alterations brought about by the other MC. say the other MC has married that NPC and the student claims her.. she'll be a cheater, or depending on the other MC's run, a hotwife to her cuck... at this point, given that in the post nexus, only one MC matters, it will be up to the student MC to determine the end result of his relation to that particular NPC.
3) the player has played only the student MC and decides to progress that narrative ( he may have played one of the other MCs as well but they have no relation with that particular NPC).. the game has default settings and values and "openings" for every MC and NPC that set a baseline relationship status. In this instance, the non played MP works just like any other NPC. the choices made by the MC student pre-nexus are the only ones that matter and define the relationship of the NPC with every other character, including the unexplored MC that might have had a claim on her had he had his run. Nexus comes, and the story simply progresses between the student and the NPC however the player sees fit, with minimal impact from the personality and "stats" of the other, unplayed, MC.
4) you decide to go the other route and explore the other MC's post nexus life, then the student's choices up to nexus are locked in and do not further matter because you will not play the student post nexus. The alternative MC will play through and determine the status of HIS relationship with the NPC, much like the student does in point 3. The student's role becomes that of scenery.
5) you decide to play a completely different character post nexus...one that never meets (or only anecdotically meets) this particular NPC..

So, in case nr 1, the student playthrough might lead to the full house harem set, or not, depending on what happened with MC nr 2...
in case nr 2, the full house is more likely, or the possibility is greater...
in case nr 3 the full house ending is entirely up to the student.. definitely a possibility.
in case nr 4 and 5 we never see the "complete" ending for the student, because after nexus he has left the center stage, and with him the other MC and the NPC. He might be mentioned, along with other played MCs, in a post credit cameo, but it will not be relevant, because in that case the player will be more concerned with what his MC of choice ends up with.

In short, the game is about individual MCs, and their fate is intertwined, yes, but each playthrough only sees the final destination for one of the MCs.
which again adds to the replayability. the MC's intertwinedness is relevant to play pre-nexus, and relevant for the post nexus in that it sents the stage and the "baseline for progression from there onwards" for the MC of choice in his further endeavours. Post Nexus however it is no longer an active factor in play.
I realise that this will make completionists completely frustrated. (I occasionally am one myself, when the game allows for it.. this one would not, necessarily).
a bone could be thrown their way by stating, once the final credits roll, that there are many permutations and that exploring them all might lead to a big shiny gold star at the end, with or without a bonus, non plot related, montage scene (which might or might not be there, because it really doesn't matter, but if anone has coded and drawn the monstruous game to completion, he might as well add a final scene to it)

I really should find a way to distinguish the playthrough of the game by a single MC from the complete playthrough/reacing the endpoint of the game.
So... MC run and player playthrough? (don't start making Run DMC jokes now )

 

[ihl86]

I wouldn't say "without any downside to them". Plenty of harem dating sims end up with a whole bunch of negative reviews that come from players that are disappointed that some specific combinations of conditions don't actually lead to the logical consequence the player wanted and expected from the premises (leaps of logic, non-sequitors, red herrings, content dead ends, or outright contradictions/continuity-errors).

Whatever you do, there will always be people that complain. If if you have 100 endings, there will be someone to find something he didn't like with the game or something you didn't think of that he would have liked. What I meant without any downside was that people still support them in large numbers, regardless of how bad their stories are. Sure, if your whole game is based on the story more than anything else (it could even be just text based if it's good enough), than you need to have as good a story as they come to keep people interested.

And 64 endings might seem like a lot, but many games that are even moderately close to complete on this site have hundreds of scenes. Some of the grander examples have thousands of scenes.

I would expect for a game to keep people interested, it would need to have a sufficient amount of scenes. Those 64 endings would involve a lot more scenes along the way to reach them.

definitely, but that is the point of this exercise.. milfy city and other games already exist. those dynamics and mechanics are already available. the whole point of my original thought was to try something different... not to appease a non existent audience.

on the topic of multiple contemporaneous endings..

both you and daclown have mentioned competing end goals or end goals of one character being hampered by the final story of another.
but that would not occur if not in a transitory manner midway through the game.. because the game, as I envision it, has two phases.. one in which the characters move in individual/competing/parallel timelines towards their goals, and one in which only one of those characters's story is examined.
What I called the nexus event is what separates them.

Indeed the journey of exploration is what is the heart of the game, not so much the unlocking of achievements at the end of it.
so.. every character gets an initial description detailing in broad strokes what he is about, what his kinks are, what the potential explorations of those kinks might lead to. This doesn't mean that the character gets a laundry list of things with possible bad endings if he fails to do those things.
Say one of the characters lives with his family of hot babe sisters and is a horny student exploring what college has to offer.. the natural expectation is that incest will feature heavily in that MC's narrative.. why mention it otherwise? likewise, the implication is that hormones will make him try to nail anything that moves and is not vegetal in nature...
What it does not mean, is that the player somehow fails if the MC doesn't hook up with all of the sisters, his aunt, his grandma and so on.. it is certainly a possibility, but there would never be a result ending that says "oh..so you've hooked up with 2 out of 3 sisters... try again, you might get a full set".. the ending would be more in the vein of "as you grow into the man you feel you were always meant to be, your sister A remains a steady presence in your life, and your sister B is your side piece/occasionally joins in for threesome hanky panky.. sister C, last you heard, is following her dreams career in the company run by main character nr x, who in good time becomes her husband.. also get a load of all the students and teachers you're getting to fuck now!"...
If on the other hand you do manage to go Full House and get all of the Olsen sisters, the ending would reflect that and talk about one big happy family with lots of Little House on the Prarie meets Best Little Whorehouse in Texas times.

Neither are bad endings, because the point of the exercise would be the journey, the story, and emotional payload thereof

I don't think anyone said anything about bad endings. The idea was, how many possibilities there are, not that there are bad endings or incomplete endings. Of course, if you play the harem guy MC and you get no NPCs in the end, that could be considered a bad ending of sorts, but in the end it's up to the player if the ending was satisfactory or not.

However, the above is moot, because, to go back to the competing end results between characters, those cannot be.
The game postulates that 4 characters lead 4 different lives with different objectives and evolutions and journeys through kink.
Those characters may ideed have objectives that are occasionally conflicting.. but conflict resolution would occur through narrative choices, leading each character down different paths towards other, new/different objectives.
That is probably not going to satisfy the completitionist, I agree.. but again, there is a next step to consider...

The nexus event.
the 4 different stories all lead up and progress to a certain point. That point is an event, a date, a moment of evaluation that each MC will experience. This may be one global event that touches and alters the lives of every MC and NPC in the game, or individual events that converge on the same moment in time. At that moment, the time will have come for the game to take stock, tally up what has been done so far, and determine the status of each active MC and NPC.
The choices made so far by the various main characters will be locked in and determine how the story progresses for all, but it is a limited "all", because only 1 of the main characters will continue exploring (and changing through player choices) the narrative further. This does not mean that you reach Nexus and get to see the ending montage of 1 character out of those you have played. it means that you pick one character and continue to play and explore further. A good idea would be to save and explore the stories further for each MC you have brought up to nexus.

The focus of the game, through playthroughs is always on one MC at a time, but the understanding is that until the nexus events, the player knows that running 1 or more further MCs after the one he is currently playing through might change the story for both.. until the nexus event.
once the nexus event comes, the player makes a choice as to which one of the characters he's played he wants to proceed with.
the other MCs stories, if any other have been explored, stops there... or rather, fades into the background, the outcome of that MC's play becomes less relevant than that of the NPCs he shares with the MC you have decided to stick with. The other, secondary NPCs and the other MCs might be occasionally mentioned in the further playthrough, but they become scenery.

To give you an example.. say that we like the story of the young student best.. say that his mother or elder sister works for another main character.
What happens at the nexus event?
Do you want to focus on the student? what can happen is the following:
1) you have played the student first.. then the other MC. the playthrough with the other MC has led the shared NPC either away or closer to the student. in the post-nexus play, the student will be confronted with how the interference of the second MC has affected his relationship with the NPC. he will get a chance to alter that relationship further.. by either changing the dynamic between them or validating it as is, or trying to undo what the second MC has done... either choice will lead to whatever the narrative will lead to.
2) you have played the student AFTER the other MC... the other MC might have initiated a relationship (sexual or otherwise) with the NPC, but the second playthrough of the player, with the student this time, has altered that relationship in whatever way suits the student MC best. at the nexus event, the preeminence of the student's choices is locked in and he will simply further explore his journey with that particular NPC unhindered by further alterations brought about by the other MC. say the other MC has married that NPC and the student claims her.. she'll be a cheater, or depending on the other MC's run, a hotwife to her cuck... at this point, given that in the post nexus, only one MC matters, it will be up to the student MC to determine the end result of his relation to that particular NPC.
3) the player has played only the student MC and decides to progress that narrative ( he may have played one of the other MCs as well but they have no relation with that particular NPC).. the game has default settings and values and "openings" for every MC and NPC that set a baseline relationship status. In this instance, the non played MP works just like any other NPC. the choices made by the MC student pre-nexus are the only ones that matter and define the relationship of the NPC with every other character, including the unexplored MC that might have had a claim on her had he had his run. Nexus comes, and the story simply progresses between the student and the NPC however the player sees fit, with minimal impact from the personality and "stats" of the other, unplayed, MC.
4) you decide to go the other route and explore the other MC's post nexus life, then the student's choices up to nexus are locked in and do not further matter because you will not play the student post nexus. The alternative MC will play through and determine the status of HIS relationship with the NPC, much like the student does in point 3. The student's role becomes that of scenery.
5) you decide to play a completely different character post nexus...one that never meets (or only anecdotically meets) this particular NPC..

So, in case nr 1, the student playthrough might lead to the full house harem set, or not, depending on what happened with MC nr 2...
in case nr 2, the full house is more likely, or the possibility is greater...
in case nr 3 the full house ending is entirely up to the student.. definitely a possibility.
in case nr 4 and 5 we never see the "complete" ending for the student, because after nexus he has left the center stage, and with him the other MC and the NPC. He might be mentioned, along with other played MCs, in a post credit cameo, but it will not be relevant, because in that case the player will be more concerned with what his MC of choice ends up with.

In short, the game is about individual MCs, and their fate is intertwined, yes, but each playthrough only sees the final destination for one of the MCs.
which again adds to the replayability. the MC's intertwinedness is relevant to play pre-nexus, and relevant for the post nexus in that it sents the stage and the "baseline for progression from there onwards" for the MC of choice in his further endeavours. Post Nexus however it is no longer an active factor in play.
I realise that this will make completionists completely frustrated. (I occasionally am one myself, when the game allows for it.. this one would not, necessarily).
a bone could be thrown their way by stating, once the final credits roll, that there are many permutations and that exploring them all might lead to a big shiny gold star at the end, with or without a bonus, non plot related, montage scene (which might or might not be there, because it really doesn't matter, but if anone has coded and drawn the monstruous game to completion, he might as well add a final scene to it)

I really should find a way to distinguish the playthrough of the game by a single MC from the complete playthrough/reacing the endpoint of the game.
So... MC run and player playthrough? (don't start making Run DMC jokes now )

I somehow envisioned the game would be played by completion on all stories. I think I would be left unsatisfied if I play with a character only until the nexus and I could not continue the story because I was forced to choose between the two of them. Much more rewarding would be to be able to play with whoever you want until completion and then choose another and do the same. If you want more interconnectivity (this would maybe increase complexity further) you could have nexuses along the way so that what you play with a character influences another character sooner than just ending his path.
For example you have 2 nexuses in a game, so in total 3 stages of the game. Start-1st nexus, 1st-2nd nexus and 2nd-endgame. Whenever you reach a nexus you have the choice to either start with another MC that stage, or continue to the next stage with one of the MCs that reached the current nexus.
For example:
You play all 4 MCs to first nexus. You decide that you only like three of them, so you play with 1st MC to second nexus, 2nd MC to that 2nd nexus and 3rd Mc to that 2nd nexus. Afterwards you continue with 1st MC to finish the story and then maybe also 2nd MC to finish the story, you decide the path for the 3rd MC was not what you wanted and don't choose him anymore.
This is of course only a thought experiment as with the nexuses the complexity grows even more and I don't think this could be implemented without true dedication, not even on paper.

 

[Cynicaladm]

I somehow envisioned the game would be played by completion on all stories. I think I would be left unsatisfied if I play with a character only until the nexus and I could not continue the story because I was forced to choose between the two of them.

you can, all you need to do is to pick him....

Much more rewarding would be to be able to play with whoever you want until completion and then choose another and do the same.

again, you can just play the same character until the nexus, and then stick by him until the completion. That way you get one linear story start to finish. If you want to see more complexity, you can save the game just on the nexus, and, once you have done that you can decide to progress the story with that same character or go back, play another one until the nexus and then resume play with the first character..
This will add the complexity of the interactions between the 2 characters (in reality all 4 are there, just 2 with baseline impact and 2 with active player choices).. and that will substantially change the play after nexus with the first character, but you're still playing one character to the end. Then you can go back and pick up the other character from the nexus and see his run play out to the end. It does mean that the post nexus phase is run on individual choices for 1 character whereas the other 3 are locked on what they accomplished in pre-nexus... but that is by design, otherwise we end up with a sandbox that is impossible to manage in terms of who did what first and what the consequences are, expanding the number of possible interactions and couplings by several orders of magnitude.
now, I see your next point

If you want more interconnectivity (this would maybe increase complexity further) you could have nexuses along the way so that what you play with a character influences another character sooner than just ending his path.
For example you have 2 nexuses in a game, so in total 3 stages of the game. Start-1st nexus, 1st-2nd nexus and 2nd-endgame. Whenever you reach a nexus you have the choice to either start with another MC that stage, or continue to the next stage with one of the MCs that reached the current nexus.
For example:
You play all 4 MCs to first nexus. You decide that you only like three of them, so you play with 1st MC to second nexus, 2nd MC to that 2nd nexus and 3rd Mc to that 2nd nexus. Afterwards you continue with 1st MC to finish the story and then maybe also 2nd MC to finish the story, you decide the path for the 3rd MC was not what you wanted and don't choose him anymore.
This is of course only a thought experiment as with the nexuses the complexity grows even more and I don't think this could be implemented without true dedication, not even on paper.

I did think of this, and yes, in a loose format roleplaying game like D&D that's more or less what happens.. but I don't see how that could be programmed and designed and delivered without calling up the NASA and asking for their computers assistance.
Also, you end up on a slippery slope if you place more than 1 nexus and don't alter the gaming experience considerably from one nexus to the next...
what I mean is that if you place 2-3 nexuses in the game and allow the player to jump from one character to the other and do mini-runs and go back every time, the gaming experience between one nexus and the other, is the same as it was before the first nexus, so the player doesn't "see" much of a difference, whereas on the creative side you and up having to add sharks to the hurricane and juggle them both without crashing all over the place.
On top of that, from an end user point of view (which admittedly doesn't really concern me) there will come a demand for even more break points/nexuses in the game.. why have a nexus every.. let's say 2-3 weeks of gameplay, when you could have one every couple of days and customise the game even further?.. slippery slope, as I said.
I am fairly confident that I could create a set of circumstances, scenes, stories and complexities and juggle those in one "interconnective scenario"..and the game could end there.. for personal interest and because that's how my idea came to me in the first place, I can manage prolonguing the game with one main character after the nexus, without further interconnections, but doing more, as I said, exponential growth of stuff to do and things to take into account..

from a narrative point of view also, it would muddy the waters extensively.
from the start there are 4 characters, each with certain penchants, kinks, desires and aspirations.
if you lead them to the nexus, they are well on their way to coming into their own and reaching their objectives despite, or maybe even thanks to the interactions with other MCs or main NPCs... and then you get to see how it all ends.
if after the nexus instead, there is more interconnection and more possibility for "distraction" and deviation of the plot, the narrative loses cohesion because the MC of the day ends up being either still pursuing the same goals and having the same expeiences he had before the first nexus (and then, what's the point of the nexus being there?), or he ends up being all over the place because of a bunch of new variables being introduced, opening and closing new avenues to follow..
which leads us back to sandbox experience. Skyrim is a great game and a great sandbox to explore.. but you end up playing the leader of an assassins guild, the good guy, the hero, the secret thief and tons of other roles that narratively are not compatible with one another. Here you would either have that same problem, or you would have to come up with distinct and individual multiple paths for each MC to explore without every one of them becoming "everything" and doing "everything". There are only so many kinks and situations that you can have your character go through before you get endless repetitions...
so you could decide to not do that..but then, what's the point of a nexus, which ultimately is a turning point?
the concept of the game is the characters are exploring, opening avenues with various NPCs..as they do that, they bump into other MCs and NPCs.. once they reach nexus, the idea is for them to have found their path..the kinks they want to pursue, the girls they want to bed, the harems ors slaves or mistresss they want to play with. in the second part of the game, you get to see them do that.. if you have them again be subjected to further crossings and complications, the characters are either going to loose their way or have a hard time actually reaching those objectives. I'd rather give a single character the spotlight and let him do what he has learned to do pre-nexus and see it come to fruition... even if it means not following the stories of the other MCs (which is only a temporary situation anyway, because you can always go back to your nexus save and run the post nexus with another MC once you've seen how this one ends)
In other words, multiple nexuses equates to sandbox, which complicates the creation of the game, narratively and technically, to a scale I could not begin to fathom, it weakens the concept of pre-and-after nexus, or narrative game (not VN, but still, there's an element of narration and character exploration that has precedence over the jacking off over however many interactions you can manage to reach), and it ultimately weakens the characters, who do have an overarching narrative arch that they should grow into and reach.

As it is, the replay value of the game is already through the roof if you play the game in the spirit it is supposed to be played,.. because you can run 4 characters in any order permutation, and for each of the order permutations tried (and that includes the permutations where you play only 1, 2 or 3 characters), the outcome and the progression would already, ideally, be somewhat altered... and THEN you get to see each main character put his comfy loafers on and reap what he has sown up until then.
Math is not my strong suit but as it is, you get a game that, at nexus point reaches anywhere between 1 and 24 permutations IF you play all 4 characters..
I am not even sure if the number wouldn't increase if you also consider the possibility of playing only 3 out of 4, or only 1, or 2..because those fewer runs would still be accompanied by the baseline values of the other, non played MCs.

Finally, also consider that within each of those MC runs, there are stories that can go in different ways.. so the same permutation can carry over NPCs with different values and "points".

For instance, let's consider the random permutation 2413... that is the order you play the MCs in in this particular playthrough.
what you do with a shared NPC with character nr 2 changes what you can do with it with character nr 1, a little down the line (nr 4 does not share access to that NPC, in this example)... so if character nr 2 makes one choice the NPC has one destiny which character nr 1 can try to alter, another if character 1 leaves it alone.. that same NPC has a different role if character nr 2 makes a different choice, and character nr 1 does something different again (because the starting conditions have changed for character nr 1).
so, within the same permutation of 2413 order of play, you still have multiple variables and multiple possibilities.
say that the NPC in my example is a single girl and character nr 2, the first one to encounter her, makes her his girlfriend... character nr 1 can then turn her into a cheating girl, or work towards an open relationship in which all 3 are equals... or he might just hire her to do his taxes. Either way, this NPC is important enough in both of their lives to merit a role after nexus too...
Likewise, say character nr 2, when he encounters her, acts like a peeping tom and watches her from a distance as she goes about her life or maybe he once helps her out with the rent and has his ways with her.
when character nr 1 encounters her, she's single, and he can still push her towards a NSA open relationship (potentially with character nr 2 if the player decides to play him after nexus), or he can decide to also help her with the rent... or he can instead want her as his girlfriend... or again, hire her to do his taxes.

What you get is, on a single NPC, a bunch of very different scenarios, with a very different vibe to them, despite being able to recycle certain lines of dialogue and thus "scenes".. still within the playthrough iteration 2413, that should be reflected and carry over to after nexus.
and, again, that's just one NPC..then there are the single run NPCs for every MC, and potentially a few more shared ones, either again between character 1 and 2, or between 1 and 3, or 4 (and I am not even going to touch on the possibility of NPCs shared by more than 2 characters).

multiply that level of detail for every one of the 24 or more iterations of the game, and the after nexus paths for each of the MC that results from it, and you get so many possible outcomes that nobody will want for yet another nexus to multiply the outcomes even further.
Simply because the nexus would cause further variations and from 24 permutations pre-nexus, you would get another 24, but each with stats and "experiences accrued" by the various NPCs...
In the case of the NPC contested between MC 1 and 2, every nexus would represent another possibility for that NPC to switch loyalty or destiny.. but it would be come a tug of war that narratively just doesn't work and feels dragged out or pointless.

Yes, you can reduce and restrict things, by leading certain paths for MCs and NPCs to lead to the same destinations/combinations, and recycle content and material from one to the other, but it is already going to look like the inside of a Sarlacc as it is.. no need to add furhter complexity.