Ren'Py The Headmaster [v0.16.3] [Altos and Herdone]

[ccxvidonaferens]

It is the 13.2 version from Patreon, where I'm a supporter. It's not fixed at all, and now the game will neither save nor autosave.

Sorry then. I cannot help. Hopefully someone else will be able to. Perhaps on the supporters section of the discord. Best of luck.

 

[jjoron95]

compressed version

 

[raven54]

I really hope the team is looking into some other way of distributing the game.
When the file's bigger than 5GB, Mega's not a good solution anymore.

I have experience distributing visual novels, though most were official and unofficial translations of Japanese visual novels where I did technical work (not the actual translation). I won't go into details on that due to NDA through.

First of all, Ren'Py has a hidden limitation in distribution. If you unzip and zip again, odds are that you ruined file attributes and then the mac version won't start and I think linux version too, through I never encountered that personally. I have seen multiple times that amateur VN makers click windows/mac/linux distribution in Ren'Py's project menu and then unzip the file to zip it again as multiple archive for distribution with file size limits for each file. This then results in mac users complaining that it won't start and the creator then usually has no idea they broke anything because it works on their windows computer. The easy fix to this is to create a multi file zip containing the original zip file. Yes it's annoying to add an extra step to unpacking, but it saves a headache later.

The simplest way to distribute is to zip the zip given from Ren'Py and set each file to be max 3.9 GB. This way it won't even cause problems if somebody use outdated software and is still limited to a 4 GB file size. I believe this is distribution approach, which is the least likely to cause problems for the end user.


As for making an upgrade download, I will point out that there exist a solution to this already. It is essentially the same issue as when companies release a VN on a DVD and then provide patches online. Ideally such patches are as small as possible one reason why people might pay extra to get the DVD as opposed to just the download version could be poor internet connection. Alternatively a small download size means less server load. Either way years ago there was one or more commercial interests in finding a solution to this problem.

The approach is to have multiple folders and each folder is packed into a file for distribution. As I recall that's how Ren'Py is by default. Version 13 is then released as it is right now (no change). Then to add the update feature all new graphics are added to a version14 folder. The script then points to version14 when using the new ones while maintaining the old paths for all existing images (and videos etc). If done right, upgrading from version 13 to 14 will then be downloading a new scripts file and version14, hence two files. The user then adds version14 and overwrite scripts and the game will be updated. Repeat for version15.

The obvious benefit of this is much smaller downloads when updating. There are two negative consequences to it through. One is that say there is a movie in version 13, which is remade in version 14. While the old one can be deleted from the full version, people who upgrade will keep the old movie file, which in turn means the installed game is larger when updated than if all is redownloaded. The other issue is that it will fragment the file locations. Say there is a subfolder with Rachel doing (whatever) as a series of background images. A future update replaces one of them to fix a consistency issue, which then means one image from the set is in a different folder than the rest of the set.

Remember this approach was developed to handle small downloads, like fixing script bugs and not to add more chapters. By definition if a VN is released as a DVD then the story is done or you are doing it wrong. I won't say I haven't seen content being added post release, but it's not how it's supposed to work.

There are update creators, which compare the files of two versions and creates a file detailing how to change one to the other. However while that will work fine with unpacked files, I do not believe packed files will benefit from this, particularly not if encrypted or compressed. I do not expect them to work with the files created by Ren'Py or rather it might work, but the patch download might be as big as the zip file itself, completely voiding the point of the patch.

I will strongly recommend doing the multi file zip of a single zip for distribution to keep the file size of each download to something manageable with as low a risk as possible for corrupting anything. The update approach is however something, which I don't know if it's a good idea in this case or not. For all I know it might completely ruin the internal workflow. Still I do believe this is the approach if there is going to be a small update file in the future and since people started talking about it, I felt like mentioning this.

Could go the easy rout and split the game into chapters. Importing the save between each... Not the best but a workaround.

This is a horrible workaround because:

• transferring savegame data will be tricky
• the combined filesize of the downloads will be even bigger because there are many shared files (like the map of the school)
• having the same file in multiple releases is a maintenance nightmare, which is prone to updating one and not the other, which then causes bugs
• it's not a good player experience to have the game quit and then you need to resume by starting what is essentially a different game
• It's not a linear story and a number of events aren't linked to a specific chapter. Should they be included in multiple chapters?

When TellTale Games released Back to the future the game, they did so in 5 chapters. They released them one by one across half a year, through later releases had all 5 as single purchase. In chapter one, Marty is asked for his name and you are given a bunch of options for fake names. This answer is remembered and used consistently after that. However starting with chapter 2, his fake name change to a specific one regardless of what you picked because apparently they never did figure out how to transfer the answer between what is essentially standalone games. Now imagine what kind of mess it would be to split the chapters of The Headmaster. The amount of data, which has to go between the standalone chapters is significant and it's game destroying if it doesn't work correctly.

In short I don't see this approach ever being able to work from a technical point of view. Splitting up the game will break a bunch of stuff, which takes ages to fix and transferring data is a nightmare, both in development and for the player.

Sadly since Telltale Games went bankrupt, BTTF the game is no longer for sale. There is no point in searching for it if you haven't bought it already.

 

[marcomemmey]

Game crashes when you try Spanking 101 by unlocking it via the cheat menu. The bug isnt really the crash, the option for that scene shouldnt even be in the scene selector since it wasnt added yet.

 

[AltosandHerdone]

It is the 13.2 version from Patreon, where I'm a supporter. It's not fixed at all, and now the game will neither save nor autosave.

I am not sure what would cause the problems you described. Did you extract the game to a new folder or did you try to overwrite the old files? If you are a Patron and you are having issues then, please message me on Patron or preferably on our official Discord so we can work out what's happening for you and try to find a solution. I always make time for my patrons, you guys are my heroes. F95 isn't the best place to get my attention.

 

[Kuroyuki28]

Not sure if it was posted here before, way too many pages to search through to find out. But I seem to have a bug with priti's swimsuit event at the lake. I got the trigger to get the swimsuit in the online shop, but it shows up as already purchased, but it is not in my inventory, and when I go to the lake I can't trigger the event, it says I need the swimsuit, but I can't buy it because it thinks I already have it. There a way to un-trigger the swimsuit sold in shop, or to add it to my inventory?

 

[raven54]

If you are a Patron and you are having issues then, please message me on Patron or preferably on our official Discord so we can work out what's happening for you and try to find a solution. I always make time for my patrons, you guys are my heroes. F95 isn't the best place to get my attention.

May I propose assigning somebody to pay attention to F95, who is then responsible for forwarding important posts to discord and/or Patron.

The main problem with project likes this (with and without payments like Patron) is that it often ends up being the same person or same few people doing everything. This means something like paying attention to forum posts takes time away from content creation. Assigning a person to filter the posts and forward the "needs reaction" ones will increase productivity if the forwarding person is somebody who wouldn't create new content anyway. Regardless of what is said, people will keep using this thread for feedback and posts like this one will not be read by whoever provides feedback in a month.

 

[Deleted member 2203154]

May I propose assigning somebody to pay attention to F95, who is then responsible for forwarding important posts to discord and/or Patron.

Gegecucu pretty much is that person already.

 

[eball360]

there a bug
Game crashes when you try Spanking 101 by unlocking it via the cheat menu. The bug isnt really the crash, the option for that scene shouldnt even be in the scene selector since it wasn't added yet.
thank you
EBALL360
p.s. it a goood game i give a 10/10.
=================================================================================
I'm sorry, but an uncaught exception occurred.

While running game code:
ScriptError: could not find label 'pre_basic_training_01'.

-- Full Traceback ------------------------------------------------------------

Full traceback:
File "C:\Users\eball\Downloads\TheHeadmaster-0.13.2-pc\renpy\bootstrap.py", line 316, in bootstrap
renpy.main.main()
File "C:\Users\eball\Downloads\TheHeadmaster-0.13.2-pc\renpy\main.py", line 578, in main
run(restart)
File "C:\Users\eball\Downloads\TheHeadmaster-0.13.2-pc\renpy\main.py", line 143, in run
renpy.execution.run_context(True)
File "C:\Users\eball\Downloads\TheHeadmaster-0.13.2-pc\renpy\execution.py", line 908, in run_context
context.run()
File "monday.rpyc", line 359, in script call
File "monday.rpyc", line 2879, in script call
File "monday.rpyc", line 3662, in script call
File "monday.rpyc", line 359, in script call
File "monday.rpyc", line 1144, in script call
File "monday.rpyc", line 3662, in script call
File "monday.rpyc", line 359, in script call
File "monday.rpyc", line 1988, in script call
File "monday.rpyc", line 3662, in script call
File "monday.rpyc", line 1144, in script call
File "monday.rpyc", line 4551, in script call
File "replay.rpyc", line 31, in script call
File "monday.rpyc", line 359, in script call
File "monday.rpyc", line 2879, in script call
File "monday.rpyc", line 3662, in script call
File "monday.rpyc", line 359, in script call
File "monday.rpyc", line 1144, in script call
File "monday.rpyc", line 3662, in script call
File "monday.rpyc", line 359, in script call
File "monday.rpyc", line 1988, in script call
File "monday.rpyc", line 3662, in script call
File "monday.rpyc", line 1144, in script call
File "monday.rpyc", line 4551, in script call
File "replay.rpyc", line 31, in script call
File "C:\Users\eball\Downloads\TheHeadmaster-0.13.2-pc\renpy\script.py", line 898, in lookup
raise ScriptError("could not find label '%s'." % str(original))
ScriptError: could not find label 'pre_basic_training_01'.

Windows-8-6.2.9200
Ren'Py 7.3.5.606
The Headmaster 0.13.2
Mon Sep 12 04:34:51 2022

 

[b00marrows]

Telltale Games

Just about the worst and most abysmal ideal of a visuel novel ever. Not only did they use models and animations (NOT CG) but still ended up fucking up more than not.
Your example of them forgetting a choice of name is more proof of just how abysmally the systems where.

But getting back to the point, its an option with added opertunities. I have expressed a few times that the filesize of visuel novels is only going to expand with time, nothing will decrease the filesize outside of compressing the pictures.

A save file is little more than an "encrypted" text file with flags, importing it between different chapters wouldn't be hard.

Different chapters is a workaround. An option. But not the only option or the best.

 

[c3p0]

But getting back to the point, its an option with added opertunities. I have expressed a few times that the filesize of visuel novels is only going to expand with time, nothing will decrease the filesize outside of compressing the pictures.

File size will constanly inscrease without any options. If you change the compression in the middle it helps short and long term, perhaps the finsihed product will even be smaller than before, but even then file size will increase as long as content will inscrease.

A save file is little more than an "encrypted" text file with flags, importing it between different chapters wouldn't be hard.

Depending on the amount of text in the file. With a lot of choice (that matter) and some forbidden combination, what could possible go wrong?
Sure it can and do work, but it depend of the complexity as always.

Different chapters is a workaround. An option. But not the only option or the best.

Can be an option, depens again on the game. Chapter base VN who chaper x and x+1 have very minor things in common, then it can works great. If the game is a sandbox type and you can still do all things in chapter x+10 that you could do in chaper x, then it won't solve anything at all.

Generally big file size is per se not a problem, it depens on the delivery option for the game and your tech. But to have more usable option would always be nice.

From the look of it the game have two big archives were the whole images and videos are. Thus a compare and then make a patch on file level is out of the windows for a patch. Only to change the file hierarchy and to patchs as Ren'Py let you do for a game would be possible for the dev. Put then you can only add content, not remove content. Thus if you have a lot of old, not used scene in the game, the size of the game is bigger than it must.
Therefore the "only" soltution that would solve that all would be an update program, who would update your copy of the game to the newest version and also delete old, not used anymore content. If that hassle is worth for the devs, I don't know.

 

[b00marrows]

sandbox

That's part of the puzzle for sure, luckily an easy factor here is much like already present a story-line could "end" with a "proceed to chapter 2 to continue". or flavor it to be time based "in a few months (Chapter 2)".
this is i belive already a thing as some storylines require others to be up to a specific point before each can proceed.

There are benefits to it, simplified to the possibility of a "time jump" and potential of a change of seasons both adding new story options due to the contextual shift.

I do still think changing the games format to allow for patches would be good, but even than there complication added between updates. "I need version 0.13.09A to apply update 0.13.10B" i could see that being another complication.

Another approach is the devs could also start splitting content between archives. Meaning the newer content is in its own separate archive, updated and patched while older content is left alone. How feasible renpy is with that? i don't have a clue but i doubt its a built in feature.

But at this point i feel like we are discussion work the devs should be thinking of. The end of the day its on them.
The growing issue of file and download size will not magically go away and will only get worse with time.
The game is already 5.74 GB compressed, its already tipping the limits of even the better file servers like MEGA.

 

[c3p0]

How feasible renpy is with that?

It is, if my head don't do me wrong, it is something that Ren'Py comes with built-in already. Eg. Harem Hotel size 9.8 GB, update patch from previous to the current version "only" 2.28 GB.
And I'm sure, if the dev want to do this they are enough who could help them here to set that up.

 

[Cartageno]

Not sure if it was posted here before, way too many pages to search through to find out.

There is a search option at the top right of the page. Entering "Priti bikini" or similar word combinations will give you plenty of results.

 

[Deleted member 2203154]

Mac update please!

We love the game too! (even if we have to wait a bit longer for Nina...grumble, grumble)

 

[T_Abraxas]

Absolutely thrilled with the update. Can't wait for the next.

However, I have to play on Android, and Joiplay is super buggy and crashes when I save, so I had to play through in one go. I know it's a major pain but I would still be extremely thankful for official android somehow....

 

[raven54]

While writing this post I realized a possible solution to keeping the file layout organized and manageable even if images ends up being spread across multiple image achieves. The problem is that as files are added in the future, some are in image14, some in image17 etc, possibly even if they are part of the same scene. Not thinking ahead about this problem can become a pain later.

The answer is to make a script file, which lists all images. In the most primitive form it can be a bunch of global constants, through it's possible Ren'Py can do something clever with namespaces to make it cleaner to use. The script will then be banned from accessing images directly. Instead it has to use the constant/variable from the list. This way all used images can be listed in a single file where comments are allowed. A scene can have all the images listed in order even if they link to different achieves, making the script appear clean even when a single scene is spread across many files/folders. The list will then work as a dictionary to find the files too for editing as it will allow listing all images for a scene at the same time, allowing lookup for where they are as opposed to searching for them.

If it becomes a pain to work with a specific scene because it's too spread out, it's possible to move all the files into the achieve for the next release and update the paths in the list. The script itself will not have to be touched. Sure it will make the next update bigger than it has to be, but it's a balance between that and delaying the release because people keep searching for images during development.

Do the same for movies, though obviously that list will be way shorter.

I would like to point out that making a list of images is actually presented online as good scripting practice so maybe the list already exist.

From the look of it the game have two big archives were the whole images and videos are. Thus a compare and then make a patch on file level is out of the windows for a patch. Only to change the file hierarchy and to patchs as Ren'Py let you do for a game would be possible for the dev. Put then you can only add content, not remove content. Thus if you have a lot of old, not used scene in the game, the size of the game is bigger than it must.

Actually removal is possible. Say we have the achieve imageBase and then 0.14 adds image14. It replaces an image from base. The list is updated to match the new path and the old image is removed from base if you get the full download. If you do the update, you get image14 while keeping your old base file. This means the updated installations will have old unused files on the disk but it won't matter from a game perspective. You can add as many files as you like without changing anything. If the script won't call them, then they are ignored. The full download will have a smaller imageBase file.
In short yes there is a risk people end up with old unused files, but nobody will download unused files. I think that is an acceptable limitation of an update system. If people have issues with HD space (say on an android system) then they can just download the full version like people do now.

Therefore the "only" soltution that would solve that all would be an update program, who would update your copy of the game to the newest version and also delete old, not used anymore content. If that hassle is worth for the devs, I don't know.

The problem with that is that Ren'Py's project application has a "build windows/mac/linux release" button, which creates the zip file. Easy approach to make a multi platform release and strictly speaking it can be used to release something for platforms the developers don't even have access to. A dedicated update program would have to be system specific, which makes it a pain for multi platform support. Ok, then it can update windows only while the other platforms have to download full versions, but then people will complain that their favorite OS is treated as a lower class.

If the devs can pull off creating an update, which is just a zip with scripts, images and videos. The latter two are new files while scripts overwrites the old script file. No extra software needed and it works regardless of platform.

But at this point i feel like we are discussion work the devs should be thinking of. The end of the day its on them.
The growing issue of file and download size will not magically go away and will only get worse with time.
The game is already 5.74 GB compressed, its already tipping the limits of even the better file servers like MEGA.

This became a topic because people can't download files larger than 5 GB without paying mega even if they are paying on patreon. As such it's a topic of "I'm worried that I won't be able to download future versions", which is a valid user concern. How it's solved is indeed a developer question. Everything I have written are suggestions, which may or may not be used. If the developers decides to ignore all of it, then fine, that's their choice. I just want their decision to be an informed decision.

The only thing I'm absolutely not ok with is a release, which is too big for free downloads and ideally browser downloads should be supported as in you don't have to install download software to enable free downloads. If it ends up as being a multi achieve zip file, then ok, that's a solution, which will work. Not ideal, but it's not a broken approach either.

Speaking of which, if we end up having to have to download multiple files, how about using multiple servers? If we have to download two files and each is hit with a "only one per day" limit, then we can download one from server A and the other from server B at the same time. It may not be faster, but it allows starting both downloads at the same time and then you can leave and it will be done when you come back. If it's two files you have to start one by one, then you can't start all at once before going to bed or work or whatever.

 

[c3p0]

If the devs can pull off creating an update, which is just a zip with scripts, images and videos. The latter two are new files while scripts overwrites the old script file. No extra software needed and it works regardless of platform.

According to my experience with the average F95 user I doubt it, other than that, yes it could. For that you could even use a rsync script and with WSL for Windows could even be used on all OS. But it is something that need some experience or a step by step instruction and I doubt that will happen.
Also too much tech bla and too less disciplinary actions.

 

[Gegecucu]

there a bug
Game crashes when you try Spanking 101 by unlocking it via the cheat menu. The bug isnt really the crash, the option for that scene shouldnt even be in the scene selector since it wasn't added yet.
thank you
EBALL360
p.s. it a goood game i give a 10/10.
=================================================================================
I'm sorry, but an uncaught exception occurred.

.....

Yep, this is a known miss. See it as a small teaser
It has been fixed in today's patch.

 

[Gegecucu]

Absolutely thrilled with the update. Can't wait for the next.

However, I have to play on Android, and Joiplay is super buggy and crashes when I save, so I had to play through in one go. I know it's a major pain but I would still be extremely thankful for official android somehow....

Thanks for your feedback!
Unfortunately, the size of game app size is out of the restrictions. That's why Joiplay seems to be the only solution now.