May Devlog: V0.6 Progress
Hey guys, I'm going to try and make devlogs more consistent with one at the end of each month. Hopefully this makes communication and scheduling easier as well.
I鈥檓 really happy with the progress on version 0.6 so far. I鈥檓 slowly working my way through finishing up all the sprites and then I鈥檒l move to making larger stage CGs. Some new CGs are in the works too so look forward to that as well.
A majority of my time has been spent fine tuning and implementing a reworked food/clothes system. I wanted to make the core gameplay of going around feeding the girls to be more interesting so I鈥檓 revamping the balancing of foods to make them more interesting with buffs/debuffs, cravings, flavours etc. This should make the act of planning and strategizing feedings more interesting, rewarding getting to know each girl and their preferences. In addition to that I鈥檓 expanding on a system that has been mostly inconsequential, the unique ways girls are optimally fed. Currently each girl does have optimal feeding strategies but they seem to be too inconsequential to matter so I am reworking and increasing the efficacy of knowing how to feed each girl.
As for a clothes system, I am implementing wearable clothes that will affect the stats of the player character as well as create for some new and interesting events, I鈥檓 still deciding whether or not this will be something extended to the girls or just for the player character.
Alongside all of this, I am working on implementing a bunch of QOL changes. Thanks to the greatly appreciated code of Hagushite on the weight gaming forums, the text overflow issue has finally been resolved! I鈥檓 also thinking of possibly adding in more SFX and music, but this is still a WIP, if anyone has a place where I can get appropriate and high quality SFX for this type of game let me know.
Another thing people have pointed out is that there hasn鈥檛 been too much content for the stuffing enjoyers as most of the updates have been geared towards weight gain, so I鈥檓 thinking of adding in some additional unlockable stuffing stages, but this is going to be a big undertaking so we鈥檒l see if that can be completed in a reasonable amount of time.
Finally, I know I mentioned that there may be new characters coming this update; unfortunately, I still haven鈥檛 completed any sprites or content for them since I鈥檝e been so busy with other aspects of the game. I have been workshopping their stories, personalities and body types but nothing concrete yet so depending on time they may or may not make it into the next version. I am hopeful that at least 2 of them can be added in and taken to at least stage 3 though.
Comments (13)
I just wanted to say keep up the great work. This is such an interesting project.
Thinking about a comment on the latest Sherry update about her sprite radically changing at level 9, rather than introducing new characters would you ever consider designing a second set of sprites of each girl from behind sort of like Sherry? Then you could flip between them.
I would like to get around to that eventually, but the amount of work required for that is almost as much as drawing a whole new sprite so a lot of the time I feel like making new sprites is a better use of time, nevertheless I think it may make sense for some specific stages.
If I use the cheat meals to make girls gain really fast, am I missing out on events?
Some hangouts may be hard to land on if the girls gain weight too fast but otherwise the debug items shouldn't skip content.
Praying for big booba tomboy waifu. 馃槑
I think keeping outfits to the player character is optimal; having to make the decision of what outfit a person should wear is a drag, and it would increase your art load exponentially if anyone besides the protagonist had alternate outfits. This isn't a 3d game, you can't just make outfits and apply them to a mesh; you have to personally draw each and every outfit and weight and bust variation for each outfit. On the player character, this is hard enough; why make it possible for each character to change outfits? It also detracts from the progress the player makes in *damaging* the outfits by overfeeding each gal. It's a good idea for the player since we already get to choose our word choices, so being able to change our presentation to match our personality matters. I don't spring for the most 'optimal' choice in dating sims. But I do spring for flavor whenever it's offered to me!
As far as stuffing goes, I do think the eating speed is wonky. It's weird that it takes hours of game time to eat some food items, and often the first thing I end up doing in a play through is repetitively spam the WcDonalds events on the characters and MC that can level the associated stat just to not lose half of a game day to feeding one of them a double burger. Maybe it'd be an easier sell if the events are more involved than "spam high calorie food item, receive fat of she", like you've been considering recently.
Excited to see what you come up with next. Don't worry about if you get the extra characters in or not, sounds like there is a lot planned for this update already. Cant do everything at once and there is more than enough to look forward to!
Thanks for the update. Because the core gamplay loop revolves around time, I usually only focus on a single girl, or maybe two when it comes to feeding and wg. The girls I pick obviously come down to preference (Sherry, Mia and Hazel are my favorites) and only certain girls can get certain stat changes like digestion rate/eating speed or self-control. When I play I honestly just use the cheat menu to get enough money to feed whatever girl I want and that's it. On the topic of stuffing vs wg, I agree that the stuffing side of things could be expanded a bit. The events that the girls get all just put them into overflow which is something you can get through regular feeding, so the payoff is mostly just the description of what's happening. I think right now, the favorite foods system is fine, but maybe focusing a bit more on how to motivate each girl to eat more might be the play. Each of them has different personalities and feelings about food and their gains. Sherry is hedonistic, Hazel is a glutton who loves being fat, etc. Either way, keep up the great work!
A femboy character may be an implementable idea if you want to avoid overlap with the cast; not sure how you feel about content of that nature though.
There's a few resources for burping/eating sounds but they're all pretty old. I wouldn't advise trying to put music/SFX into the game until it's mostly done. In general music isn't what people are looking for in a VN and sound effects have a way of getting stale very quickly when doing repetitive tasks that trigger them.
Hard agree. Personally I definitely get the appeal, but games in this space (understandably) tend to reuse the same stock effects. And they get old real quick if they're common in the main game loop.