VN Ren'Py The Neverwhere Tales [v0.5.0.4p] [Ceolag]

[HiP1]

"I love mythology....spent a lot of my free time on research.
...love exploring unknown, unraveling puzzles, and deciphering hidden meanings.
...can't get away from the stories about ancient gods. Or the illuminati and freemasons...
...people usually tell me I'm chasing fairy tales...
My dad and I were actually always of one mind. He always supported me. Except in this case. He absolutely hated it."

On its own, that could just be hobby. Cute but harmless.
In game context, above is literally her about to end up learning about Neverwhere.
So you are correct, my wording was wrong, she never says she's researching Neverwhere.

But while she never names it directly, above is basically "Do you encourage this girl to learn more, effectively putting her in danger, or tell her to drop her hobby?".
I don't see how above can end up anything else but her learning about about Neverwhere.

Medb absolutely tries to trick MC. But guess which choices give affection points with her? Not being an idiot ones.
She offers deals and honors them. Changing deals because you got greedy? Oh, Elves will absolutely scam the shit out of you.
But on surface? Deal is a deal. Don't change it on the fly and you're good.

Way more trustworthy than any Templar shown so far. Yes, that includes mommy dear. Lying bitch...

yeah, it's inevitable that Elea will be introduced to neverwhere and all the legends she craves. and that will be a real test for her relationship and loyalty with MC, i'm sure.

still Medb baits the MC into changing the deal. and she doesn't like it if he falls for it, but we don't know if it's because Kaija intervenes and Medb gets a spike of jealousy, or if she is just disappointed that MC falls for it so easily
not falling for it doesn't give affection, you just don't lose anything.

I read that as she should not get close to anyone, not specifically MC.

yeah that's one of the possibility i thought about too. but being part of a prominent family with huge influence over the world and neverwhere, she is bound to have had access to information about the templars and the family of the grandmaster. and when MC tells her the whole truth, she is not surprised that he is the son of the grandmaster. she would not be surprised about neverwere and the templar stuff, but if she didn't know who MC is, she should be surprised about finding it out at the very least.

 

[Grumpy Old Aussie]

yeah, it's inevitable that Elea will be introduced to neverwhere and all the legends she craves. and that will be a real test for her relationship and loyalty with MC, i'm sure.

still Medb baits the MC into changing the deal. and she doesn't like it if he falls for it, but we don't know if it's because Kaija intervenes and Medb gets a spike of jealousy, or if she is just disappointed that MC falls for it so easily
not falling for it doesn't give affection, you just don't lose anything.



yeah that's one of the possibility i thought about too. but being part of a prominent family with huge influence over the world and neverwhere, she is bound to have had access to information about the templars and the family of the grandmaster. and when MC tells her the whole truth, she is not surprised that he is the son of the grandmaster. she would not be surprised about neverwere and the templar stuff, but if she didn't know who MC is, she should be surprised about finding it out at the very least.

One of the reasons I lean towards Elea is her and the MC don't know much about the reality of Neverwhere and the rest of that world. MC and Elea will be able to do a lot of that exploring together. Fiona already knows so she is going to be a leader for the MC as is Medb probably. I find the idea of Elea and the MC exploring a lot of that world together rather appealing for my MC. That may not work out to be the case, who knows, but that is the way it looks to me at the moment.

 

[HiP1]

We do get some history when MC and Kaija discuss their relationship in the Templar HQ. Depending on what choices you take, determines what Kaija says and its condemning. I found that eye opening. I'm not going to go in to it too much. Kaija has been flogged to death.

actually, we don't. our choices only set up her feelings for MC and the status of their relationship. but knowing the details of the relationship, how invested she was, how invested MC actually was, their commitment, what they actually sacrficed for each other, their first everything, etc.
on the love path, she said she grew to love him, but didn't at first. we don't know what that really means. maybe she did love him but was too young and immature to recognize and acknowledge it. or maybe she really did force herself at first and then something clicked.
was it just a friendship with benefits for her all along ?
on the friendship and rejection paths, it was. it was just "business", even. but the details for the love path could change the mind of a major part of the players.

 

[HiP1]

One of the reasons I lean towards Elea is her and the MC don't know much about the reality of Neverwhere and the rest of that world. MC and Elea will be able to do a lot of that exploring together. Fiona already knows so she is going to be a leader for the MC as is Medb probably. I find the idea of Elea and the MC exploring a lot of that world together rather appealing for my MC. That may not work out to be the case, who knows, but that is the way it looks to me at the moment.

so it's because Elea will be his equal ?
for Fiona and Medb, maybe they will be MC's guide, just like Kaija can be too, but I don't think they will try to "lead" him. he is set up as a wildcard for everyone in the alternate world.

Medb is even bound to try to trip the MC at every turn, for her own amusement.

I found it a bit frustrating that a MC that is supposed to be calm and cold in his decisions the player made could not stop Medb during the Life debt deal being made. He should be able to calm everything down and ask what she is talking about. even if it ends up the same, as MC is still naive, and he would still trade a life for a life and nothing more ("doing the right thing"), he could still set up clear terms for the exchange for example.
while a hotheaded MC would be just tricked into it like it happened in the game.

 

[Grumpy Old Aussie]

actually, we don't. our choices only set up her feelings for MC and the status of their relationship. but knowing the details of the relationship, how invested she was, how invested MC actually was, their commitment, what they actually sacrficed for each other, their first everything, etc.
on the love path, she said she grew to love him, but didn't at first. we don't know what that really means. maybe she did love him but was too young and immature to recognize and acknowledge it. or maybe she really did force herself at first and then something clicked.
was it just a friendship with benefits for her all along ?
on the friendship and rejection paths, it was. it was just "business", even. but the details for the love path could change the mind of a major part of the players.

Well now we are debating semantics. What you said here IS discussing their relationship. You don't think so, okay, we will just have to agree to disagree on that one.

so it's because Elea will be his equal ?
for Fiona and Medb, maybe they will be MC's guide, just like Kaija can be too, but I don't think they will try to "lead" him. he is set up as a wildcard for everyone in the alternate world.

Medb is even bound to try to trip the MC at every turn, for her own amusement.

I found it a bit frustrating that a MC that is supposed to be calm and cold in his decisions the player made could not stop Medb during the Life debt deal being made. He should be able to calm everything down and ask what she is talking about. even if it ends up the same, as MC is still naive, and he would still trade a life for a life and nothing more ("doing the right thing"), he could still set up clear terms for the exchange for example.
while a hotheaded MC would be just tricked into it like it happened in the game.

No, its not about Elea being an equal, its about exploring something together and sharing new experiences together. Its romantic and I love doing those things with my wife and seeing her wonder as we discover things together. She feels the same way. Nothing to do with equal or being superior, etc, its just romance and so much more fun.

I agree about Medb, she is likely to be a handful for the MC. It will be fun how that evolves.

I just put the life debt incident down to the MC being way out of his depth and in shock. I think anyone would be mind blown in that situation. I get your point though, and yes Ceolag could have done it that way, certainly.

 

[Maviarab]

Well now we are debating semantics. What you said here IS discussing their relationship. You don't think so, okay, we will just have to agree to disagree on that one.


No, its not about Elea being an equal, its about exploring something together and sharing new experiences together. Its romantic and I love doing those things with my wife and seeing her wonder as we discover things together. She feels the same way. Nothing to do with equal or being superior, etc, its just romance and so much more fun.

I agree about Medb, she is likely to be a handful for the MC. It will be fun how that evolves.

I just put the life debt incident down to the MC being way out of his depth and in shock. I think anyone would be mind blown in that situation. I get your point though, and yes Ceolag could have done it that way, certainly.

There's nothing to debate here. She owed him, she also took advantage of him being clueless. HiP is just argumentative for the sake of it at times, just exactly wtf was the MC to do in that situation? Exactly what he did and Medb used that to her advantage.

It was perfectly scripted, showed her character and showed just how clueless the MC really is about the world around him and how out of his depth he is.

 

[frogbert]

I wouldn't run: I'd probably cum at the same time - a proper creampie for my best girl.

Yeah right! I wouldn't creampie her with somebody else's dick. She thinks she owns MC and I wouldn't put it past her to baby trap him if she feels threatened.

Like: "Oh by the way it looks like we had an accident, good news though we're pregnant!"
"Well I'm not totally sure but maybe the condom ripped when I cut it with scissors and stuck it back in."

Okay so she hasn't boiled any bunnies (on screen) but that's exactly what makes her so sus. It's just weird how she's obviously completely bonded to him but never says or asks anything about his side of the separation. A real girl who was that attached and drove her man away (by trying to help him, no less) would be insecure, angry, probably ugly crying into her chocolate ice cream every night.

And he never asks her either! Is he really that unworried that she would stray? If so, why isn't she pissed off that he's taking her for granted? Even Elea and Fiona are far more possessive than she is. Maybe it's just that the dev is avoiding the whole thing because he wants to give MC space to date and realizes that the premise of the story makes that really awkward.

I mean do what you want but don't come crying to me if she goes to clean up afterwards and you hear her rooting around in the bathroom trash can!

 

[Grumpy Old Aussie]

Yeah right! I wouldn't creampie her with somebody else's dick. She thinks she owns MC and I wouldn't put it past her to baby trap him if she feels threatened.

Like: "Oh by the way it looks like we had an accident, good news though we're pregnant!"
"Well I'm not totally sure but maybe condom ripped when I cut it with scissors and stuck it back in."

Okay so she hasn't boiled any bunnies (on screen) but that's exactly what makes her so sus. It's just weird how she's obviously completely bonded to him but never says or asks anything about his side of the separation. A real girl who was that attached and drove her man away (by trying to help him, no less) would be insecure, angry, probably ugly crying into her chocolate ice cream every night.

And he never asks her either! Is he really that unworried that she would stray? If so, why isn't she pissed off that he's taking her for granted? Even Elea and Fiona are far more possessive than she is. Maybe it's just that the dev is avoiding the whole thing because he wants to give MC space to date and realizes that the premise of the story makes that really awkward.

I mean do what you want but don't come crying to me if she goes to the clean up afterwards and you hear her rooting around in the bathroom trash can!

Two words - DNA TEST

Unless you're on the Kaija love path she doesn't love the MC so why would she stay faithful. In Neverwhere outside the bar, there is a hint there she was rather free with her body when the mission required it. I personally wouldn't trust her unless on the Kaija path and then I would still get a DNA Test. I'm interested to see where Ceolag goes with Kaija since she responds differently on different paths.

 

[ThorinKing]

Yeah right! I wouldn't creampie her with somebody else's dick. She thinks she owns MC and I wouldn't put it past her to baby trap him if she feels threatened.

Like: "Oh by the way it looks like we had an accident, good news though we're pregnant!"
"Well I'm not totally sure but maybe condom ripped when I cut it with scissors and stuck it back in."

Okay so she hasn't boiled any bunnies (on screen) but that's exactly what makes her so sus. It's just weird how she's obviously completely bonded to him but never says or asks anything about his side of the separation. A real girl who was that attached and drove her man away (by trying to help him, no less) would be insecure, angry, probably ugly crying into her chocolate ice cream every night.

And he never asks her either! Is he really that unworried that she would stray? If so, why isn't she pissed off that he's taking her for granted? Even Elea and Fiona are far more possessive than she is. Maybe it's just that the dev is avoiding the whole thing because he wants to give MC space to date and realizes that the premise of the story makes that really awkward.

I mean do what you want but don't come crying to me if she goes to the clean up afterwards and you hear her rooting around in the bathroom trash can!

#Yawn

 

[HiP1]

No, its not about Elea being an equal, its about exploring something together and sharing new experiences together. Its romantic and I love doing those things with my wife and seeing her wonder as we discover things together. She feels the same way. Nothing to do with equal or being superior, etc, its just romance and so much more fun.

yeah, that's what equal means in that context. they both discover everything fresh and blind together. in contrast to all the other LIs who know much more than MC.

There's nothing to debate here. She owed him, she also took advantage of him being clueless. HiP is just argumentative for the sake of it at times, just exactly wtf was the MC to do in that situation? Exactly what he did and Medb used that to her advantage.

It was perfectly scripted, showed her character and showed just how clueless the MC really is about the world around him and how out of his depth he is.

yeah, you're right. it's just a minor detail. but it would have added meaning to building that cold vs hotheaded stat.
and Medb does react to MC being calm and collected in their first meeting. so in that moment, it could have added more to their relationship if MC used it in that moment. argumentative for the sake of it, sure, but it would have been more interesting to me at the very least
we already know MC is clueless, it's the whole premise of the game, and the whole reason he is there at that moment. there was no need to hammer it again.
just a missed opportunity for more flavor on a Medb route.

 

[xapican]

My guess is that Eleas secret is that she belogs to the "Mage" lore, as the forth faction, but that is just a hunch or a wild guess, it would fit her profile quite well, since she is the one who knows the legends and as she said is researching quite a time.

 

[frogbert]

Medb still tries to trick and deceive MC. even if it is because she is interested in him and does it playfully, it's still not trustworthy at all.

My interpretation was that the "trick" was more of a formality than anything malicious. Like, in their culture they do this kind of thing all the time and it's just expected that the one side will give you the chance to trip over your own feet if you want to. If she was really trying to fool him she would have had some crafty way of presenting the option, or tried to confuse him or tempt him somehow. As it is she just kind of threw it out there expecting nothing to come of it. She seems like a plain dealer, at least, and I doubt the kidnapping was her idea.

 

[Joshy92]

Two words - DNA TEST

Unless you're on the Kaija love path she doesn't love the MC so why would she stay faithful. In Neverwhere outside the bar, there is a hint there she was rather free with her body when the mission required it. I personally wouldn't trust her unless on the Kaija path and then I would still get a DNA Test. I'm interested to see where Ceolag goes with Kaija since she responds differently on different paths.

He has already emphatically said she never did anything sexual with anyone else.

 

[HiP1]

My interpretation was that the "trick" was more of a formality than anything malicious. Like, in their culture they do this kind of thing all the time and it's just expected that the one side will give you the chance to trip over your own feet if you want to. If she was really trying to fool him she would have had some crafty way of presenting the option, or tried to confuse him or tempt him somehow. As it is she just kind of threw it out there expecting nothing to come of it. She seems like a plain dealer, at least, and I doubt the kidnapping was her idea.

she did trick him when she sealed the life debt deal. she forced him into the deal, and deceived him, as she knew he didn't know anything. she didn't give him the chance to make a proper deal and negotiate. sure, she thinks she won a bit in that deal, but it also undervalued her own life, indirectly, insulting herself
the templars warned MC that the Elves would try to trick him out of the deal and make him ask for more. if they didn't warn him beforehand, the way Medb phrased it, it could be seen as a real deception, with malicious intent (as it would make the deal null and void), it would make it seem like MC made the request to change the deal if he fell for it.
also, she tries to trick him again multiple times by asking if the deal is now done even though she knows the requirements are not met.
it was not a playful cultural thing at all. it was a battle in itself. even if she didn't try her hardest to win because she has a soft spot for humans and MC in particular, she did try a few moves for her side to come out on top. the life debt is supposed to be an honorable ancient tradition, and the fact that the Elves still tried to deceive MC with it is malicious and ill intent. at least, that's how I see it

 

[ThorinKing]

she did trick him when she sealed the life debt deal. she forced him into the deal, and deceived him, as she knew he didn't know anything. she didn't give him the chance to make a proper deal and negotiate. sure, she thinks she won a bit in that deal, but it also undervalued her own life, indirectly, insulting herself
the templars warned MC that the Elves would try to trick him out of the deal and make him ask for more. if they didn't warn him beforehand, the way Medb phrased it, it could be seen as a real deception, with malicious intent (as it would make the deal null and void), it would make it seem like MC made the request to change the deal if he fell for it.
also, she tries to trick him again multiple times by asking if the deal is now done even though she knows the requirements are not met.
it was not a playful cultural thing at all. it was a battle in itself. even if she didn't try her hardest to win because she has a soft spot for humans and MC in particular, she did try a few moves for her side to come out on top. the life debt is supposed to be an honorable ancient tradition, and the fact that the Elves still tried to deceive MC with it is malicious and ill intent. at least, that's how I see it

They're all just waiting for an opportunity to screw you over. And they'll make out like you brought it on yourself.

 

[Malicre]

she did trick him when she sealed the life debt deal. she forced him into the deal, and deceived him, as she knew he didn't know anything. she didn't give him the chance to make a proper deal and negotiate. sure, she thinks she won a bit in that deal, but it also undervalued her own life, indirectly, insulting herself
the templars warned MC that the Elves would try to trick him out of the deal and make him ask for more. if they didn't warn him beforehand, the way Medb phrased it, it could be seen as a real deception, with malicious intent (as it would make the deal null and void), it would make it seem like MC made the request to change the deal if he fell for it.
also, she tries to trick him again multiple times by asking if the deal is now done even though she knows the requirements are not met.
it was not a playful cultural thing at all. it was a battle in itself. even if she didn't try her hardest to win because she has a soft spot for humans and MC in particular, she did try a few moves for her side to come out on top. the life debt is supposed to be an honorable ancient tradition, and the fact that the Elves still tried to deceive MC with it is malicious and ill intent. at least, that's how I see it

Jokes on her because hes her future husband anyways.

 

[HiP1]

Jokes on her because hes her future husband anyways.

well, it's not a harem game, so she has 75% to be safe

 

[Grumpy Old Aussie]

He has already emphatically said she never did anything sexual with anyone else.

You're correct I forgot about that. I'm getting old, memory is failing. Plus my trust in Kaija isn't very high so my opinion of her is low as a result. With Elea and Fiona I have no reason to distrust what they have said. Medb is too dangerous to blindly trust at this stage, but we will see how Medb plays out.

A word of advice in 2024, always get a DNA test

 

[Ceolag]

Hey everyone,

this Dev Log is going to be a bit longer because there will be some news regarding the Steam release at the end.
To make sure everyone reads it: The Steam stuff is completely unrelated to the Patreon version!

This week has been pretty productive in general. No nasty surprises, no setbacks, and not a lot of other appointments outside the usual stuff.
I was able to focus on setting up the environment and renders for the scene I wrote last week.
Setting up the environment went surprisingly smoothly. I expected it to take a lot more time to get something close to what I had in mind.
You can see some parts of it in this week's preview renders.
And the good thing is, almost half of the remaining scenes take place in that environment so I can focus on writing and rendering them instead of searching for fitting assets.

Speaking of scenes, I started planning out the remaining scenes (organizing the story stuff into game scenes/settings).
There's still quite a lot of stuff left to do for Chapter 5 even if I have all environments except one (the one for the Chapter finale) set up now.
I think the pacing of a story is very important and that's especially true for Chapter 5. The story just needs time here and it'll be counter-productive to rush it.
So yes, Chapter 5 will be the biggest one to date, we already reached the size of Chapter 4 this week.

The numbers for this week:
114 new static renders for a total of 1678
1 new animation for a total of 37
250 new lines in the script file for a total of 4570

Onwards to the Steam topic...
As some of you already noticed, the Steam release was set for June 25th. To make it short: I pushed it to September.
When I set up the store page, I had to provide two dates for Steam, 1 for technical reasons (not public), and one that is shown to the public.
The technical date has to be specific and I roughly guessed when I might be able to release the Steam version.
The public date can be set to "To be announced"... which I did back then. Until I realized that doing so prevents you from showing up on the "Coming Soon" store pages.
You need to set a public date to show up there, so I just used the technical date because that was still my goal for the release.

As you probably can guess from the text above, the end of June isn't realistic for the release anymore.
So why September?
Steam Summer Sale. It starts on June 27th and runs until July 11th. And as a small dev, you absolutely don't want to release in that time frame.
Hardly anybody will buy an unknown AVN when they can get the latest Assassin's Creed at 70% off and stuff.
Even June 25th as a release date was way too close to the Summer Sale.
The same is true for the weeks after the Summer Sale: everyone spent their money on the Summer Sale, so you don't want to release within the next 3-4 weeks after the sale ends.
That would put the release into mid-August... when I'm away with the family for 2 weeks.
The next realistic release date after mid-June is early September for me.

Trust me, I'd want to get it out as soon as possible, but given the circumstances, any release before September would just be a stupid idea.
I'll set up a specific date in September when I'm done with Chapter 5 and the Steam version so the next date you see there will be the definitive date for the release.

I'm sorry for the inconvenience and the disappointment but I just had hardly any clue what I was doing when I set up all the Steam stuff.

And you can see why I usually don't give release dates: way too much potential for trouble.

As I said before, that's only affecting the Steam release. The Patreon version will be released as soon as it's done.
And no, I won't give a date for that... lesson learned. ;-)

Have a nice weekend, guys.

Cheers,
Ceolag

 

[HiP1]

was there an approximate date for the release of chapter 5 ?