I'm excited, S1 completed and increased productivity is quite a good dev log
Speaking of Sasha's book club feud. Why do you think he acted that way? He didn't like Nika's presence from the first moment.
Sasha's both strict and gentle at the same time, she'll keep herself reserved and separate, but then injures her hand to protect Nika's head (which he returns the favour with the basket ball), she doesn't want to warm up with him, but then finds the situation cute, she acts cold to him at the book club but kept her eyes on him to help him with his panic attack. She sends help for him being locked up, but then says maybe he deserved it. I kinda feel she wants to keep her distance because she doesn't trust men, but it's not that simple. I also guess when Mila heard Nika pull women down (to trigger Zara and Nadia), Sasha also heard it.
I'm guessing she just has a big distrust of men, especially if she needs a bodyguard. And she's probably tired of all the teasing from the others, being subjected to Kelly's breeding fantasies etc so she doesn't want more opportunities to be teased.
Well, the plot is much broader than you described, even with regards to Nicky himself. Your description means you don't see it. But answer these questions:
Why is Nika so depressed about Summer's disappearance?
Why doesn't he have sexual interest in women?
Why doesn’t he feel the “smell” of Sasha, although other men do? I wrote smell in quotation marks because the women in the club weren’t sure what it was.
Getting depressed because someone you cared for and saw your future with is gone is depressing, most of my friends who've had serious break ups have taken a long time to recover (one friend admitted she went looking for an assassin, kinda glad I never ticked her boxes). Why depressed? Emotions are a crazy drug. If you mean why was he so affected/traumatised? Until he reveals what happened at the cabin, it's completely unknown. His trauma is related to what happened when he last touched her, not when he last saw her, as he saw her since then.
He does have sexual interest in women, he refers to there being life down there twice with Nami. He gets weird feelings in his stomach when realising he likes Bella. Why does he have erectile dysfunction? His brain chemistry is too flooded with depression to get really excited, his triggers are buried beneath thick clouds and memories.
He doesn't notice Sasha's pheromones because the triggers are buried. It's like he's distracted. Doesn't matter how attractive someone is, if you're distracted, they just walk by. His smell works because he noticed Bella's smell when he wasn't distracted.
Amber's the one who should be asking these questions, I'm sure she will. I don't see how these questions really reveal anything that common sense can't work out by empathising and putting yourself in Nika's shoes. His problems aren't going to be solved by logic, but by struggling against the apathy/depression, and deciding to pay attention to life, not just notice details.
Anyway, the dev log is more exciting than my words.
Just my five cents. It's up to Ocean to decide, of course, but are these scenes with a couple dozen characters worth the colossal money spent on Ada? Plus the bonus to rendering time, which is not worth the expense, is only a quarter faster. In addition, one developer was able to create a party with several dozen characters in the frame using a 2xRTX3090. The visuals are certainly worse there, but the visual perfectionism of Ocean is a serious disadvantage.
It's more about not having the limits stop him in the future I guess? Also, less energy footprint, means lower cost, means less stress. A quarter faster means 9 months instead of a year, plus there were the loading benefits with the recent Daz update - I'm all for any speed improvements he makes.
All that NASA PC and still one update per year?
You say that with that game in your signature?
