Category: Harem Collector

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Four Years In

So, yesterday was the fourth anniversary of Harem Collector’s first public release, only a couple days after Nekochan had a curious peek at what I was doing in RPG Maker and encouraged me to share it with the world. It’s been quite a trip, and a lot has changed over the years. And now, the end is coming into sight. If all goes according to plan, we’re going to do v1.0 by December 2018, though certain assets like HCG and music will lag for some time after.

The general plan is to finish up the five general plotlines by late spring 2018, before diving into doing the endgame and character-specific quests. It’s a lot of work, but I think we’ve finally got a core team that can handle it. While GusBus, Peasea, and company are finishing up the art and music, Nekochan and I will be doing pre-production for… whatever comes next. HC2 is a strong contender, but I’m full of ideas and might take some time to do a smaller, less grandiose project.

In the short-term, right now Conash and I are focused on fixing up the interface a little more. The contractor budget is going towards status effect icons, which should be a lot more communicative. Once that’s done, the next contractor priority is going to be HCG. I really don’t like having placeholder sex scenes, and once the current handful are gone, I want them to be gone for good. New harem girls will be available when we can get their first scene fully CG’d, but that’s the only thing preventing their inclusion. Other than the “trophy” harem girls that will unlock upon completing the relevant story arc, of course.

That’s it for now, really. Thank for everyone who has supported us so far! I look forward to giving you more and even better harem collecting goodness in the years to come!

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Operation: Antagowaifu

We’ve had a small change of plans for the next update.

As some of you may recall, last year we held the First Annual Iron Waifu Grand Tournament, a popularity contest where, each day, two of the female characters from Harem Collector face off against one another. Last year’s winner was everyone’s favourite paladin, Therese Agart, but this year sees new contestants in the form of pop star party member Diadira, priestess-turned-servant Nerys, and naive noblewoman Doralice, all of whom have their own fans.

So we’re cutting some of the less popular characters, and making way for new characters for this year. And as part of that, Gusbus and Nekochan hjave embarked on a little something called Operation: Antagowaifu.

Getting priority for the next release are new character designs and face sets for Evanie the Sword-Saint, Fiona the Gravedigger, Queen Regal, and Countess Silvayuco. You may recall Evanie as the theatrical commander of the Kellos scout force from “Ain’t No Party Like a Search Party”, Fiona as the commander of the Kellos fortress from “It’s Pronounced ‘Sabotage'”, Queen Regal as the conniving and manipulative power behind the scenes of the Middle Kingdom, who blackmails you at the end of “Research Materials”, and Countess Silvayuco as the self-important blackmail victim from “Get Dumped”.

So, if you’re the kind of person who wants to take a military commander or noblewoman down a peg, or the kind of person who likes to imagine having your balls stepped on by the same, you’ll have a couple more options for the new Iron Waifu, this May. And even if you don’t, hey, more new character designs for stand-in characters aren’t a bad thing.

The downside to this is that Nerys definitely won’t have an island vacation sex scene ready by March, and even the HCG for “In the Village, the Peaceful Village” might be delayed, but GusBus has pledged to stay on top of her game and do her best to get everything done by the update.

Oh, and on a side note: BACKERS! Please do not forget that this Sunday is the February Backer Devstream! Starting at 3PM EST I’ll be playing some more Before the Echo, and then starting at 4pm EST we’ll be doing dungeon design for the optional dungeons you’ll have access to during the beach vacation. If you have time, please stop by, we’d love to have you around!

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Version 0.27 Goals

Hello, everyone! It’s a fresh month, on a fresh dev cycle, and that means I get to jabber at you about all the things I want to get done for the March release!

Conash, as usual, is keeping me on point with regard to bugs and that sort of thing. He’s also working on adding a proper Achievements screen to the in-game menu, so you can keep track of what you’ve earned and what achievements you’ve made progress towards. There are some other things in the cooker for the next release, but that’s the one he’s focusing on right at this moment.

At the moment, Gusbus is hard at work on face sets. We’re revising the current Diadira face set to be in the “bust” style like the other ones. She’s also almost done redoing Nerys’ faceset in the same style. Once that’s all done, she’s going to do the HCG for Nerys’ first scene, and if she can squeeze it in before the end of March, Nerys’ island vacation scene.

Speaking of which, I’m focusing on getting done the island vacation! By buying tickets for yourself and your harem, you can get whisked away for a magical, four day vacation on sunny Sandybeach Island. There, you will be able to have tropical vacation-themed sex with your harem girls, go on tours of the islands three repeatable dungeons, and participate in a few special events, including a seashell hunt, a night drinking on the beach with the guys, and a fireworks display you can share with that special someone. Of course, you will keep earning money from your investments while away, so it’s entirely possible you could make money from this little island interlude. I think it’s a pretty exciting little side event, and I’m looking forward to letting you all have a look!

As usual, Peasea is hard at work on new music tracks for the game. The way he works is that he nibbles away at a handful of projects at a time, which is why we don’t update the music often, but when we do it’s 2-3 tracks at a time. Hopefully he’ll have something ready for next month!

Our commission of the month will be for a new set of status effect icons, to better help you discern what statuses are in play. Then, now that the interface is a little more communicative, I’ll look into knocking out the sprite for the Southport maid, so that way adding the last player house can happen for May.

At least, that’s the plan, and life likes nothing more than to disrupt my carefully-laid plans. After pulling off the two quest release for January, though, I’m feeling pretty confident. That’s all for now!

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Harem Collector v0.26.4 Public Release!

DO NOT DELETE YOUR SAVE! Version 0.26.5 fixes the problem where old save data wasn’t loading. Sorry for any inconvenience!

Finally, after many, many months, it’s finally here: Every party member has been implemented in the game! There are also a lot of other cool changes, so please review the changelog carefully this time!

You can find the game at the usual place.

Changes in this version:
-Two new quests! One happens in Westcastle Outer District, one happens by speaking to Earl Nicholas.
-A new party member and harem girl, finally completing the set of party members!
-That also means a new sex scene, with art and everything this time!
-The end of Mister Postman has also been added to the game.
-The Holy Diver can now be used as an upgrade for the Hero’s sword. This is followed by a short scene with the party member you have the highest relationship with, so make sure your waifu is ready.
-The followers menu new remembers your followers’ likes and dislikes.
-New banters have been added for Therese x Kyrie and Bronwyn x Chimei.
-The Dev Item chest has been turned into a legitimate Easy Mode with slightly altered benefits.
We will now accept bug reports having to do with Timeturner use.
-Shields now universally provide some measure of damage resistance against Projectile.
Armour (light and heavy) now universally provide a degree of damage resistance against Melee.
-Magic headgear now provides 5% universal magic resistance rather than a magic reflection effect.
-The enemy Cover mechanics have been changed. Bombs will now dispel cover if they hit the person doing the covering. Blind, Knockdown, Paralysis, Sleep and Stun will also dispel cover, and attacks that cause Grab, Pin and Stagger have a chance to dispel cover.
-A new tutorial explaining what Cover is and how it works has been added, it will be shown when you encounter your first enemy that can use Cover or a similar skill.
-A few character’s upgrade items have been replaced to better pace weapon upgrades.
-Improved Assault now only costs 15 momentum, but does not give Hero 10 momentum.
-The main menu now includes a link to the Bad Kitty Game Patreon.
-The seeker’s stone now works automatically by having it in your inventory
-A lot of UI changes intended to give players more information. The equipment and status screens now give much more detailed statistics (including damage resistances, and what kind of damage you’re inflicted) and damage of different types is labeled during battle sequences.
-Elemental effects are now indicated with new, (hopefully) clearer icons.
-The ‘escape’ option has been replaced with access to the status menu in-battle.
-The Satisfaction menu has gotten a visual update.
-Florine’s item shop has been revamped, if you had upgraded it on an old save-file you will be refunded the satisfaction that you spent.
-‘Random Healing’ from skills like Therese’s ‘Shining Strike’ now target the party member with the lowest current HP, this applies to enemy heals as well.
-There was an issue where the ‘burned’ status did not properly reduce regeneration, it does now.
-Bug fixes. Lots and lots of them.

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New Character Reveal!

Hello everyone! Happy backer release day!

After weeks of being regaled with interface changes and coding whatsits from Conash, today I am here to talk about another big change in the newest version of the game- Namely, the popstar bard, Diadira!

DidiIntro

Diadira is a fairly unique character, so I’m going to go through her mechanics, describe what she does for you party, and some tips on how to best use her.

Basic Capabilities

Diadira’s main theme is that she gives huge buffs to the entire party at the expense of her own actions. Every time she uses one of her Songs, she then spends the next four turns doing nothing but singing to maintain the song. So, to make best use of Diadira, you’re going to have to cram all the DPS you’re going to need into the other three characters in your party. Diadira’s songs are powerful enough to make for it, but this presents some party planning challenges. For example, you may want to try Diadira with the Hero in Phantom Knight mode. This effectively passes off Hero’s usual buffer role to Diadira while also making a dedicated tank character less necessary. You can then feel fairly confident filling the last two party spots with high-damage characters.

In terms of stats, Diadira has high Health but so-so Defense and Resist. This makes her an excellent target for regenerative effects- she’s no pushover but she will rely on healing, and passive regeneration means that you don’t have to task another character to keep her topped up. Diadira also has a lot of Magic, so while she doesn’t use any spells herself, she can get decent damage out of combat items like bombs and scrolls. Her absolute highest stat is Agility, so she can get her buffs in before everyone else in your party acts and is no slouch with items like Kevin’s Throwing Knives.

Diadira’s main attack deals Sonic damage, so there are some enemies she will be great against (merfolk) and others, no so great (undead). Once her weapon is upgraded a couple times, though, she will also sometimes inflict a unique Sonic-themed DoT debuff with her basic attack. Most of the time you’ll want her singing, but her basic attack has it’s own properties and occasionally you might find that it’s the right move. Eventually she’ll also learn a special skill called Resonant Frequency, which deals Sonic damage based on her Magic stat and her relationship score, as well has disrupting Cover and potentially Staggering, Deafening and Knocking Down her target. We’re trying a couple different things with Resonant Frequency, so see how that fits in with your strategies and let us know.

The Songs

Now for Diadira’s bread and butter- her song-based buffs.

Her first song, Heartbeat Panic, is probably the most universally useful. It’s pretty simple- every character other than Diadira takes an extra action per turn. That’s a pretty huge advantage, but keep in mind that you’re going to blow through party resources (Mana, Momentum, items) that much faster.

Her second song, Rush of Spirit, gives every party member a +10 Momentum per turn bonus, great for characters like Bronwyn and Chimei who rely on their Momentum-using skills.

The third and final song Diadira learns by leveling up is Noise Riot. On top of a 2% Mana generation per turn buff, Noise Riot also gives all spellcasters (regardless of what kind of magic they use) access to the Feedback spell. Feedback is a Sonic-element attack spell that gets stronger the more it’s used in the duration of the Noise Riot buff. The first use starts at a base (Magic x 4) + (Luck) – (target’s Resist), but every subsequent use adds the user’s Magic rating in damage (Magic x 5 for the next cast, Magic x 6 for the next, etc), up to a maximum of Magic x 10 if you have two casters doing nothing but spam Feedback. Also, I should mention that every version of Feedback (Spells, Prayers, Evocations, etc) has slightly different properties, so please have fun exploring those possibilities.

When Diadira gets to the “Trust” relationship level, she learns a song called “My Sanctuary”. This songs does two things- it hits Diadira with a massive Health regeneration buff, then it gives every other party member increased Threat while simultaneously making those characters take 15% less damage from every attack. It’s a powerful defensive ability to break out when it looks like Diadira’s in trouble and needs the rest of the party to go full tank.

So hopefully you see some great now possibilities in using your new party member. The backer release should be out tonight sometime, but if you’re not a backer please make sure you come back on January 25th for the public release!

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My contributions to the next release

Hey everyone! It’s a bit earlier than we were planning on but NM has been sick so this week I’ll be telling you about what I’ll be adding in the upcoming release while he works on feeling better!

Before we get started, I’d like to thank everyone who’s given suggestions for the new satisfaction menu while we’ve run into delays in getting the updates to this version hammered out, the changes that we’ve talked about for fixing it up visually will probably be in by the public release, though I’m sorry to say but until I’ve got more of it done I don’t have much else to say on the matter…

But what I do have done, you can thank Flutterby for requesting that we add elemental resistances to the status menu! After talking with NM about it I got to work on some quick mock-ups which the patreons gave us some much needed feedback on for me to get to work on, so how about I show what you can expect from the new status screen to start off with?

grocsd7

First off, when in the status menu you’ll be able to switch between page 1 and page 2 with either the standard Z button (or whatever you have set to be the ‘OK’ button) or with the CTRL button like in the equipment menu. Also, you might notice that at the top of the elemental resistances are ‘melee’ and ‘projectile’, you might be seeing a few new interesting features dealing with those soon, but that’s not my department.

What IS my department though is that new ‘Fire Damage’ addition above your equipment! Not only does it prevent weird visual issues where your weapon name would overlap with the page number, but now the game tells you what kind of damage you do with regular attack along with several skills, pretty neat huh? Not only that but whenever you or the enemy does damage no longer will it just say, “150 damage’ but now it’ll tell you “150 melee damage” or “300 force damage”, this should help out a lot with knowing how to best utilize resistances, especially when you encounter enemies who don’t do melee or projectile damage with their regular attacks, there are more of then then you’d think! Though some bad news in regards to attack elements, players who fancied bashing in zombie heads with the necronomicon or cutting angels while blessed may find their damage reduced. See, it turns out that RPG Maker had it so that whenever you attacked it looked at ALL your elements and used the damage from the strongest one, which wasn’t really ever intended for this game, it has now been fixed so that whatever element you see in the status menu is the damage you will do, regardless as to if the enemy is strong or weak to it (the priority is weapon coatings > blessing > accessory > off-hand > weapon > unarmed), so make sure you plan accordingly!

Next you might have noticed that the ‘Fire Damage’ is green, there’s a reason for this, see from now on whenever you have a status effect that changes anything on the status page (except HP and MP) it will turn green if the net result of your statuses improves it, or red if the net result weakens them, in this case because I have a fire weapon coating on Hero he’s doing fire damage, all attack elements from statuses will be green, so yeah next time you’ve got some nausea or blessing and you’re not sure what it changes, try looking in your status screen to see what numbers are now green and what are red!

Finally for the status screen, some of you who are very familiar with the game might have noticed that in the example I gave Hero has a weapon coating which can only be used in battle and wear off when it’s over, you might also notice that the status menu here has a solid background while usually it’s semi-transparent, there’s a reason that both of these are happening in the picture I provided, you can now access the status menu in battle. We’ve replaced the eternally greyed out ‘escape’ command with a new ‘Status’ command that will let you look at the status of whoever is in battle, well in battle. Combine this with the earlier mention of how stats which are changed are now displayed in red and green and you’ll be able to see for yourself what various statuses do! This is a pretty big step in making the wiki unnecessary if you ask me, and one that I fully embrace.

You will also be able to find the new elemental resistances in the equipment menu as well, on a new page 3. You won’t get the full names of them since I only had about half the space to work with, but I’m hoping to put in the first one or two letters of every element next to the icon into the page later today! So yeah, that’s what I’ve been working on for this past week, I was hugely mistaken in believing that it’d only take me a day or two tops to get it all done but I’m rather happy with how it’s all turned out, what do you guys think?

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Welcome to 2017!

Happy new year everyone! I hope you all had a great holiday!

I suppose I should do the traditional thing and go over my plans for the year, right?

For development on the game, finding new hentai artists and bringing you more awesome CGs is top priority. We’re also going to make a big push to go back to the “one quest per month” schedule, so that every update has two strong pieces of content for player to explore. We’ve also already set up a better method of sorting out and fixing bugs which is much more efficient than the previous process, so expect to have a more stable experience playing HC in 2017.

We are also currently in the process of adding some fun new features. The Satisfaction menu is getting a revamp (there’s a forum thread if you want to give us your two cents on the matter), the achievements menu is finally getting a fix, and we’re adding a character/magical item/enemy encyclopedia so you can keep track of various bits of lore and useful info during your playthrough.

As for community events, there are a few things coming up there as well.

First of all, we have a fanart contest going on right now! Please consider entering if you’re a fan of Harem Collector and have any talent at drawing.

We also want to do something for the first release anniversary this February, but I’m not sure what we’re going to do yet, so please stay tuned.

Then, this May the Iron Waifu tournament is coming back! We had a lot of fun running this last year, and in 2017 is going to make a return. Vote for your favourite character, and the best girl will receive a dedicated update in September 2017!

I hope all that excites your interest (heh) and Bad Kitty Games to continue to receive your support and interest for another year!

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Backer Mini-release today!

Hey everyone! Today the backer mini-update will be coming out, the timing will be pretty tight but it’ll definitely be worth it! So while NoMoshing works on finishing up the new quest (backers should keep their eyes out in the towns, there might be something different in this release) we thought that I should share what additions of mine you’ll be seeing in this new update!

The only big addition that we could get done this time around is a new ‘Gift Memory’ system as I like to call it! Basically all gift-able characters (so not Eulania or any brain-washed slaves) will now display something else in their followers menu, a ‘Likes’ and ‘Dislikes’ addition where when you give them a gift they like (currently +3 affection) or one they dislike (+0 affection) it’ll get added to the menu to help those of you with a bad memory! Characters who were in the dungeon (but not brain-washed) will also be unique in that they’ll have two ‘Likes’ and a third category of ‘Ineffective’, the second ‘Like’ and the ‘Ineffective’ refer to the dungeon actions, so completionists should keep that in mind! Until you’ve given the character these gifts and/or tortures though the menu will show ?’s for all areas that apply to that character. In addition, this information will exist independent of your save files! So when you start a new game you won’t have to worry about finding out all their likes and dislikes all over again! However in order to accomplish this, the information will be stored in a new file called “Misc_Data.rvdata2”, while we know that some users have trouble with transferring over files like these we felt it was appropriate to store this data independent of both the save files and the scene replay data. We’ll also be making use of this file in the future for some other information like achievements when they get redone, so make sure that you transfer your “Misc_Data” file along with your “replay” file and save files when you go from one version to the next!

Next on the list of changes is going to be something that a LOT of you have been displeased about, Improved Assault has been fixed! Now instead of costing 25 momentum and giving the entire party 10 momentum (net of 15), it instead costs 15 momentum and gives everyone EXCEPT Hero 10 momentum! Now if you don’t see the difference, the thing is a lot of people thought that Improved Assault was a downgrade since you had to initially build up 25 momentum to use it, which is very difficult in most minion battles, so they preferred staying with the normal assault, this change allows Improved Assault to still effectively be the same skill without needing the extra build up!

Next up, ‘Random Healing’. See before skills like Shining Strike (where Therese attacks then heals a random person) would always heal a random target, however thanks to yours truly, all random target healing skills are set to heal whoever has the lowest current HP (based on the number, not the percent). Now there was deliberation on how it would choose it’s target, but we ultimately went with this mainly because it’s the easiest for players to notice and plan around. There’s even some strategic benefits, such as if everyone is fully healed but you want Therese to heal someone who will be hurt before she attacks this allows her to auto-target them if they take significant damage. While there are certainly downsides to this, players should remember that you can always use healing skills or items that you can choose the target of instead! Though in the course of developing this feature I noticed that enemies were very dumb with their healing, they would ALWAYS target the last enemy in the party no matter what. Well, now they’ll also heal whoever has the lowest current HP with their heals, whether you like this change or not, we felt that it was only fair that enemies not be stupid with their heals if we gave players the same functionality.

Finally, in terms of new features that I added, I fixed the ‘last target’ feature. During some unity force skills (like Therese’s X-slash) the character who used the skill would attack, then Hero follows it up with an attack of his own, the problem is that because of how RPG Maker is he would always target HIS last target, not the last target of the party (who Therese, Elaiya, Bronwyn, etc. attacked), which COULD lead to him attacking someone else which wouldn’t make sense (though given the momentum cost for unity force, rather unlikely except in battles with multiple boss-class enemies). Beyond that, most of what I’ve done is work with NoMoshing to fix a LOOOT of bugs, there are still bugs in the game mind you but we took a large chunk out of them.

So yeah, for you backers out there keep your eyes peeled for the mini-update coming out later, and for the rest of you I hope hearing all that gets you a bit more excited for the public release in January!

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Armour Pieces, Cover, and Other Mechanics

Just a quick reminder- this Saturday is going be a general hangout instead of the usual devstream! Nekochan, Conash and I will be drinking, playing Pretend You’re Xyzzy with HC fans, and just generally having a chill Christmas-type time. It will be streamed on Picarto and the voice chat will be happening on the Bad Kitty Games Discord channel. Nekochan and Conash are confirmed to be joining in, GusBus and PeaSea might make it if they can escape their family obligations, and I’m also putting some invites to other H-game devs, so we might have some special guests! Also, don’t forget to check out the Bad Kitty Games website on Christmas Day as there will be a small present for all HC fans.

So today I’m going to go over some of the new mechanics that have been added to Harem Collector which will show up in the December Mini-Update as well as the big 0.25.1 update in January.

The first big change is with the Cover mechanics. As you probably know, there are a number of frustrating and/or challenging fights where enemies will protect one another, making it so that your well-coordinated, carefully targeted attacks are wasted on some big dumb asshole with a lot of HP but doesn’t pose a real threat.

Well, no longer! From now on, status effects which inhibit or hamper movement (knockdown, stagger, pin, grab, stun, paralyze, etc.) will also cancel an enemy’s Cover ability. Many attacks that have a chance to inflict one of these status may also cancel Cover even if the status effect doesn’t stick, if you’re lucky enough. Further, most enemy cover ability now completely cancel the user’s evasion- no weird situations where a Kellos Spearman “hides behind his shield” and still manages to perfectly dodge an incoming attack. The only exception for the Evasion debuff is Pack Tactics, because werewolves are awesome.

werewolftroll

Seriously, though, some other enemy types for whom “evasion tanking” seems appropriate might also be exceptions to the evasion debuff, so be aware that not all Covering enemies are a guaranteed hit.

The second big change are the collectible armour sets. From now on, seeded throughout the game will be collectible armour pieces that aren’t equip-able on their own, but when brought together Kevin and Ino will reform them into an ultimate armour set for one of the characters. There might even be a Kamidori-style additional sex scene when the armour sets comes together for a harem girl, but that’s TBD- there’s plenty of sex scenes in the game without it, so it may be a resource/time issue. Anyway, some of these ultimate armours haven’t been designed yet, so if you pick up an item called “Meline Armour Part 3” or whatever you’ll know what it is.

The armour pieces aren’t going to be intensely difficult to find. Don’t expect a Dark Seed level of dickishness from me, but they’re not going to be just given away like the weapon upgrades. I’d say my dickishness level to be at Strange Note level- some might require completing mini-quests or solving puzzles but nothing’s going to be hidden in hard to reach background elements or buried in locations you can also visit once. I haven’t decided whether I’ll take the time to add some method of filling in armour pieces for people who have late-game saves and don’t want to do over, or just say “Tough, go visit the New Game Plus fairy.”

If I have time, I also want to go and make the Mourning Wood a re-visitable area. I think it’s a cool location, I still like how the ghosts appear and disappear based on the player’s movement, and there’s still a dearth of early-game re-visitables. Also, please be aware that some of the weapon upgrades are being rejiggered to make room for the new quest.

Anyway, I think that’s it for now! Thanks as always, have a great holiday, and we hope to see you all on Christmas Eve!

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Harem Collector 0.24.5 Release!

Here’s the latest version! Enjoy, guys!

Get it here!

Changes in this Version:

-A new quest! After completing Honey Trapper, please check out the Eastfort Adventurer’s Guild for the new content.
-A new investment opportunity exists at a vineyard north of Westcastle!
-The investment book has been revamped a little, so that’s easier for us to code and for you to use.
-Unity Force has been completely overhauled! On top of providing a potent single-person buff, Unity Force also allows the Hero to team up with his harem girls to unleash powerful combo attacks!
-The Status menu has been altered to display each character’s hit rate, evasion rates, critical rate, and critical evade! Also, you can now page through characters in the Status and Equip screens rather than exiting all the time!
-Speaking of hit rate, hit rates in excess of 100% now decreases enemy evasion!
-The enemy line-of-sight mechanics has been changed! Objects now block enemy vision, but beware- some objects (like, say, bookshelves) only block vision in certain directions.
-Kyrie’s Ice Armor buff now lasts between combats!
-New artwork for two sex scenes: Bound to Disappoint and A Difficult Position.
-More party banter!