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UncleFredo

Well-Known Member
Aug 29, 2020
1,937
3,665
Speaking to sandboxes and mini-games.
I understand that you like those features. I also suspect you want to explore those technologies with your game.
I'll advise you of the following. Folks here fall into two pretty distinct groups. Those who will play a sandbox and those who won't. Period. The second group won't even try your sandbox game, at least until it's hugely successful and maybe not even then.

Full disclosure. I generally hate sandbox games, but there are three out of all the sandboxes here that I play. Mist, Mythic Manor, and Lucky Paradox. The only reason that I even tried them was the continual appreciation expressed in their game threads. If not for truly incredible mod support for walkthroughs and other features, I would have abandoned them.

I'm here for Visual Novels. Novels that tell a story supported by imagery where I can make some choices and watch the story change. I'm utterly disinterested in finding myself before a screen with random opportunities to click and no context on how to proceed.

i appreciate you plan to have a walkthrough with each release to address that issue, but ask yourself the following question. Given all the work that you already see before you, is adding that additional work worth making a sandbox? As I understand your situation you are the only person working on this game. Which, by the way, has excellent imagery and more than decent writing. A traditional VN would allow you to focus on the story and the renders and animations to support it without the added complexity of a sandbox with mini games.

Anyway. As much as I think your demo shows the possibility of creating an excellent VN. If you produce a sandbox, you needn't "hope I enjoy it" because I won't be playing it. Two groups. Those that play sandboxes and those who do not, and the overwhelming majority of people who play these games fall into the second group.

Your game! Your Choice, which I fully support. Do as you choose, but please don't assume that your choice won't have very serious consequences for the size of your audience.
 

MisterMaya

Member
Game Developer
Apr 25, 2021
387
1,859
Speaking to sandboxes and mini-games.
I understand that you like those features. I also suspect you want to explore those technologies with your game.
I'll advise you of the following. Folks here fall into two pretty distinct groups. Those who will play a sandbox and those who won't. Period. The second group won't even try your sandbox game, at least until it's hugely successful and maybe not even then.

Full disclosure. I generally hate sandbox games, but there are three out of all the sandboxes here that I play. Mist, Mythic Manor, and Lucky Paradox. The only reason that I even tried them was the continual appreciation expressed in their game threads. If not for truly incredible mod support for walkthroughs and other features, I would have abandoned them.

I'm here for Visual Novels. Novels that tell a story supported by imagery where I can make some choices and watch the story change. I'm utterly disinterested in finding myself before a screen with random opportunities to click and no context on how to proceed.

i appreciate you plan to have a walkthrough with each release to address that issue, but ask yourself the following question. Given all the work that you already see before you, is adding that additional work worth making a sandbox? As I understand your situation you are the only person working on this game. Which, by the way, has excellent imagery and more than decent writing. A traditional VN would allow you to focus on the story and the renders and animations to support it without the added complexity of a sandbox with mini games.

Anyway. As much as I think your demo shows the possibility of creating an excellent VN. If you produce a sandbox, you needn't "hope I enjoy it" because I won't be playing it. Two groups. Those that play sandboxes and those who do not, and the overwhelming majority of people who play these games fall into the second group.

Your game! Your Choice, which I fully support. Do as you choose, but please don't assume that your choice won't have very serious consequences for the size of your audience.
Hey, thank you for taking the time to write such a message.
Wow! I honestly wasn't expecting that.

I actually thought most people were looking for the sandbox feature in Visual novels, as they allow the player to explore freely a world.
Your message has risen a lot of questions though, and I'll think about it, making a VN out of a sandbox is rather "easy" because you almost only have to modify the existing script.


But is it what I want ? Is it the direction I want my game to take ? I don't know.
I appreciate your concern, your advice, and the compliments you made about my game, and I thank you for that.

I'll need to think about it.
MisterMaya
 
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Horny

Member
Apr 26, 2017
273
487
I'm sorry, it's not planned, but I've seen people asking for incest on so many different games that maybe i'll have to think of a patch.
Even though I'm not sure how with the current scenario.
Lol I was just sorta kidding around. But hey if you can add it down the pipeline that'd be awesome :p
 
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FreshRevenge

Well-Known Member
Oct 17, 2019
1,079
2,595
Hey, thank you for taking the time to write such a message.
Wow! I honestly wasn't expecting that.

I actually thought most people were looking for the sandbox feature in Visual novels, as they allow the player to explore freely a world.
Your message has risen a lot of questions though, and I'll think about it, making a VN out of a sandbox is rather "easy" because you almost only have to modify the existing script.


But is it what I want ? Is it the direction I want my game to take ? I don't know.
I appreciate your concern, your advice, and the compliments you made about my game, and I thank you for that.

I'll need to think about it.
MisterMaya
Hmm the problem with sandbox games is that you have to rinse and repeat the same action again again until something happens.

If you had some sort of journal that would give the player some sort of idea of where they need to be.

This is just an example.

Journal

Meet Peggie at the mall at 12pm.
Maybe I should text Sarah about movie night.
I should check on Megan in her room.

This way the player doesn't have to check like 10 different rooms to see if anything triggers. Some games have a timer that you are basically wasting time until you get to day 15 before something happens. So each day you check the bathroom, nothing. Check the living room, nothing. Check the kitchen, nothing. You do this until day 15 to finally have some girl that lives in the house to be in the kitchen.

At this point I just quit the game and move on. Unfortunately sandbox VN suffer from this. Some sandbox games I can handle because it's structure to let me know where I have to go or who I need to see etc. But if there is no direction and you just wasting time by going through the entire day checking locations just to see if there is some event, it does get repetitive and exhausting.

Hope that helps.
 

MisterMaya

Member
Game Developer
Apr 25, 2021
387
1,859
I
Hmm the problem with sandbox games is that you have to rinse and repeat the same action again again until something happens.

If you had some sort of journal that would give the player some sort of idea of where they need to be.

This is just an example.

Journal

Meet Peggie at the mall at 12pm.
Maybe I should text Sarah about movie night.
I should check on Megan in her room.

This way the player doesn't have to check like 10 different rooms to see if anything triggers. Some games have a timer that you are basically wasting time until you get to day 15 before something happens. So each day you check the bathroom, nothing. Check the living room, nothing. Check the kitchen, nothing. You do this until day 15 to finally have some girl that lives in the house to be in the kitchen.

At this point I just quit the game and move on. Unfortunately sandbox VN suffer from this. Some sandbox games I can handle because it's structure to let me know where I have to go or who I need to see etc. But if there is no direction and you just wasting time by going through the entire day checking locations just to see if there is some event, it does get repetitive and exhausting.

Hope that helps.
Indeed it helped.

I'm currently thinking about what direction my game will take and perhaps sandbow isn't the best solution, based on what the people want.
Most of you guys seem to be reluctant when it comes to the idea of playing a sandbox game.

I'll see what I can do :)
 
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J.R.

Well-Known Member
Jan 2, 2020
1,877
3,536
Well, actually a decent start: excellent graphics, nice story (even if not that new - poor father...), amazing girls, even with music in the demo. Maybe a bit short, but ok, it's just a teaser. Only a strange game title (at least for me as not native english speaking, had to google the "entrepreneur")

Actually it was nice to have tried it out. But that was it, unfortunately. The last sentences in the game were exactly what made me cross this game off my list again. Too bad. So that others don't fall into it unnecessarily as well, a recommendation to the dev: If this game is supposed to be a sandbox/freeroam (with minigames according the patreon page as well - oh dear...) - then by all means set the corresponding tags as soon as possible. Thanks, and good luck with your game, but I'm out.
 
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MisterMaya

Member
Game Developer
Apr 25, 2021
387
1,859
Well, actually a decent start: excellent graphics, nice story (even if not that new - poor father...), amazing girls, even with music in the demo. Maybe a bit short, but ok, it's just a teaser. Only a strange game title (at least for me as not native english speaking, had to google the "entrepreneur")

Actually it was nice to have tried it out. But that was it, unfortunately. The last sentences in the game were exactly what made me cross this game off my list again. Too bad. So that others don't fall into it unnecessarily as well, a recommendation to the dev: If this game is supposed to be a sandbox/freeroam (with minigames according the patreon page as well - oh dear...) - then by all means set the corresponding tags as soon as possible. Thanks, and good luck with your game, but I'm out.
Thank you for you compliments it really means a lot.

Posting this demo was the occasion for me to get a feedback, so I could change what's not good.
Lots of comments have made me realised that my game should be VN and not a sandbox, which is what I decided I was going to do.

So I hope I'll see you playing it when it comes out

MisterMaya
 
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MisterMaya

Member
Game Developer
Apr 25, 2021
387
1,859
Hey,
So I'm currently introducing a new character in the game and I thought I could make you participateby helping me choose her hair.
So I created a Poll on my patreon, you can go and vote by clicking right .

Thank you in advance,

MisterMaya
 
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4.20 star(s) 60 Votes