also i may have found a bug with movement. simply put, when i move i catch on stuff for some reason. not sure if im catching on the ground or the game is forgetting im pressing a button or something. unsure.
EDIT: Found the bug. i had my controller plugged in at the same time. keep in mind that it was a PS4 controller using steam's controller api thing to make it look like an xbox controller.
what came in the most recent update? the 0.2 one. there is no dev log and i really like reading those. its a nice feeling to see progress, even if i had literally no part in the progress in question.
There's actually a new dev log! Though, it compares from 0.1.0 to 0.2.0, so if you played 0.1.9, then there's not much aside from behind-the-scenes game systems.
I just got the game and haven't played much and I still need to play more but im absolutely in love with it already. I cant wait to see what more you put into this game. It has so much potential for even more!
I'm not sure if this is the place for suggestions, but i had some interesting ones for enemies/scenes. If someone (or the creator) could point me toward the whoever or whatever is in charge of sprite creation. I did thoroughly enjoy this game and cannot wait for any future content. Great job so far.
Great game. Fun, atmospheric, and sexy as well. I feel there are amore than a few wasted tentacles floting about randomly. are there any intentions of anal or double penetration animations?
First impressions, found the camera side switching with the flashlight on kinda jarring, and it was very jarring when aiming as it was both more extreme and threw the crosshair forward. Later, this also made aiming down finicky when exploiting the enemies' AI on stairs, I also noticed then their hitbox is quite thin compared to their visuals. I really wish the camera would follow the crosshair up and down when aiming as well.
The two separate flashlights are cool, and the fact you can lose one of them.
Moxie's idle pose looks a bit weird, she looks like she's trying not to piss herself, which might be accurate considering the situation. How she closes one eye when aiming, while not proper, fits since she doesn't give the vibe of someone trained with firearms, despite that I still appreciate the muzzle discipline in the run anim. I also noticed the detail where she looks way more displeased about reloading without clothes.
Being able to see Moxie's breath is a nice detail, but because of that if there's ever to be any idle anims then she should totally shiver when missing any piece of clothing.
Atmosphere is quite intense, I still got startled by that grate despite kinda knowing it was coming, and I jumped a few more times through out, but tbh it's easy to spook me. There were some tense moments where I had to juke enemies out while panicking because of being unable to reload on the move. Although it is fairly easy to jump past enemies in general.
It's weird how you fly off the top of stairs when going up or down them, kinda reminded me of how Half-Life 1 handles slopes (not quite like this but close enough).
The magazine inventory keeping separate non-full mags reminded me of SWAT 4, very good. Being able to pick up a discarded mag is also cool.
The "grapple" minigame was trivial, didn't lose a single piece of clothing in my whole first playthrough, and I didn't even know you could slap the "limbs" away then. I also found it uninteresting concept-wise. I did notice later on while messing around that it becomes way harder with no clothing though.
Having your movement halted by little sticky-out bits that look like you should be able to easily step over was kinda annoying (this also prompted me and my friend to joke about a tripping mechanic). On that note it was also bit annoying to just barely not have enough height for certain jumps.
The interaction between enemies and the flashlight is very cool, but I wanted to be able to shoot that flickering light over that light-triggered enemy. I also only learned the connection between those and those slow armored enemies after I had already beat the game and my friend told me about it, I triggered that once near the end but didn't notice that I did. I also thought the armored enemies would only block shots, never did try to shoot them in their armored state, and just slowly kited them around.
The level design is p. corridor-y overall, not a whole lot of intricacies in the layout.
The mall signs were amusing.
The debug room becomes a clusterfuck of triggered enemies p. quickly in my experience. Also when I first saw that "Koubold" I thought he'd be friendly at first, being a similar creature to Moxie, compared to the so far homogeneous enemies, so it was a bit of a surprise when he teleported behind me all "nothing personnel"-like by spawning a vent from thin air. Whatever the plan is for his proper introduction in the game it should showcase clearly he's hostile, specially since he's also p. OP.
Some visual things:
Moxie's head should track her arms when aiming.
Reloading should have some animation besides the one pose.
Killed enemies should leave corpses behind.
I feel like the suit flashlight should be visible on the suit somewhere.
The railings on stairs are way too short, only going up to Moxie's knees.
Looking at the patreon ad image I for some reason expected the main menu to look something like that, it'd be cool if it did.
Some glitches, weirdness and screenshot spam:
Spamming jump while in the green goo will speed you up some, if you jump into it from normal ground and keep spamming jump as you go forward you will keep jumping full height and won't be slowed.
If you go back through the first usable door after the grate you will fall from the grate again.
Restarting from the end makes the first lever activated big door be already open.
If you constantly go down and to the left in the Koubold's minigame you'll end up in a tiny spot where you can just idle until the stamina depletes, that was also when I found out I could click to attack in that minigame as I just started trying random stuff then.
In my first playthrough I got stuck for a bit in between where these metal plates(?) and the ground connect, constantly hopping up and down. It took some effort to replicate it though, required a precise jump.
I then later found another spot like that further on, after the pile of ammo, just go forward without jumping and you can get stuck (it's inconsistent though).
Moxie rendering against the map is kinda inconsistent, when moving against some walls she renders over and others half of her gets occluded (which both look weird), perhaps her collision should be wider. You can also shove your gun through at least this wall.
And you can also shoot through the bottom of that wall while away from it at certain positions on the stairs (and idk what happened to her arms in this screenshot lo).
This one railing has collision that others of the same type don't.
Those crawling enemies can attack from under the floor if you go right next to a wall, as I found out while being suspicious about this broom (it immediately made me think of mimics from Prey(2017), which, I feel would be a fitting enemy type for this game), it crawled the wall underneath, escaping the grapple places it in the floor below.
The bloom effect in darker areas can make some weird glowy outlines appear on Moxie.
All in all, was a surprisingly enjoyable experience, and has potential.
- Yeah, it's weird. I'm not sure why it attracts "Not a Furry" people, but I'll take it.
- I also found the camera switching jarring. I've tested up and down aiming early on, but it still felt weird / introduces new bugs (like seeing out-of-map areas), but I'll see what I can do. If it doesn't work out, expect the camera to be the same. --- I agree the camera becomes a problem when stairs are involved. Don't know how to solve it currently.
- Her idle pose was actually the very first drawing of her. It was initially for reference, but then it stuck. Also, a shiver animation would take dev time from other mechanics, but it's still cool.
- Yeah, "flying off stairs" is weird. Still, I'd prefer making content than fiddle with physics.
- Grapple minigame does need a bit of a rework. Not sure when though.
- I do feel the jump needs to be higher, but I don't know by how much without trivializing gameplay. Will need to test it, --- (or let players set the jump height and run a poll on which is best.)
- "Shoot the flickering light" is a cool idea. Added.
- Yeah, I don't plan on having intricate levels. The gameplay demands your attention on the flashlight, so I'm fine with more corridor-y levels.
- I actually like the idea of Koubold being docile. Will think about that.
> Moxie rendering against the map is inconsistent. - An engine limitation, unfortunately. I have to find and patch these manually. Thanks for mentioning, though. These walls are patched now. (If you see an unpatched wall, assume I don't know about it. I'll patch it once I know.)
- Fixed the railing having collision.
- The stair railings being too short is for gameplay. It's annoying to see what's behind the railing at a glance. Still, I'll test it out to see if it's worth increasing.
- Added many of the bugs into the buglist.
Seriously, thank you for your impressions, ideas, and bugs. This is all super valuable, and a few are now in the game.
I'm not sure what exactly you've tried before but for what it's worth, the standard camera panning 2D shooters usually have always felt fine to me, for this game you could make it so the suit light enables a small amount of panning, and aiming down sights toggles a more sensitive panning rate with higher max distance for the camera, perhaps gradually transitioning, perhaps with transition tied to the time it takes to gain full accuracy? Or even make panning amount manual with the scroll wheel or smth, might be overcomplicating it though. If nothing else, personally I think the minimum that should be done is, reduce the speed at which camera side switching occurs with the suit light on, reduce camera transition speed when aiming (to hopefully help with the fact there's always some change to your crosshair position relative to world when you start aiming) and simply don't allow side switching at all when aiming.
And speaking of visible OoB areas, I actually found one while playing around with the latest version, just move either to the very left or the right of the ending elevator and aim in that same direction, you'll be able to see the grey void.
Fair enough on the stair air time, at least it's unlikely to affect gameplay much, with the coyote time still allowing for jumping and the high amount of air control allowing for a quick 180.
About the jump, I worded myself badly before, it's not so much that I feel it should be higher, I think it's mostly fine, and really it could still happen with higher jump heights, it's more of a potential level design issue that's likely to be in any game with jumping, any jumps you cannot make should just clearly look like so to the player. But one thing I feel could be done more generally is having a decent step up height, so you don't miss jumps by just barely stubbing your toe on the edge, I will also restate I believe this is necessary when simply walking on the ground to not get caught on tiny protrusions. It feels like the game kinda already has something like this, just very very small, as there's that area with short gaps you can run across without jumping but fall through if stopping on a gap, and how you hop up a little when stepping on the lift, as well as the stuck spots I reported before seem to be related.
Some more things from what I played of the latest version:
The console doesn't appear for me, I tried all keys it could possibly be, playing on the Linux version btw.
It turns out restarting from the end actually has all the doors already unlocked or open, except for the one that is also activated with those extendable platforms, unless your first playthrough after launching the game started from an alternate spawn after any lever activated doors.
Discarded mags of previous playthroughs will appear on a game restarted from the end.
If you beat the game, then restart and select an alternate spawn, they get screwed up, except for "quick start". "Warehouse" places you right behind the door that gets unlocked by the lever in that level, "theater" places you permanently falling through absolute blackness, and "mall" places you in front of a door in a secret room behind the mall's first set of stairs, entering the door places you in front of it again, there's no way out of this room I could find.
Shooting the flickering light while it's on will cause that plant to stay triggered forever, until you shine your flashlight on it which will fix its behavior.
Btw it'd be cool to see shootable lights used as a mechanic in new levels.
I don't think I ever noticed this suit here before, it kinda blends in with those seats.
Thank you! Most of these should be fixed in 0.2.0, except for the clothes pickup, the weird restart and mags. Even the camera speed is slowed.
(Restart and mag bugs fixed now, but not in the 0.2.0 update.)
The button for console is `. VM linux seems to work fine for DiBS 0.2.0.
I'm still finding a solution for just barely missing a ledge + small steps. One solution actually had a bug where items were treated as ledges, so that was weird. Still finding.
The camera panning feels much better now. Still feel more could be done in regards to how side switching can mess with up and down aiming though.
I still cannot open the console, I tried ' (quotes, key below Esc and besides 1 on my KB, which for p. much any other game is the console key even when they say it's ` or ~), ´ (it's besides P) and ~ (besides Ç), as well as every other symbol key for good measure, and even holding Shift. I realized I have no key that allows me to input ` without holding Shift, maybe that's relevant. I also have a PT-BR (ABTN2) keyboard, if that helps.
I think there should be cheats for the people wanting to check out the animations, trying to find a place, or wanting to see what is ate the end of the game. I also think there will be a button that goes to the debug room in the spawn locations menu.
Some of the cheats I recommend are:
-Full health
-Full clothes
-Reset [the] room (For when you might get stuck or used ammo unwisely)
-Reset [the] room with full resources
-[Go to] Cheat Room
Which brings me to my next suggestion, the Cheat Room! The cheat room will give you other, more special cheats like
-Full gallery
or
-Reset gallery
-Unlock gun[s]
And also adding upon that, I suggest a better gun later in the game (if you decide to expand upon it). Like a machine gun, or better yet, a shotgun!
The new update actually added an in-game console, so lucky you! There are only a few commands, but ammo, clothes, full gallery and reset gallery are there.
Will work on seeing if the other commands could be added.
For an alpha demo this is really fleshed out, not any detectable bugs in the actual play area of the game (I'm going to ignore the debug room because you're not supposed to play in it).
While this game will be great as a standard platformer, like Grimhelms Alien Quest Eve, with the atmosphere and the reactions of the aliens to enviromental factors such as the flashlight I could see it played out as an entire space station with more random alien placement rather than hard set with your story happening around the station rather than just farther into the level, and having to go to different portions to restock on magazines and repair your space suit, or even detox from the aliens to not get the game over and even to progress whatever story you are planning.
I love the idea of randomized placement. Unfortunately, with the way the game is structured, I don't think this can be added anytime soon. Although, I will consider this for the next game.
Still, glad you enjoyed it! (Also somewhat surprised you found the debug room if it's your first time playing.)
Great game! The concept has tons of potential and I'll be following development from here on because I'm excited to see where it goes.
My biggest critique is that it feels too easy. From what I can tell as a newcomer is that's because of improvements to things like i-frames and grappling. It sounds like it's gotten less frustrating, but that also took a lot of difficulty away as well. In a game where part of the fun is getting caught, it's a shame I had to fail on purpose or stay dressed. So I put some thought into why.
The grappling mini-game was too easy. Later on when the tentacles restrict movement during the grappling mini-game, that was hard enough that I felt I could win, but would probably still lose and it was great. Early on though there's little tension once you realize how easy it is to break free. Maybe if multiple enemies grapple you, it could make the minigame harder. Maybe it wouldn't feel like as much of an issue if the game was longer (which I assume it will be) since I can clearly see it does get harder, but as of now the easy beginning is most of the game.
To impose more challenge on myself, I tried doing a run where I let them win the mini-game every time they grapple me. I was surprised to find that that was also too easy. I was able to jump over almost every enemy. So even wasting ammo and getting caught in a bad position didn't really have a consequence. It would make more sense if taller enemies couldn't be jumped over without standing on something first, and only crawling enemies could be jumped over.
On my most recent run, I restricted myself to no jumping over enemies and no fighting out of grapples and it was probably the best one yet. It was punishing, but fair. Sure, I would get stuck in situations where damage would be unavoidable, but those situations were a result of poor positioning and ammo usage. And besides, losing is part of the fun. Yeah in the end I was caught in a death spiral so it's not ideal, but overall my favorite run.
Sorry if I sound like a try hard over an H game. It's just great to see something with promise and I hope this feedback is helpful!
- Agreed on the grapple mechanic. I plan on overhauling it a fair bit later on. If you have suggestions for it, I'd love to hear it!
- There has been a few requests for harder difficulty, and I'm still deciding if it's viable.
- No jumping is a neat idea. Maybe jumping leads to stamina drain? Although, I worry that the levels where you jump often will become annoying to traverse.
- Oh, and there was an idea for taller enemies, but that hasn't won any of the patron/discord votes, so there he stays in the cutting room void.
This is a genuinly shockingly well made game, even for an Alpha. It absolutely nails the scary atmosphere, the animations look very good and the gameplay itself even without the lewd stuff is fun and keeps you on your toes. Keep up the good work!
I actually ended up getting scared by a couple of enemies i wasnt expecting, i like it so far. I think the giant armored enemies are bugged as they never actually attacked?
Also i like the safe room music, thats Claire De Lune from evil within right?
That's not a glitch, you've entered a sort of gallery mode for the game, I think you can use space to summon whichever alien is whited out.There also maaaybeee a way to get out but I haven't said anything
Ok so this game is a pretty damn solid start. The atmosphere is bleak and spooky, the aliens are creepy gross and kinda terrifying, the gameplay itself is great (albiet with a few rough edges I'll go into), and the art is pretty solid. It was a legitimately heart-pounding and scary dive into an unforgiving abyss full of slimey rape-beast-plants....
As for rough edges, the jump is just too short for a few things that seem perfectly makeable (like when you activate stairs you can't quite jump to the platform from the second stair and you have to be on the very top stair), the grapple mechanic is a little hard to understand since it happens so bloody fast and what certain things mean are not explained BUT it can be figured out through a lot of brute force, the grapple mechanic happens so suddenly and with little warning or buffer that I will still have inputs from trying to move the character but I move her in the grapple game straight into a hazard and instantly lose, losing a grapple doesn't provide enough i-frames or anything to really avoid getting grappled again if there are more enemies, reloading the gun basically throws a few bullets away which I'm not sure if that's intended, the light-activated plants aren't properly signposted as invincible (like the armored pods are) and thus the first instinct to shoot at it ends up wasting like 2 clips of ammo, the light-sensitive plant also isn't super clear that light actually makes it aggressive at first (or maybe I'm stupid. Cause like, I saw the blinking light over it but it took me some time to realize the light affected the plant instead of the plant unpredictibly screeching at random), and the last unique plant thing right infront of the elevator that starts the credits is hard to avoid and jump over (I would walk into it's range a few times trying to get into the door and getting grappled by it puts you on the other side of it again. this might not've been an issue if I had sufficient ammo but I completely ran out at the end, ammo is sooo scarce)....
Anyways sorry for the lack of formatting and the massive wall of text. I really think this game has great potential and I really hope this feedback is helpful. I hope to see this game bloom into the game I think it can be.
No, thank you for the wall of text. I always enjoy reading these.
> the grapple mechanic is a little hard to understand
Yes, there needs to be a better tutorial. But at this stage, the focus is on adding more content. A better tutorial comes later. Thank you for bringing it up though.
> reloading the gun basically throws a few bullets away
Well, well. The update in 0.0.90 is exactly this. Reloading will now drop the magazine if there's still ammo.
> the light-activated plants aren't properly signposted as invincible
They aren't actually invincible, just really high health. They should probably be invincible though, now that I think about it. Nice catch.
> light-sensitive plant also isn't super clear that light actually makes it aggressive at first
Yeah, I had a problem designing enemies that signal the player they're light-sensitive. At least, not without breaking the style of the game.
> last unique plant thing right infront of the elevator
This one honestly needs a rework. It's very unclear what its gimmick is. ---- Thank you for writing! Always nice to read impressions.
In fact, feedback like this reminds what works and doesn't. You're helping make the game better just by giving impressions.
Light activated plants could glow in the dark. Theres already a bit of precedent for it as theres already a few plants that do that are light activated. That way you can see them before you aim your flashlight at them. And this way they can also provide cover for other enemies bc you can't see into the darkness without agroing the glowing ones
edit: which, i realize, is what you did originally. disregard, i'm an idiot :|
edit 2: might be part of a text-based tutorial, depending on how much story you plan on putting in the game. maybe a note from a character suggesting they don't like the light? might help dense folk like me pick up on the environmental cue on the first encounter
another idea might be to have the first encounter with light sensitive enemies signal it by forcing the player into a combat engagement.
i can picture it now, the first time encountering a light sensitive enemy there's a defective light that flickers on and off, enraging the enemy during the light and allowing it back to rest in the dark.
more like an environmental trap/simple puzzle than an enemy on the first encounter?
I think the most important points I mentioned were the ones you didn't have a reply to.
First, the need for a buffer between being grabbed and the grapple game actually beginning. Trying to run or jump away from something only for it to grab you and you immediately slam your icon into a hazard and instantly losing a grapple before you realize it even started feels really cheap.
Second, Ending a grapple (either by losing or winning (honestly it happens so fast it's hard to tell what's a win and what's a sort of neutral grapple)) and not having enough I-frames to escape multiple enemies is pretty rough. This problem is VASTLY magnified when trying to platform... I perfectly understand if you don't want it to be too easy, the difficulty adds to the eerie and terrifying tone. I'm merely pointing out that it could be a problem beyond just being hard.
I haven't played the update yet (and I might want to wait till after a few more updates, It depends on how I feel), but I have full confidence based on your responses to feedback that you are gonna keep at this and keep improving. I'm glad my feedback is useful, always a nice feeling knowing I've been heard and potentially helped smooth a promising game into a better direction with just a few words. Keep it up and remember to hydrate :)
Excuse me. I thought I mentioned this. I'm already implementing i-frames for the grapple-minigame icon.
Also, just double-checked and it seems the "i-frame timer after ending a grapple" got reset to 1 second instead of 1.6. I don't know when and why. Now reverted to 1.6 secs (or 2 secs. I'll see.)
As long as there arent any overtly complicated mechanics being added in the future, I think a tutorial beyond the controls isnt really needed. It adds to the feeling of being literally dropped into an alien and hostile environment.
I hate to say it but, frankly, I do wish this was a 'proper' sci-fi survival horror adventure (cinematic) platformer instead of (yet another) vessel for porn content.
Honestly, ye old "have to let em catch me to lose clothes before getting fucked" formula was never that good of a mechanic, even back when ToonPimp introduced the concept… Including a mini-game won't fix much.
So yeah, considering the artstyle and theme in general, as well as how the combat state and lighting behave, I can see the potential. Believe it or not, there aren't that many games in the genre. Some level design, movement animation, better gunplay - a lot that can be done on the UX front if the focus was shifted. Sex sells, but so do well-made video games.
Each to their own, I suppose. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ Good luck, anywise.
> "have to let em catch me to lose clothes before getting fucked" formula was never that good of a mechanic.
I feel the same way. Unfortunately, there isn't a lot of precedence for mixing porn and gameplay that doesn't ruin flow for either. If there were, I'd use that mechanic in a heartbeat.
But as of right now (as far as I can see), there is none.
Might as well take the existing formula and give it my own spin.
(I'd love to know a game that mixes lewd and game well, though.)
> I feel the same way. Unfortunately, there isn't a lot of precedence for mixing porn and gameplay that doesn't ruin flow for either. But as of right now (as far as I can see), there is none.
Well… In the context of current design, you can't have your cake and eat it: either players get to progress, or – see porno content. To the best of my knowledge, you cannot marry two fundamentally opposite game goals into a functional loop. i.e. A ‘run and gun’ style of gameplay where the player’s trying to avoid losing to enemies, and a ‘desirable loss’ state which encourages staying completely passive while getting (literally) fucked.
Frankly, it all comes down to what you, as the dev, want to achieve. Going out on a limb here, but doing this as a hobby, artistic expression, or even extra income, please don’t mind my wishful thinking. People obviously do want the porn, and they don’t care much about loops, MDA theory and UX stuff - I'm in the minority there. Instead have fun while picking up some experience along the way.
Heck, go ultra-silly! Give the audience even more reasons to want to ‘do it’ with the aliens…
Otherwise, may be you'd want to try some genre subversion. Like controlling the monsters against the character, à la reverse-horror games do, etc.
> I'd love to know a game that mixes lewd and game well, though
Gonna go off on a tangent first, so bear with me.
The availability of impactful mechanics in sex-games depend a lot on the game’s genre. As porn is meant to fulfil sexual fantasy scenarios and provide quick gratification, most smut experiences either focus on shorter play-times and simple, nonintrusive mechanics (e.g. casual, point&click, social), or have a lot of easily accessible and various lewd content (e.g. visual novels, dating sims, freeplay).
Games that delve more into narrative-design ultimately outgrow the pornography and turn to either exploring eroticism, sexual themes, or other, more grown-up stuff. Ze old ‘came for the porn, stayed for the story’ jazz.
All that said, off the top of my head, I do have are some suggestions of games (that are not pure visual novels, dating sims, or mini-games) that implemented sex-mechanics in 'interesting' ways:
- ‘Corruption of Champions’ makes the top of the list, as the body-modification mechanics, in addition to allowing combat customization and personalising the descriptions, (dis)allow certain sexual interactions depending on what tools the player possessed. Plus, the modded versions of the game have sooo much content ‘tis really hard not to be impressed.
- ‘Breeding Season’ was, before its downfall, the highest earning adult game on Patreon. I suppose people really wanted a well-drawn, animated, match-making, stats-management game about monster-hybrid husbandry. UI had a lot of issues, and tech-wise it got worse with every revision, but in case you’re curious how to run a promising project into the ground and still have an audience…
- ‘Tales of Androgyny’, for the time being, also suffers from the ‘desirable loss’ problem, but it’s the only porn game I know of that uses an RP combo system to allow setting-up certain (sexual) actions depending on the character’s stance and state of being. So there’s food for thought.
- ‘Rack 2’ is pretty darn impressive as far as visualization of lewd activities is concerned. Paired with the amounts of allowed customization, and the way it blends simple mechanics into more complex sexual interactions, it is a very promising adult freeplay game. Has some performance issues and bugs atm thou.
- ‘House of Tail’ is a game about managing a brothel. There are many of these out there, but somehow this one left the best impression, probably cause of the clean UI, or smtn. The porn element isn't as accented as the other ones I've listed. It's more about the theme, really.
- ‘My Very Own Lith’ starts off as a lewd digital pet game but, since its creator is a writer, things can get rather subversive depending on the players actions. Good example how writing can exploit basic mechanics.
So… there, I guess? Hopefully you'll find at least some of this useful. I'm all ears in case you need any more comment.
edit: clarity, fluency, formatting, spelling - work is never done.
> either players get to progress, or – see porno content.
Yep. What I'm struggling, design-wise: Connoting lewd scenes to progression (without throw-away* content.)
This is actually the purpose of the cinema tapes. Rewards for just exploring. (Although, I feel this reward method is archaic. It's also weird if you haven't let her get boned. Also somewhat throw-away*.)
*throw-away - lewd scenes shown once, then never brought up again. It always leaves a feeling of wanting more, and leads to project scaling problems.
---
> People obviously do want the porn, and they don’t care much about loops, MDA theory and UX stuff.
Absolutely. At the same time, I want a 2D shooting game with a specific reload mechanic, and I don't see it anywhere, porn or not. So I'm making it, and I'm so happy with how the shooting feels now. (Of course, needs improvement.)
> - I'm in the minority there.
Same.
---
>Otherwise, may be you'd want to try some genre subversion. Like controlling the monsters against the character, à la reverse-horror games do, etc.
Like Carrion? I love this idea. This was one of the first ideas before DiBS, until I realized how much assets I'd need to make. Then I promptly walked back from the idea. Project scale is something I'd want to manage. Still, I'd like to play this game.
---
From games you mentioned (and my personal observations of other games), I've noticed people really like story in their porn.
Actually, no. It's context. And that's something DiBS simply doesn't do at all.
DiBS is a "tourist-sightseeing" game with no dialogue whatsoever, and I feel this is holding the game back. (That, and the fact this is furry with tentacles lol.)
I don't think DiBS needs dialogue, but it does need explicit context. Random logs and journals would do a lot to legitimize the world and the experience. It's something I'd want to do later in development.
I've had this in the back of my head, but it's nice to legitimately write this down.
--- Anyway, thank you. Been insightful. It's also just nice to talk about what can be better for the game (or the next one).
i really loved a few implementations of Divine Arms, but the creator seems to be caught up in one thing or another, so as far as i know there's been no development on that game.
i loved its system of gameplay meets porn, where you could resist a "sex attack" similar to your grapple mechanic but with the typical button masher/point and clicker to prevent damage, or indulge in the "sex attack" voluntarily to take damage but gain damage buffs.
still didn't like the idea that you had to wait for an enemy AI to choose its "sex attack" instead of a regular attack, but i think it might be an interesting combination with your grapple mechanic? choose to resist, or choose to indulge by picking one of two "termination nodes" where if you just reach the cursor to the escape node, you escape as is in the current game, or to the "indulge node" where you can either take no damage or trade damage for a buff?
another idea i just had, mix the clothing/HP with a mechanical tradeoff, maybe the less armor you have, the harder it is to resist a grapple but the faster your stamina recharges, and alternatively/additionally you reload your pistol faster/move faster? i imagine if i was a little lady trapped in an infested station of tentacles, naked and afraid, i'd be pretty panicked and run a hell of a lot faster than when fully armored.
the last idea being that you could intentionally trade armor for buffs so that you can be instantly undressed in one grapple in favor of nude buffs(admittedly paired with debuffs so it's high risk+high reward)
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hey is there anyway to instanly unlock all enemies on respawn room (like a command or smth) for convenience sake?
hey man, heads up that the mac file is corrupted so playing the game on MacOS is currently impossible
I was just about to ask about this. Glad to see it isn't just me.
For some motivation:
I LOVE THIS GAME SO FAR I NEED MORE PLEASE
Deleted cuz I found the answer
You're that mf from GitHub that everyone resents /j
(if you know, you know)
R U N
run
F U N
fun
Let's F U C
Kin the future can you add invincibility in the gallery so we can see all the animations also i love this game!
okay but how do you get to the gallery?
also i may have found a bug with movement. simply put, when i move i catch on stuff for some reason. not sure if im catching on the ground or the game is forgetting im pressing a button or something. unsure.
EDIT: Found the bug. i had my controller plugged in at the same time. keep in mind that it was a PS4 controller using steam's controller api thing to make it look like an xbox controller.
Thank you. I'm not familiar with PS4 controllers on PC, so it's good that you brought that up!
what came in the most recent update? the 0.2 one. there is no dev log and i really like reading those. its a nice feeling to see progress, even if i had literally no part in the progress in question.
There's actually a new dev log! Though, it compares from 0.1.0 to 0.2.0, so if you played 0.1.9, then there's not much aside from behind-the-scenes game systems.
I cant find where the second tape is or is it not in the game yet?
They're found in the DebugRoom. To find Debug, jump over the door where the floor falls.
oh! I didn't think it was in the debug room, thank you for telling me!
would a male version be viable in the future uwu
Unfortunately not. There is this guy though.
Is he playable? :O
Nope. NPC.
dang, and i wanted to be gay lol, great game though
Same, lol, but yea, it is a great game UwU
is he in the update?
Just asking, Will be there's a Mobile version gor android?
Nope. No android, unfortunately.
great update
Hi there, the DiBS 0.1.9a Mac Version keeps giving me the "This application is damaged and should be trashed" error message on MacOS Monterey.
Edit: Solved it. Needed to use terminal to remove quarantine on it.
I know it's a minor detail, but I'm loving the "I'm enjoying this" face you gave Moxie when she's getting boned
I just got the game and haven't played much and I still need to play more but im absolutely in love with it already. I cant wait to see what more you put into this game. It has so much potential for even more!
the controls are really buggy, I am unable to move left or right unless I am heavilly mashing my A, or D button
Did you figure out how to get the game running?
Yeah, why? =P
It keeps crashing for me
Really? That's kinda weird, it works fine on my end. =/
Finally!
THE SETTINGS MENU
I'm having trouble with the new version (0.1.9a) on Mac. Looks like it just crashes every time I launch. Just a heads up!
yeah i had the same issue
Thank you. Fixed up a new build that'll hopefully work, but since I have no Mac, I can't be sure.
(Removed link)
If this one works, I'll replace the itch mac version and remove the link above.
Looks like this works! I'll reply here if I come across any new bugs (that aren't green and in-game). Alpha looking great.
I'm not sure if this is the place for suggestions, but i had some interesting ones for enemies/scenes. If someone (or the creator) could point me toward the whoever or whatever is in charge of sprite creation. I did thoroughly enjoy this game and cannot wait for any future content. Great job so far.
Thank you! There is a Discord with a suggestions channel.
Great game. Fun, atmospheric, and sexy as well. I feel there are amore than a few wasted tentacles floting about randomly. are there any intentions of anal or double penetration animations?
There is one that has four tentacles, and it's a double+anal animation.
I look forward to seeing it.
Didn't really expect I'd end up playing this when my friend linked me it, but between the sound design in the gameplay vid, the free software engine Godot, Linux support, the responses to feedback, and other details I learned, I felt I had to give it a try. Seemingly this game just has the mystical ability to catch the interest of people who are Not A Furry©™. Anyway, here's my feedback.
First impressions, found the camera side switching with the flashlight on kinda jarring, and it was very jarring when aiming as it was both more extreme and threw the crosshair forward. Later, this also made aiming down finicky when exploiting the enemies' AI on stairs, I also noticed then their hitbox is quite thin compared to their visuals. I really wish the camera would follow the crosshair up and down when aiming as well.
The two separate flashlights are cool, and the fact you can lose one of them.
Moxie's idle pose looks a bit weird, she looks like she's trying not to piss herself, which might be accurate considering the situation. How she closes one eye when aiming, while not proper, fits since she doesn't give the vibe of someone trained with firearms, despite that I still appreciate the muzzle discipline in the run anim. I also noticed the detail where she looks way more displeased about reloading without clothes.
Being able to see Moxie's breath is a nice detail, but because of that if there's ever to be any idle anims then she should totally shiver when missing any piece of clothing.
Atmosphere is quite intense, I still got startled by that grate despite kinda knowing it was coming, and I jumped a few more times through out, but tbh it's easy to spook me. There were some tense moments where I had to juke enemies out while panicking because of being unable to reload on the move. Although it is fairly easy to jump past enemies in general.
It's weird how you fly off the top of stairs when going up or down them, kinda reminded me of how Half-Life 1 handles slopes (not quite like this but close enough).
The magazine inventory keeping separate non-full mags reminded me of SWAT 4, very good. Being able to pick up a discarded mag is also cool.
The "grapple" minigame was trivial, didn't lose a single piece of clothing in my whole first playthrough, and I didn't even know you could slap the "limbs" away then. I also found it uninteresting concept-wise. I did notice later on while messing around that it becomes way harder with no clothing though.
Having your movement halted by little sticky-out bits that look like you should be able to easily step over was kinda annoying (this also prompted me and my friend to joke about a tripping mechanic). On that note it was also bit annoying to just barely not have enough height for certain jumps.
The interaction between enemies and the flashlight is very cool, but I wanted to be able to shoot that flickering light over that light-triggered enemy. I also only learned the connection between those and those slow armored enemies after I had already beat the game and my friend told me about it, I triggered that once near the end but didn't notice that I did. I also thought the armored enemies would only block shots, never did try to shoot them in their armored state, and just slowly kited them around.
The level design is p. corridor-y overall, not a whole lot of intricacies in the layout.
The mall signs were amusing.
The debug room becomes a clusterfuck of triggered enemies p. quickly in my experience. Also when I first saw that "Koubold" I thought he'd be friendly at first, being a similar creature to Moxie, compared to the so far homogeneous enemies, so it was a bit of a surprise when he teleported behind me all "nothing personnel"-like by spawning a vent from thin air. Whatever the plan is for his proper introduction in the game it should showcase clearly he's hostile, specially since he's also p. OP.
Some visual things:
Moxie's head should track her arms when aiming.
Reloading should have some animation besides the one pose.
Killed enemies should leave corpses behind.
I feel like the suit flashlight should be visible on the suit somewhere.
The railings on stairs are way too short, only going up to Moxie's knees.
Looking at the patreon ad image I for some reason expected the main menu to look something like that, it'd be cool if it did.
Some glitches, weirdness and screenshot spam:
Spamming jump while in the green goo will speed you up some, if you jump into it from normal ground and keep spamming jump as you go forward you will keep jumping full height and won't be slowed.
If you go back through the first usable door after the grate you will fall from the grate again.
Restarting from the end makes the first lever activated big door be already open.
If you constantly go down and to the left in the Koubold's minigame you'll end up in a tiny spot where you can just idle until the stamina depletes, that was also when I found out I could click to attack in that minigame as I just started trying random stuff then.
In my first playthrough I got stuck for a bit in between where these metal plates(?) and the ground connect, constantly hopping up and down. It took some effort to replicate it though, required a precise jump.
I then later found another spot like that further on, after the pile of ammo, just go forward without jumping and you can get stuck (it's inconsistent though).
Moxie rendering against the map is kinda inconsistent, when moving against some walls she renders over and others half of her gets occluded (which both look weird), perhaps her collision should be wider. You can also shove your gun through at least this wall.
And you can also shoot through the bottom of that wall while away from it at certain positions on the stairs (and idk what happened to her arms in this screenshot lo).
This one railing has collision that others of the same type don't.
Those crawling enemies can attack from under the floor if you go right next to a wall, as I found out while being suspicious about this broom (it immediately made me think of mimics from Prey(2017), which, I feel would be a fitting enemy type for this game), it crawled the wall underneath, escaping the grapple places it in the floor below.
The bloom effect in darker areas can make some weird glowy outlines appear on Moxie.
All in all, was a surprisingly enjoyable experience, and has potential.
Woah. This is a long one.
- Yeah, it's weird. I'm not sure why it attracts "Not a Furry" people, but I'll take it.
- I also found the camera switching jarring. I've tested up and down aiming early on, but it still felt weird / introduces new bugs (like seeing out-of-map areas), but I'll see what I can do. If it doesn't work out, expect the camera to be the same.
--- I agree the camera becomes a problem when stairs are involved. Don't know how to solve it currently.
- Her idle pose was actually the very first drawing of her. It was initially for reference, but then it stuck. Also, a shiver animation would take dev time from other mechanics, but it's still cool.
- Yeah, "flying off stairs" is weird. Still, I'd prefer making content than fiddle with physics.
- Grapple minigame does need a bit of a rework. Not sure when though.
- I do feel the jump needs to be higher, but I don't know by how much without trivializing gameplay. Will need to test it,
--- (or let players set the jump height and run a poll on which is best.)
- "Shoot the flickering light" is a cool idea. Added.
- Yeah, I don't plan on having intricate levels. The gameplay demands your attention on the flashlight, so I'm fine with more corridor-y levels.
- I actually like the idea of Koubold being docile. Will think about that.
> Moxie rendering against the map is inconsistent.
- An engine limitation, unfortunately. I have to find and patch these manually. Thanks for mentioning, though. These walls are patched now. (If you see an unpatched wall, assume I don't know about it. I'll patch it once I know.)
- Fixed the railing having collision.
- The stair railings being too short is for gameplay. It's annoying to see what's behind the railing at a glance. Still, I'll test it out to see if it's worth increasing.
- Added many of the bugs into the buglist.
Seriously, thank you for your impressions, ideas, and bugs. This is all super valuable, and a few are now in the game.
I'm not sure what exactly you've tried before but for what it's worth, the standard camera panning 2D shooters usually have always felt fine to me, for this game you could make it so the suit light enables a small amount of panning, and aiming down sights toggles a more sensitive panning rate with higher max distance for the camera, perhaps gradually transitioning, perhaps with transition tied to the time it takes to gain full accuracy? Or even make panning amount manual with the scroll wheel or smth, might be overcomplicating it though. If nothing else, personally I think the minimum that should be done is, reduce the speed at which camera side switching occurs with the suit light on, reduce camera transition speed when aiming (to hopefully help with the fact there's always some change to your crosshair position relative to world when you start aiming) and simply don't allow side switching at all when aiming.
And speaking of visible OoB areas, I actually found one while playing around with the latest version, just move either to the very left or the right of the ending elevator and aim in that same direction, you'll be able to see the grey void.
Fair enough on the stair air time, at least it's unlikely to affect gameplay much, with the coyote time still allowing for jumping and the high amount of air control allowing for a quick 180.
About the jump, I worded myself badly before, it's not so much that I feel it should be higher, I think it's mostly fine, and really it could still happen with higher jump heights, it's more of a potential level design issue that's likely to be in any game with jumping, any jumps you cannot make should just clearly look like so to the player. But one thing I feel could be done more generally is having a decent step up height, so you don't miss jumps by just barely stubbing your toe on the edge, I will also restate I believe this is necessary when simply walking on the ground to not get caught on tiny protrusions. It feels like the game kinda already has something like this, just very very small, as there's that area with short gaps you can run across without jumping but fall through if stopping on a gap, and how you hop up a little when stepping on the lift, as well as the stuck spots I reported before seem to be related.
Some more things from what I played of the latest version:
The console doesn't appear for me, I tried all keys it could possibly be, playing on the Linux version btw.
It turns out restarting from the end actually has all the doors already unlocked or open, except for the one that is also activated with those extendable platforms, unless your first playthrough after launching the game started from an alternate spawn after any lever activated doors.
Discarded mags of previous playthroughs will appear on a game restarted from the end.
If you beat the game, then restart and select an alternate spawn, they get screwed up, except for "quick start". "Warehouse" places you right behind the door that gets unlocked by the lever in that level, "theater" places you permanently falling through absolute blackness, and "mall" places you in front of a door in a secret room behind the mall's first set of stairs, entering the door places you in front of it again, there's no way out of this room I could find.
Shooting the flickering light while it's on will cause that plant to stay triggered forever, until you shine your flashlight on it which will fix its behavior.
Btw it'd be cool to see shootable lights used as a mechanic in new levels.
I don't think I ever noticed this suit here before, it kinda blends in with those seats.
I found out you can do this, lo.
Anyway, I'm glad to help.
Thank you! Most of these should be fixed in 0.2.0, except for the clothes pickup, the weird restart and mags. Even the camera speed is slowed.
(Restart and mag bugs fixed now, but not in the 0.2.0 update.)
The button for console is `. VM linux seems to work fine for DiBS 0.2.0.
I'm still finding a solution for just barely missing a ledge + small steps. One solution actually had a bug where items were treated as ledges, so that was weird. Still finding.
Once again, thank you!
No problem.
The camera panning feels much better now. Still feel more could be done in regards to how side switching can mess with up and down aiming though.
I still cannot open the console, I tried ' (quotes, key below Esc and besides 1 on my KB, which for p. much any other game is the console key even when they say it's ` or ~), ´ (it's besides P) and ~ (besides Ç), as well as every other symbol key for good measure, and even holding Shift. I realized I have no key that allows me to input ` without holding Shift, maybe that's relevant. I also have a PT-BR (ABTN2) keyboard, if that helps.
Hm. Okay. I'll just make F1 as another way to open the console.
The new 0.2.0a update should allow the F1 key to be used.
Oh, it's using the Godot engine.
I think there should be cheats for the people wanting to check out the animations, trying to find a place, or wanting to see what is ate the end of the game. I also think there will be a button that goes to the debug room in the spawn locations menu.
Some of the cheats I recommend are:
-Full health
-Full clothes
-Reset [the] room (For when you might get stuck or used ammo unwisely)
-Reset [the] room with full resources
-[Go to] Cheat Room
Which brings me to my next suggestion, the Cheat Room! The cheat room will give you other, more special cheats like
-Full gallery
or
-Reset gallery
-Unlock gun[s]
And also adding upon that, I suggest a better gun later in the game (if you decide to expand upon it). Like a machine gun, or better yet, a shotgun!
what are your opinions on this?
The new update actually added an in-game console, so lucky you! There are only a few commands, but ammo, clothes, full gallery and reset gallery are there.
Will work on seeing if the other commands could be added.
thank you for listening to my suggestions
For an alpha demo this is really fleshed out, not any detectable bugs in the actual play area of the game (I'm going to ignore the debug room because you're not supposed to play in it).
While this game will be great as a standard platformer, like Grimhelms Alien Quest Eve, with the atmosphere and the reactions of the aliens to enviromental factors such as the flashlight I could see it played out as an entire space station with more random alien placement rather than hard set with your story happening around the station rather than just farther into the level, and having to go to different portions to restock on magazines and repair your space suit, or even detox from the aliens to not get the game over and even to progress whatever story you are planning.
I love the idea of randomized placement. Unfortunately, with the way the game is structured, I don't think this can be added anytime soon. Although, I will consider this for the next game.
Still, glad you enjoyed it! (Also somewhat surprised you found the debug room if it's your first time playing.)
Great game! The concept has tons of potential and I'll be following development from here on because I'm excited to see where it goes.
My biggest critique is that it feels too easy. From what I can tell as a newcomer is that's because of improvements to things like i-frames and grappling. It sounds like it's gotten less frustrating, but that also took a lot of difficulty away as well. In a game where part of the fun is getting caught, it's a shame I had to fail on purpose or stay dressed. So I put some thought into why.
The grappling mini-game was too easy. Later on when the tentacles restrict movement during the grappling mini-game, that was hard enough that I felt I could win, but would probably still lose and it was great. Early on though there's little tension once you realize how easy it is to break free. Maybe if multiple enemies grapple you, it could make the minigame harder. Maybe it wouldn't feel like as much of an issue if the game was longer (which I assume it will be) since I can clearly see it does get harder, but as of now the easy beginning is most of the game.
To impose more challenge on myself, I tried doing a run where I let them win the mini-game every time they grapple me. I was surprised to find that that was also too easy. I was able to jump over almost every enemy. So even wasting ammo and getting caught in a bad position didn't really have a consequence. It would make more sense if taller enemies couldn't be jumped over without standing on something first, and only crawling enemies could be jumped over.
On my most recent run, I restricted myself to no jumping over enemies and no fighting out of grapples and it was probably the best one yet. It was punishing, but fair. Sure, I would get stuck in situations where damage would be unavoidable, but those situations were a result of poor positioning and ammo usage. And besides, losing is part of the fun. Yeah in the end I was caught in a death spiral so it's not ideal, but overall my favorite run.
Sorry if I sound like a try hard over an H game. It's just great to see something with promise and I hope this feedback is helpful!
Thank you for the feedback!
- Agreed on the grapple mechanic. I plan on overhauling it a fair bit later on. If you have suggestions for it, I'd love to hear it!
- There has been a few requests for harder difficulty, and I'm still deciding if it's viable.
- No jumping is a neat idea. Maybe jumping leads to stamina drain? Although, I worry that the levels where you jump often will become annoying to traverse.
- Oh, and there was an idea for taller enemies, but that hasn't won any of the patron/discord votes, so there he stays in the cutting room void.
Anyway, am glad you enjoyed the game!
This is a genuinly shockingly well made game, even for an Alpha. It absolutely nails the scary atmosphere, the animations look very good and the gameplay itself even without the lewd stuff is fun and keeps you on your toes. Keep up the good work!
Thank you! Real glad you enjoyed the game.
I actually ended up getting scared by a couple of enemies i wasnt expecting, i like it so far. I think the giant armored enemies are bugged as they never actually attacked?
Also i like the safe room music, thats Claire De Lune from evil within right?
- Oh, they aren't supposed to attack (unless you shoot the head).
- Yep, but not specifically from Evil Within.
Oh that clears things up, and yeah i recognized the track, it was a nice choice
btw, what do you do with the tapes?
and i also think there should be a "exit to main menu" button soon
Sure. Added to to-do list.
The tape is used in the place called "YMAX."
and where is that
btw there is a glitch in the game where when you "die", there are whited out aliens to the right of the screen.
That's not a glitch, you've entered a sort of gallery mode for the game, I think you can use space to summon whichever alien is whited out.
There also maaaybeee a way to get out but I haven't said anythingHow do you change the alien bc i only ever get one
press up and down to cycle through enemies you have encountered
i got so fucking jumpscared by the floor falling bruh
it will be cool if u add an option to change your sex in the game
I wish you can masterbate in the game by pressing a certain button
im having trouble finding the koubold and the other cinema tape, ive found the one in the mall, could you tell me where i can find either of these?
You can find the koubold and the tape in the debug room. Just jump over the floor that breaks and you'll see the debug room.
ok thanks
Is there a way to get to the debug room without starting the game over?
I didn't find it tbh but its ok! I might find it next time...
Ok so this game is a pretty damn solid start. The atmosphere is bleak and spooky, the aliens are creepy gross and kinda terrifying, the gameplay itself is great (albiet with a few rough edges I'll go into), and the art is pretty solid. It was a legitimately heart-pounding and scary dive into an unforgiving abyss full of slimey rape-beast-plants....
As for rough edges, the jump is just too short for a few things that seem perfectly makeable (like when you activate stairs you can't quite jump to the platform from the second stair and you have to be on the very top stair), the grapple mechanic is a little hard to understand since it happens so bloody fast and what certain things mean are not explained BUT it can be figured out through a lot of brute force, the grapple mechanic happens so suddenly and with little warning or buffer that I will still have inputs from trying to move the character but I move her in the grapple game straight into a hazard and instantly lose, losing a grapple doesn't provide enough i-frames or anything to really avoid getting grappled again if there are more enemies, reloading the gun basically throws a few bullets away which I'm not sure if that's intended, the light-activated plants aren't properly signposted as invincible (like the armored pods are) and thus the first instinct to shoot at it ends up wasting like 2 clips of ammo, the light-sensitive plant also isn't super clear that light actually makes it aggressive at first (or maybe I'm stupid. Cause like, I saw the blinking light over it but it took me some time to realize the light affected the plant instead of the plant unpredictibly screeching at random), and the last unique plant thing right infront of the elevator that starts the credits is hard to avoid and jump over (I would walk into it's range a few times trying to get into the door and getting grappled by it puts you on the other side of it again. this might not've been an issue if I had sufficient ammo but I completely ran out at the end, ammo is sooo scarce)....
Anyways sorry for the lack of formatting and the massive wall of text. I really think this game has great potential and I really hope this feedback is helpful. I hope to see this game bloom into the game I think it can be.
No, thank you for the wall of text. I always enjoy reading these.
> the grapple mechanic is a little hard to understand
Yes, there needs to be a better tutorial. But at this stage, the focus is on adding more content. A better tutorial comes later. Thank you for bringing it up though.
> reloading the gun basically throws a few bullets away
Well, well. The update in 0.0.90 is exactly this. Reloading will now drop the magazine if there's still ammo.
> the light-activated plants aren't properly signposted as invincible
They aren't actually invincible, just really high health. They should probably be invincible though, now that I think about it. Nice catch.
> light-sensitive plant also isn't super clear that light actually makes it aggressive at first
Yeah, I had a problem designing enemies that signal the player they're light-sensitive. At least, not without breaking the style of the game.
> last unique plant thing right infront of the elevator
This one honestly needs a rework. It's very unclear what its gimmick is.
----
Thank you for writing! Always nice to read impressions.
In fact, feedback like this reminds what works and doesn't. You're helping make the game better just by giving impressions.
(PS. new update released.)
Light activated plants could glow in the dark. Theres already a bit of precedent for it as theres already a few plants that do that are light activated. That way you can see them before you aim your flashlight at them. And this way they can also provide cover for other enemies bc you can't see into the darkness without agroing the glowing ones
I like the glow in the dark idea. I'm just worried it'll impact performance.
Still, I'll see if it's feasible. Great suggestion!
edit: which, i realize, is what you did originally. disregard, i'm an idiot :|
edit 2: might be part of a text-based tutorial, depending on how much story you plan on putting in the game. maybe a note from a character suggesting they don't like the light? might help dense folk like me pick up on the environmental cue on the first encounter
another idea might be to have the first encounter with light sensitive enemies signal it by forcing the player into a combat engagement.
i can picture it now, the first time encountering a light sensitive enemy there's a defective light that flickers on and off, enraging the enemy during the light and allowing it back to rest in the dark.
more like an environmental trap/simple puzzle than an enemy on the first encounter?
I think the most important points I mentioned were the ones you didn't have a reply to.
First, the need for a buffer between being grabbed and the grapple game actually beginning. Trying to run or jump away from something only for it to grab you and you immediately slam your icon into a hazard and instantly losing a grapple before you realize it even started feels really cheap.
Second, Ending a grapple (either by losing or winning (honestly it happens so fast it's hard to tell what's a win and what's a sort of neutral grapple)) and not having enough I-frames to escape multiple enemies is pretty rough. This problem is VASTLY magnified when trying to platform... I perfectly understand if you don't want it to be too easy, the difficulty adds to the eerie and terrifying tone. I'm merely pointing out that it could be a problem beyond just being hard.
I haven't played the update yet (and I might want to wait till after a few more updates, It depends on how I feel), but I have full confidence based on your responses to feedback that you are gonna keep at this and keep improving. I'm glad my feedback is useful, always a nice feeling knowing I've been heard and potentially helped smooth a promising game into a better direction with just a few words. Keep it up and remember to hydrate :)
Excuse me. I thought I mentioned this. I'm already implementing i-frames for the grapple-minigame icon.
Also, just double-checked and it seems the "i-frame timer after ending a grapple" got reset to 1 second instead of 1.6. I don't know when and why. Now reverted to 1.6 secs (or 2 secs. I'll see.)
These changes should be in the next, next update.
Thanks for the catch!
As long as there arent any overtly complicated mechanics being added in the future, I think a tutorial beyond the controls isnt really needed. It adds to the feeling of being literally dropped into an alien and hostile environment.
The floor at the start? Didn't see it coming.
I hate to say it but, frankly, I do wish this was a 'proper' sci-fi survival horror adventure (cinematic) platformer instead of (yet another) vessel for porn content.
Honestly, ye old "have to let em catch me to lose clothes before getting fucked" formula was never that good of a mechanic, even back when ToonPimp introduced the concept… Including a mini-game won't fix much.
So yeah, considering the artstyle and theme in general, as well as how the combat state and lighting behave, I can see the potential. Believe it or not, there aren't that many games in the genre. Some level design, movement animation, better gunplay - a lot that can be done on the UX front if the focus was shifted. Sex sells, but so do well-made video games.
Each to their own, I suppose. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Good luck, anywise.
> "have to let em catch me to lose clothes before getting fucked" formula was never that good of a mechanic.
I feel the same way. Unfortunately, there isn't a lot of precedence for mixing porn and gameplay that doesn't ruin flow for either. If there were, I'd use that mechanic in a heartbeat.
But as of right now (as far as I can see), there is none.
Might as well take the existing formula and give it my own spin.
(I'd love to know a game that mixes lewd and game well, though.)
Huh. Not the reply I expected, actually.
> I feel the same way. Unfortunately, there isn't a lot of precedence for mixing porn and gameplay that doesn't ruin flow for either. But as of right now (as far as I can see), there is none.
Well… In the context of current design, you can't have your cake and eat it: either players get to progress, or – see porno content. To the best of my knowledge, you cannot marry two fundamentally opposite game goals into a functional loop. i.e. A ‘run and gun’ style of gameplay where the player’s trying to avoid losing to enemies, and a ‘desirable loss’ state which encourages staying completely passive while getting (literally) fucked.
Frankly, it all comes down to what you, as the dev, want to achieve. Going out on a limb here, but doing this as a hobby, artistic expression, or even extra income, please don’t mind my wishful thinking. People obviously do want the porn, and they don’t care much about loops, MDA theory and UX stuff - I'm in the minority there. Instead have fun while picking up some experience along the way.
Heck, go ultra-silly! Give the audience even more reasons to want to ‘do it’ with the aliens…
Otherwise, may be you'd want to try some genre subversion. Like controlling the monsters against the character, à la reverse-horror games do, etc.
> I'd love to know a game that mixes lewd and game well, though
Gonna go off on a tangent first, so bear with me.
The availability of impactful mechanics in sex-games depend a lot on the game’s genre. As porn is meant to fulfil sexual fantasy scenarios and provide quick gratification, most smut experiences either focus on shorter play-times and simple, nonintrusive mechanics (e.g. casual, point&click, social), or have a lot of easily accessible and various lewd content (e.g. visual novels, dating sims, freeplay).
Games that delve more into narrative-design ultimately outgrow the pornography and turn to either exploring eroticism, sexual themes, or other, more grown-up stuff. Ze old ‘came for the porn, stayed for the story’ jazz.
All that said, off the top of my head, I do have are some suggestions of games (that are not pure visual novels, dating sims, or mini-games) that implemented sex-mechanics in 'interesting' ways:
- ‘Corruption of Champions’ makes the top of the list, as the body-modification mechanics, in addition to allowing combat customization and personalising the descriptions, (dis)allow certain sexual interactions depending on what tools the player possessed. Plus, the modded versions of the game have sooo much content ‘tis really hard not to be impressed.
- ‘Breeding Season’ was, before its downfall, the highest earning adult game on Patreon. I suppose people really wanted a well-drawn, animated, match-making, stats-management game about monster-hybrid husbandry. UI had a lot of issues, and tech-wise it got worse with every revision, but in case you’re curious how to run a promising project into the ground and still have an audience…
- ‘Tales of Androgyny’, for the time being, also suffers from the ‘desirable loss’ problem, but it’s the only porn game I know of that uses an RP combo system to allow setting-up certain (sexual) actions depending on the character’s stance and state of being. So there’s food for thought.
- ‘Rack 2’ is pretty darn impressive as far as visualization of lewd activities is concerned. Paired with the amounts of allowed customization, and the way it blends simple mechanics into more complex sexual interactions, it is a very promising adult freeplay game. Has some performance issues and bugs atm thou.
- ‘House of Tail’ is a game about managing a brothel. There are many of these out there, but somehow this one left the best impression, probably cause of the clean UI, or smtn. The porn element isn't as accented as the other ones I've listed. It's more about the theme, really.
- ‘My Very Own Lith’ starts off as a lewd digital pet game but, since its creator is a writer, things can get rather subversive depending on the players actions. Good example how writing can exploit basic mechanics.
So… there, I guess?
Hopefully you'll find at least some of this useful.
I'm all ears in case you need any more comment.
edit: clarity, fluency, formatting, spelling - work is never done.
Hey, sorry for the late reply!
> either players get to progress, or – see porno content.
Yep. What I'm struggling, design-wise: Connoting lewd scenes to progression (without throw-away* content.)
This is actually the purpose of the cinema tapes. Rewards for just exploring. (Although, I feel this reward method is archaic. It's also weird if you haven't let her get boned. Also somewhat throw-away*.)
*throw-away - lewd scenes shown once, then never brought up again. It always leaves a feeling of wanting more, and leads to project scaling problems.
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> People obviously do want the porn, and they don’t care much about loops, MDA theory and UX stuff.
Absolutely. At the same time, I want a 2D shooting game with a specific reload mechanic, and I don't see it anywhere, porn or not. So I'm making it, and I'm so happy with how the shooting feels now. (Of course, needs improvement.)
> - I'm in the minority there.
Same.
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> Otherwise, may be you'd want to try some genre subversion. Like controlling the monsters against the character, à la reverse-horror games do, etc.
Like Carrion? I love this idea. This was one of the first ideas before DiBS, until I realized how much assets I'd need to make. Then I promptly walked back from the idea. Project scale is something I'd want to manage. Still, I'd like to play this game.
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From games you mentioned (and my personal observations of other games), I've noticed people really like story in their porn.
Actually, no. It's context. And that's something DiBS simply doesn't do at all.
DiBS is a "tourist-sightseeing" game with no dialogue whatsoever, and I feel this is holding the game back. (That, and the fact this is furry with tentacles lol.)
I don't think DiBS needs dialogue, but it does need explicit context. Random logs and journals would do a lot to legitimize the world and the experience. It's something I'd want to do later in development.
I've had this in the back of my head, but it's nice to legitimately write this down.
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Anyway, thank you. Been insightful. It's also just nice to talk about what can be better for the game (or the next one).
Edit: Typo, different opening, and clarity.
i really loved a few implementations of Divine Arms, but the creator seems to be caught up in one thing or another, so as far as i know there's been no development on that game.
i loved its system of gameplay meets porn, where you could resist a "sex attack" similar to your grapple mechanic but with the typical button masher/point and clicker to prevent damage, or indulge in the "sex attack" voluntarily to take damage but gain damage buffs.
still didn't like the idea that you had to wait for an enemy AI to choose its "sex attack" instead of a regular attack, but i think it might be an interesting combination with your grapple mechanic? choose to resist, or choose to indulge by picking one of two "termination nodes" where if you just reach the cursor to the escape node, you escape as is in the current game, or to the "indulge node" where you can either take no damage or trade damage for a buff?
another idea i just had, mix the clothing/HP with a mechanical tradeoff, maybe the less armor you have, the harder it is to resist a grapple but the faster your stamina recharges, and alternatively/additionally you reload your pistol faster/move faster? i imagine if i was a little lady trapped in an infested station of tentacles, naked and afraid, i'd be pretty panicked and run a hell of a lot faster than when fully armored.
the last idea being that you could intentionally trade armor for buffs so that you can be instantly undressed in one grapple in favor of nude buffs(admittedly paired with debuffs so it's high risk+high reward)
Will there be an android version or one that work with joiplay
Sorry. Unfortunately, there won't be an Android version. I'm not even sure if the game can even run on mobile.
This is amazing, I'm considering supporting the patron I just want updates, it's fun and it has real good sex scenes (my opinion)
Thank you! A new update just got released as well. Nothing much. Just a few new enemies.
Will there be android
Sorry. There won't be an Android version. I'm not even sure if it can even run on mobile, since even older machines lag the game.
What aversion that can run on joiplayor wine
The game can't run on joiplay, I'm afraid.
Ok