Post by chapomon in Build 0.5 Q&A Session comments

Viewing post in Build 0.5 Q&A Session comments

That's an insightful Q&A! I'm so hyped for 0.5!

As to my question about everyone finding happiness, while it's sad that you can't please everyone in one go, I actually like that idea that makes the story and choices more grounded rather than too "video gamey." It also (ironically following my previous statement) makes the game more replayable and more tailored to the player's choices.

As for my other question, I'm think I get what you're putting down: the tablets. I did find some on my playthrough that gives me more of an idea of what he did to earn his eternal punishment... which is still not deserved but the gods are assholes. I won't state what I've pieced together here to avoid spoilers for those who may not want them.

I also have to say that EB150N said it best, it's so great that a game like this exists for the reasons you stated you're making them. One other thing I really appreciate is how the team has gone out of the way to include representation from cultures around the world to make the characters, not only diverse, as accurate and real to the parts of the world they're from. It feels good as a person from a Latin American background to see characters who share a similar background in niche media like this and I hope others from different backgrounds can experience that feeling as well. The effort in research that goes into that aspect of the writing is very much appreciated.

Something mentioned in some of these answers and something I've learned from reading other threads and the wiki is that Minotaur Hotel was original an imageboard game of some sort? (I have no idea how that works, other than playing tag with suggestions like a choose your own adventure?) I'm intrigued to want to read the original iteration of MH, assuming that it still exists in some form. Though at the same time, I kind of don't want to spoil the story for myself. And on the other hand, I would love to read about content from the original iteration that didn't make it into the game for whatever reason (like who is this JoJo and what was their story?). I love reading about the creative processes, drafts and cutting room floor content. A request to MH fans who are familiar with both iterations in the future when MH is complete: write a wiki page about the differences in the iterations. Pretty please? :)

In closing, I love all the effort and work the whole team has put into this game and I look forward to seeing future content. <3

Nanoff2 years ago(+2)

The biggest reason why you can't get everyone in one go is that if there was a way to do that, then everyone would look up a guide on how to do it and they'd stop making choices themselves. That's an issue I had with the Persona games, you can do all the social links in one playthrough but doing so requires sticking to a very strict guide and at that point you're on autopilot. You stop playing the game the way it was intended.

We try to keep everything balanced so that there isn't an optimal background, or a best guest to choose to manage the lounge, what side quests you choose in 0.5 and so on, and even when you get the "best solution" to how to deal with argos, for example, there's always a trade-off or consequence tied to it, so that even if you know what's coming it's still a meaningful decision.

To answer your other question, yes, MH was originally a quest on an image board where Minoanon would make a post advancing the story and the other anons would reply what the Mc did next, or throw ideas for characters. It's very rough by nature of being written post by post and making shit up as it goes, and full of spoilers of course. I think it's a neat idea to add info on the wiki about how characters changed when jumping from one medium to the other (Luke was a quadruped, good luck showing that on a visual novel format) but I wouldn't recommend reading the original quest because it kind of diminishes the experience. Argos wasn't even in it, and he's an absolutely integral character to this iteration of the story.

chapomon2 years ago(+2)

That's a really good way to look at how to make sure your players don't just end up sticking to one way to play the game when you've given them a wide range of choices from. I think you're on the right track when making choices come off as neutral as possible and avoiding them as "the good or bad, nice or mean, right or wrong" choice. It encourages the player to make the choices they want to, using whatever reason they want without falling to that tired binary or just plain want to explore the choices that are possible. It's an odd concept to imagine, by removing choices and outcomes, you unintuitively create more variety among your players' playthroughs and increase their freedom to make the choices they want rather than the choices they may feel compelled to make because it's "the right one."

I'm enjoying going through this game blind on my primary file and sticking to things that may seem like "mistakes." Argos is a good example. I sort of noticed the clause to challenged but figured that even the wording there didn't make sense or supersede the rules of the land so I instead challenged clause that gave him an hour to clear out his farm if the contracted is broken and his stuff would disappear. I wanted to kill him with kindness and wanted to give him more time (that's probably my animal welfare career talking) and hope that treating him nicely would confuse him. Learning later that I was correct in my initial observation and my choice made may allow Argos to enter the hotel made me intrigued to see if this would later cause trouble or maybe get the chance to kill him with kindness and have him stay as a guest for a few days while treating him so nicely that I scared him away or something.

And speaking of Argos, I can't imagine MH without him! He brings a bit of a lingering menace to break up, the best way I can put this, the sense of wonder one can get lost in discovering more about the magical hotel and positive relationship building with Asterion to snap us back to the reality of the situation and remind us that this is place was meant to be a dark place with a dark purpose. Every time I see the text describing a flute, I can't help but think "oh crap, it's Argos." And while I'm reminded of my shitpost meme of a quadruped griffin with a thong pasted on him, it would have been odd to explain how Luke can do the things he does with on all fours. He'd either have to prop himself up and use his front legs all the time or be very talented with his beak (heh).

Minoh Workshop2 years ago(+2)

Originally Mino Hotel was a "quest", which is a story format wherein the "Quest Master"/QM starts a story and then lets the readers pick what should happen next. You can think of it as the contemporary and online equivalent of a cozy night of storytelling by a bonfire, surrounded with a small group of engaged readers.

The story back then was many times shorter. Asterion and the MC's relation advanced very quickly (far too quickly to be realistic) and the story was very openly erotica. I was also taking character suggestions from the readers, which made the tone bounce around a bit depending on which guests I put in.

I'm very proud of the quest. I think it was a good piece of writing given its context and limitations, and given what it was trying to accomplish. But I no longer recommend people read it for a few reasons. First, it does spoil some things and I think it'll feel better if people only play the game. Second, I think most people like Mino Hotel for the kind of writing we stick to, and the quest was majorly a piece of erotica — things were very different tonally, shockingly so.

The third reason is the biggest one for me: it's because the quest wasn't only the story's text. There was a context to it — the fun conversations we had in the thread, the ideas people threw around, the little in-jokes, what people requested or were opposed to... It was very much a little social experience, and that's just impossible to be glimpsed from the text alone.

In that sense, I think the text of the Quest is only half of the story, and the experience of the Quest is just impossible to reproduce outside of its original context. Because of that, nowadays I think reading it is just not worth it, it'll probably disappoint people.

I do think about making a big devlog laying these changes side by side, by the way... It's just that we can only do that after we go through some plot points, otherwise it would be very spoiler-y.

chapomon2 years ago(+1)

I love that idea and I can understand what you're saying. It's a "you had to be there moment." Even if it's just a telling of the story that anyone can do afterwards, what is hard to replicate and impart is the matter that the initial storytelling occurred. The natural gathering of a group of people and whatever naturally lead to the story being told in the first place. The energy of the people around the campfire and their interactions with the storyteller who then in turn interacts with their words. It's just like Asterion remembering the good times he had talking the night away with guest. He can tell you about it and you can empathies with the way the memory clearly changes his mood and body language but the tale will not have the same magic as it did for him.

Though the more you talk about it, the more I really get intrigued from a creator working with a muse aspect and how online experiences like boards can inspire such a captivated piece of media. I think despite how much the internet is a big part of most of the world's lives, most would dismiss such experiences and interactions as pointless or a way to pass the time when it was absolutely necessary to the creation of something like Minotaur Hotel. To see you talk about it so passionately about those times and seeing you and the rest of the team put so much heart and soul into MH, it's inspiring in itself.

I'm sure as with most creators, you may look back on the writing itself and cringe a little; not because you're ashamed of what you created but because you've grown as a writer and it could be better with "rules of storytelling and writing" (though I'm sure given the limitations of the medium of an image board, it's likely the key source of the structure that could be better.) I would still be very interested in seeing a comparison of characters and plot points or maybe even reading it myself someday but yeah, I don't want spoilers. That's why my request was for future people once MH is completed. You also can't really do an accurate comparison if one half of the content being compared isn't complete.

Something else I should have originally commented in regards to the question of how much adult content would be in build 0.5, is that I appreciate not forcing any NSFW content in the build for the sake of having sex content in your adult visual novel. That's not to say I don't like seeing that content (I love me my sexual content) but I always appreciate when the sexual content is woven into a narrative naturally rather than being there for the sake of it. Like Luke's sex scene informs his character and doesn't seem force. The casual nudity with Kota is more of an adult mature thing rather than sexual. The build up to a relationship with Asterion feels like it would be more fulfilling than just banging him. I'm really enjoying more of the casual build up of potential sexual tension with Asterion such as the long looks and the lingering touches. I'm sure there'll be more of this and that's enough for me. We'll get to the banging when we get to it.

Though the quest being a raunchy version of the MH might make a good read someday (maybe we should distinguish the two by dubbing the imageboard quest as Minotaur Quest?) in a future where MH is complete. I'm sort of jokingly picturing Asterion having a conversation with the MC on a serious topic while the MC is riding Asterion. Did the quest have equally dark themes and tones in it like MH does? Or were the some of the more darker aspects just not as focused on?

Hivemindedly2 years ago

I haven't read 4ch Quests (and their equivalents on other sites) in a while -- they're past their heyday, unfortunately. Some of the older ones were a real treat. Which ones would you recommend, as someone that was involved in that community? There are so many on the archive (among which, most are pretty unappealing), and I'm curious if there's anything worthwhile I've missed.

itch.io

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