New Game Stuff, A Dev Log Or Something, I Dunno

Hello everyone!

So, you know how I said that I was going to stay out GameMaker this month so that I could focus on other things like commissions that I still need to finish? Yeah, I failed on that again. At this point I'm just going to stop trying. My body and soul wants to work in the engine and to actively resist it is stressful, both physically and psychologically. I'm not taking this as a defeat, though, so don't think I'm self-flagellating here - if anything, I'm just kinda taking ownership of the whole thing. I want to make cool new things in a cool new engine and... you know, I'm okay with that.

Does it mean that commissions/stories/whatever take a bit longer to write? Yeah, absolutely, and I still need to do better on those - more because I want to write more stories than anything. But at the same time - for me personally, anyways - as a creative, it's hard for me to go don't work on the project you want to work on, work on this other thing instead. It's stifling and the thing that I am forcing myself to work on suffers for it - and then, after I've forced myself to work on it for a while, I end up spending several days getting sidetracked because of the stress. So I think, in future, I am just going to allocate a reasonable amount of time in the month to working on this new project instead of, well, forcing myself not to. I think it's just healthier and more productive to do things that way.

I want to make it abundantly clear that I have no plans on stopping work on A Tiny Furry In A Huge World. I have been working hard on that all month too, and in a couple of days there will be a nice chunky preview build with a whole bunch of new scenes (including a cum jar) and even some other stuff that I am excited to show everyone. The only thing that'll really slow in terms of output is commissions, but... that's been a thing ever since I started shifting focus to a new engine back in January. I'm still adapting to that change, but, I'll get there!

Anyway! I am keen to show off the progress that I have made, so, I am going to do that. As you can see, I've attached a video to the post. If you don't watch the video then what I'm going to talk about next won't make much sense, so, feel free to go ahead and watch before reading on.

So, the video contains my (rough) backbone for a new text adventure game engine thingy. The UI is definitely not final, it's more placeholder stuff so that I could kinda get a rough visualization for everything, so, if you hate how it looks, it'll definitely look different in the final game. As you can see, it's very similar to Quest. The room description prints over there, there's some objects on the side that you can interact with in a bunch of ways, and there's a compass in the corner for movement.

The only big difference is that I have removed the text parser - or, in layman's terms, the box that you type commands into - like go west or eat micro or whatever. I decided to remove this for a couple of reasons. The first is that it's cumbersome, to the point where I was actively trying to make my games in Quest playable only by clicking on them in the first place. The second is that it'll make it much easier to port to mobile. Having to type text commands in on a phone is just no fun for anyone.

So how do commands work? Well, there are three context-sensitive verbs instead - these being look at, use, and talk to. Look at is pretty universal - bar a couple of circumstances it won't change - but use and talk to will vary between every object. As you can see in the video, if you use a wardrobe then the command will change to open for example, or if you try to talk to your laundry then the command changes to taste. I might add a couple more verbs - one for smell comes to mind, for example. It wouldn't be hard to do so.

The aim was to create something that is both familiar and fresh - something that looks like a Quest game, but, plays better than one.

This backbone was completed early in March. By backbone I really mean the backbone. Aside from some tweaks that I want to do, the only thing that I really need to work on now is the game's content - so, all the words and puzzles and dialogue and scenes and stuff. The vast majority of the programming is done now, which is nice, because now I don't really have to worry about it too much later.

It took a lot of effort and I had to learn a lot of new stuff in order to be able to do it, but at the same time, I kind of needed to prove to myself that I could. I think that's one of the reasons why I've been so obsessed with programming this lately. I've spoken about this before, but I have a lot of confidence issues and I don't really know if I can do something until I do it and until I do it it kinda gnaws at the mind, you know? This little voice saying you'll never be good enough to do this whispering away back there and the only way to shut it up is to either give or... do it. Having done it, that little voice has successfully been slain, and I feel a lot happier for it.

But wait. I'm not done yet. I have more game stuff to show, including a game that you can play right now.

I want my new game to have a few mini-games. Don't get me wrong, the focus is still going to heavily be on the CYOA vore game vibes with all the juicy scenes that you'd expect, but, I want to offer a couple of different kinds of gameplay along the way.

I labored over this decision for a while because from my perspective being forced to play mini-games in a porno game when you just wanna read the porno is annoying. At the same time, though, it adds gameplay variety and depth and stuff, and it feels like a waste not to do something more when I'm working in a program that, well, allows me to do more.

So, I decided that I would make the mini-games completely optional. You will either be able to skip them when they come up or you'll be able to switch them off entirely with a toggle. Doing so won't affect the experience bar, well, not being able to play the minigame. If you just want the vore or you just want to get behind the story or both or whatever, then you won't have your objective blocked by a stupid mini-game that you don't want to play.

So, anyway. Back to stupid voices, ever since I hatched this plan I had one particularly annoying gremlin in the back of my mind going ah, you made the text thing, but that's all you'll ever be able to do! You'll never be able to program something with actual gameplay! It was particularly annoying because it was keeping me up at night, to the point where I started programming this game in the middle of the night because I couldn't get to sleep. Yes, I am really that down bad.

Anyway. So I decided to make a runner game. I did this for two reasons. The first is that I roughly understood how to make one before going in using my existing knowledge. I didn't want to rely on tutorials too much to make this, it was made, in a way, to prove to myself that I could do it without relying too much on outside help. The second is that I thought a runner mini-game would make a lot of sense for the game. You're going to be very small in it, so you're probably going to be running away from a lot of things. I think a mini-game where you have to survive for a certain amount of time before getting stepped on would be pretty fun.

So I set out to make a basic game that I could play on my end just to kinda show myself that I could do it. I didn't really plan on releasing it or talking about it at all, actually, so I didn't make it with a vore slant, it's just kind of a cute runner game. The intention was to spend a couple of days making something playable.

In the end, I kinda surprised myself. Don't get me wrong, it's not the best thing ever or anything, but for something I banged up in about three days I think it's pretty fucking cool. You can play it for at least two minutes and have fun. For that reason, despite not intending to talk about it, I am talking about it... obviously. I'm also going to release it for everyone to play.

Here's a GIF!

Looks chill, right? Well, it gets faster the higher your score gets, and it can get REALLY FAST. My best score is 85. I am confident that 100 is achievable if the stars align, but beyond that is probably impossible.

It's called Bullet Cat, and it's a silly infinite runner game where you're a cat that has to shoot ghosts for some reason. The song was made by Raruke, the cat sprite was made by SeethingSwarm, and the sound effects are from this pack here. Everything else was made by me. The UI is definitely patchy and boy wait until you see the title screen but aside from that it's a pretty damn playable game, especially for something made in less than a week.

It'll work on just about any Windows computer. I'm not porting it anywhere or doing anything more with it. I've proven my point and somehow even gone so far as to make something fun and playable that I am happy and proud to share. It's a big confidence boost, and I can now work on commissions with a clearer mind and a confidence for the future that I didn't have before.

Don't worry, I am not getting into the business of making non-vore games. This will probably the only non-vore game that I release, and it's questionable to call it a release anyway - it's more to show everyone how much progress I've made so far. I very much enjoy the niche that I am in and have no plans of stepping outside of it.

Anyway! This is a long post, so, I am going to end it here. If you'd like to give Bullet Cat a whizz then I have attached it to the post.

In an hour or so I'm going to have a poll up to decide what kinda content the feral vixen will be getting as a bonus ending, so, see you soon!