Ruin Me 0.48.0: The Chthonic Swelling

Hi, perverts! It's once again been longer than I intended. I'll give a bit of info on my situation below, but to summarize: I'm continuing to deal with mental health stuff and I intend to keep posting updates more-or-less regularly. Feel free to skip ahead to the changelog if you don't need more details. :)

I had a minor dissociative episode on a weekend trip with some partners. It turned out fine, but was scary enough that I finally found the strength to get a therapist after too long without one. That therapy work is going well but will still take a while before the benefits really start to show up in my life. I appreciate your continued support and understanding! For those of you who are also creative people: try not to let too much of your self-image get tied up in your capacity for work. <3

I'm trying to be kind and accepting of myself and my limitations right now, so I don't want to make any commitments about release schedules. I was stuck with this release 90% done for a while, and of course now that I finally finished it I'm full of eagerness for my plans for the next one, which I'll share when they're more finished. 

Enough of that! The big thing in this update is a new horror expedition; this one is playable in Act I, and has a lot of literary geekery. It also features my personal favorite horror/fantasy creature, if you can call it that. This should be a good one for fans of male partners. Another big thing, not listed in the changelog, is that I've got automated testing figured out for the game, which means I can have Ren'Py run through a predetermined sequence of actions and make sure the game doesn't crash or break too badly. This should help to prevent the large number of hotfixes that were needed for the last release.

As always, please let me know about your thoughts! Your responses really help guide how I think about adding to the game.

Version 0.48.0p adds:

• "The Chthonic Swelling" horror expedition, featuring an encounter with a shadowy figure at a crossroads. It's available by talking to Byron in the bar starting in Act 1. Optional kinks include intoxication.
• New transitions replacing most of the fade-to-black transitions used throughout the game.
• A report of how much Ken you currently have on the "Explore" menus for the mansion and town. Previously, you had to open your journal to check.
• Occasional minor variations to Cathy's play scene upon repeated visits. This will probably get extended to other scenes. It can be disabled with the new "Repeated Scene Variations" option in the preferences.
• Minor enhancements and fixes.

This release also contains the fixes from 0.47.3:

• Fix for a bad variable in a breakfast line.
• Fix for certain initial names for Theresa. If the way you address Theresa is busted, it should be fixed automatically when you load your game.
• Fix for muddled history entries when dealing with random text. There's a remaining issue where the history will not always match what was originally shown in these cases; I'm working on it.
• Fix for task notification messages not having variables substituted.
• Fix for a bad variable during the second scene of massage training.

As patrons, you have access to the Reminisce option in your bedroom, which lets you replay old sex scenes easily. Folks who support at the Center of Attention level get access to an additional cheat menu; the password has not changed.

Use the link above to connect your Patreon account to Itch and grab the new version!