It is not lost on me that the game is borderline impenetrable to new players. I would like to take feedback from players with a fresh perspective.
Post any encountered issues or things you struggle with here.
Some of this isn’t really feedback and could use it’s own thread. But, either way, Kari tells you to meet her at the Mall at dusk/sunset specifically. You can review what needs to be done to progress the story at the computer desk back home.
So I guess my take away is that there needs to be something that forces the player to use the desk for the first time.
You don’t have to use the tome to identify shrooms. Read the researcher pages and extract information from that. Making it rain is an involved sequence of puzzles that themselves have are sequences of puzzles. And guess what will happen when you make it rain? It’s also part of a puzzle. I’m not kidding that this is a difficult game. Some of the existing, seasoned players claim to have spent 7 hours on the Woods alone. The RNG is there only because you’re trying to brute force a solution.
I’ve had this in development for so long that I occasionally forget new players probably have no idea what the stats are. I’ll consider a legend or something.
Stamina(White) - Energy to spend on interacting with things and going to places when awake. Works in reverse when asleep. When completely refilled you wake up.
Body(Red) - sends you to the void on the next dream if it gets completely drained. At the moment it’s not particularly painful due negative feedback, so it’s fine to experience at least once.
Mind(Blue) - Some times used in dialogue and other interactions. If it goes to 0 in the dream world you will get a nightmare event. There are 5 events currently, only one is unlocked initially and the other 4 are added to the pool as you experience them by exploring the dream world.
Will(Green) - “Currency” stat that is used to force certain dialogue interactions or to perform extraordinary actions
Cohesion - restored by interacting with NPCs and selecting colored dialogue choice(that use up the stat of that color). Max 2 per NPC per day. Halved every day.
Dissonance - Increases by 1 point every day. Lewd acts have a 50% chance on lowering it. Resets to 0 after a nightmare event
Every time you sleep Mind decreases(or increases) by ( Dissonance - Cohesion ) * 5
Hunger and Thirst - self explanatory, but will start to drain stats if left in the red for a full period.
The day is split into Dawn, Morning, Afternoon, Dusk, Evening, Night (and a ??? state for dreams) Each period has 5 Time Units that represented by dots next to the period. After all 5 are gone the period changes. These drain when you travel (usually 3 points) and when you do something (1-2 points).
Ah, going by the initial thing of "what you struggled with" it felt like these went here.
I poked at the Kari thing a bit further, and I managed to trigger the mall meeting, but I loaded the save a few more times to doublecheck some stuff. She doesn't specify "dusk" in the dialogue, just "after class". Heading back home, the diary (which I had checked a few times before making my post) is a little more clear at saying "before dark", but it seems rather easy to miss the specific period of "dusk", as at least a couple of my attempts managed to clear the entire dusk period before I could reach the mall. (Namely, one where I headed home, swapped outfits, went to the mall at "afternoon", went back to the house and ended up at "dusk", but going back to the mall ended up at "evening"; somehow used up all the dusk time in coming back from the mall and going to it again.)
As for the mushroom puzzle, I had spent some time with the pages trying to identify the shrooms before I finally managed to stumble on getting the book... about all I could figure appearance-wise was that "one of the three important shrooms that look the same glows at night" and the visual link to reality for another type. And it felt in that one of my runs at it, I collected two glowing ones and they had different effects upon consumption, hence the sense of RNG I had.
I'll admit that if one of them had an audio cue like the research pages imply, I may not have heard it due to outside audio at the time.
I still don't know how I got all the trees to be colorful on one of my attempts.
The bars I had some hints for, having played some very early versions of this long ago, but I was misremembering some of the differences between Mind and Will. Good to know on the Cohesion and Dissonance, and I can't believe I somehow never registered the Hunger and Thirst indicators.
There's definitely lots of stumbling in the dark, but am still gonna keep poking at it, heh.
I realized that separate threads might be needed, since this is supposed to be feedback/suggestions provided by non-patreon players.
To rectify this, I decided to create a dedicated thread for requesting hints related to specific dream worlds. I noticed Mansion was already started, so I added one for forest and one for the lab.
I just randomly figure out how to get into Jessica's bedroom but didn't get to do anything and the character wakes up. Then I see the MC having Jessica's appearance. Is this a part of the story?? Was I suppose to get her appearance this early in the game??
Also I'm struggling at finding Yuri in the library as I don't seem to see her anywhere despite the library being a small room with some sudents inside
“And then my question: I encountered the squid bunny and of course got assimilated because curiosity got me, and I was wondering if there is a permanent way to remove the state to allow me to use bioscanners. I don’t need an explanation for how to do it I kinda just wanna know if that’s a thing and if so which map it’s in.”
There are 3 ways to remove it. 2 in the Lab, 1 in the Manor. 1 in the Lab if you didn’t read the research logs behind the scanner before encountering it.
Milkroot only increases the size, not perfects “the maiden”.
Ok, this is intricate, but here’s how sizes work:
Both reset to the original size on waking up, plus(or minus) 1 point of difference. Prioritizes the largest difference delta. If the same, then hips are prioritized over bust. Real sizes are then saved over the dream sizes.
There are minimum and maximum size thresholds for both breasts and hips.
They trigger only upon waking up.
The total value consists of various flags you collect through the game. These flags are not stackable.
In general, maximum threshold is fairly easy to max out by just playing the game, while the minimum is more involved, and requires more complicated sets of actions.
Current list of flags will likely change as more content is added. Some of them are obviously temporary:
-Hips minimum threshold flags:
Finish intro sequence (free in freeplay) - 2 points
Genderswap route or Venus scene as male - 1 point
Spend 3 nights as Squidrabbit TF - 2 points
Complete Festival of Life ritual - 1 point
-Hips maximum threshold flags:
Finish intro sequence (free in freeplay) - 3 points
Genderswap route or Venus scene as male (free in freeplay) - 1 point
Squidrabbit TF - 1 point
Harbinger TF - 1 point
Broodmaiden scene - 1 point
Flesh Wall Nightmare - 1 point
-Breasts minimum threshold flags:
Finish intro sequence (free in freeplay) - 1 points
Genderswap route - 1 point
Max out milkroot usage - 1 point
Complete Festival of Life ritual - 1 point
-Breasts maximum threshold flags:
Finish intro sequence (free in freeplay) - 2 points
Genderswap route (free in freeplay) - 2 points
Use milkroot - 1 point
Drink coffee 5 times - 1 point
Mimic Chest - 1 point
Cursed Dress - 1 point
Jessica, Squidrabbit and Malice transformations function differently.
-Jessica: Swaps out the real version entirely, and disables all thresholds. Then it functions like normal. (Original version is “stored” for future use.)
-Squidrabbit: Forces second highest hip size at the start of a dream. Any body proportion changes that happen to PC while in this form are voided if removed.
-Malice: Forces original Malice look at the start of the dream.
Dream locations reset. No save points. Knowledge the player character possesses persists: formulas, console passwords, journal entries. Some of that information relies on the player memorizing rather than the character, but you are expected to discover it in game regardless. i.e there’s a fake rock in the Woods. Once you gain True Sight and go through it, you won’t need True Sight anymore.
This method basically involves allowing oneself to be possessed by Jessica Apparition, then allowing the transformation time to expire before allowing the pregnant maiden manifestations to transfer their offspring to your non-transformed MC.
Do not currently know if this is the correct method as I have yet to successfully start new dream cycle where MC is actively pregnant (minus one instance where I have no idea how it occured).
Ok I see, I've kinda just been just trying to fiddle around with the Jessica pregnancy, and the only really interesting thing that I encountered was that I managed to get the pregnant state in the awake world.
It did not carry over to the next night though. I'm a little bit stuck, like I can get the pregnancy but I cant figure out the giving birth part, is it just a waiting game?
Can’t help you there, That birthing was a total fluke. The End’s Door activated for an unnecessary reason (had plenty of hp, mind, and willpower).
I’m basically at the same place as you, still trying to figure out how to get the pregnancy to carry over (either from night to night or from mansion over to other dream world in the same bight).
Okay, I walked through the water (the only body of water I could think of), but it didn't work. But I did somehow wind up with a locked in jessica variant that I never passed a mirror with (was returned to MC after elevator). Does it only work if you cleanse the main body directly? Cause some of these transformation timers are just too long to wait out, and it's inconsistent. purple eye could clear in less than 5 minutes in most 3 cycles, then randomly refuse to clear suddenly despite how rare that variant seems to be.
Edit: Tried to verify the concept by doing a cycle where I only cleansed then drink coffee, then scanned in the Lab. Still getting that 'Unknown Organism Detected' message.
You can access the Lab without going through the scanner when entering from the Manor by going through the sludge. That’s what I meant. The scanner will detect all parasite including Venus, Squidrabbit and Unwidow. It will also detect if you’ve interacted with the futas, though that should reset when waking up. C-Alpha, or even the decontamiantion spray should remove all of those.
The red ghost has a randomized appearance each time. There are no variants. The transformation lasts for 7200 frames(120 seconds at base framerate). If the player is doing something that would conflict with transformation (i.e in an animation or in a menu) the timers is delayed by about 30 seconds. The transformation should always disappear when you enter Jessica’s room or when you wake up.
The mirror transformation is permanent.
As for the lab, C-Alpha I recall I used it once before while infected by D-Bug (not sure of correct name) and it was not removed then. However, the decon room I have confirmed removes the 'unknown' dna source (Venus). Difficult to actually get to though...
I tried intentional modifications to both possible lab starts, ultimately both missed the mark in granting access to decon chamber in some way. After careful evaluation of everything and hints you have provided, I realized there was one other way I had already discovered brought me into the decon room other than the two main lab starts, that way was the only way that worked with me being infected with the Venus.
Now with Jessica, based on what you just described I have something to report that does not align (functioning not as described). It seems to be rng-like that I’ve been experiencing a larger number of cycles where I never pass any mirrors but Long after accessing Jessica’s room the transformation persists. One occasion I had walked around in circles for half an hour before getting tired of waiting. That was with a solid red-eyed variant, and it happens like that with a high lvl of consistency to me, so I’ve started just resetting when I roll one.
I believe I discovered a way to prevent the practically permanent non-mirror Jessica transformation. Until the cause is understood and solved, I noticed that when I obtained Jessica transformation, if I approach Jessica's bedroom door but did not actually enter, I could continue with other actions and the transformations would ends pretty consistently around 7200 frames like you said. Only 4 tests have been done by me, but hopefully this helps the others get past that nuisance for the time being.
That’s oversimplifying it but I could do it. I don’t know if that is s reasonable though. I would like for the player to have some responsibility. Either way, next gameplay update will restructure stat economy, so I’ll see what it looks like and go from there.
I’m not sure about the ‘wait on demand’ action. It would mess too much with areas that don’t expect you to pass time and load content when you move into them.
Some comments in no particular order:
It looks like you know what you are doing!
I don't know Yume Nikki, but I like puzzle and exploration for the sake of it, I just think story bits can be a good tool to nudge the player in the right direction.
I've played quite a lot more since then and I am starting to feel I've reach the end of content (some "fillers" items, not a lot puzzle-less pieces nor piece-less puzzles, not much closed door left to open).
You really did a great job weaving the three areas together and it feel rewarding to loop around one and the other to try to bring stuff and states around. There's this feeling of setting up an insane route and trying to unfold it like clock work.
I found a glitch when you use ether next to the red ghost and get possessed, it kept the collisions disabled and removed the ether "leash", with this I found a hidden area I don't think I would ever found.
Clay doll crashed the game because I've just passed through decontamination (-1 index error on hip size).
I am stuck with a purple face huger despite going though all sort of transformation removal. I still not sure if there's layers of transformations that need to be peeled one by one and I'm still not sure what or when some transformations are kept through the day.
I am definitely hitting New game on the next update, try to rework my way there way with my notes.
