*Sigh*

Alright, here's the deal.

I can live off making H games, but that assumes that I actually release them. As it stands, the current game is taking to long. Or rather, long enough that the idea of working on it until it's done makes me feel uneasy about the coming months. Could I finish it before money becomes an issue? Definitely. Should I test that assumption? The simple answer is no. And as much as I feel bad whenever I write these "I need to work on a different project" posts, I need to take the action that ensures I can continue to make games for a living.

So, here's the situation.

About a week ago I began working on a new game. The idea is just to make something simple. Or rather, something I'm so familiar with that the development itself is simple. There's no story, no gameplay mechanics to be indecisive about, I'm just doing what I know I can do at this point.

When will it be done? Well, honestly I'm probably closer to a demo of this game than the other one. 

As for the previous game, I'll be picking it up again the moment this game is finished. Unlike other abandoned projects, the reasons this time are purely financial. Like I said in my previous post, I'm actually pretty enthusiastic about working on it.

So, that's that. Other than the above image, I'll avoid any real details, for now. I'll be releasing a demo of it when it's ready anyway. I considered just posting the game when it was done, but people starting thinking I died. So, you know, disclosure.

My god, am I having...fun?!

I'm sure I've said this before, but Kurovadis was originally going to be a very slow paced, deliberate kind of game. Almost survival horror esque. The roll, specifically was going to be very slow, and would have to be well-timed, since it would have a cool-down time. However, before I implemented the cool down, I had fun rolling around really fast, and because of how it was programmed at the time, I could chain together punches and attacks. I liked the way it felt, and as a result, the core mechanics of the game changed completely from that point on.

Well, something similar happened the other day with the current game, and damn am I glad that I didn't go forward with the game the way it was.

Until now, it always felt like something was missing, nothing really stood out. The first area in particular was meant to be incredibly easy, and didn't have much to it. I kept telling myself that the game would be more fun once there were more elements to the levels, but to be honest, I don't know if it would have. 

After adding the new mechanics, on the other hand, I actually found myself going through that first area multiple times and enjoying it, each time doing it a different way, and each time getting better at it, learning new ways to utilize the new moves. And each time I got better, it was satisfying to go back and see what I could pull off. I feel like the game finally has a mechanic that's fun without all the fluff to try and make it better.

I'm sure I'm making it sound more fun that it is, of course, but I suppose it's just because my mindset went from "This game is bland and I don't want to work on it" to "Hey, this is actually pretty fun". I'll have to change some other elements of the game to help compliment these mechanics, but, overall I think the game is going to be much better for it.

Edit: Er, just to clarify, it has nothing to do with that picture -__-

Cgs

Since I'm going to have more enemies and non-combat related H-content, I don't think I'll have as many CGs this time.

Basically, normal enemies will just sort of have their way with you, and then that's it, everything happens in-game, and you retain any effects from it. On the other hand, there will be CGs for anything that implies that the protagonist's journey ended.

I'll also take a shot at animating them with bone-based/deform animation, as a sort of compromise. While I dislike bone based animation for gameplay, I think it's fine for CGs, and better than still-frames. It doesn't really take much work, either, when it comes down to it. I'll be using anime studio, since it can deform raster images.

As for how much content there will be in general, at this point I need to start thinking about cutting back and finishing a minimum amount of content that I could release the game with. The minimum is basically,

20+enemies/traps with h-animations

3 bosses

3 h-events involving npcs

A few other hidden h-animations involving items or props, and some other stuff. 

In terms of CGs, that's a minimum of 6. 3 bosses, and at least 3 others. But that's if they're animated.

Anyhow, back to work.

Stuff

Eroico.com? $35,000
Owning the domain for the name of your game? Priceless.
Wait, no, that's right, it'd cost $35,000. I'LL GET RIGHT ON THAT.

On a side note, I decided there wasn't enough stuff to find in the game, so I'm going to add costumes which are basically just color swaps. Though, I can't do it through code, so it'll have to be done manually. Annoying, but wouldn't take more than a few hours to do a bunch of them.

Basically these "forms" will have status effects, like regaining health in exchange for MP by initiating H animations, or taking less damage, etc. I don't know if they will extend into H animations visually with all of them, though, as that would bring the number of sprites I have to edit to around least 20-30 per form. You'l probably revert back to your normal form under certain conditions.

Deadlines..

I'm beginning to see big difference between how long something could take me to do, and how long it always will.

I always say to myself, "I can do this feature in 20 minutes", and I draw a sprite or two for it that would do the job. But then I end up redoing them completely because I wasn't satisfied with them, or it makes me think of something else I want to try. Then I look at the clock and two hours have passed.

For instance, yesterday I played with the idea of adding friction to make the platforming more interesting (since you can jump on enemies). I went in, programmed it, sprited a run animation for the player that transitions from walking, and changed the way the sprites animate while moving. it took around three hours. Then at the end, I decided I didn't like it for this game, and just loaded the previous state. While I learned a lot about programming mario-style movement, among other things, it didn't exactly put me anywhere closer to a demo.

But, in the end, that's just how I make games. If I don't play with ideas along the way, or try doing something just to see how it will work out, it just isn't as fun. When I start composing a low-key song for a cutscene, but it turns into an epic last boss theme, I have to see it through, even though it's not what I'm supposed to be making. (Even if that happens 2-3 times in a row..*sigh*)

In other words, while I feel bad for disappointing you, I'm not going to try and meet a deadline for the demo. I'm just going to continue to work on it (pretty much all day, every day), and finish it as soon as I can. Disappointing you twice is bad (though I doubt many of you expected me to release it anyway), but setting you up to be disappointed even more is worse -__-

If you think this is me slacking off, well I am working more than 10 hours a day on this now, so it WILL get done. And when it does, I'll move on to finishing the full game. (which really, won't take as long as you think after everything is already implemented)

Now, back to work. Again, sorry for disappointing you -__-

Too much inspiration can be a hassle..

Gahhh...

I need to make a short song for a cutscene. Just a sort of "casually in danger" kind of sound. But everything ends up sounding too..epic, like a last boss. It's tough to do songs that aren't very melodic, but it's what I need to do in this case.

Long story short, more time spent doing something I can't use for the demo -__-

Names names names...

*3:21am*

*Just spent two hours try to decide on names*
I feel like half of the time I've spent on this demo has been being indecisive about writing. -__-

I'll be working all day tomorrow..dunno how much I'll get done.

Most of the scenes for the demo are written, some of the cutscenes are done. There's still a bunch of mechanics I need to finish, because I spent a lot of time redoing things that were bugging me, and making a better system for cutscenes that allows me to make characters do stuff during text, and a bunch of other things.

If it comes down to it, I'll play the "well I lost a day because of a broken tablet, so it'll be done tomorrow" card. Realistically, I probably won't finish it by the end of today (sunday, it's late at night in the morning right now).

It's kind of frustrating not being able to just wrap things up, but every time I work on something, I end up doing unnecessary things to try and make it better. But in the end, I know it's those things that makes something stand out, so I can't not do them.

Anyhow, time for sleep..I could go without sleep and work, but I'm sure that would only slow me down, so,

*woosh*

Hwelp, the new stylus arrived, so it's back to work.

First thing I did was remove the rubber grip and put on the old one, because I prefer the way it felt over the new one. Other than that, it's pretty much identical.

"Now then, time to work on the ga-"
*computer explodes*

Are you kidding me...

Here is a dramatic reenactment of my current situation.

Looks like the next few days are gonna be level design, music, and writing -__-

Or at least, as long as it takes for amazon prime to deliver an intuos pen.

Work log

For the work log, I'll be laying out what I plan on working on for the day. Completed tasks will be gray'd out, and if everything on the list is completed, I'll add more.

Some of you also noticed that yesterday I mentioned I was working on adding X-ray graphics. To clarify, there will be an H-content menu where you will be able to disable any kind of content or fetish in the game. This includes changing if H animations do damage, among other things.

Shallow experience for full experience? Hmm..

Well, some of you called it, but I'm going to put off releasing a demo until next week.

The entire reason I set a deadline in the first place was so that I could work faster, and I succeeded in that regard. I'll keep this pace, and ideally the demo next week will be closer or identical to what you'll expect from the full game, rather than just a teaser.

I know this may disappoint some of you or diminish your impression of me as a developer, but honestly, I think your first impressions of the complete experience are more important than being held over for a week or me going "Yay, I did it".

So, see you next week -__-

I'll be posting a daily work log that lists everything I did for the day until then.

GM is a butt

GM Studio, I love ya, but sometimes you make me want to punch babies.

So, in terms of the demo, here's the situation.

GM Studio can't deal with files in the same folder as the exe like 8.1 could. This means I'm going to have to make some changes to how my save system works and a few other things, depending on what the solution is. Bottom line is, it's something that's going to take some tinkering, so the demo won't have save-games, for now.

For that reason, the focus of the demo may be a bit different. Here are the things I could focus on today and tomorrow, before a demo is released.

-H-event with NPC
-3 enemy/trap H animations
-Game intro
-Story related elements
-Shop

Normally, my priority would be the gameplay related elements, but in this case since there's no saving it makes little sense to make the player do anything that would take any amount of time to accomplish.

Feel free to let me know what you'd like my priority to be, or what it is you want to see out of the demo. As it stands, I think it's more or less just going to be a quick first look at the gameplay and some H content.