Dev log Q&A + News

Thanks for the shoutout! But honestly, a lot of what you wrote is kinda BS? First off, you should know that this project mainly has just three people working on it: odes, Dogson, and Pegashis. Dogson is just a modeler. He's not a programmer. His job is to crank out new assets on a regular basis and fix the bugs found in those assets by us. He does this job exceptionally well, in my opinion. Pegashis is the environment designer (I believe), so they also don't do any coding either. Beyond the assets, odes is the one doing the rest of the work and he's the one who puts together all of the devlogs. And since this project has been losing money for years now, he can't hire additional help. Like, I can tell your intentions are mostly good here, and you're just trying to show tough love, but I can also tell you've only been around for a couple years and that you don't pay very close attention to the Patreon updates, because you seem to be under the impression that odes is STILL developing FVNE with the same design philosophy he had for YL1 and that we're all just too fanboyish or naive to call him on it after all these years. And I get that, because I once was also quite skeptical. I first became a Patron at the beginning of 2019, but I started off at the $3 tier because I could also see that YL1 was made without a lot of forethought in mind, hadn't been updated in years, the successor was still vaporware, and that they were already way behind their initial expected release of the character creator. I frankly saw no reason to increase my pledge level since there were no WIP builds to download, and I didn't want to throw that much support behind a project that, in my mind, hadn't proven itself yet. I, too, tried out YL1, and while I was impressed with some aspects, the app was incredibly clunky. As the year went on and odes kept pushing back the release date of the character creator, I became increasingly doubtful that it would ever actually be released, or if it was, I expected it to be disappointing or as clunky as YL1. But then at the very end of 2019, the character editor finally dropped. And in the years that followed, new features were being added at a regular pace. Cloud integration, fur authoring, cloth binding, and custom offsets all came out at a regular pace in 2020 and 2021 once the initial foundation of the character creator was done. In the end, the character creator was far better than I expected and significantly less clunky than YL1 was, even though it lacked most of the features (i.e. sex). Once all the main milestones for the character creator were reached (because yes, they had milestones), odes made a big post where he laid out all of the different components he would need to work on for the next major release: Upgrade to a newer version of Unity, create a new custom physics engine and IK system, soft body dynamics and collision, penetration dynamics, as well as an editor to tie all of these systems together. That was less than two years ago. Since then, odes has created all of the custom systems he originally laid out, and posted updates about them as he got those components completed. So when you point to all of YL1's failings and lack of clear planning, I would actually agree with you. And you know who else would agree with you? odes. Here's a quote from odes in 2018: "The first Yiffalicious was pretty much developed organically, i.e. as a prototype that we kept adding more and more things to, until it eventually started to crack in its very foundations due to the sheer weight of its own size. This time around we're approaching our development from a more "proper", traditional software modelling perspective, so the systems have been designed with much care and thought to get a more robust and dynamic structure. This means we can't take shortcuts to get results fast, we can't cheat, and everything has to be defined in a more abstract and modular fashion. In the end, this method will pay off, and the results will be much closer to what you'd expected from a professional 3D editing tool, but it does take longer to develop." So when you say "you're going to justify the failure the same way you justified the baked in flaws of YL1", I have no idea what you're talking about, because the reason they ended development on YL1 was specifically because they didn't want to ignore the unfixable flaws of YL1 and decided instead to rebuild the idea from the ground up with proper planning this time around. I can't help but think your misconceptions are a result of how you don't "pay attention to these things". or perhaps a lack of interest in reading through old Patreon posts from before you started backing. Even back in 2017 when odes first started planning what would become FVNE, he already posted about the scene workflow they were building towards. You can still find it here: https://www.patreon.com/posts/yl2-update-9587607 What aspect of that post sounds like someone with logistical apathy? He's had a logistical plan with clear milestones from the beginning, and while some things have changed, it seems like he's largely stuck to his original vision. It's just taken a long time, which he also acknowledged would be the case from the beginning. He even stopped making his target dates public because he didn't want people to support the Patreon expecting a release at a specific time only for the release to be delayed from an unexpected show-stopping bug. And it's not like odes has been chasing this white whale in spite of us demanding he change course. Way back when he first started, he asked the community whether they would rather he kept working on YL1 and YL2/FVNE at the same time, even if it meant YL2/FVNE would take even longer since his attention would be divided. The community at the time was clear that they wanted YL2/FVNE as soon as possible and they were fine with YL1 production ending if it meant getting YL2/FVNE sooner. Then later still, he put up a poll of whether people wanted YL2/FVNE to lean more towards expressiveness (allowing control over fine details and animating scenes with dialogue) or interactivity (more like YL1). The community voted overwhelmingly for more expressiveness, which was clearly the more difficult path. All this said, your skepticism is understandable, and I don't necessarily blame you for not searching through old Patreon posts to have a better idea of the project roadmap. But as someone who HAS gone through old Patreon posts and has read through all of the updates as they've come out... things are going fine.

Mobius Scarf

Honestly, no, the text is a bit too much information! I simply make a wish-idea-suggestion to the FVNE team My thought is why not look beyond the edge of the plate, why not try to think bigger - where to make this big effort when it's just another wank template they should, would be something pitiful. What's different is when it's just not technically feasible.

Deimos

You clearly didn't read what I said closely or carefully enough. I SAID " There was like, no plan, no order, no thinking through a work flow for the end user. And that might work fine in the "Character Editor" but I hope you're reading and thinking about this seriously because if you're planning more than a YL1, (and) you want this to be a medium to make "furry visual novels" you guys have got to work on these logistics" MY IMPLICATION is the CHARACTER EDITOR, as FANCY and SNAZZY and EASY it may make CHARACTER MODIFCATION and CUSTOMIZATION it's a fundamentally STATIC FUNCTION. And rotating or extending appendages is NOT ANIMATION, IT'S POSING. The scene editor and snap shot editor is a COMPLETELY different animal. Poking through menus in the char editor is very nice and sedate, but the workflow for even BASIC scene production is COMPLETELY different. The workflow for basic scenes in YL1 is an exercise in frustration. Yeah, adding a penetrator and penetratee and locking knob to fob is the easiest part, but basic scene navigation is a nightmare, when I work in Blender I use a logitech G600 MMO mouse because it has twenty side buttons + the "G SHIFT" which toggles the MMO buttons from one set of macros to an other on the fly, and I added keybinds to common functions which had none. Then I assigned basic macros like toggle ortho/persp, select all/select none, toggle between different modes (object, texturing, posing, edit, weight paint, etc). Then I made these like thirty key long macros on the G SHIFT toggle buttons. This is one of my favorite Tab to edit mesh, element select mode, edges, select all, select border/boundary edges only mark UV seams, remove doubles (double merge distance is set in another dialogue before using the macro) select none T SM E SA SB MS RD SN tab (in to edit mode) ▼ TAB ▲ TAB select mode ▼ L CTRL ▼ TAB ▲ TAB ▲ L CTRL edge ▼ E ▲ E Select all ▼ A ▲ A select borders ▼ L CTRL ▼ L SHIFT ▼ L ALT ▼ B ▲ B ▲ L ALT ▲ L SHIFT ▲ L CTRL mark seams ▼ L CTRL ▼ L SHIFT ▼ L ALT ▼ K ▲ K ▲ L ALT ▲ L SHIFT ▲ L CTRL remove doubles ▼ L CTRL ▼ L SHIFT ▼ L ALT ▼ J ▲ J ▲ L ALT ▲ L SHIFT ▲ L CTRL select none ▼ A ▲ A 18 keys, four multikey macros executed with a mere right (gshift) hold and a press of G17 this is a very simple example of logistical planning, think through how to minimize effort and key strokes I can navigate just BARELY navigate the scene editor/builder even with macros like this in YL1 because seriously, WHY NO FOV ADJUSTMENT? Don't tell me that's a monumental task, I've dissected unity asset repositories and a lot of functions are supplied by the unity package itself, it's just the implementation part I can't figure out. To make POV scenes with the ridiculously narrow FOV of 60 angular degrees? AND ON AN ULTRA WIDE MONITOR? to even get in the neighborhood of the POV FOV with that I basically have to break the character's backs and twist them backwards like deformed pretzels. I'm not asking for a slider up to 120 angular degrees but christ man, at least make it toggleable between default and 75 if 90 causes issues. And the god damn middle click to anchor edit cam, another nightmare. No, don't have the edit cam anchor like right next to the middle clicked target, have it hover half a meter away by default, forcing one to zoom IN to the anchor target to be able to intelligibly rotate the cam to where it needs to be focused, and ! make it so HOLD middle click is PAN as well so unless you keep an iron grip on that middle button you'll oopsie, select a different camera anchor, usually half way across the environment! BRILLIANT! And I know the key bind combos for navigation, they're mapped to my macros, but that doesn't change errant middle clicks while panning, not all of us were blessed with carpel tunnel free ligaments in the wrist, the key binds are a smack in my face. As for a map editor, it's just not enough for you is it? Add more tangential work to the process. I got a better idea. Select map size>1x1, 2x2, 4x4, 8x8, whatever, dimensionless units since I don't know the inworld default dimensions. SO make like, a selection list from a cubicle to whatever realistic limitation make sense, all cubic, all powers of 2 to keep it simple. Boom, you drop in a blank map with a default flat surface and a default cubemap sky. Since you can pull assets in, you import objects and construct everything from scratch loose base objects. Again, GO TO OUTWORLDZ.COM. FREE ASSETS UNDER GPL/GNU. If they need materials rebaking, that's a low price to pay for not having to construct an entire prefab house or spend weeks on making interlockable terrain pieces from scratch. But I would say just provide loose prebaked and materialed objects like panels, windows, etc. Make their rotations and orbits rigid, like only by 45 or 90 degree increments, make them stretchable, and make them so that they snap together automatically once in proximity. Again> Second Life. People with patience and creativity still manage to use the ancient in world primitives (cubes, cones, cylinders, etc) to make really nice houses with out mesh, but this engine has a major advantage, SL still uses OGL so real time shadows and on the fly pixel shading is very demanding, so even with normal (the RGB kind) maps and spec maps (which behave very differently in OGL) diffuse textures still need to be baked because there's a limit to the quality of pixel and voxel shading even with normal and spec maps, and real time shadows in OGL are nightmarishly slow to procedurally generate at anything higher than the lowest quality, where as the DX11/12 pipeline has next to no issues with shadows and occlusion and on the fly pixel/texel/voxel shading, so prefabbed prematerial baked building units should be more than enough to clap together a house or whatever without worrying about on the fly render pipeline shading taking care of itself. But I'm done, gvetch at you guys in a few months, I have tossed my pearls, now its no longer my choice if they were cast before men or swine.

Gabriel

We have a quite sophisticated character editor that leaves little to be desired (THANKS for that) - Would a map editor be possible in the far future???

Deimos

Gabriel

My question is more like a suggestion: is it possible to do an asset flip and just reuse the maps from Yiffalicious in FVNE? I know it wouldn't be anything new or original, but it would still give us more to work with while we wait for new maps.

SteelCrow13

It was mentioned that something will change in the fur representation in how far will this affect us users? Punkto fur it would be great if you could the fur stroke direction, irgentwie memory similar to the fluff.

Deimos

One problem I have with the original Yiffalicious is sorting. I keep coming up with new interaction ideas but cycling through to get to older ones page by page is a hassle. Especially trying to get back to ones I've made years ago. Will there be a means to catalogue interactions in a way to allow easier access? Like allowing us to sort by folders, search our interactions by name or view a larger amount at once instead of a small page?

PseudoSamurai

I see Just like Blacky My dream would be to develop FVNE so far that it would become a kind of "poser program" the penetration system could only be the beginning to be able to create your very own scenes and stories maybe even mini-series. So what about sound files, language editions, if need be speech bubbles? The levels/map design would also be interesting for me, I have some ideas in planning, only what limitations they would have, how big they should be and I have to be able to set "light sources", sure it would also need "scripts" so that something moves leaves - a "water mill" as an example?! How about physics An "Clothes" (a skirt that not only sticks to the body but swings) and "Parts" to have? A piece of clothing that falls to the ground, a door that can be opened. Wind hitting the surface It would be a bit more complex, there are Shapekeys for clothes, but these have been rigid in the animation so that a jacket should perhaps open. In order to adjust the atmosphere of the scene, how about more color and brightness adjustment options for the lighting? The few included me, paid attention to the size of his character, changing the size afterwards requires a lot of rework, will it be possible to fix this in the future to simply scale the character in the interaction? Um, that immediately gives me an idea, how about giving the slider an approximate meter measure instead of 0.1-2 to have a better idea and also to be able to define later how big the character should be?

Deimos

Haven't been able to keep up with the Q&As but. How advanced is the penetration system going to be, like are characters going to be able to "hold" stuff in them?

Nicoroys

Hey there odes! I'm really glad that you're doing well and I'm super excited about those news and really look forward to that video :D Now for my questions: I'd like to know how garments and part will work on interactions. Will there be some kind of tool to place bones on tails, wings or whatever parts come to mind or do we have to learn how rigging works in blender and export stuff as .dea files? This would also mean that everything will have to be made on each existing character individually as long as the exact same parts are being used, correct? So, this leads me to the old thing we talked about a year ago: will we be able to apply physics like weight or wind to hair and dresses? Now something entirely different, as I am quite interested in the novel part of FVNE, are there existing plans already how SFW scenes could work out? For example shooting bow and arrow or make our characters walk and jump around, having some kind of sword fight action scenes and such. How would transition between scenes work or let's say: would it be possible to switch camera angles inside a larger map within a split second from one corner to the other so we can have two groups of characters in the same scene and while those characters can't see each other, the camera, and with that the viewer can. Would it be possible to make cars, motorcycles or plains get to work? Would it be possible to implement actual water like on a shower or a bath? I believe it has been talked about implementing sprites for special effects somewhere later down the road, so how would this work out? Feel free to pick any of those questions, You don't have to answere all of them, as I am actually more interested in animating short movies with mostly SFW content I probably don't resemble the majority of the community here ;)

Blacky

Most of these questions are overlapping so just just answer them at your own leasure.

Static_snowflake

How will the scenes be put together, like how before in yiff it was saving certain scenes and saving the settings you have before moving to the next scene, will it be the same or will there be something new?

My questions is about maps. Or maybe the question is just "maps?". What kind of and how many maps are planned for FurryVNE? Are they big and open or small and intricate? Are they something similar to the old Yiffalicious maps or something entirely different? Are there going to be different themes like urban, fantasy, sci-fi or something else. Can users make their own maps to share and enjoy? Maybe modular maps? Is the old beach house going to make a comeback? I know this is a lot of questions and the maps are not the priority but any information would be appreciated!

Static_snowflake