Ren'Py What a Legend! [v0.7.05] [MagicNuts]

[wd1111]

I don't understand why folks keep making their games a little at a time and then release it to the public as they go. I've said this before on here and got blasted for it, but I've never played a Triple A game that was only 10% complete and had to wait months for the next 2.5% of game content. I understand they are feeling out players' perceptions before they fully commit, but imagine if TV shows, or movies worked like this? Why not just make your game, and then add DLC to the completed game after the release?

Someone tried to compare this "A little at a time model" to musicians testing unreleased songs live on crowds, but the difference is that the song has been fully written! They aren't just playing the intro guitar riff and then saying, "So... thoughts?" No, they play the entire song and then gage the audience reaction. Comedians do the same thing, but they retool and rewrite their joke based on audience response. If you will, both musicians and comedians Beta test, however, these games are not beta testing. They are writing and releasing at the same time, which inevitably leads to not being able to keep-up with demand.


But then again, the F@#$ do I know? I just like playing these games and jacking-off...

it isn't quite like that, a lot of tv series for instance start off with a pilot, and quite a lot of them never take off, some turn to utter crap after a season or two, when the original material is all used up and they can't be arsed to write more good stuff for same money

so, with these games, they take quite a lot of time to develop, this game so far could probably take a year full time from 0 to 0.6, but what if it never takes off? would you be ok to flush a year or more of your work down the drain with nothing to show for it?

the real enigma is why pretty much all of these devs production drops dramatically once they get some success, because the logic dictates that they would reinvest, grow, learn to be more productive, but the exact opposite seems to always be the case, hence my speculation that they simply develop alternative revenue streams, other games, this original game still is going strong, so why bother, when you can double, triple or more your income by creating another game, that's my theory anyway

 

[rajawali34]

another greedy bastard with abandoned game tag soon

 

[Knight]

Side point - are there any projects when the next update after the long wait is significantly quicker? I am trying to remember any games where devs managed to overcome the slow down, but so far it looks like if something like this happens, the development is in deep waters for good.

I have never heard of any despite years on this site, whenever the development windows get stretched the update afterwards is usually even slower and with less content and the pattern continues until all works stops and you just get endless excuses with nothing to show for it. I.e: "My mom died, I will be in mourning for the next month", "I needed surgery!, see you in three months", "I had a baby!, see you next year" then they stop even bothering to make excuses and just go dark. Any one of these things is understandably but it's the pattern of behavior that is the problem.

While the pattern repeats the diehard fanbase that a game has cultivated viciously attack anyone who says something about it or expresses disbelief in the devs statements, this is amplified by devs who set up discords and the like where they can put their most fanatical supporters as mods who then brutally police on their behalf.
It happens to every single dev who doesn't openly quit and shutdown their Patreon, it's just a question of how much content gets put out before it happens, if you are really lucky they at least finish the main story of a game but these last few years I haven't seen a single case of that happening.

 

[Xupuzulla]

I know a game but im scared to name it for being off-topic.
In that game the dev realized pumping small content releases regurarly was better long term than working X months to deliver bigger releases.
To this day i dont understand why the patreons of this game voted for big updates,seems like a terrible decision for both the fans and the devs.

 

[Syrabert]

Well there are two sides of the coin and the dev's will never find a proper solution. If he do pumping out small updates some people will complain as "only small update, i will wait few updates" which will be similar to a bigger update. If he do bigger update people will complain about long update time.
There are also people like the dev of "o.r.s" (abbreviated, you know the game ), between the final update you get a lot of alpha, beta, rework, bugfix releases but if you only take the time between each final chapter you have also a "working x month".
Let's switch back to WAL, the story's are arc-based means an update is the story about one character. The patreons have voted for a complete arc to prevent cliffhangers even it would be longer dev time. AFAIK during the discussion/vote the estimated time between each update was expected around 6-10 month. At this time nobody expected the IRL problems leading to this extreme delay. So if you want to blame the devs for something it's their lack of emergency planning.
(lol, contraception? health care? )

 

[Bobbylikesthegames]

Yes, you won't see such things because the triple A devs had alpha and beta tester before they start to publish. And a lot of games were never be released because the first tests were catastrophic. Or take movies, there is a lot of "wasted" filmmaterial, lots of scenes will be rejected in the pre-screening or will be altered redone.
A lot of musicians are testing their song in a studio, ask for comments, change their song or text and test again, and when it's barely ready it goes on stage , similar happens with other artists. In my courier for some time i was a mangaka, don't ask me how often i had to rework my manga-series. And it was similar to some games, the manga changed after every few chapters, so it was similar to those "unfinished" games.
So maybe it helps to smooth your mind if you treat those indy-games as beta-releases and be happy to follow the steps from first edition up to the final product.
Another solution would be to select only games with the "complete" tag, those would be similar to triple a games in terms of "final product"

Did you read what I wrote? The games on here are not doing what you have regurgitated from my post.

Most art forms write, rewrite, and retool before public consumption. The games here are not retooling. They fix bugs and spelling errors, but they are not writing, changing their stories, or overhauling their entire game. Their releases function more like a comic book series, however, the difference is that a comic book run is completed and then released bi-weekly, or every month as issues, or in the case of TV, episodes.

Pre-screenings are done for a small group, however, most of those films are not rewritten, re-shot, and overhauled, but rather edited, or shelved. If they are redone and completely overhauled, then it becomes something entirely different. They also show the ENTIRE MOVIE, and not the first 12 minutes! Of course, there is such a thing as screen testing, or panel testing, but again, that is done in a very small group and it is mostly to feel out ideas and topics of the story, or to get a sense for how folks feel about a specific actor on screen. Not the same as what most developers do here.

As for musicians... You just proved my point! Yes, when a band/artist records, they go through the process of, "Pre-production." At this time they write, practice, retool, and receive feedback from their producer, A&R, and associates, and NOT THE FANS. They are not releasing their demos to the general public and then saying, "What do you all think?" After pre, they record, then release a single, and then the album. (Well they used to release albums. Those are dead now). My example of live audience song testing could be similar to what these developers are doing, but again, THEY ARE PLAYING THE ENTIRE F!@#$ING SONG, and not 30 seconds!

Rewriting, retooling, and starting over is part of the creative process. However, this is done outside of the public sphere. The Artist is always right, and knows what is best best for their art. They are not and should not be making art for us, but rather themselves. If it is true, then they will find folks who wish to fund their passion.

That being said... I think this game is amazing! I highly respect what this couple has created thus far. Their circumstances are completely understood, given that I am in the exact same situation. When you have little ones, everything else goes to hell, as it should! Seriously, there is nothing more important, fun, and exciting than waking-up 4 times a night, not sleeping for close to 72 hours, being thrown-up on, pooped on, peed on, or all three at once (sarcasm for folks who don't understand nuance).
However, once the clouds start to part and these little poop machines start to walk, talk, and develop personalities, you stop giving a shit about everything else, because they become your new muse. I'm sure once their kids hit 9, 10, 11, or 12, then they will jump right back into this and rock our worlds. Till then, I can wait and go back to parody porn...

Seriously, who gives a F*!@? Also, yes, I enjoy arguing for the sake of arguing... HAHA

 

[Syrabert]

Did you read what I wrote? The games on here are not doing what you have regurgitated from my post.

yes i read your first post and i interpreted it as a direct comparison between triple a games and the indy games. sorry for my misunderstanding but it felt like a comparison between apple and pears.

Most art forms write, rewrite, and retool before public consumption. The games here are not retooling. They fix bugs and spelling errors, but they are not writing, changing their stories, or overhauling their entire game. Their releases function more like a comic book series, however, the difference is that a comic book run is completed and then released bi-weekly, or every month as issues, or in the case of TV, episodes.

Would you agree with me that they change or add content based on the input of their fans? You are right that they nearly never overhaul the entire game but that also never happens on other games. For your example about the comics you are unfortunately wrong, lots of comics change during their serialization after input from editor ->publisher ->readers. (ask me how i know, did this shit for more than 30 years). As writer you offer an overview aka global storyboard. Later you change it on demands of your editor, publisher, reader response. Trust me i had my fair share of "you cant write like this!" or "it doesn't fit our line" or "the character is not pleasing" or "too long, too short," , " it need's more...."
edit: back to the original, i got distracted. I could agree with your thesis that the games here are more like a comic series, but there is maybe a reason: lack of money and lack of experience. There are very few indy-devs asking for pre-testing their ideas or gameplay, most devs are just like"i have an idea, let's try".
In my mind the support via patreon (or similar) is important, unfortunately some devs misused this as a "quick money scheme".

Pre-screenings are done for a small group, however, most of those films are not rewritten, re-shot, and overhauled, but rather edited, or shelved. If they are redone and completely overhauled, then it becomes something entirely different. They also show the ENTIRE MOVIE, and not the first 12 minutes! Of course, there is such a thing as screen testing, or panel testing, but again, that is done in a very small group and it is mostly to feel out ideas and topics of the story, or to get a sense for how folks feel about a specific actor on screen. Not the same as what most developers do here.

no, not the entire movie, normally the movie is split in small chunks and the animatic of those chunks is screened and discussed. The character screening is a separate task. If any of these tasks failed this chunk will be changed or dropped (worst case)

As for musicians... You just proved my point! Yes, when a band/artist records, they go through the process of, "Pre-production." At this time they write, practice, retool, and receive feedback from their producer, A&R, and associates, and NOT THE FANS. They are not releasing their demos to the general public and then saying, "What do you all think?" After pre, they record, then release a single, and then the album.

Sorry, but you wrote it differently in your previous post, the sentence " No, they play the entire song and then gage the audience reaction" is misleading and gave a different impression

The Artist is always right, and knows what is best best for their art. They are not and should not be making art for us, but rather themselves. If it is true, then they will find folks who wish to fund their passion.

Oh, that's a nice wish unfortunately the real world is not so kind. You even mentioned this somehow in your post. You will find lot's of examples where the artist has to change their work up to the point it's no longer their original work. Let me phrase this like : the artist is always right until job or money is involved. Best example would be the patreon drama when the fanbase decide the content of a game. Or as an artist try to create a film for company's like netflix, you are in for a bad surprise.

Seriously, who gives a F*!@? Also, yes, I enjoy arguing for the sake of arguing... HAHA

exact my thought, haha. Heck, sometimes i wish we could discuss such things direct in person and not in a limited area with written arguments

 

[John Dane]

atleast writing and art is finished. it will be another 3 months minimum. I am expecting big content.

 

[Kaerad]

it isn't quite like that, a lot of tv series for instance start off with a pilot, and quite a lot of them never take off, some turn to utter crap after a season or two, when the original material is all used up and they can't be arsed to write more good stuff for same money

so, with these games, they take quite a lot of time to develop, this game so far could probably take a year full time from 0 to 0.6, but what if it never takes off? would you be ok to flush a year or more of your work down the drain with nothing to show for it?

the real enigma is why pretty much all of these devs production drops dramatically once they get some success, because the logic dictates that they would reinvest, grow, learn to be more productive, but the exact opposite seems to always be the case, hence my speculation that they simply develop alternative revenue streams, other games, this original game still is going strong, so why bother, when you can double, triple or more your income by creating another game, that's my theory anyway

That's depend in what those devs are pursuing. I'm pretty sure almost everyone want to get a solid income, some of they want do get a kinda of full job. There's actually some who want to tell a history, get better in his art skills, be recognized as artist or improve his portfolio.
Unfortunally, there's a few developers who want anything besides money, and even these soner or later will face adverse situations and think twice about go further with the project. Managing the project is actually harder than coding or drawing

 

[whichone]

The games here are not retooling. They fix bugs and spelling errors, but they are not writing, changing their stories, or overhauling their entire game.

To be fair, that's a pretty large generalisation. Some most certainly are.
The DeLuca Family springs to mind as one that had a complete re-write, from the ground up.
Heavy Five is another that's currently undergoing one.

I've seen plenty of other games go back & re-do earlier chapters. Sometimes simply because the dev's graphical skills got better & the earlier images were not consistent with later, better ones.
Sometimes because the story is organic & it had naturally changed course over time, so the early stages no longer fit the overarching narrative, so the dev wanted to rewrite them to make them fit better.

 

[Deleted member 6923157]

I don't understand why folks keep making their games a little at a time and then release it to the public as they go. I've said this before on here and got blasted for it, but I've never played a Triple A game that was only 10% complete and had to wait months for the next 2.5% of game content. I understand they are feeling out players' perceptions before they fully commit, but imagine if TV shows, or movies worked like this? Why not just make your game, and then add DLC to the completed game after the release?

Someone tried to compare this "A little at a time model" to musicians testing unreleased songs live on crowds, but the difference is that the song has been fully written! They aren't just playing the intro guitar riff and then saying, "So... thoughts?" No, they play the entire song and then gage the audience reaction. Comedians do the same thing, but they retool and rewrite their joke based on audience response. If you will, both musicians and comedians Beta test, however, these games are not beta testing. They are writing and releasing at the same time, which inevitably leads to not being able to keep-up with demand.


But then again, the F@#$ do I know? I just like playing these games and jacking-off...

Just select 'completed' under latest updates, and you never have that problem.

Even professional games takes years to make, and even after that lots of updates come to fix bugs people find after release.

If you read the dev on this game, they constantly play the game anew and anew to find if it goes as they think it should. And now some random dude comes and plays it a different way, a bingo find a new bug. For example Genesis Order, it has a lot more freedom than this game, and because of that people do things that should be done after something else is finished.

I would suggest if anything needs to be done at the gate here, it could conflict with the sheeple story. So we will see, until now you can play it anyway you like, I didn't find any problems, when I played it story after story or all stories at the same time. Of course you need to get the green orc released from jail, before the next story stars, so maybe such possability problems fix themselves...

 

[Deleted member 6923157]

The problem is that with 1 update every 18 months, the game will be ready in 8 years, if not more...

It's the first time they have this problem, of course if the next update it's similar than yeh. Normaly they had like 1-2 updates every year, because of the shorter stories.

What would you like then? Having a story split in 2, and you can only play half the story? Then need to wait a few months. Than when part 2 is released, you have to reply it, because they didn't like something in the first part, and revisited the story line. Then people start complaining about their save games again.

It's difficult to please everyone. "I want the game, When? I want it finished yesterday...."

 

[Bobbylikesthegames]

yes i read your first post and i interpreted it as a direct comparison between triple a games and the indy games. sorry for my misunderstanding but it felt like a comparison between apple and pears.

Would you agree with me that they change or add content based on the input of their fans? You are right that they nearly never overhaul the entire game but that also never happens on other games. For your example about the comics you are unfortunately wrong, lots of comics change during their serialization after input from editor ->publisher ->readers. (ask me how i know, did this shit for more than 30 years). As writer you offer an overview aka global storyboard. Later you change it on demands of your editor, publisher, reader response. Trust me i had my fair share of "you cant write like this!" or "it doesn't fit our line" or "the character is not pleasing" or "too long, too short," , " it need's more...."
edit: back to the original, i got distracted. I could agree with your thesis that the games here are more like a comic series, but there is maybe a reason: lack of money and lack of experience. There are very few indy-devs asking for pre-testing their ideas or gameplay, most devs are just like"i have an idea, let's try".
In my mind the support via patreon (or similar) is important, unfortunately some devs misused this as a "quick money scheme".

no, not the entire movie, normally the movie is split in small chunks and the animatic of those chunks is screened and discussed. The character screening is a separate task. If any of these tasks failed this chunk will be changed or dropped (worst case)

Sorry, but you wrote it differently in your previous post, the sentence " No, they play the entire song and then gage the audience reaction" is misleading and gave a different impression
Oh, that's a nice wish unfortunately the real world is not so kind. You even mentioned this somehow in your post. You will find lot's of examples where the artist has to change their work up to the point it's no longer their original work. Let me phrase this like : the artist is always right until job or money is involved. Best example would be the patreon drama when the fanbase decide the content of a game. Or as an artist try to create a film for company's like netflix, you are in for a bad surprise.

exact my thought, haha. Heck, sometimes i wish we could discuss such things direct in person and not in a limited area with written arguments

I don't think I contradicted myself. What I was describing the second time was the process for recording an album. In both cases, I stuck with my original premise: Bands plays the entire song, and not just part of the song in all scenarios. Yes, they do rewrites and retool, but if a song flops live, it's usually scrapped. Musicians do not consult fans on what they want to hear, or have them apart of the writing process little by little.

My perspective is coming from the music world. When the artist has had artistic license, and given the freedom to do as they wish, and given time to develop (artist development died in the 2000s), then the quality of the art really exceeds all expectations. Of course, labels do ask for more songs, or a single, but for the most part, the artist is always right. And yes, there have been some massive flops because the artist attempted to go too far, or thought they had to go left just to "Stay True."

I'd love to hear more about your work on comics. The creative process you described sounds very interesting. I am not being sarcastic, I seriously love to hear about that entire process. For whatever reason, I had assumed comics were fully ironed out in the planning stage with the editor and creative team, then written, drawn, and inked, and then released as a serial. Much like a TV show. Aside from South Park, almost all TV shows are written, storyboard, filmed, edited, and sent for release as a completed season.

 

[Syrabert]

Oh, we are running off topic and before a mod goes angry we better "slow down", sorry to put a lid on our fun.

My perspective is coming from the music world. When the artist has had artistic license, and given the freedom to do as they wish, and given time to develop (artist development died in the 2000s), then the quality of the art really exceeds all expectations. Of course, labels do ask for more songs, or a single, but for the most part, the artist is always right. And yes, there have been some massive flops because the artist attempted to go too far, or thought they had to go left just to "Stay True."

Well, i admit i have less knowledge about the music world, my info is based on talks with a lot of musician during our own sound recording in the studios. As far as i understood lately their work is more and more commission work, the label decides what the musician has to prepare. Just remember how much (good) songs get refused by a Label. Of course there are famous musician who could do their stuff but the mainstream musician is somehow caged. The end-consumer gets the songs like processed food. OK, this impression could be total wrong but that's how i was told.
So let go back to the original posts, to compare music dev with games i would say music is more equal to triple a or a complete release of a game where the dev is done in background. With the games here we have different approaches, some like WAL are more like comic or TV series, some others are more like seeing the development ( like the pre-stage "written, storyboard, filmed, edited" ). Lol, and of course there are games like "wtf is the dev doing". But never forget, the devs here are normally not professionals (e.g. WAL is the first game of the "nuts").

For whatever reason, I had assumed comics were fully ironed out in the planning stage with the editor and creative team, then written, drawn, and inked, and then released as a serial. Much like a TV show. Aside from South Park, almost all TV shows are written, storyboard, filmed, edited, and sent for release as a completed season.

Only with short comics you could afford a full release, for longer comics (and TV series) you create something like a framework and fill this over time (hehe similar to WAL). So no complete release, normally you send only few chapters/shows to the publisher and during the "airing" you work on the next chapters. This type of work works like a safety feature e.g. what happens if the artist can't deliver or the consumers don't like how the art is going. There is even another buffer called "filler chapter", you get a filler when something went wrong. Lets see the worst case, the show/comic doesn't work and needed to be axed, there is still enough time to do a closure chapter.
On a side-note: I have an active manga (comic) in work, it started in 2012 and has now more than 120 chapters and hopeful will not end soon. It has changed over time, heck even during times i had to change the story slightly to be "political correct" (or whatever they will call this fad). To release it as whole at start would be impossible

 

[Bobbylikesthegames]

Oh, we are running off topic and before a mod goes angry we better "slow down", sorry to put a lid on our fun.
Well, i admit i have less knowledge about the music world, my info is based on talks with a lot of musician during our own sound recording in the studios. As far as i understood lately their work is more and more commission work, the label decides what the musician has to prepare. Just remember how much (good) songs get refused by a Label. Of course there are famous musician who could do their stuff but the mainstream musician is somehow caged. The end-consumer gets the songs like processed food. OK, this impression could be total wrong but that's how i was told.
So let go back to the original posts, to compare music dev with games i would say music is more equal to triple a or a complete release of a game where the dev is done in background. With the games here we have different approaches, some like WAL are more like comic or TV series, some others are more like seeing the development ( like the pre-stage "written, storyboard, filmed, edited" ). Lol, and of course there are games like "wtf is the dev doing". But never forget, the devs here are normally not professionals (e.g. WAL is the first game of the "nuts").
Only with short comics you could afford a full release, for longer comics (and TV series) you create something like a framework and fill this over time (hehe similar to WAL). So no complete release, normally you send only few chapters/shows to the publisher and during the "airing" you work on the next chapters. This type of work works like a safety feature e.g. what happens if the artist can't deliver or the consumers don't like how the art is going. There is even another buffer called "filler chapter", you get a filler when something went wrong. Lets see the worst case, the show/comic doesn't work and needed to be axed, there is still enough time to do a closure chapter.
On a side-note: I have an active manga (comic) in work, it started in 2012 and has now more than 120 chapters and hopeful will not end soon. It has changed over time, heck even during times i had to change the story slightly to be "political correct" (or whatever they will call this fad). To release it as whole at start would be impossible

Interesting perspective on how comics work. Makes sense, especially if it's an untested story/market.

I think the musicians you have dealt with are more hired guns, or hired studio musician. Studio Musicians more or less show up, get the music, play a few takes, and then F!@#$ with money in hand. HAHA. However, composers and song writers also fit what you have described. Composers and song writers tend to be employed by a label/production company to write a specific style, or piece to fit the manufactured group/band/movie/game/etc. On the other hand, artist/bands are independent and either have their music licensed, or released by a label, but function outside the constraints of the label... Well, within and outside depending on how successful their project is, or has become. Most bands now start on an indie label, which tends to give artist full range, but major labels do tend to have a stronger influence over a bands process. However, if a band has proven their worth (Foo Fighters, Red Hot Chili Peppers), then they can do Whatever the F!@#4 they wish.

 

[Syrabert]

Interesting perspective on how comics work. Makes sense, especially if it's an untested story/market.

no, it's not just comics, same procedure is also used in a lot's of cartoons and TV series.
Take the tv-series: When the writer guild of america went to strike, a whooping amount of over 11500 writers stopped working. Lots of series had to put on hold but because the studios had some scripts on shelf they have mitigated the effect for some time. There are also other similar occurrences, lets say a studio had big problems, so they can imediately switch to another studio.

funfact: A lot of series have already produced "the last chapter", just in case something bad happened to the series.

 

[fusibile87]

It's the first time they have this problem, of course if the next update it's similar than yeh. Normaly they had like 1-2 updates every year, because of the shorter stories.

I mean, are we sure other updates will be shorter? Rand orc girl update required more than one year. How can we be sure that main storyline updates will be shorter? Have they said something about it?

I think that Madeline and Serena updates will be very long, maybe even longer than Gomira.

 

[Deleted member 6923157]

I mean, are we sure other updates will be shorter? Rand orc girl update required more than one year. How can we be sure that main storyline updates will be shorter? Have they said something about it?

I think that Madeline and Serena updates will be very long, maybe even longer than Gomira.

Again same story:

- normaly they had shorter updates
- they asked their patrions what the wanted, smaller updates or bigger updates (read smaller stories or bigger story).

- and patreons wanted a bigger update
- then new kid popped out
- then got hip replacement or so (I still don't understand if its kids or grandkids)

So unfortunate circumstances one after the other...

 

[HunterLavie]

Holly is by far the best girl

 

[fusibile87]

Again same story:

- normaly they had shorter updates
- they asked their patrions what the wanted, smaller updates or bigger updates (read smaller stories or bigger story).

- and patreons wanted a bigger update
- then new kid popped out
- then got hip replacement or so (I still don't understand if its kids or grandkids)

So unfortunate circumstances one after the other...

This still doesn't address if main story updates will be longer or shorter than Gomira's ones and how much time they plan to spend on the next update. A "bigger " update done in 8 month and one done in 18 months are a completely different thing.
The game is "0.6", so it will be supposedly completed in 4 updates, but there are more than 4 girls missing... next updates will be multi-girl? So even longer?