Report for 2025
Hi! Let's summarize development progress through 2025 and discuss future plans. I'll try to avoid a long read this time, I guess...
This year has been too eventful for me, particularly the forced change to the game model. It didn't have much of an impact on my well-being, but overall, I've gotten through it somehow, so I can continue working. Today, we'll be recapping all the key changes that have happened to the game throughout 2025, and I hope to also reinforce your expectations regarding future development. So, let's get going!
Bosses:
Let's start with the fact that the game now has bosses, or rather, only one boss so far. In a game driven by sandbox gameplay, this at least adds some variety, beyond just catching every NPC on the map and lining them up (seriously, you're still doing that, lol...). I didn't initially plan on doing anything like this, not least because I'm not very good at designing mechanics for this kind of NPC population, but I needed some incentive to show some explicit cutscenes with bondage elements, and it seems bosses were perfect for this. The idea was to create some difficulty for the player before tying up some elusive woman who moved faster than a crossbow bolt, and also to generate some interest in achieving this goal, but it seems to have turned out to be the exact opposite.
If a boss catches you, they'll punish you, whether for bad behavior or for capturing and tying up half a slaver camp—it doesn't matter. Bosses, in addition to gameplay, feature well-produced cutscenes, which also add a touch of flavor to the experience. In this regard, I leaned heavily on Didnapper 2's art (Game Over), but with the added bonus of wanting to offer more than just a static image.
Game Modes :
Game modes emerged more as byproducts, as the game framework allowed for complete customization of the gameplay, allowing players to assume the role of a particular character in specific circumstances. This gave rise to role-playing modes, which currently function as a kind of narrative equivalent, providing a basic understanding of the game's world without the need for lore.
Session personalization also emerged along with these modes, or rather, it was initially introduced due to the game's obvious issues with its use of your PC's resources and your desire to gather all 60 NPCs in one place. While this was a somewhat dubious optimization measure, it later evolved into a fully-fledged preferences tool.
AI :
NPCs have undergone significant changes. Overall, the result still doesn't reach any quality standards, but it's still better than before. In particular, significant work was done on navigation, expanding NPC basic capabilities, and improving player understanding. Traders began to pay attention to unusual situations and try to resolve them, and slaves are no longer just static idiots but have learned to help each other out, as well as the player. Overall, the most work was done under the hood, and I know how much you hate it when I turn into a snob and go into detail, so let's move on to the next point...
New Maps :
A new map, "Wild Forest," has been released, replacing the Slaver's Camp. It didn't quite turn out the way I'd planned—I'd planned it to be a night map in pouring rain, but there were some readability issues, so we ended up with what we got. Overall, the map still needs some expansion and isn't quite as large as the Slaver's Camp, but it turned out just right, dark enough to fit the game's setting and because I love dark themes.
A blacksmith village also appeared as a small bonus to the update, along with a new map. It was a purely experimental map, created in a couple of days, and was added as a reference (if you played Damsel Desh, you'll understand).
Weaponment :
I don't remember exactly, but I think someone on the server said the single-shot crossbow was too cumbersome and didn't allow for mistakes. That's how new gameplay solutions are born... The game now features a semi-automatic drum crossbow, which has some limitations compared to the standard crossbow, though it's just as difficult to obtain or craft on a workbench.
New character models :
This is where a lot of problems started... Initially, I planned to switch to Metahuman, since it covered a lot of technical solutions, but due to its exceptional inconvenience and lack of flexibility when used in my own framework, I switched to an alternative.
My eyes fell on the assets provided by Character Creator, which are complete crap in terms of working with them, but they were still not too different structurally, which gave some advantage in the implementation and complete replacement of the character model.
Thus began three epic months of hell, lol. It was necessary to replace not only the models, but also movement animations, struggle animations, clothing, restraints, and a whole bunch of other character-related assets. Unfortunately, we live in a world where not everything works by magic and the click of a mouse.
So, with a lot of effort, a lot of work was done to replace the game model, or rather its foundation. Of course, most of the plans had to be scrapped, cut, or even temporarily disabled so the game could at least function, because no one likes to wait, especially the sponsors who pay for my work.
Unfortunately, at the moment some functionality, as well as a small part of the content, is left behind due to incompatibility, or due to the fact that I do not have 6 hands, but I think over time everything will return to normal.
Actress Voices :
Probably the best thing that happened this year was the re-dubbing of the female voices. It was a quintessential collaboration between my friend, who does this professionally, and me, who likes to approach such tasks with great responsibility. Three actresses were hired to work on the new voices, who followed the instructions precisely and seem to have done a decent job—at least, I can tell from the enthusiastic comments.
The voiceover work took over six months, giving you the opportunity to choose how your female voice, as well as everyone else's, will sound. More assets will be added over time, and I hope the quality remains at the same level.
Animations of struggle :
Another important breakthrough (at least for me) was a fundamentally new approach to producing struggle animations for the girls.
The new character models were not only incompatible with the old animations, but also looked incorrect and, in most cases, primitive. This wasn't a problem with the old Sims models, since the characters themselves were doll-like and no one expected them to move realistically or anything like that, but with anatomically accurate characters, such a trick wouldn't work.
Along with major changes to the animation engines, a number of measures were taken to produce the new animations, namely, switching to new software and meticulously checking against video references. The essence of this work is that for most hostage states, animations are recorded separately, both for the idle position and for the struggle animations, and all animations are also compared with real-life examples, which ultimately resulted in a fairly acceptable result.
Game Settings :
The game now features completely new, redesigned game settings. The key difference between the old settings is their fully extensible design and the ease of implementing the new parameters. I've gotten a little creative here, as there's a lot of work ahead, and even more requires fine-tuning or the ability to change things in the game settings, which is now possible with just a click of a mouse.
Overall, this is a fairly flexible add-on that will allow for a ton of customization within the game in the future, although the new game settings are already proving to be quite impressive.
Rescue Mode :
For those who'd been following the project for a while, the hostage mode was understandable, but new players encountered contradictions. Were gags preventing you from picking up objects or using weapons? What nonsense? Rescue Mode was added to the game, separating the normal game state from a state in which the player can free their character, or partially, as they prefer. And then everyone started walking around with collars and gags, lol...
Assistants :
Previously, the game had a pawn-swapping mechanic that allowed you to take control of alternate recruits recruited on the battlefield if other characters were captured and tied up. I'll admit right away, I dreamed of getting rid of this system, as it was causing more development headaches than it was worth, and also led to some unsolvable issues.
In particular, I didn't want to get rid of it completely, but to provide some kind of equivalent, which ultimately became the new, redesigned assistant system. You still recruit a new agent at a location, the only difference being that the agent is next to you, and you can control their actions using context commands and targeting (thanks to the gameplay objective system written two years earlier, which powers half the game). It turned out to be something like companions in MGSV...
Assistants also found uses outside of gameplay; for example, you can now assign them tasks such as finding supplies, scouting, and other tasks.
Save Game :
While a sandbox save system was previously available, it has been replaced by an advanced alternative.
I implemented some systems that allow scene data to be loaded using a pipeline, which prevents most errors when starting a scene and activating components with their scripts. I didn't have to do this, but the UE5 game framework is just too weird.
The new save system was a byproduct of this pipeline, making it possible to save and unload many more scene parameters without running into unload queue issues, thereby avoiding obvious problems like enemies not being linked when loading a save because a system component didn't have time to activate, etc.
You know, I've learned a lot this year, like that if I'd known what I was getting myself into, I never would have started it =), but that's not important anymore. This past year was more of a torture for me, because I'm primarily a programmer, and all this 3D crap is just another problem standing in my way, and it really tires me out. This year also wasn't particularly rich in changes, probably due to the heavy workload and difficulty of working on some of the aspects mentioned above, but I think I learned a few things from sitting in crunch, so I'll try not to repeat those mistakes...
Finally, I want to say that next year will definitely be exciting for you, as my main goal is to get to version 0.8 as quickly as possible, which will include all the main content, missions, and so on. All subsequent updates to version 0.8 will also contain new content and gameplay features that you'll definitely enjoy.
Regarding plans for the near future, I'm creating a public roadmap for the remainder of development. This will reduce the number of questions about expectations for the project and provide a complete picture of what the game will look like before it reaches pre-release (at least in general). The roadmap may seem incomplete due to its abstract nature, but it includes all the key features that are planned and will be implemented in any case. I need a couple more days to review my decisions, but I think I'll publish it in the coming days.