Crist of Raunch, I’m sorry that development is not fast enough for you but I feel you do not have an appreciation for how much work goes into making something like this. We are just a small team with almost the entirety of this game so far made by one person in his spare time. There are tens of thousands of lines of code, probably around 50,000 words of dialogue and approaching 2000 images. From the game’s conception to the state we are in now is thousands of hours of work. All of which has been made available to you for free. Complaints about a lack of content are extremely harsh, all things considered. This is a hugely complicated and ambitious project. A vast amount of the work gone into it is stuff behind the scenes like the coding and the writing and the planning. At some stage I’ll have the game at a point where I can just start pumping out content, however, we are not quite there yet, there’s still a lot of code to write, new areas to design and create etc.
The game was never meant to be grindy (if you play it right you can complete all the current content in about four weekly cycles). However, this is an inevitable consequence of trying to make a non-linear game and introducing the content bit by bit. The weekly schedule was always going to feel bare bones in the earliest versions. With the replay menu I tried to make it positble to track all your main progress so that there would be no need to grind more than neccessary.
In terms of complaints about the numbering of the releases and the fact that the latest version was just bug fixes. This is really nitpicking. Firstly, I don’t control when these game versions get leaked on F95. This is not a public release of the game. Secondly, as far as we are concerned there have only been three main releases over four months of this year. Version 0.1 was an introduction to set out the premise of the game and to see if it was something people would be interested in. Version 0.2 was to introduce the basic gameplay mechanics. Version 0.3 was supposed to be the punishment mini-game but because I was still working my day job full time I didn’t have time to do it properly so instead I just added as much extra content to the base game as I could. Now, thanks to Patreon, I’m able to work on the game almost full time. Version 0.4 that I’m working on at the moment will implement the punishment mini-game. I’m also hoping to add the lake and some other areas and there will be a greater involvement of the school inspector Ruth.
Thank you for your reply. Your answers, as far as I can see, are fair and to the point. I will address a few of them...
You are correct in that I am not a game developer and therefore may not understand the amount of time and labor that might go into a game. However, I am experienced in game reviews and ratings (I used to rate and review Japanese games under a different name) so I am aware of how difficult it is to create a game (especially a free game) and accept your comments as valid. I confess, however that I was NOT aware of the (possible?) loss of one of the developers. as I had ztated, this was simp,y an opinion, not ment to belittle you or accuse you of anything (in spite of the comments regarding other devs that abandon or milk games, for that I apologise and must simply plead illness and age related disability, so I willingly withdraw those comments).
As far as the grind within the game: I can see your point in that regard, yet where the grind comes in (at least from my point of view) I will have to use a couple of examples to explain: after teaching a couple of classes (or 3 or 4, lol) I patrol the halls (or grounds) and almost everytime the same scene replays over and over(weekends 2 girls sunbathing, during week you observe twins playing soccer, just to describe 2 scenes). At night you are replaying either the same scenes with Ms Potts or the spying at back of dorm, or with Math Teacher (sorry, cannot remember his name). As far as your released versions, if I am wrong, I apologise, but every releaae or posts regarding a new release/update appeared to come direct from you (as the original poster for each upgrade). Again, if I misread or misinterpreted that, I apologise.
To adress my commentsnas to how the game is progressing re content; I accept your reasonings regarding the versions and your intents regarding each version number. But in truth - at leaat for meself - I would rather wait a month or 2 for significant content rather than get so little advancement within the game at each update ( based on what I have seen so far). Examples the (still) inabiliy to open the lake, the inability to change rules (except for the 2 originals within the 1st or second version that was instituted) the inability to find, speak to, investigate Ruth (or info that would let me have some hope of "corrupting" her) and the inability to find, speak to or interact with the grounds keeper. I play any number of gamea still in developement that use the Ren'py platform, and yet in the updates there is significant content within each update(even those that update once a month, or with devs that have putside jobs añd family interests, etc) so I honestly do not feel I am being unreasonable in my comments about the lack or difficulty of advancement within the game. However, once again, I admit that this is only an opinion of mine, and can eaaily be wrong or unfair.
I will give you a 100% multi thumbs up for replying to my comment rather than ignoring it. The fact that you actually took the time to respond speaks well for you from my personal point of view. I also appreciate the fact that you at least defended yourself on several of my points I had made, so will accept that maybe I was wrong or unfair. As such, I will be eagerly (or at least patiently, lol) waiting for your next primary update or 2.
My thanks and respects to you;
Christof