itch.io

Thanks! I spend a lot of time trying to select stuff that will really fit and give the right vibe; in games that's especially important, because you may end up listening to a particular track a LOT. So I'm glad you're enjoying them!

Not for now. Will get into that once the third pack is out here, gallery is in the first game, and a few other things are squared away, which will probably be another month or so. In general terms of how long I expect development to take once started though, probably a little over a year as before.

Nope, that's a bug, screwed up the formatting on the unlock file a little. Will be fixed in the next patch. That last entry is just direct access to the GH minigame though, there's not an extra scene you're missing out on.

Edit: Just tested: 

-After 3 defeats through the new job, Mezz does correctly remove his clothes with the appropriate comments, and he does unequip them properly, not just change his sprite. 

-Getting captured in the stealth version of ent. dist. 1 3 times does correctly strip Mezz, both visually and removing the jacket item, and recovery works correctly. 

Can you confirm that you are sure you're on 1.0.2? Was playthrough done on an earlier version? There were duplication issues with the jacket previously which caused a variety of issues, but those have been fixed as of .2. If you can confirm this was all played through on .2, can you upload a save demonstrating it to catbox.moe or a similar site and link it here?

Also, in general try to report bugs on Substar, comments or dms there if the pack hasn't been released yet. Doesn't matter in this case, since there isn't really much of a spoiler concern, but just keep it in mind for the future.

Thanks!

Was a lot of fun! Thanks for checking the new stuff out. 

No. Only the first game is free, by design. Now if by "can't buy" you LITERALLY mean "can't buy", as in you're in a country like Russia or certain south american countries where international payment processing is...not so great right now and you can prove it, we may be able to work something out. But otherwise you do have to buy GT, at least once.
Also, why are you asking if you can get it for free if you've already played it, as evidenced by your other comment about it feeling short?

It's fine, and I don't want to discourage feedback overall. It's just that an open-ended "I wish there was more" on a game that took nearly two years to finish has a lot of potential to rub someone the wrong way. But let's be clear, you are right in some ways. There are definitely weaknesses to the game: the combat is shallow, there isn't really any mechanical rpg progression, etc. I don't deny that, and I will try to improve that at least in small ways as I keep making games. But the improvements will probably focus on quality rather than quantity; this is about as much STUFF as I can probably get into a game, but I'll do what I can to improve how good it is as I go forward. 

It is, and always will be a fairly simple RPG though, I want to be clear on that. I've played a few recently, RPGMaker games, that genuinely went on to 30+ hours, these vast, sprawling stories with all these different subplots and characters coming and going and this huge character mechanic progression where you start out simple and become a god by the end. Cruel Serenade will never be that. It's short and sweet, an episode of a Saturday morning cartoon for adults.

But there is always room for improvement, and I'll do what I can.

Exactly. A lot of people seem to get wrapped up in these grand pronouncements, good or bad about AI, but I tend toward the practical. If it ever reaches a point where it can actually make compelling stuff, maybe I'll re-evaluate (not in the sense that I'd use it, but as a horse beholding a model t), But for now, I'm not particularly worried. I continue to work. And thanks!

Possibly, although if you've played the boar content in this you know it's more that the conditioning persists once the item itself has done its work, so it's not really needed any more.

Thanks!

Subscribestar now, here on Itch two weeks after the initial release, free to those who own the game.

The scope of the project is what it is. Scope control is important; people who try to do more than is realistically possible run out of time, or money, or energy and the game is never finished. In contrast, this one just was, twice over in a way: the first content pack finished the game functionally and from a narrative perspective, and this third one finished all the content I had planned for it. Itch, Steam, and gaming in general is littered with the corpses of unfinished projects. Just last week while cleaning I discovered the stickers for a game called "Drift Stage" that I backed many years ago. Fun little simple game about drifting cars, the demo was already 80% of the way there, they had a bunch of buzz, a bunch of support, everything going for them.
Game never came out.
They couldn't. close. the. circle.

That's what's important. Finishing. Having realistic goals and completing them. If you make a small, humble thing and finish it, you can then go on to another, and another, and slowly build. If you get side-tracked trying to do more and more and more, the project crashes and burns, and after a few of those people stop trusting you, you lose your enthusiasm, and it's over. 

Of course GT could be more than it is. A game could ALWAYS be more. I know this very well; I MADE it. There are tons of other things I'd like to do, weaknesses I see. But in both drawing and game design, there's a principle of diminishing returns, like upgrading a computer. Up to a point, more and more memory, faster and faster processor etc gives a huge boost. After that, it drops off dramatically. Up to a point, working an image, or a game makes it dramatically better, but after that you're putting more and more effort in for less and less reward. This means that the best way to improve at art, and at games, is to know when to quit, when to let a piece be finished, because you learn more, and gain more, and make better stuff by moving on to the next thing, rather than trying to polish forever. 

Also realistically, there's a certain range, a certain league I can work within, given my resources. I will continue to tweak my art, my game design etc as I go forward, because I always want to learn and improve. I look at old art, and already see ways I've moved beyond it. Certain programming challenges that were intimidating before are now solved problems, and all that carries forward. But with that said, broadly, I expect future games to be roughly in the same range as GT. It's a good balance of what I can do with the time I have while still being interesting, fun and hot to enough people. Not everyone obviously. But enough.

And yes, it would be helpfully to have a team, but scaling, and working with other people is very difficult and dangerous, moreso than you probably realize. A project like this takes a lot of discipline and dedication to keep on track; if you have multiple people, they ALL have to up to that standard, on a consistent basis, AND you have to deal with the inter-personal nightmares of running a team. Some day I probably will have to work with others, and in small ways I already do: the excellent work of Openfireplace charting out the game paths, Eiga-xx translating it, and so on. But for now, it'll have to mostly remain solo. This is more or less the product I make, and will make for a while. A lot of people like it, but you don't, if it doesn't end up being what you're looking for, that's fine.

Yeah, it's fascinating to play with, but the problem, as cliche as it is, is that it still can't come up with anything NEW. This is something people miss, because it CAN recombine a bunch of things it knows in superficially "new" ways, and yes, part of human creation is drawing on things we've read/seen before. But humans have something AI doesn't: the experience of being alive. The experience of being a person moving through space and time, acting and being acted on, rather that a static database on a server. And whenever we make something it ends up being filtered through that experience, consciously and unconsciously. That's how we make truly NEW things. Talking to an LLM is like talking to Wikipedia, or every SEO "help" article ever written. It's fine as a reference material, but it's never going to look at what it has and put it together in a novel way. It's never going to INVENT. And the problem is that idiots don't understand this, they think the revolution is now, they get caught up in the glitter and go to AI for "generating ideas", which is the worst idea imaginable. Because the result is that you're going to get the most average, predictable, middle-of-the-road narrative, scenarios, characters etc imaginable. It's also kind of dark in another way, because the whole point of art and fiction is for one HUMAN unconscious, which can't communicate via normal speech and writing, to have a way to escape the brain cage and talk to other unconsciousness in other brains. Putting AI in the drivers seat, instead of simply as an assistant, defeats the whole purpose; it's like food with no calories, no taste, and no texture: what's the point?

Lol. Also that is already being tracked: check "status" then "subject stats" in the menu.

Oh I have it planned out, but I'll share more once I start gearing up for the production process on the third game. Got a ways to go yet: bugtesting on this pack, releasing this pack on Itch, getting a gallery set up on the first game, working with a very hard-working Japanese fan to get the translation up and working, etc. If all goes well, I'll hopefully be doing my presentation of "here's the plan for 3" in a month or so.

Thanks! I've been seeing a lot of speculation about the growing use of generative AI for "assistance" in writing movies/games etc, and while I don't hate AI, this is utterly baffling to me. Writing is the fun part, the easy part! I could sit around making up absurdly deep little settings all day. Why on earth would anyone want "assistance" with that? That's like using AI to help you eat ice cream or slam shots. I can do that just fine on my own thanks (the first anyway, I don't drink, but you get the point).

But regardless, glad you're digging what I've got so far. Hope to have a lot more to show in time.

Eh, people miss things sometimes. I've had times where brain no work good too, and to be fair some people might be wandering in fresh off an Itch search.

Thanks!

Thanks!

Like any payment platform, they have their somewhat byzantine and always opaque rules about who they'll work with. Do what you can to get it to work, it's easier to get bugfixes on the early releases that way. But if you can't, and you don't mind the hassle, buy the game here (same price as a sub, $10), drop me a note over on FA (bitshift) with the email on your purchase so I can check, and I'll toss you a link.

Oh there's plenty of fun yet to be had, yes. I just have to pace myself for the marathon.

Thanks!

Pfff, figured you might be :D.

Thanks!

Thanks! I'll try to manage a LITTLE break here, but I am excited to get started a fresh chapter finally.

Thanks!

Just the end of this game. It's a five-part series, this is part two. Like I said, I'll be working on a few odds and ends for the next month or so, but before too long I'll be starting work on 3.

Ha, thanks. Even I'm not crazy enough to plan more that five though, that'll be plenty for a while.

Hey, there are other games to come (though they'll be in different places). But we'll see.

And more to come! (Mostly bug fixes right now though :P).

Gotta read that carefully. But since you already paid the same as a sub, toss me a note over on FurAffinity (BitShift), and I'll set ya up with a copy.

Well, about a week over, but close to two, yes. To be fair though, as I said earlier, this is a bit smaller/more modest than pack 2. And yeah, more or less the plan. I had HOPED to get to this point from the beginning,  but it was very much a "let's see how things go", both in terms of time/effort and, realistically, how much revenue each new pack drew in. But my fans are amazing, the releases more than justified themselves, and thus here we are, with all three packs out! 

Oh and no rush on the chart. You certainly CAN update it if you want to, but structurally this update doesn't change much, it's just another job in the plaza.

True, although that's a very different scenario in a lot of ways. But thanks, I appreciate it. And nearly done!

Again, different people have different expectations. I continue to grow things here and there as I learn, but I'm one person working on my own; only so much I can do. This isn't, and was never meant as a traditional, super-indepth rpg with a 40-hr story and dozens of sidequests. It's a fun little pornographic romp. Enjoy it for what it is, if you can.

Lol! But yeah, I do what I can. Can't stand it when creators just disappear with no communication, so I try to be clear on where things are and keep people updated, though in this case it was a little early. And thanks! I definitely think you'll enjoy it.

Aw, thanks!

Unfortunately you're probably playing an older version and not 0.7.3. In previous versions, Mahir gave you the bunny suit on first meeting; now, he gives you that later, and gives you the street clothes first. Luckily if you're still just trying to enter the center path you're not THAT far along yet. I would find a save in the Barrens (the desert map), and move that over to the new version; none of the triggers/flags should have changed version-to-version before you get to the Gutter, so it should be compatible. Then just fast-forward your way back to where you were, using the instant defeat items, skipping through dialog etc.

Thanks, really do appreciate it. To some extent shitty things like this are just part of life, but it really helps to now have this game, and the people around it to come back to. Gives me something positive to obsess over.

Exactly. I r dumb. But it's a good mistake to make, certainly better than the reverse. I think I was hoping/pushing to try to get this out by the end of June even though I had more time because it was a smaller bit of content, and that ended up transforming in my mind over time. 

But yeah, still WELL within original deadline, and should be ready soon!