Game Design Rants – Page 5

June 14, 2017

How I design enemies

Hey everyone, Conash here! First, I’d like to remind everyone that the public devstream is this Saturday! Now normally here’s where I’d talk about my current scripting project, but NoMoshing already gave you all the cliff-notes and there’s not anything more that I can add on the matter. While I do have a few ideas of some other scripting stuff that I’d like to squeeze into this update I can’t guarantee I’ll have time to do those so I’ll save that talk for another time, which leaves me really with talking about the newest task that I’ve taken up, enemy design.

While I’m far from an expert, I thought you all might still appreciate hearing how I go about it. In regard to common enemies I try to think in terms of the various ‘roles’ that the player characters come in (damage, tank, debuffer, and support) and since we’re a fair amount into the game I feel pretty comfortable assuming the player is properly equipped to handle a ‘full deck’ of enemies. I make sure to talk about what types of enemies we’d be fighting with NoMoshing and try to figure out a good range to fill those various roles. On top of that I also like to fit in little tidbits about the enemies in their design (surprised no one’s pointed out yet that the Devout Clerics have a bit of a surprising magic selection). Beyond that there’s not a whole much too it, I make sure that their various strengths/weaknesses both make sense and are consistent with that type of enemy among other things.

Bosses however get a bit more thought put into them. I don’t know about the rest of you, but I personally like my bosses to have a unique feeling to them, they should be a boss in more than just numbers. With the last quest, I had to play around a bit including changing enemy behavior in the entire game to be able to pull it off that the main boss would switch between an offensive spell and then a support spell with his two actions, throw in that the offensive spell goes from single target to an AoE once he drops below 50% health and you’ve got a very good incentive for players to take out the other bosses first. It might be a bit light in terms of being unique behavior, but with four boss enemies you can’t really go too over the top, whereas the upcoming boss for the Cannibal Corps finale I’m probably getting a bit too hands on with them…. Let’s just say, I’m not exactly a fan when bosses become RNG-dumb.

Though, another thing about these sorta boss gimmicks that I feel is important is that the player shouldn’t be caught completely unaware of it, whether you can figure it out if you pay attention to the story of the quest, by seeing some minors have a weaker version of the behavior, or maybe even I bug NoMoshing to throw some dialogue in somewhere hinting at it, I feel that a player should be able to get a good idea of what to expect from the boss’ behavior before it’s risked wiping out their entire party. I might give up on this particular little practice later on so that bosses aren’t easy to predict, but I imagine many of the less observant players may have a few surprises in store for them.

Anyway, that’s probably more than enough rambling about enemy design for you all, see ya later!

March 29, 2017

Island Vacation Post-Mortem

So, that was a learning experience, at least.

Back when I was first working on Harem Collector, in the “lol throw it in” phase of the game’s design, I thought it would be a good idea to include two vacation events. I figured that a) going on luxury vacations played into the fantasy of being a rich, successful adventurer, b) there could be a ton of vacation-themed sex scenes, and c) it would put a lot of the harem girls in a new situation, in order to inspire new and more interesting dialogue. I had Gurotaku make up some CGs for all the available girls (at the time) having sex in various swimwear, drew up some basic ideas, and resolved to revisit the vacation later, when I had time.

Two years later, we throw up this poll asking what quests should be done next. I plan the next few updates after the results of that poll, and behold, the beach vacation is number two on that list. I was about two weeks into developing the new content when I suddenly realized that this just doesn’t work.

You see, the vacation as a whole doesn’t feel like part of Harem Collector proper. It’s just kind of… bolted on to the side of everything like ill-fitting DLC. I eventually came to kind of resent the vacation content and wish I was actually making progress on parts of the game that contributed more to the whole. But, because of the poll and the fact that the vacation was part of the plan from the start, I didn’t feel like I could just cut my losses. I’m beholden to my patrons to at least attempt to deliver on my promises, so I pressed on. And things did not go well, drawing out the process of working on the thing I’d rather not be working on. Not an ideal situation by any means.

Either way, the vacation is mostly finished at this point- just have to write dialogue- except for adding a few more sex scenes once pics become available. But this is why I’m cutting the second vacation, why I’m not happy with this update, and why more 3DCG sex scenes are getting added to the game.

March 24, 2015

Backer Topic #2: It’s the Apocalypse Again!?

How do you feel about RPG’s protagonists tendency to save the world? I think “small scale” RPG, where most of the action is limited to one region, could be as engaging as running around the whole world. -Seil

Small-scale RPGs aren’t all that uncommon, I think. The mid-range Ultima games (IV-VI) were generally focused on the affairs of a single kingdom. The Fallout series usually looks at an area the size of a medium US state. Persona 4 (unless the secret ending contradicts me) is essentially a morality play set in a Japanese small town. But I could list examples all day- that doesn’t make for a very helpful conversation, now does it?

Unless you’re talking about very short stories, every tale sooner or later has to raise the stakes. The traditional three-act story structure requires that the fundamental conflict change over the course of the second act, so that the climax feels grander and more important (and more satisfying to the audience) than the first act. The Avengers begins with the initial conflict- Loki has stolen the Tesseract and mind controlled a bunch of SHIELD personnel and is enacting some kind of plot- and gradually escalates to the climax- Loki opens a portal to somewhere in space, and an invasion of alien warriors threatens the entire earth. I won’t bore you with an extended lecture on story structure though- other people have done it better and I wasn’t all that great at college-level English anyway.

What RPGs (and, it seems, JRPGs in particular) often due is focus on increasing the scale of the conflict rather than exploring other ways of raising the stakes. In action movies, things often get “personal” at one point- in the Matrix, for example, the scale of the conflict (ie, freeing the human race from the machines’ control) never really changes, but the climax is kicked off when Neo’s mentor, Morpheus, is kidnapped (ie, something specific the hero cares about is threatened, rather than a broader conflict that is difficult for the human mind to properly comprehend). A few games don’t shy away from this. The stakes are raised in Persona 4 when Nanako is put under personal threat.

Another way to raise the stakes in by sheer exhaustion. To get away from the examples from movies and RPGs, in the first silent Hill game the stakes never really change- Harry is looking for his daughter the whole time, and uncovering the mystery doesn’t really change his driving motivation to find her. But by the end of the game, Harry sounds tired and exhausted, having been through hell (thrice!) and (probably) just murdered his only real ally. The stakes are raised not because anything about the conflict changes, but Harry’s got nothing left but a hail mary play, going all in with his remaining energy and sanity to end the conflict before the conflict ends him.

Shit, I’m listing examples again. The reason why I think a lot of games decide to increase the scale of conflicts rather than finding other ways of raising the stakes is because spectacle is easier than good writing. Not that there’s anything wrong with spectacle, but it’s far harder to get an audience to care about the small things. A big final boss fight against a dragon is easier than, say, a race against time to save a little girl being used as a hostage. The dragon doesn’t need to be “sold” very hard to the audience- as long as it looks bigger and more threatening than anything else the player has fought, that makes it a climax. Getting an audience to really care about a character, a group, or a region is much harder.

Now, I hope you all don’t get the impression that I hate spectacle, or I think smaller conflicts are better- just because something is more difficult to do doesn’t make it automatically more enjoyable. It’s just that broadening the scale of conflict to raise the stakes is easy, and, to be honest, we’re all still figuring out how to tell stories through the medium of video games. Nobody’s got the perfect formula quite yet, and once that happens, well, I think all game developers will be forced to raise the stakes- on their own writing and plot development.

February 18, 2015

Two Years, Gentle Reminder, Game Development Breakdown

Two years of game development on Harem Collector! Yeah, that is… not an achievement. Don’t get me wrong, I’m perfectly happy celebrating two years of getting to work on games, but I’m really hoping I can wrap-up HC by this time next year. I have lots of other projects I want to share with you all, so here’s hoping I can escalate my efforts accordingly.

Also, small reminder- if you want to get in on the Backer release on March 4th, you have to sign on to the Patreon campaign by the end of the month. If you’ve ever donated before the Patreon campaign, then don’t worry about it- you’ll still get the regular backer email.

So, lately I’ve been reflecting on why RPG Maker has such a terrible reputation in the gaming community. There are plenty of folks who avoid games made with the engine entirely, and now Unity is starting to get the same reputation. This makes my job significantly harder- it’s hard enough to get people to try your product in a crowded marketplace without potential players thinking “all games with your engine suck”. The truth, the only difference between Unity, RPG Maker and all other game engines out there is the barrier to entry.

Game development is tremendously complex, but it generally gets broken down into a handful of categories:

Game design, or mechanical design, which covers how the game plays, the mechanics work, how the levels are laid out and the general “feel” of the experience.
Sound design, which can be broken down further into music, acted dialogue, sound effects and audio engineering.
Game “writing”, which covers everything from plot expression, character dialogue, and even something as mundane as menu or tutorial text.
Art or visual design, which covers literally everything visual that appears on the screen, from animation to image stills to character design to font choice.
Programming, or code. Most programming is “just” making all the other harmonize on a computer screen in such a way as the game does what it is designed to do, but there can be plenty of “art” rather than “science” to programming, especially when things like physics engines are involved.

I hope that short list really gives you a sense of the scope of things that need to get put into any one game, because there is a lot that needs to happen in order to create a good game experience.

My essential point is this- very few individuals are the kind of savants that can actually do all of these things together. I like to think my main strength is mechanical design- though everyone currently stuck on the Count Corgan battle will probably disagree with that assessment. Chibi’s primary strength is in visuals, and the “feel of the experience” parts of game design. Cypress’ biggest strength is his writing and dialogue. That doesn’t necessarily mean that any of us slouch in the other departments (we all work very hard at what we do), but it’s almost impossible to be an expert in all five. For every Phil Fish and Jasper Byrne there are hundreds of game designers who are weak in two or more areas.

Which brings us back to RPG Maker and Unity. The biggest strength of these engines is that they provide art, sound, code editors, and some rudimentary mechanics. This lower “barrier to entry” is attractive to anyone who isn’t some game dev Übermensch, but unfortunately it also means a lot of poorly thought out crap gets made available to the public.

So, I guess, don’t judge a game by it’s engine. There are lots of great (free!) RPG Maker games that absolutely deserve your time and attention. The same goes for Unity.

December 17, 2014

The Process (Okay, For Real This Time)

Okay, so it looks like nothing in the Backer’s Pack requires my immediate attention, so I’ll try to lay down a real blog post. If you’ve ever wondered just what goes on to get a release done, this week I’m gonna tell you.

Step 0: Play Games

You might think I’m kidding, but this is probably the most important step. You need to know the medium you want to work in, so crack open Steam or GOG or your FLGS or even Abandonia and get playing. Here’s the important bit, though- one, you must pay careful attention while you play, and two, you must have to get outside your comfort zone. That might mean examining old favourites with a newly-critical eye, or trying truly new experiences. The important thing is to leave the familiar behind, and examine the games you play with a critical eye. You never know what game mechanic or experience will inspire the next great part of your game, so expand your horizons.

Step 1: The Plan

Sometime during the closing weeks of the previous release, I grab my notes and head to a local coffee shop. I keep two simple spiral notebooks for each project I’m working on, one for planning and another to record notes in as I work. While rocking some coffee and free from distractions, I’ll lay out the plan for the next release.

Generally, “the plan” is divided into several parts. Most important are the Quests, which are the set pieces and foundation stones that Harem Collector is built around. I also brainstorm the events (generally whatever I think is important but doesn’t involve a quest or dungeon), character notes (for chats, banter, new characters, etc), new investments and items, and whatever else I think I’ll need.

Notes on the next release

After laying out the general plan, I’ll start to go into specifics about the big stuff- quests, dungeons, big animated sequences, that kind of thing. I generally end up with a page of notes each individual quest or sequence- you can check out a page of my notes about a dungeon above. It’s important to remain flexible from here- things don’t often work exactly how you plan, and you never know when something different will inspire you and you’ll end up working on something completely different.

Step 2: Art and Visuals

Before actually opening up the editor, I take the first big chunk of content and figure out what art I’ll need for it. This can be something as simple as a style or specific look I want the maps to capture, or it might mean looking for free to use sprites online, asking Chibi for custom stuff, asking Gurotaku to get started on CGs, and assembling face sets.

Art is a serious weakness for me, so even when I give art priority, it’s very easily for things to fall apart at this step. As always, remain flexible- you have to be about deal with that kind of setback and still move forward.

Step 3: The First Quest

Next, I take one of the big, meaty chunks of content and, well, get it done. Usually I start with the middle- crafting the dungeon, placing encounters, and designing the boss fight- first, and then fill in the pre-dungeon dialogue and investigation and post-dungeon dialogue and rewards. Often, I play through the dungeon a couple times on my own, just to make sure the sequence of events feel right and any weird new ideas I have actually work. After a revision or two, getting one quest finished takes about two weeks when I’m working at my peak ability.

The reason why I tackle things one quest at a time is twofold- one, if a crisis occurs I’ll have at least one small piece of content to show for it, and two, I focus intensely on one piece at a time, so as not to get distracted.

Step 4: Moar Content

Provided I don’t fall ill or stab my wife in the eye or whatever, I’ll finish with that first quest and move on to the next. And then the next, etc, until I’m about two weeks away from Testing Week.

Step 5: Dangling Threads

Time for cleaning up! This is where I make sure the new quests are properly hooked into the game and accessible, update the quest log, and generally round off the corners and make sure everything fits. Once everything is ready for Test Week, I’ll move on to step 6, even if it’s not actually Test Week yet- what I’m doing doesn’t change.

Adding sex scenes occur as part of this step, btw. I like giving Gurotaku and Kakurine as much time as possible to work.

Step 6: Soft Content

While Testers are busy testing and going into the week between the Backer release and the Public release, I do all the stuff that isn’t really programming intensive that I’m reasonably sure I’ve mastered- investments, chats, shops, banters, etc. Not only does this mean that testers are focused on the content that’s most likely to break/have bugs/have weird exploits in it, it means I get to have a break, relax and do some easy stuff for a change. It’s at this time I also start on Step 1 for the next release cycle, as well.

Well, hope that was interest for you all. I’ll see you next week for the public release!

October 1, 2014

Let’s Get Archetypal

First of all, the latest version of Harem Collector was emailed to backers this morning. If you are a backer and did not receive your email, please contact me ASAP. I probably have the wrong email for you. So relieved and happy to actually get a release out, btw. Looking forward to the public release next week.

Oh, and Spoiler Warning for Harem Collector. You’ve been warned.

Video games should always be about gameplay. If you want to tell an excellent story via a video game, you’re probably better off writing a novel or making a movie. This is why video game stories- even from games are lauded for their stories- tend to be very simple. The point is to provide an engaging, interactive element for the player, after all. This is why games tend to be a poor medium for a character study. This is what makes archetypes so important for storytelling in this medium.

Archetypes (or, if you pay more attention to the internets than English class, character tropes) are basically a short-hand for what a given character is or how they will act. Archetypes are useful to game designers because they are capable of delivering a large amount of information with a small amount of characterization, which is key in game design because very few games are character studies. I know this sounds lazy, but Japanese developers use them, western developers use them, and I’m going to tell you why you should use them.

For example, take Guardians of the Galaxy. Action movies are similar to video games in that studying the characters is not the point, so you need to deliver all the information necessary to describe the characters in a small amount of time. Fantasy novels are the same way- video games should focus on gameplay, action movies on engaging action and good dialogue, fantasy novels on the unique setting (usually). Anyway, by taking the core five characters of GotG, and describing them in 2-4 words, you’ll probably end up with something like this:

Peter Quill- Loveable Rogue
Gamora- Assassin with a Heart
Rocket- Jaded Veteran
Groot- Gentle Giant
Drax- Noble Savage

When the movie opens, we are introduced to Peter Quill by seeing him in action- on a hostile planet, searching for something, but while he does that while listening to a walkman and dancing around. He kicks the local predators out of the way without breaking stride. By the time those opening scenes are over and Quill heads for the planet Nova, we have a bead on his personality- he’s cut from the same cloth as Malcolm Reynolds, Han Solo, or even Bluto Blutarsky and Danny Ocean. Immediately, the audience starts associating attributes to Quill that they don’t necessarily have any evidence for, because of those archetypal connections. The character appears fuller and more complete, because you can draw on that archetype. Later, Quill is given better definition, and the specifics of his personality and how he defies his own archetype are introduced, but the movie’s authors have bought themselves breathing room while also making the experience more satisfying to the audience.

When designing a new character Harem Collector, I find it very useful to say “This character is like X except for Y”. For example, Therese is basically what TV Tropes would call a Lawful Stupid Knight Templar- she is a straightforward, hardcore agent for good who reviles sin and refuses to do evil. This provides a broad map for her character and her behaviour, until later when the differences show up. She talks to Larelle, and accepts her necromantic powers while condemning Larelle’s assault on Lumberhill. This way, you learn that Therese doesn’t believe evil is inherent, and her character gets a little more definition, but the playing audience never feels that Therese is less of a character until they learned that fact. Gargan is like a typical 80’s movie bully and rival, then you start the Virgin Gynocides and learn that he’s actually really dedicated to his job. Meline is a typical imouto character with a huge hard-on for her brother, then you do her Love Quest and (hopefully) pick up on the fact that her dedication to her brother is very much a result of her childhood and family life.

Archetypes are a valuable tool for the game designer, and in hentai specifically, archetypes have a secondary value in that they can be comforting. Hentai draws from a small pool of similar character archetypes (and western porn is an even smaller pool, but that’s kinda sorta a different thing entirely) because when you’re looking to enjoy some hentai, challenging characters will probably just distract you from your purpose. In this case, archetypes serve a useful function of putting the audience at ease, and tipping the audience off as to what this character will react to (and thus, reinforcing the fantasy that you’re a charmer who can romance the panties off anyone).

So don’t worry about your characters being “too typical” or “simple”. Design around archetypes to your heart’s content, and save your innovation for the stuff that’s really important- the gameplay.

By the way, Chibi needs to get some computer equipment repaired before she can work more on Harem Collector or Fairy Side, so starting today she’s doing commissions to raise money for the repairs. Her commissions start at $10 USD, and comes with the added benefit that your commission dollars also benefit Harem Collector’s development. You can see examples of her work here and here and here and here. Contact her at magicwhitelady AT hotmail DOT com for more information.

July 23, 2014

The Die is Cast

Last May, at a convention, it was my pleasure to attend a panel run by a guy who was a technical artist for Bioware, and worked on the Mass Effect series and Dragon Age: Origins. One of the things he said was very interesting to me: When looking for dialogue writers, the second thing that Bioware looks for in new hires (after industry experience, of course) is experience with game mastering tabletop RPGs.

See, being a DM or GM or ST requires you to create a character to serve a purpose in the story, but then you have to respond to your players, as that character, in real time, improvising that character’s actions and reactions. Sure, you might have a couple lines, maybe even a paragraph of dialogue written down or memorized in advance to respond to specific situations, but very frequently the players will have other questions or comments, things to say that it’s impossible to plan for and you need to improvise. Because of this, you develop where you learn to anticipate certain topics and at least know how to respond to certain things. You eventually become very skilled at planning the fractal-ish possible patterns that conversations can take and thus, very good at anticipating what things a player would want to ask in a video game.

But the truth is, there’s a lot of things you can learn from tabletop gaming that will help you in game design. After all, being a game master and a game designer are both fundamentally about creating interactive experiences. While not every great game designer played D&D, if you can grab some friends and sit down ’round a table and slay some dragons together you’ll probably learn something valuable.

Here are some of my recommendations for tabletop RPGs you can play to sharpen your game design skills, and what lessons you should take from them.

Party Mechanics 101: Dungeons and Dragons, 4th Edition
A lot of people hate D&D4e. It was a dramatic departure from the feel and mechanics of 2nd and 3rd edition, and focused on two things: being accessible to new players and providing a balanced game where no character class has a strict advantage over the other. The game lost, badly, to it’s nascent competitor, Pathfinder, but if you want to try it this is an advantage: most gaming stores and bookstores have a stack of unsold 4e books, and I imagine a lot of used copies are available online.
The real strength of the system is it’s mechanics, though. D&D4e breaks down traditional RPG classes into two axes: power source, which is a fancy way of saying “theme”, and role, which tell you that class’ function in combat. A paladin, for example, is a divine defender, being their combat focus is in tanking and they are empowered by the gods. A cleric is a divine leader, still powered by the gods but focused instead on healing and buffing their allies. Simply play the game and pay attention to how combat unfolds, and think on how to apply that to your game. If you need any other recommendation, know that I’ve based the party roles and mechanics in Harem Collector heavily on D&D4e.

Creating Mood: Changeling: the Lost
This one can apply to any game in the New World of Darkness, but I picked Changeling specifically because I think it’s the best of the bunch. Basically, games need more than mechanics and a story- you need to pay attention to the mood of your games, and how your game makes the player feel. The oppression and hostility of Silent Hill, the decadence and madness of Bioshock, and the rustic comfort and relaxing atmosphere of Harvest Moon aren’t accidental- they’re build into the very foundation of each game’s design and mechanics. While the substance of the NWoD is generally mediocre to weak, the setting and tone of the game is what you need to exploit to make your games great. Changeling really reflects this- you play a person who was kidnapped by the Fair Folk and escaped, only to find that you have been replaced by a fake in real life. You can choose to try to return to the life you had, but you’ve been fundamentally changed by your experiences, and have carried some of that fae magic with you to the real world. Denying what happened to you causes you to lose Clarity and slowly become incapable of differentiating between fantasy and reality… but so does enveloping yourself entirely in the realm of the supernatural. And this causes a simple truth to emerge- you can never really escape your past, and you have to carry it with you wherever you go, in a delicate balancing act where you cannot ignore it completely nor can you allow yourself to obsess over it.

Let Gameplay Tell Your Story: Legend of the Five Rings
Pretty much any version of L5R works here, save one (explained below). L5R is a game about a fantasy version of Samurai Japan, mixed liberally with other Asian influences, and originally based on a CCG. Despite it’s origins, L5R is an excellent game with an interesting setting, but it’s true strength is in the craft of the mechanics. There are really only five character classes: bushi (fighters), shugenja (clerics/wizards), shinobi (ninja), courtiers (politicians) and monks. There are also eight clans, which occupy roughly the same role as “races” in other RPGs. But not every clan can use every class- the Lion Clan does not have any use for shinobi or monks, and instead has not one but two variations on the bushi class to choose from. Only the Phoenix Clan and Dragon Clan make any use of monks at all, but meanwhile the Crab Clan and the Scorpion Clan are the only ones to makes widespread use of shinobi. Also, while the clans themselves are balanced in general, the individual classes are not. Consider what this says about each clan- the Lion disdain both monks and shinobi, and their two bushi classes are easily two of the best in the game. Yet the Crab have a bushi school that easily competes with the Lion, and yet they make use of shinobi as well. The Scorpion have a bushi class, and while it lacks in power in a straight-up fight, it is very good at using all those little obscure rules that many people gloss over in the rulebook- stuff like disarms, called shots, and feints. However, the Scorpion shinobi class is hands-down the best shinobi in the game, while the Crab shinobi school is better at being the “skill rogue” for a party of bushi. The Lion, Crab and Scorpion shugenja are all focused on doing one thing well- Buffing, undead/demon hunting, and illusion magic respectively- none can equal the Phoenix shugenja for sheer versatility. Without me telling you anything about the history or behaviour of these clans within the setting itself, you can paint a mental picture of what each clan might be like and how they regard each other.
Similarly, the rules themselves tell you about parts of the setting. The dice mechanics don’t technically have an upper ceiling- as long as you keep rolling tens, you can “explode” your dice to higher and higher numbers- allowing for every character to occasionally have a moment of enlightenment, cutting down a difficult opponent in a single perfect stroke (or what have you). You can use your honour rating to get a bonus at any die roll in the game, therefore honourable characters tend to just be better than everyone else. Because your level is not determined by your total experience points, but how you spent those experience points, it tends to favour well-balanced characters over highly-specialized ones- a character who is a good warrior (weapon skill of choice) but also comports themselves well in society (with a decent Courtier skill) and spends their spare time studying calligraphy (Calligraphy skill) is going to understand the higher secrets of their fighting style better than a brute who does nothing but focus on fighting. It’s a very elegant system.

How to be Sexy Without Being Stupid: Exalted Second Edition
This one is mainly for H-Games. Every H-Game has to decide where on the spectrum of “porn vs plot” they are- something like a Meet-n-Fuck game is going to be the gaming equivalent of “pizza boy with extra sausage” type porno movies, without challenge, meaning or emotional content at all. Which is fine, sometimes that’s exactly what you need, and for some people, that’s all they want. But people like us (assuming you’re a fan of Harem Collector) usually need something more, an intellectual or emotional engagement that you can’t get from just porn, which is why we turn to more complex H-Games.
Exalted is a great example of a setting that was created to be sexy without being as in-your-face with it as, say, FATAL. While it’s not primarily intended to be used for erotic role-play, it also doesn’t deny sex in the same way that many other games do. There is a slave trade in the setting, and yes, some slaves are trained specifically for the bedroom. A sorcerer is perfectly capable of summoning up a succubus or a nymph for a *ahem* magical evening. Many of the supernatural powers characters receive can be used for erotic mind control purposes. Reincarnation romance is not only possible, but started out as default- they recently instituted a change saying your soul-bound partner need not necessarily have been a romantic one (allowing to, for example, have a reincarnation rivalry or friendship). At the same time, these elements are just that- elements of a greater whole that help inform the game without making the game just about fucking. It’s perfectly possible to play a celibate hero- indeed, it’s one of the few games out there that treats celibacy as one of a number of heroic traits, being informed by similar tales in Buddhist myth and Christian martyrdom.

Whoa this ended up being a long one- I’ve been writing for two and half hours at this point. I’d better cut it short. Anyway, these are just my recommendations for games- sites like drivethrurpg.com have tons of different games for you to try, many of which have free “quickstarts” which contain a brief on the rules, some pre-made characters and a sample adventure for you to try, so if you’ve never played tabletop RPGs before and are looking to try, I’d start there.

April 23, 2014

Are Gamers Hurting The Gaming Industry?

A couple weeks ago, when Cypress_Z, MagicWhiteLady and I were doing the sound test for the first episode of the Indecent Gaming Podcast, we received a question from a fan:

What do you think about Game Theory’s “Are Gamers Killing Video Games?” episode?

But, because we actually have pretty strict itineraries for the Indecent Gaming Podcast and are trying to focus on a particular topic per week, addressing the state of the “game industry” isn’t on the agenda. At least not soon enough to be topical with Game Theory’s episode on the subject. So here I am, making my viewpoint known from the safety of muh interblags, because I do have thoughts to share on the subject.

In case you haven’t watched it, MatPat’s view is that gamers who say they want innovation are lying. Citing the high sales of games like Call of Duty and Madden, he points out that there is a clear divide between popular internet opinion and what actually sells.

But I don’t think that’s entirely the case… or, at least, the people who are asking for innovation aren’t the people who are buying 10 million copies of Blops 2 in one month.

MatPat (the guy who makes Game Theory) clearly uses “gamer” as an umbrella term in his video- if you’re a person who plays video games, you’re a “gamer”. However, the customer base for the gaming industry is made up of many smaller groups with different needs and motivations, known as “market segments”. Fratboy Fred (who wants to spend time after classes rocking Blops with his buddies) has different needs and habits than Mommy Marge (who has 2.5 children begging for the new Mario game), Retiree Rita (who wants to relax after a hard day of gardening with some hidden-object games or maybe a little Peggle), and Gamer Nerd Greg (who is on top of all the latest releases, reads game reviews online, and watches shows like Game Theory).

Basically, I think who “gamers” are in terms of culture is very different from who “gamers” are in terms of raw sales data- and the people who desire innovation and change in the gaming industry are a smaller market segment within the group of people who buy games as a whole. This is why a plurality of indy games devs can do well while AAA studio releases that target “gamers” as defined by gamer culture constantly under-perform. I think we’re looking at a community of perhaps 15 million “culture gamers” as opposed to a community of ~200 million “people who buy games” worldwide. Thus, Call of Duty Black Ops 2, reviled by gaming culture, sells 7.5 million units on launch day while critically acclaimed, meme-spawning Bioshock Infinite sells less than one million copies in its first month of sales.

Obviously, the situation is more complicated than I make it out here, and I’m far from being an expert. But from where I stand, taking “popular opinion on the internet” and conflating it to “the opinion of everyone who buys games everywhere” was a mistake on MatPat’s part. It’s not that “gamers want innovation” is a lie, it’s just that the definition of “gamer” is a lot more complex than it initially appears.

Anyway, Nekochan is still editing the next Indecent Gaming Podcast- sorry it’s not out yet, but until we get a rhythm going on how the release schedule is going to work, things are going to be shaky like this. Until then check out this Offbeatr for a monster girl breeding game I thought was cool. I don’t know much about the guys running it, but they asked me to take a look at their page and plug their stuff and, well, I wouldn’t be doing that if their game didn’t catch my interest.

February 26, 2014

What Pokemon Taught Me (Or, How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love to Grind)

On Valentine’s Day this year, Nekochan gave me Pokemon Y.* I’ve been pretty engrossed in it ever since, and yesterday I noticed something startling- I’ve spend 45 hours on the game so far.

Forty-five hours- almost two full days of time- and I was only on Route 10. I had spent all that time grinding around seventy pokemon to level twenty, and my “main party” of favourites to level 30.

Not bad for a guy who has repeated said he hates grinding. It stills boggles my mind.

So, I found grinding to be fun, and even fulfilling. How did this ever occur? I have a few thoughts, and I’d like to share them with you now.

Rule #1: Grinding Must Be Easy
With Pokeymans, especially in the newer versions, you’re generally earning a level every 2-3 battles against an enemy of equal level. This is nice and fast-paced, and you never feel like you’re wasting your time.

With the help of an item called the “Exp. Share” every players automatically gets around level seven, your whole party of pokeymans get half XP even when they don’t participate in the battle. Not only does this help a great deal with leveling that Magikarp, it also means that if you want to level a pokemon you don’t have to do anything more complicated than having them in your party.

Rule #2: Grinding Must Give You Something New
On top of getting the normal stat-ups associated with a level, every 4-5 levels a pokemon will learn a new move. Granted, you’re not going to be taking every every new move that comes along, but the important thing is that every twenty battles or so, you have to make a decision that could give you something new to play with. But even this can get out of control…

Rule #3: Grinding Must Be Simple
The one time I tried World of Warcraft, shit got out of hand pretty quickly. Not just because of grinding- I had friends to play with, and was prepared to deal with grinding if it meant I could roll with my peeps- but because once you level to a point where you finally saw a skill tree, it was just too complicated. On top of spells that must be bought from trainers, this new skill tree that starts at level ten, and recipes and skill levels for crafting, the grinding became too complicated.
When leveling up means having to tab out to consult a FAQ or figuring out how best to spend skill points so that your character doesn’t end up piss useless, that’s too much shit.

Rule #4: Grinding Must Have a Point (More Than Getting Stronger)
This is going to be the hard one for most games. In pokemon, you have the pokedex. By catching or evolving your pokeymans, you fill entries on the ‘dex. If you want to have caught them all, it’s your pokedex that will track your progress and let you know. So on top of getting something new every twenty levels or so when a pokeyman evolves, it all contributes to a greater purpose- filling out the pokedex.
And Pokemon is hardly the only game that uses this. Lost Odyssey made grinding fun because it was all about your immortals learning skills. Your immortals not only got stronger through level-ups, but from learning skills from mortal characters, who (in the process of grinding) would then level-up and learn more skills to teach to the immortals. Collecting those skills took a lot of the bite out of grinding, because it really felt like you were getting somewhere. And heck, if it matters, there are achievements to be had as well.
Final Fantasy X-2 did something similar with it’s job. system (and I can heard you snickering- yes, the game’s story is a complete shit sandwich but goddamn did Square ever hit one out of the park with the job system). However, because grinding in that game wasn’t easy, it is overall less attractive.

Now, obviously the individual tastes of people differ, and if millions of Warcraft players are any indication I think I’m in the minority of gamers who think grinding sucks. But these are just my findings that I thought I’d share with you.

*I got her the Play Arts P4 Arena Elizabeth and Grim Grimoire, in case you were wondering.

January 29, 2014

Cheevos

I have a confession to make: I love Achievements. Oh, you can call them “Trophies” or “Challenges” or what have you, but the basic idea is the same: A means of tracking your in-game accomplishments that you can show your friends or merely admire on your own. And while many people don’t live achievements, the truth is they’re far more ubiquitous than most people admit. Take, for example, Sengoku Rance.

“But wait, No Moshing,” you might say if you were my convenient strawman, “Isn’t Sengoku Rance a hentai game with dubcon and weird stuff? There’s no way that Sengoku Rance would see an Xbox release!” While that is true, feast your eyes:

Sengoku Rance uses a scoring system to determine what unlocked extras you get to use in subsequent playthroughs. You start with a certain amount of points for the difficulty you’re on, and lose one point for every turn you take. Clearing characters’ relationship sideplots grants two extra points per, and there are five other achievements that add to your score- Beat Orochi, Beat the Youkai King, have sex with 300 women, find 6 treasures, and have an army of 30k troops or more.
On top of that, the system info page also demonstrates how far you are along in the game’s story mode.

That’s, basically a whole bunch of achievements with an in-game mechanic attached. On an Xbox it’d look like:

Beat Youkai King (10G)
Fuck 300 women (10G)

…and so on. Why am I explaining this? Because when I say that I’d like to introduce achievements to Harem Collector that you don’t immediately think of that annoying “Boop” sound from Xbox 360 games and want to strangle me.

I don’t know if I will, though- achievements are the sort of thing that work best when front-ended onto a game and adding them a quarter of the way through development like this will probably lead to bugs and problems. So here’s a preview/tease about what achievements would be in the game if I could.

Dawson’s Dream: Collect all 100 Dark Seeds
This one is fairly self-explanatory- collecting all the Dark Seeds in the game woul be quite a feat, and earn you a little recognition as well as the reward for the 100th Seed.

Middle Kingdom Champion: Defeat Evanie the Sword-Saint with only the Hero
While Evanie will show up later in the game, soloing her the first time you meet her would offer up this achievement.

One Man Army: Defeat the Orc Chieftain, Zombie Bard, and Leon the Steel-Hearted with only the Hero.
Later on, there might be more names to add to this list, but the basic idea is to reward the player for soloing the non-optional “Leader”-type bosses with the Hero. If this list becomes too large, it could easily be pared down to “Leader-type bosses who actually represent military leaders”, dropping stuff like the Zombie Bard.
Who is Leon the Steel-Hearted? He’s the only other “Leader-type” boss I have planned for right now, and will be the final boss of the Eastfort questline.

OSHA Compliant: Complete The Virgin Gynocides without knocking Borgen unconscious.
One those cool “alternate path” sort of things, if you convince Borgen to give you both keys without dropping a [REDACTED] on him. Not that that is possible in the January Update, because I still have to add that alternate path, but it should be ready for February.

Taste the Rainbow: Deal every kind of elemental damage in one combat without using scrolls.
This is *almost* possible in the current build of the game- the only thing you’d be missing is an item which exists but I haven’t set to drop anywhere.

Results May Vary: Do something terrible and get away with it.
This achievement would unlock in a number of different ways- for lowering the pay of the kids at the cannery during Cannery Can-Can, raping the maid during Ain’t No Party Like A Search Party, drugging Yamamaya with catnip, and other things like that. It’d basically be a 0-point “shame on you” sort of thing.

Switch Hitter: Have sex with a man.
There are currently two opportunities in the hero for the Hero to get a taste of vitamin D, and there probably will be more- I find the idea of such an aggressively heterosexual man constantly ending up in situations where he has to “Take one for the team” to be pretty funny. This achievement would simply recognize the fact that your Hero has a little more… variety of experience than is canon.

There’d also be less interesting ones for plot completion, and more interesting ones for secret bosses and such, but this gives you a basic idea of what I had in mind.