Wednesday, May 01, 2013

Same old, same old...

I am about 2/3 done with the quest. I was kind of hoping to get it finished by now, but I am so easily distracted lately, I just can't seem to complete a proper game developing session. It's mildly annoying, but it is what it is (maybe it's because I haven't sleeped to well these last few days). Anyway, this week should be it for the quest, and then I go back to adding a couple of scenes for the sexy lingerie. I am not sure of what to do next, I have yet to think of it, but the "to-do" list is quite long, so I'll have no problems finding something to keep me busy when the time comes.

On the plus side for my paypal account, I got donations from C. S. (15 USD) and NPdC (20 euros), which clearly shows how my laziness pays off, and I should slow down development even further... :P

Joking aside, if you guys would like getting something back for your generosity as a thank you, feel free to send me a PM over at the HC, or use the e-mail address for the donations to send me an e-mail, so we can talk it over. ;)

This is all I have to report for the week, so it's video-crazy-anime-nonsense-to-keep-you-all-fairly-entertained time (somehow I think I should find a better name for this). This time around, we feature Trigun on our blog, I quite like the opening theme of this one, and I find the Anime simply hilarious, enjoy:

Sci-fi westerns are a thing, apparently.

19 comments:

  1. Just discovered Tales. I've only played it once--resisting Alice every step of the way until the game threw me an error in the Commercial district and crashed. Well, up to that point, this is one well made game and I've enjoyed it (except for that early maze which was *frustrating*). Thanks a lot for sharing this game and I hope it continues to grow. Good luck and have fun with it! :)

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    1. Glad to hear you liked the game (minus the maze at the beginning. Apparently, nobody likes it... :P)!

      What exactly were you doing when the game crashed? There are a few bugs that are due to problems with the engine, so I can't do anything about them, but just in case, let me know, maybe it's something I can fix.

      If you haven't left Europa 4 yet, there is still a lot for you to see, I hope it will be enough to keep you entertained for a while! ^_^

      The game will definitely grow more, just wait and see! :D

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  2. Man, you watch the best anime :)

    Speaking of sci-fi westerns though, I trust you've watched Firefly?

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    1. Actually, I never watched Firefly. When I heard of it, it had already been canceled, and I usually try to avoid watching a series if I fear it might feel incomplete somehow (I am still recovering from the way Wonderfalls was killed. While it wasn't a cliffhanger or anything, it really begged for more content).

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  3. I agree with Bob, first Cowboy Bebop and now Trigun. You have great taste.

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    1. What can I say? I am just too awesome for words... ^_^

      But seriously, I have a great love for these anime, they are all interesting, one way or the other, and since I grew up with them, I thought this was a good way to pay homage to them.

      The next one is going to be more obscure, at least for those who didn't live in Italy at the time. So obscure, in fact, that I couldn't find a USA/UK version of the intro. Since the original japanese one isn't really all that good, I will be using the italian intro, which is quite awesome, instead.

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    2. tl;dr - Scifi = cool. TotDC = cool. How to heal? Brownies are yummy! So brownie points for all! ^^

      This is anon 1 / commenter 1 from earlier. I really enjoyed these shows--Cowboy Bebop, Firefly, and Trigun that were mentioned. Fantastic stuff. You have good taste sir or madam! :D (Not really sure with "mdqp". Heh.)

      Please believe me when I say this is *PURELY coincidental*, but when I read the synopsis of for TotDC these shows among a couple of others immediately came to mind for various reasons (before seeing them here on the recent blog entries). Once I got into traits screen for my first try, I was thinking along the lines of a skilled yet extremely lucky rogue in the likes of Han (SW) or Malcolm (Firefly) or Vash (Trigun) and chose: athletic, sexy (why not?), and lucky.

      (Minor spoilers below this line.)
      As you can see, none of those traits helps in the first maze (as far as I know). My second and third plays were SOOO much easier since I picked up one or both of the other traits. ;p

      Game #1: I felt I got around to doing a lot of stuff and it gave me a very good impression of the game! Good music choices and lots of Easter Eggs. I really dig those and was glad to find more along the third game. This first game gave me a good feel for the game after the initial frustration of the maze and I completed several missions and was working through the Ray mission (encountering Bob) before the game crashed. (I should have probably saved the game at some point, but I admit that didn't save in any of the play-throughs. After all, I was supposed to be lucky, right?) ^^ I think I was just walking around examining things and when it was transitioning to a new area within the district when it crashed, but I can't be sure. Sorry that I can't be more forthcoming to help you out, mdqp.

      Game #2: Didn't get past the first mission since I didn't wait. D'oh! ;p But-but-but! I *did* beat that maze in RECORD time versus the first game! Yay! ;)

      Game #3: Okay, this attempt... Wow! I got to do a LOT of stuff and even got to go around to other places. I took a "whatever" approach on this--giving in half time to, umm, "unusual" approaches while being a unstoppable merc goddess for the rest of the time; good sometimes and bad in others. Boris got the drop on me for this run. I just could NOT figure out a way to heal myself and was sitting at 10 hp for most of the game once I used up my supplies. I suppose I should have stocked up more when I had the chance (4823 creds at game end), but I blew most of the early funds for the engines, outpost, and renovations (that I never got to see). Zero each of the consumables when Celeste went down; though she did go down swinging! That was a FUN play even though I didn't figure out all the puzzles I encountered. (The circuit board puzzle in the dark cave hideout is the one that I am most interested in at this point. I think I'll search the walkthrough for only that bit. I'm trying to avoid it since I want to give this game an "honest" attempt for these early runs.)

      All-in-all, that was BLOODY fun! I hope you keep this high standard as you continue to truck on and improve upon the game. I hope I didn't come off as rambling too much--I just wanted to express how impressed I was from what saw and played so far.

      Btw, is it just me or is the lucky trait not so... lucky / good? I didn't notice much use for it on the first attempt. Work in progress?

      Anyway, thanks again for sharing this game! ;p

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    3. I am a man, isn't it obvious? Mdqp is clearly a very masculine nickname! XD

      Well, it's no secret that Cowboy Bebop was one of the main inspirations for the game. Trigun was less influential for TOTDC, but it was important,nevertheless. If you want to know a little secret, I have a few pictures of a Vash cosplayer I plan to use for a random encounter. It was supposed to appear a long time ago, but I got side-tracked, and never worked on it. ^_^

      Glad to hear you had fun during your first three playthroughs! Apparently, you still have some stuff to find, which is cool, if you plan to pick the game up again.

      Hopefully, it was a random problem with the engine, and you won't experience any more crashes.

      The lucky trait triggers automatically, more often than not, so it's easy to miss its effects (it often negates traps, or harmful random events, and it boosts your offensive abilities, making you hit the enemies a bit harder compared to non-lucky characters. It also improves your odds if you play with the slot machine). It's probably the less noticeable trait, but overall it has its uses. I should probably add a few related choices/effects, though, since I neglected it a bit, recently.

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  4. I find the name of that anime misleading and quite frankly offensive.

    Never once did he pull out a third gun!

    Unless the anime is more similar to your game then it appears, and he is actually referring to something else as his "third gun"..? ;)
    (yes I know its three barreled - trying to be funny here)

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    1. And I got a good laugh out of it, so it worked.

      Also, I believe his "third gun" is somewhat canon in the anime, believe it or not... XD

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    2. So his.. "third gun" is cannon sized in the actual show?

      Wow, talk about that cartoonist overcompensating for personal insecurities. ;)
      (again still tryin' to be funny here)

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    3. This time it didn't work so well... C minus, son! You must try harder! XD XD XD

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    4. That's what she said!

      And as far as I see it I got two more "XD's" then the last time, and XXX rating is always more fun then a X one. :D

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  5. Hi, just wanted to say thanks for making such a great game. I do have a question though, I know you are expanding the grope scene on the tram but are we going to see more of that type of stuff (consensual molestation)?

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    1. Well, I am going to answer with a definitive "maybe". I don't exactly plan my porn quota too much, it all depends on what strikes my fancy at the moment. I think it's likely that similar content will be added to the game, but I can't say for sure. Sorry for not being very informative.

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  6. Wonderful! can't wait to play what you have created now! aside note everytime I read one of your comments I keep imagining it in Grocho Marx voice XP

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    1. Eh, eh, it's still going to be a while before I pile up enough content for a closed beta or even a public release, but the game is definitely growing bigger.

      Does Groucho's voice make everything better to you, as it does to me? ;D

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  7. How did you learn coding in RAGS, is it like JAVA or C++, would you ever be open to someone helping you with coding, where do you/how do you get inspiration?

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    1. Well, I use the term "coding" because it sounds better than "putting stuff together". :D

      RAGS doesn't require learning any programming language (although the licensed version supports javascript, if you need it). It's a fairly easy to use engine, that has most of the stuff already in it (you don't need to tell the game what a "character" is, or what a "room" is). Basically is just a big flow-chart building program, that allows you to display text and images when they meet the conditions you set, without you having to worry about the most basic level. I am probably making it sound more difficult than it actually is, you can download it for free, and see it for yourself, it's really simple.

      Getting help with coding is possible, but is difficult to do, given how RAGS is built. It's also not that big of a deal, I usually never have troubles coding what I want to, I just don't have that much free time, and sometimes not being a native english speaker slows down the actual writing.

      I don't have any specific way I get inspiration. I usually just think something like "I might want a sexy scene here" and then I think about what could work (trying to avoid situations that are similar to ones I used before in the game), or I think "I could use a side quest there", and go through a similar process. Sometimes a player suggests a scene, and I adapt it to my game, sometimes I see a new model's gallery and think "these pictures would be better for this thing", sometimes it's a matter of "what would this character do, if I put him/her in this situation?". The overall main plot was planned before I released my first demo, and it was something I come up with playing around the idea of having some entity co-existing with the main character and trying to change her (ALICE was supposed to be a Djinn, and the setting was supposed to be fantasy in present days, with vampires, werewolves, and all that stuff. I showed it to chaosrevolver, and we discussed things a bit, and then I decided to go for a sci-fi setting... To be honest, I can't even remember if he was the one that suggested it, or if I decided to go for sci-fi after his lukewarm reaction to the first concept).

      Writing can be about re-telling your own experiences in a new light, taking an idea and exploring it in a different setting, to look at it from a different angle, trying to portray as close to reality as possible a person or an event, and pretty much anything else you can think of. So the way to get the inspiration changes based on what the goal is and the way you are trying to accomplish it, if that makes sense.


      Basically, you just get a rough idea, and think about it until you find a way to improve/expand it, till you feel it is good enough. ^_^

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