Nah if you actually played it you know that most of the lewd scenes take place in the real world and not the VR space.
Not to mention if you played the game you'd know that this is an isekai story masquerading as a Ready Player One clone, with the "VR Game" actually being some sort of Astral Plane of existence, with the servers being different worlds. Hell, in the latest update alone the main character gains the ability to jump between worlds and even brings some love interests along the ride, so your arguments about the "VR component trivializing intimate moments because everything is virtual" actually falls fucking flat as far as this game is concerned.
From what I'm reading he did pay for them. It's just that the license holders don't like the music they have rights to associated with porn (which AVNs fall under) as noted in their ToS (which didn't use to be that way until they updated them because image thing and all that).
AI music was already in the game before this happened. For instance, the track used for the Andromeda event for 0.8 (when Orion entered the server) is AI-made.
AI music was already in the game before this happened. For instance, the track used for the Andromeda event for 0.8 (when Orion entered the server) is AI-made.
Read what post said again, he said he THOUGHT Cari abandoned the project due to slow update, when in fact he didn't. In fact he's quite hard at work with 0.9 which just entered development last month.
Considering that Thanatos seems to have a way of tracking down gems and breaking into servers he's not supposed to have access to (see: him getting into Ogygia), I don't think even a private server is gonna keep him out.
There was a poll a few years back asking Patreon subs if they wanted meatier content with longer dev time or shorter content with shorter dev time. The former won, so that's that.
Plus Cari mentioned around 0.6 that he wanted to pace his dev time to a more manageable sched so as to prevent burnout, hence the added dev time to an already lengthy sched. While that may sound unfortunate for those waiting for the updates, IMO if it eventually leads to him seeing the game to completion instead of noping out and becoming another abandoned game then I'm all for it.
Steam's never gonna happen due to HS2 being used for renders. If it was Daz3D or Blender where the renders created by the software are effectively owned by the person who created said render instead of the software devs then that would be a different story. But HS2 doesn't provide that kind of freedom to those who use it.
Load from an earlier instance and continue from there. Don't load in the "Thank you for playing" screen, otherwise the game assumes you finished the update.
The most recent guesstimate was 13 total updates in a reply to a comment on Patreon (in the Progress Bar comments), tho I suppose that could be subject to change...
....The game is made using Honey Select 2 (a Japanese H-game with a built-in Studio Mode which is where the renders for this game are made), not Daz3D.
Recently Cari mentioned on the Progress Bar comments section on Patreon that he's targeting 13 updates total, meaning there's about 5 more updates to go after 0.8.
Orion referred to him as "Ex-President Michael Stabb" in his intro monologue tho. Also according to a post Cari made on Discord Mike served 2 full terms as President, so he's either retired or have gone back to his world-hopping/vigilante ways.
OIAL takes place in the same continuity. MBML does not. Plus there's a lot of inconsistencies that MBML has with its cameos that essentially make it non-canon (such as Alex appearing fully grown in her cameo despite Eternum recently being released (in her flashbacks with her Grandma she was still a kid when Eternum was on the verge of being released)).
0.7 ending feels apt tho if you're familiar with Greek Mythology (which this AVN has a lot of references to), particularly Orion's namesake. Man was a literal giant and one of the best hunters there was, and was also boastful about it...but he eventually got himself killed after getting stung by a scorpion of all things (tho I suppose in other versions he got accidentally killed by the goddess Artemis who had a thing for him).
There was a poll a long while back on Patreon that asked if people wanted meatier updates with longer dev time or shorter updates with quicker dev time. The former won, so folks will just have to deal with it.
The walkthrough is optimized so that if you follow it you will get the harem ending without issue. However, there will be points in the game where there is no right or wrong answer and is more of a "choose your poison" moment. Hasil v. Hasler is one of them.
If anything tho, the "consequences" mentioned in the walkthrough will likely be on the state of the server when we eventually return to it in a future update, and not that it could lead to losing a girl's path in the future (the walkthrough will warn players beforehand about it if that were the case).
There was actually a poll on Patreon a long while ago where Cari put on a vote whether he should go for longer dev times with meatier content or keep the shorter dev times which Cari was using at the time (3-4 months per update). Guess which option won?
I didn't say there are no feel-good moments in the game. Far from it. All I said was those moments still don't take away the fact that 0.7's ending was an absolute downer moment and I would recommend waiting until 0.8 for it to (possibly) be resolved.
Likely explanation as to why is that importing model data from HS1 (the software OIAL uses for renders) to HS2 (the software Eternum uses for renders) can't be done, so Cari will have to recreate everyone from scratch in HS2 (which is likely a tedious process exacerbated by the fact that he has to significantly age them up because of the second point stated below, so he likely decided to just not bother).
Second, someone on Cari's Discord created a timeline based on the information provided in the game, stating that Eternum takes place 12-14 years after OIAL. Cari himself approved of this timeline and changed some things in the script to reflect it (such as changing the time Ulysses showed up from "a few years ago" to "more than a decade").
Orion namedropped Stabby Mike as "Ex-President Stabb" during his intro monologue, making the harem ending canon (as every other ending has Mike dead or brainwashed by Astaroth). Also Cari confirmed it in an earlier comment:
Cari has gone on record on his Discord that he doesn't like redoing/remaking stuff, so don't expect that kind of thing from him. Furthermore, he's already mentioned that he's planning to make the next game after Eternum with Honey Select 2 again, so he seems to be pretty much committed in not having his works ever grace Steam anytime soon.
