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Dev Blog #99 - The Powers That Be
🕑 Added 2020-06-11 04:00:02 +0000 UTCGreetings everyone!
Everyone super stoked for the upcoming back end maintenance update? Does fixing antiquated code structure get you all hot and bothered? No? Well, maybe today we can change that!
Pillars of Focus
While Update 3.3.0 is effectively one big "fix all the things!" update that aims to bring ALL the game's systems up to snuff, that doesn't mean players' shouldn't expect to see anything new. In fact, some of the key changes coming with the new update will have a very meaningful impact on the game both immediately and moving forward. Specifically, the lion's share of June's development time will be going towards three major pillars:
- Updating the Paperdoll and Wardrobe System
- Updating Stats and Rewards
- Updating Image Pack Support
Of course there's plenty of other things going into the update as well, though the three items above will be the most impactful. So, let's get into them!
New Player Paperdoll and Wardrobe System
The new paperdoll models are now in the game and feature a much cleaner, sharper design than what is currently on the live version. As of yesterday, those with access to the development builds have had a chance to play around with the new models and get a glimpse at all the new and redesigned outfits. There's really not a whole lot to say about the new models themselves outside of I think they look pretty great and I'm excited to share them with everyone in the next update.
The redesigned wardrobe system, on the other hand, warrants some extra discussion. The biggest apparent change to the system is that that individual clothing items have been consolidated into complete outfits. Rather than choosing to wear dress shoes, slacks, dress socks, a button-up shirt, and a tie, you'll now simply select the "Shirt & Tie" outfit from your wardrobe. Underwear works in much the same way, with bras and panties coming as sets rather than individual items. The result is a system that's much easier to manage and parse on the back end, such as when needing to determine what type of outfit the MC is wearing or even if the MC is wearing a specialty outfit, as well as one that's much quicker to manage for the player due to much less clicking.
Of course, an understandable reaction to this change may be to see this as a reduction of options and customization. I can certainly see that, though I'd also argue that most players are following clear outfit templates anyway, but at the end of the day none of that matters because...
The new wardrobe system is completely modifiable.
Upon downloading the local version of The Company, players will discover a new "data" folder alongside the pics directory that house four new JSON databases. Each of these files corresponds to one of the four clothing categories and allows you to easily edit existing outfits and accessories, or add new ones altogether. These files allow for complete control items, including primary outfit type, additional outfit tags, specific pieces of the outfit, cost, what shop sells it, even the ability to point towards specific image files. Of course, documentation will be provided when the update is released, so if this is of interest to you then you can definitely look forward to that! And if that's not your thing, then you'll still be able to experience a bunch of fun new outfits and models, not to mention an improved shop scene for purchases.
Bad Romance - Stat System Overhaul
As a long-time-though-not-as-of-recent Blizzard fan boy, my favorite part of any WoW-related Blizzcon panel was when the devs would take some antiquated or unpopular concept, like hit rating or weapon skills, and casually follow it up with... "Gone!". Anyway, to the point...
Relationship. Gone.
Corruption. Gone.
Mind. Gone.
Ah, that felt good... So let's talk about Relationship (formerly Love), Corruption (formerly Lust), and Mind (formerly... Mind...), and what they were meant to be.
Stripping away all the context and setting and themes, these stats were always meant to act as "a thing for players for grind for". Now, that's not a bad thing. Having things to grind for makes for a compelling reason to continue playing a game so long as it doesn't make the game tiresome. Of course, you need to have a reason to grind for the things you're grinding for, which is where things kind of fell apart in The Company. Relationship was intended to unlock content by building up someone's affection for you, leading to eventual romance routes. Corruption was similar in that it would, in some respects, bypass the need to use serums to unlock certain scenes. Mind would be similar to Corruption were it to ever actually get off the ground.
Over the course of development, however, the game shifted away from using a stat-based progression system and more towards an event-based progression system. What I mean is, under the original design if you wanted to date Penny you'd need only to raise her Relationship up to a certain level and you'd be dating. Under today's model, you would need to take her out for a day on the weekend, then opt in to an after-work event, then after a few more events you would naturally end up in a position where you would be "dating". Under this model, that stat grind feeling more arbitrary and awkward at best, confusing and frustrating at worst.
Enter Coins.
Digging down to the intent of stats as well as the intended effect they would have on the player and the game helped narrow down the best way to replace them while maintaining the spirit of that intention also holy crap run-on sentence much? Coins pay homage to Wandrer's more mystical works by themselves being a someone mystical currency. You'll earn them the same way you would gain existing Relationship and Corruption stats, by performing the same actions you are currently. Rather than growing stats with specific characters, you'll instead grow your supply of one of three different coins. As is to be expected of an evil corporation like The Company, these are the Wolf Coins, the Ram Coins, and the Hart Coins.
Wolf Coins are earned through interactions with coworkers both in and out of the office. Ram Coins can be earned through social relationships such as Chris and the mall store clerks, and Hart Coins can be earned through interactions at home with Ava and Dakota. Of course, as stated earlier, the grind means nothing without the payoff, right? With the appearance of these coins also comes the first iteration of Saya's Shop. Saya's Shop will become available through the usual means once per week and allow you to exchange your hard earned coins for vanity content such as alternate outfits for NPCs and "What if?" style side stories. The shop will be expanded over time, and what follows isn't representative for this specific update, but to give you a general idea...
As the shop itself is fantastical, so too are the rewards. That is to say, alternative outfits adhere to the Big Heads Mode theory of unlockable content, as in no one but you will actually notice them, and the what-if stories are just that, fun what-if scenarios you'll get to see play out. This gives us a great way to flex our creative muscles, or to put it more accurately, take a long creative stretch, and it gives players a chance to have some more just-for-fun lewdness!
That Whole Image Pack Thing
Finally, the last major initiative coming in this update is not only completing implementation of image pack support throughout the entire game, but also taking some time to reevaluate the image directory as a whole. Now that image pack support is more uniform, I was able to take the time and play with alternative image formats and video codecs and after what feels like an eternity of getting asked about it, well...
There it is. The complete image pack brought down by roughly 90% with no quality loss over GIF images and confirmed functionality across all supported browsers, including Safari. What's more is that this can pave the way for much higher quality images to be added to the game without a hugely significant impact on the file size. Smells like another community event, no?
That's going to be it for this week. Expect the next devblog to touch on a few additional odds and ends concerning the upcoming update. Hopefully this has made everyone a little more exciting for this boring maintenance update than they were before! As always, thank you all for your continued feedback and support. Stay safe, stay healthy!
Comments
To be honest the coin update feels like an April fools joke. At first i read something like "throw the grind away it didn't make sense anyway" then later "here is a new system for you to grind and dream characters affect reality which makes total sense". Why all the extra work for something that should appear as choices like making use of that hard-earned money and buy clothes as gifts for chars or reach a certain point with a char to invite them to dinner and so on...
Hans-Petter Langvik
Cool, ty, btw, just a small question about the game, specifically about the length of the game, will it be 5 chapters, ( think I remember seeing that somewhere ), or will there be more than 5?............wait, ( am I afraid of the game having an end!?!? ), yes, because, ( my bad side want to see HOW far I push them, because up until now I've had a mixture of laughing my ass off and smiling from ear to ear, ( especially when you turn Penny into a slut, or having been mean to John when you turn him, turning him into Chanel, and then having Chanel running at you thanking you )............whoops, gonna stop ranting now, lol, anyways, again, ty for answering. :)
Westane
1. Relationship and Corruption currently have little/no impact on choices being made available or not, and the serum system doesn't tie into this at all, it's still completely separate. 2. The dev builds are specifically for finding these sorts of bugs and errors so that they can fixed. In fact I should have a new build out today addressing most of the reported issues.
Hans-Petter Langvik
Honestly, I for one welcome the change, ( so boo hoo, too bad for those that don't like it ), but anyways, back to the comment at hand ). I kinda have to agree that, I'm used to the serum/corruption, and that you can see when it says "This or that person has gained this much corruption", ( same with the relationship part too ), so I just want some insight on how the new system will actually work. ......So 1. How will the new system actually work, ( because to me it feels like a 'Choose this or that dialogue option to get this much corruption or or increase that amount of relationship', and as a result you'll get new dialogue options based on which choice you made or how much relationship or corruption you gained based on choosing only these types or those types of dialogue options, ( so I'm kinda confused ), and how will the new system work as opposed to how the serum system worked , 2. .....And speaking of the new system, ( I got an error with the new system, the clothing didn't show up, so I suppose that either the new system hasn't been properly implemented ), or the if the issue will get resolved once it is in place, ( if it hasn't already )?
Westane
Just wait until I add next month's Kizuna AI collab events! So I get what you're saying and I'm not looking to break that level of immersion either. You'll only be notified of coin gains when you go to sleep, not every time you'd gain them. As far as nomenclature, I mean, we're still in dev :p
XeddicAxion
I guess my biggest issue is that using the term coins for the corruption. I think I would prefer the system use something like "familial corruption". Such as 'You now have your step-mom giving you coffee in the morning. You have gained 100 familial corruption.' Instead of 'You gained 5 Hart coins'. Maybe it's just me since I get reminded of Gacha games on mobile whenever I hear about using coins to unlock things. Anyways just my thoughts :)
Westane
That's understandable, but I'd rather the game "show" you how a character is becoming more and more corrupted/affectionate rather than displaying that an arbitrary value has increased. That said, there are mechanics being put into the system to curtail the "interacting with Penny to unlock scenes with Sophie" issue to some degree. Essentially, certain character-specific outfits and stories won't actually be added to the store until you've progressed to certain points with those characters, if that makes sense.
XeddicAxion
I like most of what's in this update. I like the changes to the paper doll system along with the much needed conversion of everything over to the image pack system. The only thing I am wary of is the removal of stats for a "coin" system. I like seeing a character's Corruption increase and I'm afraid that just getting "coins" won't fulfill the same feelings. How they unlock things doesn't make a lot of sense realistically. How does messing around with Penny allow you to unlock a scene with Ms. Dee? Anyways thanks for the update.
SylvieTG
I'll pile on this - the "individual item of clothing" systems never work out well, even in larger games (shhh, don't tell Blizzard). Everyone just figures out Best In Slot, and everyone wears the damn uniform anyway.
Scars Unseen
I will admit it would be amusing to have an unlockable in Saya's Shop that creates a new store at the mall called "The Emperor's Secret" that sells nothing but invisible clothes for all occasions.
Westane
Thanks! Yes that was sort of the driving factor behind the change. That, and when people did decide to go off the rails it made parsing the outfit style just as nonsensical.
Westane
Right, so I'm taking the currently useless stats you're grinding for and converting them to a system where you can exchange them for fun things. It's all "extra" and none of it will pertain directly to the main game, which won't be changing as a result.
Westane
Well, these posts go live at midnight my time and despite opinions to the contrary I'm entitled to a bit of sleep at night. Thank you for loving/hating/supporting/condemning the game :)
Westane
Looking forward to expanding on the home content and story here soon!
Westane
Yes, that is correct to a reasonable extent, but really so did the original system if you think about it. You still get to choose what outfit you want to wear and, if you're feeling up to it, you'll now have the tools to add your own to the game, artwork and all. In fact, you could even quite easily mod in a wearing "nude" outfit if you wanted to.
Westane
I've been waiting a long time... I'm just happy someone caught it!
King Horsey
Ah ok that makes sense.
I think it's more that instead of stuff like "X has become more corruptable/likes you more" you get some coins to use on different outfits for the NPC cast and some extra scenes. I doubt they would get rid of serums since they are one of the major parts of the game.
Zeal
Who the hell is this John Ross guy, and why are they making new comment threads repeatedly? If you don't support the actions of the developer, then don't subscribe to their patreon. The public version is free to play anyway, so it's not even like you'd lose the ability to play the damn thing. I for one think the changes to the clothing system look great. The ability to pick individual items for different slots was pointless anyway, since there was only ever 2 - 3 choices that clashed HORRIBLY if you didn't go for a specific set. This sounds like a great update that should go a long way to facilitating meaningful content going forwards!
King Horsey
So from what I could understand from reading the post we grind for coins instead of serums to change/corrupt the characters from now on or is my understanding of the post wrong?
Haseo
You sound incredibly entitled dude. This isn't your fucking game so stop acting like it belongs to you. You have a CHOICE in backing Westane. If you're unhappy then leave. You won't be missed based on your meltdown over the course of the last 3 hours.
Icarus Media
<img src="http://joshwayman.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/09/cool-story-bro.jpg">
john ross
Well it was interesting to see the responses I got except nothing from the author... Doesnt suprise me since he hates my guts but likes my money. I guess Public build 3.2.5 will be the last I play since the new changes..I hate, but then I am only one who says they hate them. Too bad I love this game.
Gurt
Sounds great, the new paperdoll system was one of the things i have been waiting for. :D
Icarus Media
Then by all means study, learn new skills and create one yourself.
Icarus Media
I re-read the post and NOWHERE can I find him saying you can't be naked.
Blasphazar
It'll be interesting to see how the system overhaul will work once it's all implemented. I've had the game on a shelf for a little bit because I don't care a whit about John content but it'll be interesting for the sake of the new system. Looking forward to it.
john ross
To be totallt honest your new clothing system sucks. It does not relect how the player wants to be protayed. it is hoe YOU want us to be.
Miro
I just wanted to tell you how happy it makes me to see a wolfram & hart reference after all these years. <3
john ross
Why in the hell cant we go naked if we want to? This is an adult game and no one can see you anyways.
