Ren'Py The Sin Within [v0.4] [CigarRex]

[AggressiveCheeto]

Playing through all these scenes once each will naturally get your goal with Greed done. It is a placeholder quest anyways - just a means of giving the player money when there's still not any money-making systems available (you only walk around the house for now)

The plan is to simply open up this world. You can stay at home and experience the family scenes, and eventually go out go other locations to do the same things with other characters.
Special events that further their storylines meaningfully will be unlocked as you develop the relationships. No mystery to that. Though, such an event is still unimplemented for the family girls.

A lot of people, or at least a lot of vocal people, don't like "sandboxes" unless it's basically a straight visual novel especially early on when there's not a lot of content in the sandbox to begin with. Not much you can do about that just keep that in mind and don't let it screw up your vision and enthusiasm for the game's development.

I didn't do the math but it seemed like you didn't have to repeat any scenes which is usually for the best, but it might help if you clarified that somewhere so they don't jump to that conclusion. As a sandbox enjoyer, my biggest recommendation as a player is to make new or unattained scenes very clear. Already deleted the game for storage but I think the character circles in the house had question marks near the bottom corner, those could change to a check or something when a scene has been completed which should ideally stop players from feeling lost when they have to balance multiple characters and reduce the feeling of having to stick to them one at a time to get their stuff out of the way which is the least fun way to play a sandbox, especially one that is a work in progress. Also would ideally reduce both complaints and criticisms. Another good addition I rarely see is highlighting unseen choices, particularly in repeatable scenes with different outcomes like choosing whether to hide your presence or not in the bath scenes.

I was quickly distracted by the phone menu to process it at the time but the prologue to sandbox transition was a lil jarring. A short sandbox tutorial would probably be good there. I enjoyed both the streamlined prologue and see potential in the sandbox so I'm looking forward to seeing where game goes from here.

 

[BlasKyau]

For my taste the game has too many lesbian scenes, I don't know how many I have "seen", but many and none really avoidable. And for now the only scenes of the MC are with a prostitute, which of course I didn't do, but at least it doesn't happen when you decide to, and a dream of some kind that I've skipped using CTRL because there was no other option to avoid it.

I've made a list of LIs that have unavoidable lesbian scenes to avoid them. For the rest I assume that none of the prostitutes is a LI.

And if you don't need to replay events, why make them replayable in the first place, especially since they all show up in the Gallery anyway?

I never use the gallery, but if events can be repeated in a sandbox, I will surely do it, especially if I liked them. If I have to use the gallery to repeat the events, then I won't do it.

I like sandboxes, with a good hint system they can be very entertaining and open up lots of optional events that the player can do or avoid, also if the event needs certain stats, in a VN you might not have them when it arrives, while in a sanbox you can do it when you do them.

 

[CigarRex]

Fundamentally, I understand you've made the decision to stick with sandbox, and that's fine for your game, but any time there's a promising VN that turns into sandbox, I try to explain why people dislike sandboxes in the hopes that I can convince at least one dev to switch back to a prviously-promising VN.

I see no meaning in butting heads over the game being a sandbox. Those updates were called a prologue for a reason. Not "Linear Visual Novel - Day 1" or whatever...

Before ever writing a single word of dialogue anywhere, I first implemented the entire sandbox system currently playable. The planned story is one I can't see ever being told in anything but a sandbox environment, either. This is the kind of game I've always enjoyed most, in the end.

And I understand it is a challenging project to take on, but it is the one I want to make. I'm glad for the supporters that share this feeling, and who trust in my vision for the game.

That will be all. Thanks for the feedback, as always. I will at least look into improving relevant information on how to navigate the game for future versions.

 

[anon280]

This is very strange, since 0.2.1 always ended from the prologue straight to the sandbox, even though the scenes weren't ready yet. Don't know what that could be... Try just making a new save then. Haven't seen any incident of being thrown back to the menu.

yeah i had no issue continuing from where i saved after the last encounter with Greed in v0.2.1

Tiur did you play the game? all those sandbox points may be relevant to sandbox in general but this game handled the sandbox pretty well in that it was controlled - there's no grind here lol. at most you may repeat a scene once to bump some points you missed or pass time to get to that last scene you want.
knowing what sandbox is, i came with my expectations and wasn't bogged down by the mechanics as a lot of sandbox does by leaving too many placeholders
what dev could do to improve his sandbox further, though it doesn't seem necessary to me, is:
- change the dialogue and pacing of repeatable events so it fits naturally as one rather than the first encounter always repeating
- have a disclaimer in changelog of where the gameplay ends for a version - in this case something like "once the Gallery of events is full, you've finished the version"

 

[CigarRex]

Another good addition I rarely see is highlighting unseen choices, particularly in repeatable scenes with different outcomes like choosing whether to hide your presence or not in the bath scenes.

Yes, it is a good idea.
I didn't implement such a thing yet since it requires exhaustive creation of flags to detect any action you could possibly take, as to highlight unseen choices accordingly.
It is a nice layer of polish to have, but I may have to look for simpler alternatives... Who knows?

Since each major scene has a gallery entry (which all have such 'flags'), it'd be nice to add checks that inform the player the scene was seen already, based on gallery unlocks.

 

[AggressiveCheeto]

what dev could do to improve his sandbox further, though it doesn't seem necessary to me, is:
- change the dialogue and pacing of repeatable events so it fits naturally as one rather than the first encounter always repeating

Only seen it sparingly in a few sandboxes but it really makes a huge difference for me as someone who likes to repeat events sometimes rather than just spamming "wait", particularly in the games that had had the dialogue change multiple times throughout the story or character's progress or had a few different dialogues that would cycle each repeat. I imagine its a pain in the ass to do that for most scenes though and I'd rather a dev's time be spent on more events or whatever else.

 

[BlasKyau]

Yes, it is a good idea.
I didn't implement such a thing yet since it requires exhaustive creation of flags to detect any action you could possibly take, as to highlight unseen choices accordingly.
It is a nice layer of polish to have, but I may have to look for simpler alternatives... Who knows?

Since each major scene has a gallery entry (which all have such 'flags'), it'd be nice to add checks that inform the player the scene was seen already, based on gallery unlocks.

I think I'm missing quite a few scenes from the prologue (I haven't checked it)


In the prologue you couldn't really avoid any lesbian scenes (they all happened, you just chose whether to watch or not) is it going to stay like this for the whole game?

 

[anon280]

Only seen it sparingly in a few sandboxes but it really makes a huge difference for me as someone who likes to repeat events sometimes rather than just spamming "wait",

for sure, it's the best you can do if you want to go that extra step. it helps in keeping me immersed/roleplaying.

particularly in the games that had had the dialogue change multiple times throughout the story or character's progress or had a few different dialogues that would cycle each repeat.

I imagine its a pain in the ass to do that for most scenes though and I'd rather a dev's time be spent on more events or whatever else.

agreed

 

[vilewe7570]

Man, I'd *love* for there to be an option to disable all the various slow text. It's forced so incredibly often here, and it's just jarring. It leads to a lot of spamming through every-single-bloody-character, and then suddenly instead of waiting on a single line of dialogue you're halfway through the conversation and have to go back.

It's really incredibly annoying, and it really doesn't have to be.

You could override the tag.

### Filter CPS Text Tag

init python:

    def cps(tag, argument, contents):
        return contents

    config.custom_text_tags["cps"] = cps

 

[CigarRex]

I think I'm missing quite a few scenes from the prologue (I haven't checked it)


In the prologue you couldn't really avoid any lesbian scenes (they all happened, you just chose whether to watch or not) is it going to stay like this for the whole game?

You can unlock them in the "specials" app

 

[CigarRex]

for sure, it's the best you can do if you want to go that extra step. it helps in keeping me immersed/roleplaying.

View attachment 2787981

agreed

While reading the documentation for RenPy, it seems it really does keep track of whether you've picked any given menu choice already. This should make implementing this pretty easy now, hopefully

Edit: Choices are kept track of between any saves ever... That's kind of worthless now.

 

[BlasKyau]

You can unlock them in the "specials" app

Good to Know.

The truth is that all the scenes that I haven't seen don't interest me (although one that I have seen don't interest me either) On the other hand, I haven't checked in the gallery which are the scenes that I'm missing (and it isn't likely that I will do it).

 

[sergerserj]

Plot and dialogs writing by someone new? Looks like there are 2 different games before and after free roam.
ps- why ppl so like that damn free roam...

 

[Tiur]

yeah i had no issue continuing from where i saved after the last encounter with Greed in v0.2.1

I already said what I encountered, and it was still true. For all saves of a game I had originally started in 0.1, it did not ever bring me to sandbox, and when I looked at the prologue rpy file, that's because there is no jump at the end of the prologue file to go to the start of the sandbox. If it was relying on the inherent return at the end of a given file, that failed for me because the sandbox that called it was not on my return stack. The only solution was starting a brand new game and holding down Ctrl for 10 minutes.

Tiur did you play the game? all those sandbox points may be relevant to sandbox in general but this game handled the sandbox pretty well in that it was controlled - there's no grind here lol. at most you may repeat a scene once to bump some points you missed or pass time to get to that last scene you want.

Yes, I've played a few days' worth of the sandbox, and find that, other than grinding for stats (which we've already talked about enough), it does have every disadvantage of sandbox I stated, and more that I hadn't gotten around to saying while I was tired last night.

Passing time to get to that last scene is the issue, especially when the icons indicating scenes do not show whether you've seen that scene already or not. It's unnecessary busywork that artificially extends gameplay.

Even beyond the grinding and the constant click-click-click and hunting down events, the main issue with sandboxes holds true here as well: sandboxes are the death of pacing, tone, consistent plots, and any kind of consequence or impact on the story or setting. The latter two can sometimes be solved through extensive variable usage, but that increases the workload and the likelihood of introducing continuity bugs.

The prologue had consistent plot, pacing, and tone. The sandbox has none of those.

Hell, since you can't see anything outside the house, even just seeing all the events currently in the sandbox means the MC has gone for weeks without going to school or finding out the consequences of anything school-related from the prologue, and it locks out any time frame that has a repeatable event from ever having another event that furthers plot or even character interactions.

For example: the first-available Penny event is her hunting for her uniform. You play through that once. Any other morning, if you wanted to talk to Penny about anything else, or if the plot encouraged the MC to talk to Penny about anything else, it doesn't matter. That time period and Penny are now permanently locked into talking about her missing uniform and nothing else, and it's always the same without change. If it changes, then that's already lost the replayability that is supposedly one of the benefits of sandbox.

 

[Amjdfattali12]

Im want full save pls

 

[BlasKyau]

I already said what I encountered, and it was still true. For all saves of a game I had originally started in 0.1, it did not ever bring me to sandbox, and when I looked at the prologue rpy file, that's because there is no jump at the end of the prologue file to go to the start of the sandbox. If it was relying on the inherent return at the end of a given file, that failed for me because the sandbox that called it was not on my return stack. The only solution was starting a brand new game and holding down Ctrl for 10 minutes.


Yes, I've played a few days' worth of the sandbox, and find that, other than grinding for stats (which we've already talked about enough), it does have every disadvantage of sandbox I stated, and more that I hadn't gotten around to saying while I was tired last night.

Passing time to get to that last scene is the issue, especially when the icons indicating scenes do not show whether you've seen that scene already or not. It's unnecessary busywork that artificially extends gameplay.

Even beyond the grinding and the constant click-click-click and hunting down events, the main issue with sandboxes holds true here as well: sandboxes are the death of pacing, tone, consistent plots, and any kind of consequence or impact on the story or setting. The latter two can sometimes be solved through extensive variable usage, but that increases the workload and the likelihood of introducing continuity bugs.

The prologue had consistent plot, pacing, and tone. The sandbox has none of those.

Hell, since you can't see anything outside the house, even just seeing all the events currently in the sandbox means the MC has gone for weeks without going to school or finding out the consequences of anything school-related from the prologue, and it locks out any time frame that has a repeatable event from ever having another event that furthers plot or even character interactions.

For example: the first-available Penny event is her hunting for her uniform. You play through that once. Any other morning, if you wanted to talk to Penny about anything else, or if the plot encouraged the MC to talk to Penny about anything else, it doesn't matter. That time period and Penny are now permanently locked into talking about her missing uniform and nothing else, and it's always the same without change. If it changes, then that's already lost the replayability that is supposedly one of the benefits of sandbox.

In my opinion, what I've seen so far of the sandbox looks very good.

 

[Malicron]

Ok i think that i got who will be the all of the seven deadly sins
the information I based this of is plot, conntact information or just innformation of character, personality of character, comparing appearance of characters to subscribestar demons model (on

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even't without paying you can see all of the demon faces and their role (pride, greed, wrath, envy, lust, gluttony and sloth) and because demon appearance is similar to the non demon look you can recognize the human behind the demon)
so these are my guesses
(sorry for all language mistakes englisch is not my first language)

Spoiler: SINS

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I want to start by 1) apologizing for the borderline necro-post, and 2) saying I agree with you 100% on Lust (duh) Sloth, and Gluttony. I likewise agree we've not got a lot to go on with Wrath, so I won't touch that one.
That said, I disagree on Envy, Pride, and Greed. And I have some actual reasons:

Spoiler: Reasons/Pedantry

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Hope I'm not annoying anyone with this. Loving the game so far!

 

[CigarRex]

The only solution was starting a brand new game and holding down Ctrl for 10 minutes.

Spoiler

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That time period and Penny are now permanently locked into talking about her missing uniform

Remember, this is a finite game, with finite content, set in a sandbox.
Even the largest Open World Triple A games will have moments where you're seeing repeated dialogue until progressing further. No different to most sandbox games in this site - good or bad.

It's fine to dislike the format, but certain things are inherent to how sandboxes go. Unless, of course, we get 100% AI-generated procedural games that create new scenes with all dialogues, visuals and plot coherence every time you started a conversation...

Again, I appreciate your consideration for this game. This porn game, that has lewd scenes to interact with on a sandbox, with a story stirring as you go.

 

[CigarRex]

I want to start by 1) apologizing for the borderline necro-post, and 2) saying I agree with you 100% on Lust (duh) Sloth, and Gluttony. I likewise agree we've not got a lot to go on with Wrath, so I won't touch that one.
That said, I disagree on Envy, Pride, and Greed. And I have some actual reasons:

Spoiler: Reasons/Pedantry

You don't have permission to view the spoiler content. Log in or register now.

Hope I'm not annoying anyone with this. Loving the game so far!

Love reading these

Bridgitte is the volley coach. You're talking about Beatrice Hawks instead

 

[Malicron]

Love reading these

Bridgitte is the volley coach. You're talking about Beatrice Hawks instead

I'm glad I'm not annoying you at least! And yes, I meant Beatrice