Dev Update #21 & E2 Survey Review Part 12/12

Hi all, hope you've had a good week. E3 development is mostly going well (but today I was losing my mind trying to fix some of the girls' skin maps in their delicate areas). Aside from that though everything is going smoothly and I've made some progress on the script and I've finished all outfits and pretty much got all the environments ready for E3. This coming week I'm going to try and get started on the animations as I like to do these as early as possible to ensure they're as good as possible and not rushed. So now that I've got everyone's outfits and the environments sorted I have everything ready to proceed with that. That's going to be my priority in the short term but I'll also be working on the script in the background and maybe a few renders. We've also got to the end of the survey so as this is a short dev update I'm answering some of the questions that were posted at the end of that below. I'll also be posting the raw survey data for Gold, IR and UV members tomorrow incase you want to take a look at anything yourself.

Some questions from the survey:

How many clubs are there at Elmwood (and what are they)?

More than 100. There are clubs for every major sport, various charities and various cultural groups. But the clubs most important to the story are the feminist society, the rugby club and the cheerleading society.

How big is the school? right now it seems a little small with us seeing only small vignettes.

Elmwood has around 13,000 undergraduate students and around 8,500 postgrads. Unfortunately it's difficult for me to just show very busy and populous regions with limited time and computing power. Ideally I would have very seat occupied in lectures but it's just not very feasible without slowing down production.

When we get that far can you get both Eclipse and Devil's kiss?

Yes.

Are the professors MILF side characters or true LIs?

True love interests that you can romance.

Will the game change scenarios at some point meaning will we do a school trip or something as other college VN like to do?

There will almost definitely be little holiday type events, yes. I've always planned on having a ski holiday with a certain group of girls and there will likely be other retreats too.

Does is go to graduation like 3 years university progression of story.

1 year - the 21 episodes of Elmwood span the protagonist's first year of uni.

Will there be an actual main story? Will there be plot explanation for the magic abilities?

Yes there's a story lol. Contrary to how it may seem there isn't any actual magic in Elmwood. Sure the perks may seem a little far fetched but to me they're just tools to help describe lust and romance and to give you a way customise your identity in the game.

Since the first term at Elmwood is going to end by episode 7.. It got me thinking about just how much time is going to pass between ep2 and ep7? ......Because so far it has been 1ep=1day. Quite curious to see if this changes in the future or if we finish elmwood in 21 days lol (hope people don't find the question spoiler-ish)

This is a good question but it hasn't quite been 1 ep = 1 day. Episode 1 was only one day but E2 was two days - Sunday and Monday. E3 is going to be split over 4 days (Wednesday - Sat) while skipping one day (Tuesday) and this is more representative of future episodes. The nature of the story means that you meet a huge amount of people very early on which is why we've spent so much time on just those first 3 days. Between some episodes we'll be skipping many days, even entire weeks and typically focusing on 2-5 action packed days in each episode.

Would you consider changing Violet's hair? her hair model is way overused and it brings down otherwise fantastic girls down.

You're absolutely correct it is way overused and I'd love to change it but the reason it's so overused is because it does look quite good. Some girls might change hairstyles between season 1 & 2 of Elmwood but only if I find something that's a big upgrade.

Do you have an overall idea for the story? Is the beginning, middle, and end planned?

Yes, all the core elements are planned.

Will there be any niche fetish action like watersports, rimming, fisting or similar?

This is a fair question. The thing about Elmwood is that it's basically all about things that I personally find hot. Perhaps fortunately I seem to have fairly mainstream tastes. In terms of the the specific things you've mentioned:

Watersports - Unless squirting counts then not really no, I don't personally find pee hot so I wouldn't be keen on having it in Elmwood.

Rimming - Eating girls' asses: Yes 1000%. The reverse of having the protagonist's ass eaten: unlikely.

Fisting - Possibly but to me the more simple alternative having one finger inside a very tight butt is way hotter than having 5 inside a very loose butt. Anal fingering will absolutely be in the game, fisting... unlikely but not impossible.

are there game over choises

Ages ago I was planning on an actual death mechanic if you drank too much lol but I've since scrapped that. I don't like the idea of having game over choices as these just feel a bit pointless in a visual novel. Instead choices have more subtle, longer term effects.

Will there be an in-built walkthrough and a cheat system (option for some/most)?

Maybe in future but I don't really like the idea of this - I want players to be immersed in the decision making so that the rewards feel rewarding.

Will all of the LI's be able to be inpregnated?

Yes but only late in the game.

The game is all a big dream while we are in a coma? I ask because the only interaction with a male is our father on the phone (¬_¬ ) . Is it possible to be a good or bad student? Will there be a usable phone?

Nope - not a dream. You can interact with a dude in E2 via Dr Riley's auction and there'll be a more important dude you can interact with in E3. Yes it's possible to be a good or bad student - you have the option to break into your professor's office in E2 so I'd say that's pretty bad lol.

The phone is why I want to answer this question though - I actually initially planned to have a phone mechanic in the game and I designed a draft for what it would be like which is the pic below. What I was considering was basically an alternative tool to use the various in game menus (trophies app would take you to achievements screen, settings would take you to the options etc). I was even planning on having a dating app - FuckDuck which is referenced in E1 and it's how Jordan and Chloe met.

But in the end I decided against it because of how I wanted to do texting. In a game where you have to click on your phone to send and view texts I feel like it would result in you mass texting at the start of every episode and it just feeling like a chore you have to cram all out at once (or even worse, constantly click on your phone to see if there's anything new) in fear of missing anything out from not texting. So I decided I wanted to control exactly when texting happens so that it's integrated more seamlessly into the flow of each chapter. And then if there's a phone you can click on but can't text with - it just seems a bit redundant. As for the other apps like FuckDuck, I didn't see a need for it in the end given the amount of sex in Elmwood and I think it's better if even the very casual encounters you'll have in the future happen more organically in a way that makes them feel more earned/special.

Apologies for any questions I didn't answer here and also thank you so much for everyone who wrote suggestions in the section before this, I've read them all and there's a lot of great advice there. As always though, feel free to dm me any questions you have and I'd be happy to answer. Hope you have a great week!

WW