BBBen
patreon
Update - Twyla and Velexis kiss
🕑 Added 2017-11-06 22:06:06 +0000 UTC tl;dr - I've been learning a little Ren'py programming for PAT, as well as doing a little bit of AotNM update work.This week's image
I made this one without really knowing exactly where it would go, but EFon's been looking at finding a place for it in the game. It's not my best pic by any means but I thought it might be entertaining at least. I think if these girls could put aside their differences they could have a lot of fun together. :) I've made other stuff this week, but I was in the mood to show an LMO pic. Also, I don't want to show the new PAT stuff because you'll see that soon in the teaser demo.
Learning Ren'py for PAT
A lot of my time this week was spent learning some of the basic systems of Ren'py. I haven't managed to master everything that I've tried just yet, but I've got some of the basic baby steps down. I think it's going to be a long, slow process but I'll try to get results as I learn. I always find it's best for me to learn something by just leaping in and trying to get a feel of how things work by trying them out before doing actual 'lessons' or tutorials. Fortunately it doesn't seem all that complex, I'm just a bad student and the documentation is a bit confusing sometimes.
The demo I'm making for PAT is planned to have an interactive section early where you can click on parts of the image to get responses ('hotspots') but I haven't worked out the technique yet - I think it's kind of an intermediate thing and I'm still very much at the novice stage. For now, therefore, the demo will probably not have that feature and will look more like a traditional and unspectacular visual novel. I'm not planning for the final version to seem like every other VN out there, though. I'll try to get that demo out soon for all patrons, since it's just a little teaser that I wouldn't feel good about asking $10 for just yet. I'll also be wanting plenty of feedback for it!
Oh, one other thing, I would imagine I'll continue in Ren'py because it's powerful and gives me more options if I hire a part-time programmer at some point, but I also might think about using other engines - there's a new program coming out soon that might be easier to learn, so I'll look at that.
Working on the next AotNM update too
I want to make an update to AotNM this month. It's likely to be one of those content patches you get in games that doesn't really have a theme or a big, single feature, but it's got a bunch of little features across the whole game. I don't know quite which ones will make the cut in the end, but I've got plenty of small things I can add with a little bit more work. It might be a little hard to market an update like that, but I hope you still appreciate it. :)
Oh, and I haven't forgotten LMO either, but that just got an update. I've programmed a few new responses in and improved access to one of the placeholder endings that I think nobody had found - it should be easier in the next version when that comes out.
So what's up with you? You doing well? I hope so. Oh, here's a question: would you be happy if PAT was pretty much a traditional VN, or would you be more interested if it was a little different? Let me know in the comments!
Comments
Hank Rillek
Yeah the trainer games do take longer to get going. Hreinn games' kingdom of deception is better.
BBBen
Not that old, no. :) Maybe I just act like an old man. I've tried Akabur's games a bit but while they had great art I found them rather badly paced, so I lost patience with them. It seemed like nothing really happened for a long time, so I may not have seen them get to the good bits. I didn't know they used Ren'py, though, so that's interesting. It's not quite the model I was thinking about for how to make PAT work, but I can see there's a lot that the system could do.
Hank Rillek
Haha, I thought you were older. ;) have you tried the renpy games I mentioned?
BBBen
I don't totally know how Ren'py works yet either, so I guess I'm going to find out slowly. I appreciate the compliment, though! And yes, I don't think I'd be happy if it was just a VN either, so I'll be looking for ways to make it a bit more interesting at least.
BBBen
If you're short of time you only really need to play my games. ;) Honestly, I don't really plan to make PAT into a standard VN, I'm just still figuring out what the game needs and what I can do with the engine. I'm also in a funny place with the game design - I think the story doesn't really call for the same gameplay that's been in the last couple of Pervert Action games, so I need to work out how best to make it fit and I didn't want to commit too much to that without knowing first what I could do - a bit of a problem. Oh, and BTW, I didn't grow up with text parser games either :)
TBH, I would be slightly disappointed if it was a sandard visual novel. Your games has 10x the quality the rest the games here on patreon have, The "exploration" in PAL, made it feel much less linear, but I don't know how Renpy works.
Hank Rillek
I'm doing well, it's just difficult to find the time to play adult games. I've got an internship and a side job, so I'm pretty busy. There are a ton of new adult games coming out every day as well. It's kinda a luxury problem. :P I'd be a bit disappointed if PAT were a normal VN. Whilst your art and stories are a mayor selling point, your combat and interactivity makes the whole package way better. Your games are quite unique in the combination of different game elements. I think the text parsers are simply a big barrier for most players. They didn't grow up with games like that. Neither did I, and I only got into AIF games because those were the only western games with a story. Nowadays there a tons of Renpy and RPG maker games, systems that are way easier to get into then the text parser systems. If you want a good example of what I'm hoping you'll do with Renpy, I'd look at Akabur's Princess Trainer and Hreinn Games' Kingdom of Deception. They manage to have a high level of interactivity, nonliniear gameplay, combat, stat managament and a sense of scale. They always work from some kind of overworld with different sections you can go to. Akabur's games are even quite text heavy, so your dialogue writing skills won't be lost.
