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WebCough1 year ago

Thank you madodev for such a in depth breakdown.

Slow and confusing intro text

Yes, I really need to add visuals.

Music style doesn't fit

all music, or just specific songs? I got different songs for different templates, training room, and menu.

Apparently you need to fiddle with the FOV, but new players aren't going to do that.

Default FOV is at 60. I personally play at 80. What was the FOV you found best?

Seals remained very unclear to me

I must do a better job at explaining them.

The newer version just made the first dungeon a lot more difficult. Not a good change.

I did not make changes for beginner template between version 0.2.12 and 0.2.13, which means you just got different random generation. It would be interesting to know which rooms at the start of the game you found more difficult, so I can make move them to more difficult templates. I'm also going to make the entrance room easier in future.

Adult games always do well, and this has a different main concept.
Just needs a lot more content (primarily visual, UI, and H-related), but main scaffolding is in place.

Most in-development adult games make lewd content first, and then work on gameplay (if they do at all). My aproach is the opposite. I aim to have a working game before I start adding adult content. Also I am terrible at UI.

There is a clean segregation between H and non-H content.

Yes, I want players to be able to choose with how much H-content they want to play with.

The main reward system is obviously underdeveloped, but is a solid base for keeping players engaged.

Obviously the main rewards are going to be unlocking lewd content in future, but I am also the sort of player who enjoys unlocking seals, and min-maxing.

I am missing (a start of) a workflow for the visuals. There aren't even even placeholders. This is an important aspect in adult games, and creating these visuals also takes a long time. This will certainly slow down the project and may even cause burnout.
All heart rooms are going to be very different when I get to replacing them e.g. imagine running inside a dungeon, and on opening a door you are going to see a beach with a bar and "sunbathing" sexy fantasy creatures doing lewd things. It's going to take a lot of time, but one of the advantages of being a solo dev is you can rotate between completely different tasks.

I hope that the current 3D-models are placeholders

Most guest placeholders' heads are going to stay the same, but their bodies are going to be changed. I enjoy chibis, and mobfaces with more detailed, lewd bodies.

There seems to be a certain scope creep

Yeah e.g. when I first introduced seals, I only had about 15 on them, but it's over 120 now. I really enjoy adding that sort of content. I still got some game features I got not implemented like side objectives, and skill tree, so I am very much in the scope creep territory.

About the tutorials.

I don't really have a good way of gradually introducing game mechanics, which is why I got long movement and dungeon tutorial. My reason for that is with randomly generated rooms I have no way of predicting what sort of information would be the most useful. The game has many little machanics, which make differences, but they are just dependent on too many things. I also don't think I could remove default abilities with how rooms are crafted.

UI:

Green doesn't necessarily mean unlocked

Green means you can afford it, it's yellow that shows reception tag was unlocked. I went with colours because that's what I was familiar with from another game, and I lack icons in general.

I will try add more icons in future.

Also, I wouldn't show everything at once. Start small, currently it is overwhelming. I don't need to see all races and racial aspects, let me unlock them throughout the game. Preferably in a story driven manner.

There are 2 reasons for why I do it that way:

The most efficient way of getting the most guests in dungeons is unlocking the guests that players found empty hearts for (you can check heart requirements while in dungeon).

I want players to just choose what they want to unlock, and be able to prioritize them e.g. not everyone may be into kobolds, and they would rather concentrate on unlocking elves.

Thanks again for your detailed feedback

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madodev1 year ago
Default FOV is at 60. I personally play at 80. What was the FOV you found best?

After you suggested it, I played 0.2.13 with 80 FOV which felt better. Although I can't be sure that it isn't just because I got more used to the game.

all music, or just specific songs? I got different songs for different templates, training room, and menu.

Sorry, I wasn't clear. This only talked about the difference between the dungeon run music and the music that pops up when you open the menu. Feel free to ignore it, but I would have expected just a more muffled version of the dungeon run music.

It would be interesting to know which rooms at the start of the game you found more difficult

Early on, the most difficult rooms are those where you can't see all doors (like having a wall in the middle or smaller sidepaths). Rooms with green sludge are also difficult since you lose a lot of time as a beginner, unlike the lava rooms where you might not care about the coin loss.

I aim to have a working game before I start adding adult content.

I'm just afraid that at that point you will burn yourself out, since there will be nothing else left to do.

All heart rooms are going to be very different when I get to replacing them

In that case, please stop time when you enter the heart rooms. I imagine I'd be too stressed by the time limit to check them out.

My reason for that is with randomly generated rooms I have no way of predicting what sort of information would be the most useful.

One way to handle this is to make specific "tutorial" dungeon rooms. So the first dungeons the player runs through would actually be specifically crafted to serve as a tutorial and introduce new mechanics. Afterwards you start up the random dungeons. The player, not knowing anything about the game, won't notice that the first few dungeons aren't randomized.

(you can check heart requirements while in dungeon)

I never thought to check honestly due to the time limit.

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WebCough1 year ago

ok, I am going to change some default settings like the FOV and turn on automatic tooltips.

I might not change music when pausing the game as well.

Early on, the most difficult rooms are those where you can't see all doors (like having a wall in the middle or smaller sidepaths). Rooms with green sludge are also difficult since you lose a lot of time as a beginner
yeah, it is my intention to not always show all room, but maybe those are also too hard for beginners. I just don't want new players to see all rooms as just cubes. Most rooms with sticky slime pools should not appear until template Baby Steps+. I am going to change the spawn room to make it less punishing.

I'm just afraid that at that point you will burn yourself out, since there will be nothing else left to do.

It's ok, I could always start coding another game while making assets for this one. I am more likely to slow down development due to ilr things, than burning out on my passion project.

In that case, please stop time when you enter the heart rooms. I imagine I'd be too stressed by the time limit to check them out.

I don't know about completely stoping the timer in heart rooms, but there is a seal in the game which maxes out exra time when you approach hearts for the first time (it's really good when you increase your max extra time too).

One way to handle this is to make specific "tutorial" dungeon rooms.

Yes but teaching things during dungeon runs would completely break the flow of those runs. If I put optional signs for reading in front of some jumps explaining all the possibilities, players that would read them would feel like I am just extending the tutorial with more writing about some edge cases.

I never thought to check honestly due to the time limit

The timer pauses when you open those windows.

Thanks for all the feedback, and ideas on how I can improve the game.

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madodev1 year ago
Yes but teaching things during dungeon runs would completely break the flow of those runs. If I put optional signs for reading in front of some jumps explaining all the possibilities, players that would read them would feel like I am just extending the tutorial with more writing about some edge cases.

I wouldn't add signs there. Just give the player the big jump, and include a room with a very large wall that requires that jump. Maybe add the explanation in the pause menu. But I can also see your point of view.

Good luck with the further development, I'm looking forward to it!

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WebCough1 year ago

oh, the thing with my dungeons, they can all be beaten with no mana. All rooms are designed that way. So there would never be a room where you have to use e.g. power jump.

Players overusing abilities when they don't need them is something I saw many times, but that's something they just gotta learn on their own I think.

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