I agree. But I can't tell 100% one way or the other. We'll see where he takes it.
oh it just an innocent question, how bad could the answer be right...? ha-haFor the love of Patreon don't answer it Victor
Right, this is a common complaint, and I'm of the opinion that this should have been made a choice rather than just written in the way it was. In the beginning, Eshtel was a very unpopular character, so I didn't think there would be much impact if I made her polyamorous. Turns out, a LOT of people wanted a one-on-one relationship with Eshtel, or at least the option, so I'm working on a bit of rewriting to make that happen. The poly branch will still be there; you'll just be offered a CHOICE instead of being forced to wingman. That's the dream, at least.
The main request I got from Season 1 was that players wanted more things to click. More choices to make. To be able to avoid intimacy with the characters they didn't like and to spend more time with the characters they DO like.
Tbh you probably could've done it a lot easier from dialogue choices, for example MC thinking to himself "Should I go hang out with Ruka? I can probably find her at the pool" and then a simple yes/no choice. Would effectively do the same thing as the sandbox but without it being a sandbox.
Oh boy, I'd gone through the whole 5 stages straight to acceptance over that one.... or maybe I just stopped caring after Chiara started being cool. Gonna have to play through both options here though, I didn't really have a problem with the whole poly dynamic but I'm selfish, I want MC to be first even if it does cut out the Eshtel x Chiara/poly path with her doing that. Probably gonna take advantage of that choice, especially given how excited Eshtel was when she thought MC was confessing to her, felt like a total rat when I played through that bit. Kinda glad to hear, even as a fan of having lesbians in the harem.
In theory, this is a great idea, but I have 49 planned characters, as I said. Much easier to just have a panel of buttons of their faces, and a choice to go back to the main story.
I'm working on a solution to this, such as maybe greying it out and making the button insensitive once you've played all there is to play. I'd have to do some finagling with some variables, but I think I know how it might be done. I just have to force the system to check what scenes you've seen already and compare it to a Maximum Scenes variable, I think, and if the two are equal, grey the button out. Or something.
My issue with sandbox is generally not present in what you have, ie the "Skip time to meet some arbitrary time requirement to see the next scene. And grind arbitrary stat for the same reason." Which is fine, unless that gets added. But sandboxes just feel empty, unless there's stuff to do. Yours has a bunch of areas that look like buttons, all unclickable, and again, not a lot to do. And seeing as none of the events are repeatable, a linear VN would be fine. Giving more dialogue options that don't affect stats but add dialogue flavor, a path tracker and/or maybe a "Who do I want to see" screen/menu would be simpler. Not an empty map that you can't use for some odd reason.
I don't believe I've called him that, or any close derivative to it once in this thread, unless you're responding to someone else there. I think at times he can be a little frustrating but overall he's a pretty decent character tbh.
Well, I just got to the point where you find out river is not a girl. I am wondering what the comment means:
One thing people asked for was a sort of affection tracker, and I have a skeleton built for it. It's just not fully functional. It's also a bit redundant, as it'll only really display the number of scenes you've seen for the character in question.
Oh I was absolutely responding to someone else, he who opted "not to continue our conversation" lol. And I really appreciate your kind words. I know I rely way too much on outside stimulus to generate motivation, but that's how my brain chemicals be and seeing what people enjoy about a story kinda fuels me.
I do need to change that line. That was before I had the idea to implement the Free Time system, and you absolutely WILL be able to avoid romance with any character once I have it done correctly. You will still be friends and may have a conversation or two in the main story, as they might be required to, say, discover Willy's location or something serious like that which affects a good number of the characters. But I don't plan for there to be more than light flirting from most of the LIs outside of their side story scenes.
Life won't always let you easily avoid all of those coworkers or customers that you'd rather not see or deal with, so imo no reason the game should always let you have that choice.
The affection tracker and most stuff can be redundant, most people just like confirmation on what they're doing. Or X/Y scene viewed thing. But part of my intrigue WAS "Oh man, how's he gonna deal with the LIs interacting/finding out about other girls." So if what you said means that's not gonna be a thing, I'm a little sad. A lot of what takes me out of these games is MC telling every girl he loves and only loves her, then going next door, screwing the neighbor and doing the same.
Reading these comments i am starting to understand why most creators on this site refrain from interaction with people here. Maybe consider not getting too interactive with your playerbase so much, especially if you care/feel attachment to your work, as you mentioned before.
So, funny you should mention that. In my original storyline, Chiara was going to find out from Eshtel that Eshtel had a huge thing for you, and that scene where she thought the bracelet was from you was going to have a huge significance. Chiara was gonna chew you out for not considering Eshtel's feelings. Later, there were going to be some conflicts, just as there are in real life, and this would end with Chiara and Eshtel agreeing that friendship was their best connection. From there, after a bit of time had passed, Chiara would bring up Eshtel's admission again, and ask if you wanted her to wingman for you. Aurum was going to be concerned, citing the Bro Code rule "never date a friend's ex," but Chiara would remind him of what she told him earlier, that jealousy was a horrible trait and she'd rather see two of her close friends happy.
So, I am VERY not a fan of the whole "keeping it a secret/cheating" style dynamic in games like that. So what I did was try to make it fairly clear, albeit subtly that all of the girls are aware of what you're doing and are more or less okay with it. Does it take the "intrigue" out of it for some people? Sure. But at least I'm free of that scummy, cheating feeling. I'm not gonna spend all this time writing these characters just to damage them that way.
Aye, the entire first game has a Google Form with over 2k responses. That's where most of my citing of "common requests" comes from. Lots of people said there was something wrong with Rukah's face. I fixed her skin tone and texture, and she no longer looks like a plastic Army Man. A lot of people had that request about River. A TON of people want more Wither, and to see her smile for once. A lot of people are bummed about not having access to Eshtel. It's feedback like this that really helps me sculpt the experience into both something that stays in line with my vision for the story, but also something that isn't disappointing people by robbing them of the character they liked most.
