A question about the mod: does it force scenes to progress even if you made the "wrong" choices?
For example, I didn't like Maria. I assumed (and having played more, correctly) that they way she treated Alice would be explained, and she would become a more interesting character, but I decided to play "in the moment" rather than based off of what I assumed would come about later.
So, I chose all of the "wrong" options for her.
And we slept together anyway.
I'm curious if the game is set up in a linear way, so most scenes happen, regardless, or if the mod is essentially allowing us to make choices but showing us available scenes either way?
I'd also like to make a request with the mod. I don't know coding, so I don't know if this would be exceptionably easy to implement, or a complete pain in the ass, but.... making it so we know what the choices mean, rather than "click green for best results" would be appreciated. With choices, are we gaining or losing love points? Gaining or losing some personal stat? I've seen mods that highlight optimal options green, but also have in parenthesis something like (Alice love +1) or in red (Alice love -1) or even more importantly messages like (path lost).
The biggest reason I enjoy, and deeply apricate, mods like yours is that I can see where the choices lead, and then make my decision, rather than play a game blindly (playing without a mod and losing a path because you chose one wrong dialog option is infuriating... especially if it seems the correct option), or rather than just choosing green to see scenes, as if I weren't playing for the story.
So, I wanted to ask that, hoping it is a surprisingly small, simple ask.... or to at least get your opinion on the matter.
In any event, thank you for your hard work. The devs put hard work into making the games, but I feel that the modders put in a hell of a lot of work, that sadly can go underappreciated.
Thank you for your coments and thanks for bringing up this topic. Personally, I don't play without a walkthrough, whether in PDF or Mod.
Obviously there are as many styles of gaming as there are players and games. Developing a Mod is subjective to the criteria, to the modder's way of playing. My Mods have the objective that the player can see all the scenes without having to replay the game.
In the case of TIF, the game is very straightforward. There are no routes to open or close. Therefore, my Mod exists so that the player does not miss any scene or have to go to the gallery to make sure he did not lose anything.
I also have as a criterion not to add too much information or change the code since the game developer did it that way for a reason. For example, I added some option to see two scenes in some cases and not in others. As I said, it depends on how the modder likes to play.
It's all a question of balance. There are players with more knowledge of the code, as is my case, and there are players who do not know nor are interested in knowing what the game is like 'inside'. The Mod has to serve both.
As I said, TIF does not open or close routes, therefore there is no
Alice Love +1 to show in a Mod. In other games that have implemented the concept of routes it does not always make sense to show that information in the Mod. For example, No More Money game is really complex, the game has decisions that include variables that accumulate scores, if the scores are enough they trigger events that have decisions that sets flags on or off. At some point, the game asks if 4 or 5 of these flags are on, if so a route opens.
It is impossible to display all this information in the Mod. The best thing, in that case, is to paint green the option that will eventually lead to the desired route being opened.
A modder also (should) learns and evolves. My Mods now have a little more information, for example the green option may say (Leads to open Tris path). In other cases I put a message of (Recommended) or (More content) for those decisions that do not impact routes.
A Mod from one author can also be complemented by another author. For example, in the game The Assistant, not only routes are opened or closed, the relationships between MC and his LIs can be more romantic or more dominant. There is only one question for each LI that guides the relationship in one direction or the other. This question is so hidden that the player never finds out that they made that decision. I am developing an addition to the original Mod, developed by Joker, to warn the player of this condition.
As a last comment, it is my opinion that WTs are necessary, even indispensable. There are games in which a route is inadvertently closed and the player will never be able to open it again. For example, the first decision in Intertwined game opens the route with Alexis and then there are 40 opportunities to close it but no opportunities to reopen it. I spent weeks playing Intertwined without realizing this fact. There are literally variables with the subfix
_friends that relegate the MC to the friendzone. So frustrating. So I made a WT in PDF with the only winding routes so that the protagonist can have the best possible results with these LIs.
Some might say that it is cheating, for me it is a question of being able to decide having all the information, I don't believe there is an absolute truth.
Looking forward for your thoughts, comments, opinions.
Best regards,
Murray.
