House of Hellish Harlots - Things To Do (Update 28th Feb '21)

Normally, I'd put an update post here, but that seems a bit superfluous as it's all in the release post for "House of Hellish Harlots" v0.016 I put out yesterday.

Instead I thought I'd go over a list of things that still need to be done.

SHORT TERM
Short term goal is to get a proper demo done that showcases all the mechanics and has maybe the first third of the game implemented.  This needs:

Intro
A short introduction detailing how the player ended up at the House.  Will likely have options for character creation.

(I did write something like this – but it was as Chapter 1 for a different type of game.  This will need to be short so the player can get right back to the action without having to click through lots and lots of passages.  I'll likely move 'Misty' into the House and give her a scenario now that she can't kill the player before he even enters the House)

Interior
The existing game loop passages are fairly skeletal.  I need to flesh those out with proper descriptions of the House interior.

I also need to properly introduce The Madam and have her explain the rules of her game.  Again, this will need to be fairly brief so it doesn't feel like a chore to run through at the beginning of every new game.

NPC Barman
He's the last of the main NPCs and his role is to give helpful advice.  In the early game it's to introduce all the other NPCs.  In the mid and late game the advice will be on how to escape the House.  For now I just need to write his early part so the player has a smooth introduction to the other NPCs.

Replace Placeholder Harlots
There are only 5 placeholders left to replace.  Some of the placeholders will get scenarios and come back (I might put up a poll to see which ones people would most like to see).

Maintenance
This is the work I didn't get done for ver0.016.  I need to go through the rest of the remaining harlots and given them a few tweaks to interact with the charms.

At an estimate, I think this is about 2 months work.  After it's done, I should have a proper public demo version and will start to see if I can snowball interest for art and sound assets.

MEDIUM TERM
Best described as:

Harlots, Harlots, and more Harlots.
This is when I start to pile on the harlot scenarios.  This is when I'll also start to think about going tall as well as broad to extend the number of playable rounds.  Maybe even put in a route to the end and a final 'boss' harlot the player has to survive to exit the House at the end.

This is also where I'll need to think about organising the harlots into faction and tier them according to difficulty.

Most of the harlots will belong to a clan or faction that has some shared characteristics.  The initial plan I had has mutated into something a little different.  At the moment there is a grouping around 'smother' harlots and with The Doctoress I had an idea for another grouping based around 'artificial being' harlots.  As I add more harlots, other groupings will likely present themselves.

A faction needs around 12-14 scenarios (a single harlot could count as multiple scenarios with her repeat visits) and a final 'Queen' or 'endboss'.  The harlots also need to be spread across the full range of difficulty.

Originally I had 7 factions, but I think I might only need 4-5 for a 'complete' game, with the option to extend it later with new content.

I'll likely create a chart at some point and try to match harlot ideas with faction and difficulty slot.

This is probably around 70+ harlots.  Which sounds a lot, but there are already 26 in the House.  As long as I don't panic and keep adding new ones every month, that big number soon won't seem so big.

LONG TERM (OPTIONAL)
There are some game mechanics that came up as maybes when I was first plotting out the idea.  They might go in, or they might not depending on how the project is going.

Post-room events
Currently, the player has two post-room actions but only really has The Portly Gentleman and The Elegant Woman to spend them on.  An idea I had was for an array of random events that might throw help or hindrances the player's way (a little like the Town Events in Darkest Dungeon).  It's something I'd like to add, but it's currently low priority.

Eavesdropping in the Bar
This is to fulfil a requirement for when the player has more actions than coins.  A slightly worse way to gain information than the Elegant Woman, but free.  Can also be a post-room action.

Other NPCs
These are other people trapped in the House.  The passengers in the car taking the player to the House fit here.  A sub-quest could involve giving them information to keep them alive.  (The game "Catherine" is an example)

Harlot Sub-Quests
I've already experimented with this with Suffocatrix Mamilla's repeat visits.  Repeat visits and satisfying certain requirements could unlock alternate endings where the player is taken off and 'claimed' by a harlot for a more involved End (Bad, Good and varying degrees of pleasure in between).  This is also a sneaky way to pad up the scenario count, but it will also make some of the harlots feel more like characters than random mook encounters.  I definitely don't want to go overboard here as it's the kind of complexity that has dropped other game projects in the shit, but it's something to look at once everything else is in place.

Anyway, that's a rough outline of things that still need to be done.  Let me know your thoughts in the comments below.