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5.2 - Love, Lust, and Pacing
🕑 Added 2017-12-20 07:01:00 +0000 UTC Season's greetings!Things have slowed down a bit thanks to a hectic holiday schedule, but that doesn't mean work isn't getting done. New dosage events have been written, new systems are materializing, and content is getting fleshed out constantly. Today, I wanted to talk briefly about the Lust and Stamina systems I introduced last week, and what my current intentions for them are.
There was always something a little unnatural about the dosing system in the game, like the behavioral jump was just a little too jarring. The Lust system is my way of trying to resolve that in a way that feels both rewarding and natural.
5.1 removed the cooldown between doses, which was the right call, but with 5.2 a new requirement will need to be met before you can administer a serum to someone. Currently, in testing, every 10 Lust points will unlock the next serum tier for a character. This means after giving someone a serum, you'll need to spend time interacting with that person under the effects of the serum before you can push them to the next stage. With every new dosage comes new interactions which, of course, will require Stamina to activate.
Additionally, as you progress, you'll be able to skip some interactions entirely in order to get to "the good stuff". At first, these things will come slowly, and you'll be limited to a small starting Stamina pool. As the game progresses, and as you progress with a character, more and more interactions will open up to you.
While the ultimate goal is to add this level of interaction to all scenes in the game, the current intention is for each character to have 1-2 set areas in the game where these interactions can occur. For you mom, this will be the living room while watching TV, as well as the kitchen and/or her bedroom.
While the Lust is meant to measure someone's arousal and corruption, another stat from the 5.0 days makes its return in the form of Love. Love is effectively Relationship, and affects how much someone cares for you. Generally this is reflected in "how" interactions play out, rather than "what" interactions can play out.
The reason for its return is due to these new character interactions, specifically, those of the unwilling variety. In these new Stamina events, players will find they have various chances to push the boundaries with certain character, beyond what that character's current serum level might allow for. Taking advantage of these events will likely have a negative impact on that person's Love value in exchange for opening new scenes or pushing their Lust further. It's yet another chance to play the game the way you want to play it!
Once these systems, as well as the content to showcase them, have been cleaned up sufficiently, I plan to release something of a demo to all patrons, much like I did with 5.1. This should be expected some time next month and hopefully it'll give everyone a better idea of how the game will be post 5.2. Of course, all these new mechanical features undermine the real draw of the patch, which is all the new content involving Ava you'll be getting!
There likely won't be a post next week due to the holidays, so I hope everyone has a great couple of weeks, and looks forward to new content from me.
Have an excellent non-denominational holiday gift-giving season!
Comments
Twisted Kidney
IIDY.
Westane
Adult Interactive Fiction :)
Troqu
I have the same concerns Sterno does, but we'll see whenever we can get our hands on it whether those concerns are actually necessary. However! What are AIF games?
KazzKazz
I was apprehensive at first but this sounds great.
true but i would personaly just be happy with more access and incentive to talk and get closer to the cherictors
Twisted Kidney
It would be nice if every NPC could get the AssHole McAssholeFace treatment then. If every one of them could become central to the game and steer the plot in new directions depending on your actions. Then you could have a different experience on each play-through depending on who you make your special playmate. Get on it Westane. I don't want to hear any "But I need to sleep once a week." crybaby stuff either.
i know this might be a bit of a reused trop in games like this but now that you have started to implement the talking and increasing character states by interaction. we need to be able to talk to them in the morning and night when their in bed, or at least have more interactions with the ability to talk to them. for instance the sister, i don't watch a movie i increase her lust instead, i can't dos her but i will get me closer to my goal none the less and i don't have to wast time by watching the movie when i can't actually do anything with her then.
plus something like this gives us more incentive to truly go after one person. though to be honest don't be cheap about it and be like one simple action that only races lust and love by a tiny bit allowed. act it as more of a make out session that last an hour or so and repeatedly rises it as long as you do the right picks. i don't want to take five days to do one does for something that is set up before hand to make the next dose easer to do (it would lasson the impact of the doses in our eyes when it comes to the cherictor in the world)
Lech
Hey! If there is more interaction with the characters in the game i'm all for it! More depth is always good.
Twisted Kidney
I'll give it a chance for sure. A more sandboxy type of game play could be a whole lot of fun when coupled with this interesting plot. Is it done yet?
Westane
That's fair, but there's a few factors. First, yes, there will be more content and more main story to balance it all out. See, I don't WANT the player to be able to do everything there is to do within a single playthrough. I want there to be reasons to go back through and try different things. I'm also planning on having some form of free-play mode either after the game ends or as an alternative to playing through the story. The real goal here is to add a level of investment on the player's end when it comes to shaping and corrupting these characters, as opposed to just "flipping a switch" how it is now. In practice, assuming minimum stamina, it shouldn't ever take more than 2-3 days to build someone up enough to dose them again, and really only about a day as you progress. More stamina will be earned through an achievement system, which I'll talk about in another post, and in its current iteration it's actually possible to gain 4 additional stamina by your second work day. Basically, in practice, it's not going to slow things down as much as it'll sound. The point is to give the player that rush they get in AIF games when they're intimately directing the flow of events with another character.
Twisted Kidney
I'm going to be honest here, that sounds like trying to slow down the dosing in a game where there isn't enough time to do it now. Do we really want to spend a few weeks of nothing after the game has concluded just to get dosing done? I'm sure it will look better once there is more main plot.
I like the little hearts.
