Patreon devlog 24/07

 Hey guys! 

Time for this week's devlog. Sorry it is coming late in the day - during the morning I was dealing with a minor family issue. Then had to do school with my kiddo later on…

So I'm just now getting around to posting this. 

Anyway, let's jump into this week's update! 

Summary:

• Edited through Ch. 8 of Caleb's route
• Art - Got two BG sketches this week
• Game mechanic planning - no actual coding though.
• Some GUI designing

The Ramble:

This week I spent a lot of time editing. I was going to work on coding in some BGs for Caissa's first chapter so I could look into releasing that to patrons. But editing ate my life. I ended up continuing to put it off in favour of editing so my goal is to do the BG coding and get the alpha version out maybe this weekend instead.

I got to the part of the route where Caleb becomes an angst muffin and they only talk about how he ruined Morgan's and is mean. So I've been doing a lot of changing that and having them focus on other things. 

I've also been smoothing out the plot - there's always a lot of that at this stage for routes with a complex plot. And Caleb's route is very plot abundant. For this kind of route, even if I make what seems like a fairly small change, it can often result in a sort of snowball effect for changes. But overall, I feel like his route is in a much better place. (Which is always the case after editing! LoL)

And there have been some unexpected and fun organic developments as I edit. So that's always exciting.

The other thing that I started looking into this week is the possibility of slightly shifting the personality mechanic in the game. I've done a lot of asking if people want the personality traits to shift around as they play (so even if you choose "bold" - if you tend to make cautious choices, you can flip that meter over to "cautious.") 

People have shared a lot of thoughts about this and I think the biggest concern people have - which is my concern as well - is that it'll feel a little too much like "stat raising" if I'm not careful. And I don't want that.

But I think one way I can mitigate that feeling is labelling the choices. That way you're not guessing if you're making a "bold" or "cautious" choice - you know when you click the choice what you're doing.

I've always intended the personality aspect to give more of a "boost" than anything. I don't intend it to be a sort of de-buff when you're trying to romance a guy. There are "wrong" choices in Gilded Shadows (because I don't want to make a game with no consequences - that's not my style). But I don't intend it to be a situation where, if you don't have the "right" trait for a guy, you can never win his heart. 

As I continue to write and edit, I move more and more toward wanting a system where the personality traits are flexible. My main reason is that right now we have certain choices that the player is locked out of based on what traits they have. This is really done just to make things more interesting and interactive.

But I realise more and more that our non-locked choices often fall into the categories set out by the personality traits. Even if none of the choices are locked, there's often one that is "cautious" or "rational" or "emotional" or whatever. And it feels as if it sort of undermines the concept of personality based elements if those choices aren't labelled by personality.

But if I label them, it's weird if they don't do anything. 

So I guess if I had to summarise the issue, it's that the personality aspect - as it is now - feels incomplete. And I keep finding myself feeling like it's not fully realised. So that's why I continue to think of ways to improve on it and make it a more integrated part of the game.

I haven't implemented any changes. But I've been taking notes and thinking about how to potentially code the changes to the system. I've also been thinking about a potential addition to the relationship meter page that would just list what traits the player currently has. I don't think I want to create meters for the personality traits. I do feel that would lend itself too much to this feeling of it being a "stat" you need to watch.

So I was thinking I would just have them stated at the top as words. No meters. 

So yeah, that's kind of...what I've been doing this week, what I've been contemplating, and what I've been working on. It feels like there are large portions of game dev that are just planning and thinking about how to accomplish things. LoL And asking a ton of questions!

-if I label choices with personality type, does that mean I should alter the flowchart icons to reflect this as well?

-how do I want to let the player know what personality trait they currently have without making it feel like they are being forced to focus on watching their "stats"?

-if I make choices more overtly labelled, and have them affect the personality trait status, does this mean I should consider having personality branches impact the relationship score? 

These are the kinds of questions I have to ask myself. And some of them involve a lot of weighing of various pros and cons or just sketching out (mentally or...in a tangible way) what that will mean for design and mechanics. 

I'm not a very experienced coder so sometimes I have to stop and think about *how* to make an idea work; I don't just inherently *know.* 

And all of this happens while I'm also focusing on editing, writing, and creating the game content! 

Sneak Peeks and Previews:

No completed BGs this week - but we did get two new sketches! 

A hallway (exciting! LoL)

And an alley! 

Upcoming Week:

The upcoming week will remain editing focused. I have three routes I want to edit before I continue writing. I was hoping to get a little further along in Cale's route but I knew my initial goal was ambitious. The last few chapters I wrote are super potato-y.

So we'll just take it a chapter at a time. 

At this point, Cale's route is still just over 85%. 87% to be accurate. Right now the count is going up and down as I cut things and add things and cut things and add things. I don't really expect to add to the completion level until I reach the next chapter because that's when the chapters start really needing fleshing out.

Hopefully we get some additional completed backgrounds as well. I'm really looking forward to seeing the alley from above, which we're getting from Vui Huynh - one of three artists we currently have working on stuff right now! 

That's all for now! I shall see you next week.