Respond to this topic with the answers to these questions.
It's a question adjacent to question 5, so I'll ask it here instead of sitting on it: Any plans of making a Mac version of the game? I know rpgmaker tends to be a bit difficult to port over, but I've heard there's sites and engines that'll change everything for you, and I'd be more than happy to bugtest and make sure it's working.
I return with news! Not the good kind, but the interesting kind at least!
First and foremost, downloaded the experimental mac version, unzipped it, went to start it, INSTANTLY said "The application can't be opened", no way to xattr my way around that.
Secondly, started perusing the files to see if there was anything I could do, noticed that they are quadruple nested in the www folder, dunno if that's intended (click www the first time, a few things change, but the second and third time it's the same. Fourth time, has some of the same folders, but not another www file)
Finally, I also noticed that the Resources folder INSIDE the Game Application (the one that should run on Mac, "Show package contents -> Contents -> Resources -> app.nw") seems to include all of the same files as the Windows version, and is also quadruple nested in the www folder. Might explain why the windows version is about 900MB and the mac one is almost 3GB.
I'll say it now, I'm not a game dev, but I AM a game player, and most of the ones I've got that run on mac have the game folder, and inside is "Game.app" and sometimes "credits.html". Everything from Contents to App.nw looks about right, but then it has those .dll and .pak files which I'm fairly certain Mac can't open, the games I'm looking at all have json, rpgmvp (images), and rpgmvo (pretty much anything else), the latter 2 work fine since they're handled by the app itself. You CAN use the classic png/jpg, or .ogg if you don't mind folk poking through and seeing all the content.
Having typed out all those words, it looks like a lot, but I'm confident it's all important and understandable. I implore you, look into this, and if you need someone to test a mac port again, upload it and I'll see, or you can reply to any of my messages. Tally ho!
EDIT: posted this, went to my feed, IMMEDIATELY saw you noticed the nesting files LMAO
Lol that is kind of funny timing. I already updated the Mac version so that zip is now 1.3GB.
It looks like the image files are available in the Win version as well. It doesn't matter that much since I was planning on letting other people have access to my sprites anyways.
Once I detangle the files fully I'll update the Mac version again. Hopefully that will make it easier to figure out.
I updated the file again and it now has only the Mac files in there.
If it still doesnt work then I found an option from a steam message board you can try:
https://steamcommunity.com/app/363890/discussions/1/3277925755444294890
1. Yes please.
2. Sure, I saw the dryads walking near the plants and I thought they were going to grow and get immobilized. It'd be cool to trick them into doing that as a possible puzzle. Or/and you could maybe do a block/plug puzzle with them when they've gotten too big. Like maybe you have to slide them next to some vines that will drink the milk and open a path for the player. I think it'd be neat to integrate some more puzzles like that to get some more playtime and depth.
3. I Liked em.
4. I also like those.
1. If you do, make it skippable past the first time.
2. The forest area definitely felt like there would've been something more to it. Like another commenter said, consideering the dryads are known to grow from the corruption, turning the area from a simple chase sequence into a puzzle to make them grow might be a cool spin on it
3. Loved the vine and dryad animations. Protip though: before the event, load all the images in sequence off-screen on a dummy event to get rid of the sprite flicker. As long as they've been loaded at least once, the flicker won't happen. It's helpful for the character portrait, too.
4. The science scenes were cool, although I never actually found the laboratory. I just accessed them through the gallery. Where is it?
5. N/A
6. Did find it, quite enjoyed it. Was the first code I thought of.
General feedback:
- Artwork is great! Love me some cowgirls. Can't wait for the other expansion types!
- Please look around for new music. I think it's safe to say that the default RMMV music tracks have been done to death by this point. There's oodles of great royalty-free music out there if you go looking.
- You should aim to reward the player with fetish scenes for succeeding, rather than as a failure state. It's really counter-intuitive to lose to get what you want. I know why it's done and it fits with the gameplay, but it shouldn't be prioritized. Still, props for giving the player a consolation prize for losing, so there is still an incentive.
- I presume the money will be used for purchasing stuff other than tokens at some point? The shop feels quite anemic at this point in time.
Overall, I really enjoyed this and can't wait to see it develop further!
Firstly, thanks for the excellent feedback. I appreciate it.
Chuckl609 did have a good suggestion and I will probably use something in relation to it.
That's good to know about the images. I was thinking I would need to put them on a higher image layer and then lower them down, but preloading them will be easier to do.
The lab is intended to be a scenes only location. I could technically make it accessible and let the player examine parts of it, but the gallery is the intended way to interact with it.
I can look for other music. I also noticed that this music is used by, basically every other RPGM game so far lol.
It is kind of funny making reward events for failing. I'm going to make an extra scene for each region once you beat them. They are going to take a bit to make though. Hmm, maybe i should also make a scene for when you rescue enough people too.
The money is kind of a weird left over from the original concept for the game which was that you had to earn 1 million coins to pay for your resurrection. As I scrapped that idea money has become much less important, especially since there will be no actual battles. Oh, I could make usable items that reduce essence or something along those lines.
1. I agree with another comment, adding one for flavor would be great, but it should be skippable if it results in the same thing again (the dryad scene and the special vines scene are notable, and should be forced to view at least once)
2. A cutscene, three chase sequences, then another cutscene does feel a bit short, but making it longer could feel repetitive, so it's probably fine.
3. Vines and Dryad scene were great, though the "Hey, if you do this something's gonna happen" in front of the vines could've been shorter. A simple "I don't trust those vines" followed by "Do I really want to chance this? [YES, NO]" would've worked wonders there. You could even do a "I know what these are gonna do to me" thing for repeats, whether that be to avoid them or to prompt the player again, who's to say.
4. The science scenes were fun, and made for some excellent world-building. The fact that you physically need a dryad seed to do the third science was a bit annoying, especially since the event that gives you them is from losing, AND it explicitly says "Just sell these"
5. N/A (I appreciate all the work of getting a Mac port up and running)
6. I did! It took me a second to see it since it's tucked away a bit, as all debug-y things should be.
For the Dryad zone:
If you don't already have anything in mind. I think to better tie in the Dryads with the science portion you could have the chase event have a switch that sets after you save the girl/beat the zone. So that when you return to the dryad area, they could be sitting around, or offer to help you with your research leading to a similar ending scene as the losing animation. That could allow for it to be a nonloss event after the main goals are reached in the zone and easier on players to gather the Dryad seeds, or for replayability (different reason why you're chased through the scene after completion)
All in all I think this is a fun game and I can't wait to see more!
1. Go nuts. I wouldn't mind an animation as long as there's some way to skip it if it becomes tedious.
2. Longer? No, but if there's some way to pause movement scripts for the dryads (such as when you're rescuing a cow or using a bulb) that'd be great.
3 & 4. Scenes were great. Good stuff.
5. N/A
6. I... did. On accident. So, when you first start the game, you can actually get into the debug room without a code. I'm not actually sure if that was intentional, but there's only a hole in the wall to squeeze through where the keypad is (which gives you access to the room without needing the code). I found that the keypad only appears after you enter the character room for the first time.
Glad to see you back, Primalemotion. I loved your Flash stuff, and when that died I thought you (like many other flash game creators) went the way of the dodo. Super pleased to see you still doing stuff!
1. Personally I don't care that much about that, so my vote is "no" if it would slow down the development too much, but if majority wants it then it'll probably help the game's popularity in which case I fully support it.
2. More content is always nice, but the forest area didn't strike me as too short, aside from the fact that I need more of this game in my life but that's not especially heh
3. Personally not into vines so I'm probably not the one to judge.
4. Interesting concept and executed quite well I'd say but personally I prefer interactive stuff overall.
5. For me personally it was a piece of cake.
6. I don't believe I did.
1. Would be nice, but it's not a huge deal imo. If it's too much trouble there's more important things to focus on currently.
2. The length is fine for the first area, but I wouldn't mind an extra section with its own checkpoint. Or some sort of side area off the main path that contains a tiny sidequest or something, with a few rescue tokens as a reward. I was also hoping to revisit the Dryad tree after completing the forest wondering if I could meet an NPC or two in there or at least explore it for an item or two, but it looks like it just takes you back to viewing the cutscene and otherwise just teleports you back.
3. Pretty good. Though I'm unsure I missed one scene with the first vine where you can choose to just try to burst through it. I chose not to, and it doesn't appear like there's a way to make that vine reappear when I came back later. And I'm not even sure if that has a scene anyway since it doesn't show up in the gallery anywhere.
On that note, the gallery could use some expanding (no pun intended) to contain these sorts of minor "bad-end"-like sequences that you would normally want to avoid (like with the vines). With the method of unlocking them requiring you to either do it at least once, or if it's totally inaccessible after finishing an area, just finishing said area. It could serve as an actual gallery to view scenes and cutscenes you have already done in regular gameplay, and have one section of it be reserved for scenes exclusive to the gallery.
4. Pretty good. Could be more immersive to have that area actually accessible outside of the science cutscenes though, and initiate them for the first time from there rather than the gallery. Bonus points if we could interact with the huge cowgirl inbetween scenes for extra dialogue tidbits.
6. I did see the keypad but figured it's some sort of secret code for testers, so I didn't bother with it. Seeing the hint in this thread makes it very obvious though so I know the code now lol
The only real issue I've noticed is that at the current max sizes (including overload but that one might be intentional) the image simply gets cropped and you can't really see the full boob. I'm unsure if that's simply a limitation of this version of rpgmaker or if something can be done about it, but it would be nice to see the full-body shots at bigger sizes when those become a thing.
A suggestion I'd love to see is Cowsza herself getting bigger with every area you beat in the main game, starting with the Forest. Similarly to how Seeds of Destiny makes their goddess bigger with every few crystals you find, signifying that her power has increased. And just generally I'd love some scenes with Cowsza as the focus, even if later in the game.
This is good feedback.
With the current max sizes it's related to the size of the PNG images themselves. It's not really a limitation, but more that I chose that width so that it won't cover up anything on screen. You can change the overload image to show the entire width of it and goes to, like, half way across the screen. I might change the option to show the full overload image to also show the full expansion sizes.
Eventually, I'll make Cowza change to the same growth type the player chooses. And I do plan to make her grow at some point, it's just lower priority.
Hmm, maybe I should make a scene for Cowza doing something.
I gave the game a try - stands out pretty nicely in the endless sea of RPG Maker expansion titles. Here's what I have to say in response to the questions:
Since I saw other people give their thoughts beyond the questionnaire in their posts here, I'll do the same. I genuinely love what you've got going here - the story having a significant focus on lore that isn't just "girls are growing and you have to figure out what" is refreshing. I've always been a sucker for growth having some sort of explained catalyst behind it, and that's partly why I love the angle you took of focusing on an established scientist character. I do feel like a bit more focus could be placed on the puzzle elements, since right now a lot of it is just "make sure you have enough storage for the essence you're about to absorb."
