Dev log update

Hello all!  Hope you're doing great.  This is my weekly dev log update.  I was told that you guys/gals like it when I go into extra detail, so I'll be doing that again.

I think it'll help to contextualize this week.  I went on reddit and asked if anyone would like to give me feedback on my game.  I got tons of people reaching out to me wanting to try it, just from showing a few pics and explaining what the game will be.  May as well give you all that same description I used on reddit:

Hi all!  My game is like a restaurant sim, but instead of serving food to  customers, you're pampering women who will transform into monster girls.   The gameplay is modeled after a game called "Cook, Serve, Delicious!"  You can see some of that gameplay here: https://youtu.be/ItTM08_zFKE?t=153

My game already has character and background art you can see here: https://imgur.com/GmLOLwK   Note that some of that is placeholder.  Although I already have the  artists and scripts for the lewd scenes, I want to make sure the  gameplay is fun first.  That's where I need help!  Only with your  feedback can I make the game fun.  I've been building it for so long, I  can no longer see it like someone who's playing it for the first time.  :(

I want the game to be fun and addictive, so any guidance on how it  met/failed to meet these goals would be helpful and shape what I  prioritize next.  If you'd like to try it, put a comment here or  send me a PM. I'm a little too nervous to post it publicly since it's  just a prototype at this point.

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Here's my long term vision for the game: You start of as the main  character (MC).  Your estranged father's died and unbeknownst to you,  you've inherited his farm.  Eva (the tutorial giver) breaks into your  house and kidnaps you to help fulfill your father's dying wishes of  converting his dilapidated farm into one that thrives.  When you arrive,  there are no animals, only human women (the demo starts here).  Unlike  other restaurant sims, these characters have personalities, and part of  the appeal of the story is going to be getting to learn more about them  (and of course to fuck them).  

All the women want to transform into various monster girls.  It's a  two stage process, and when you arrive, they've already completed the  first stage.  The first stage only changes their personalities.  e.g.,  Mia the cat-girl will act like a cat-girl, but she's still physically  human.  After the second stage, she'll look like a cat-girl, too (tail,  cat ears, paws, but otherwise human).

I've described this in a very dry way to keep it short, but I plan  for the game to be a comedy that doesn't take itself too seriously.   When you've got humans acting like animals, there's a lot of opportunity  there.  E.g., Imagine Mia the cat girl waking you up by sitting on your  face because she wants her breakfast.

A lot of people were interested in the game, so I received a lot of useful feedback!  It was amazing: There were people playing my game for hours, and the game doesn't even have a story or any lewd scenes yet.  I think I'm onto something ;)

The feedback I received was very useful.  It seems the highest priority thing I should work on next is adding more upgrades to the game.  People want more ways to spend their money.  A lot of people liked the wardrobe system, too.  I think that's what kept most of them going.

Parsing the feedback took a lot of time, but I think that's just part of the process.  Today, I literally spent all my time just reading and recording feedback, so this week's update may seem a little light, but that's just because 60% of my time went into interpreting feedback.

Oh, also, I am commissioning new UI artwork.  If you're a $10 pledge, you'll notice the WIP art I posted last week.  After talking to Nugg, we decided to scrap all that and start over again with a look that's far simpler.  I'll be posting the first iteration of that after this post.

THIS PARAGRAPH IS A SPOILER Another thing is, Nugg is creating custom artwork for the first lewd scene in the game.  We've only discussed it, so there isn't a sketch yet, but when I have something I'll share it ASAP.  I'm going to have the first lewd scene be a dream sequence with all the starting characters, but in their transformed states.  You'll be laying face up in the bed, and every character is going to "service" you.  The dream will end with Mia sitting on your face, and you'll wake up to realize she's doing it in real life, but for warmth, not for sexual reasons.  Mia sitting on your face is the artwork I'm commissioning first.  I'm considering having it so that you have a wet dream while Mia's on top of you, Mia notices, and tells everyone at the farm.  Anyway, this seems humorous to me.  I hope I'm not the only one.

OK, what was I supposed to be talking about?  Oh yeah, the dev log.  Here you go:

• The clock should have a progress bar
• The clock should be a digital clock instead of an hourglass - These two go together.  I got feedback that the clock was unclear.  It used to be 6 frames of an hourglass that would slowly drain as the level went on.  So imagine playing a level for 120 seconds, and 6 times through that level, the clock would change.  Some people didn't even notice it, and it certainly didn't give a clear indication of how much time is left.  Some people thought the only thing my game had was a level that you play endlessly.  In an attempt to fix this, I turned it into a digital clock and also added a progress bar underneath it.  Here's the before: https://imgur.com/a/CvJ5epM  Here's how it looks now: https://imgur.com/a/Ss9G7DN 
• Find out if CSD1/2 makes the next need pop up sooner if you address the previous one faster - Ha, I never actually did figure this out.  If it does, it's very subtle.  What I did figure out is that there is less time between needs in later levels.  When CSD2 starts, you wait 10 seconds before the first and second need.  But in a later level, you wait 9 seconds.  So the game progressively gets harder.  
  
  I'm considering doing the same for mine, but in a more sophisticated way.  I think the game should react to how well/poorly you're doing, and adjust the timing accordingly.  Those that are better will get more XP/gold because they'll be able to complete more needs in the same time frame.  
• Make all the characters a little smaller so their shadows don't overlap and there's more UI space - I think this is self explanatory, but if it's not, let me know.
• When you fail a maintenance task, say somewhere on the screen that your rewards are x% - Right now, when you fail a maintenance task, you get punished with less rewards for a certain number of Needs.  Unfortunately, I wasn't saying this anywhere in-game, so people were confused.  "Sometimes when I complete a need, I don't get gold or xp.  I think you have a bug?"  Nope, I just wasn't giving proper feedback.  My bad.  
• The urge upsurge label should stay on the screen during urge upsurge. - The game has a concept called "Urge Upsurge" where there is a lot less time between needs.  It's supposed to give you a really frantic period on every level.  I already indicate when this mode is going to start and stop, but I decided to also keep a label on the screen the whole time so you can't forget when it's active.  It looks like this: https://imgur.com/a/drlWOll
• Player should be able to change the resolution - I was forcing the game to be played at a particular resolution because the UI elements would shift around at different aspect ratios, but now I letterbox the content (if it doesn't fit in the aspect ratio, there's black bars on the sides to maintain the correct aspect ratio).  Therefore, I can let the player choose their preferred resolution again.
• The name tags should flicker when a character has a need. - Something I've constantly battled with in this game is, "How do you know when someone else has a need while the dialog is already open?"  Can you take your time with the current dialog because there's nobody waiting, or do you need to rush because there's 3 people waiting?  As a player, you need to know the answer to this question.
  
  The solution to this problem was, the thought bubbles were visible above the dialogs.  But, when I reduced the size of the characters (mentioned above), the thought bubbles above their head shrunk with them and were now hidden behindthe dialog.  I went a little overboard in solving this problem.  Here's the first thing I did: The name tag (shown below the dialog) now flickers when a character has a need.  Here's a gif of that:  https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/424046852069916704/565001446689341440/yearbook.gif  Notice how the thought bubbles are still hidden behind the dialog?  I'll get to that soon.
• Dialogs now know which character they are showing a dialog for. - This was a refactoring.  The dialogs didn't know who the dialog was for, it was just passed information of the proper way to perform the need.  But for the next feature, the dialog also must know who has the need.
• When a dialog is open, that character's name tag should stay solid yellow - This way, you know who you're currently helping.  Here's a gif of that: https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/535698084567711764/565008861942120448/yearbook.gif
• The name tags should turn red as the character's need timer is about to run out. - You can see this in the above gif, too.  The name tags turn red if someone behind the dialog has a need that's about to expire.  
• When the dialog is open, raise the Need/Upset/Happy bubbles so they're above the dialog, then lower them when the dialog is closed. - This is the final fix to the problem.  I simply raise the bubbles when the dialog is open.  It looks really weird to have them that high when you can see the characters though, so I have to return them back to where they were.  Here's a gif of that:  https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/424046852069916704/565066058805805056/yearbook.gif
• Bug: Olivia can't wear navel and nipple piercings at the same time - Yep... I typed out a paragraph to explain how this happened, but I was boring myself with the details.  :P  If you find the inner workings of the game to be interesting though, let me know, and I'll try again.
• Bug: Olivia's pierced clitoris shows even when she's wearing shorts - Although I think this would be a cool fashion statement in real life, it looked very strange in the game.  Now the clitoris piercing is behind her pants, not in front.
• Maintenance failure should be described as per actions rather than turns - I simply renamed a label to be more clear.  I actually just named it to be per "needs" instead of "actions."
• Add a HoldDurationPropertyDrawer - This might be as boring as the navel piercing bug, but... Here's how it used to look when I was editing Need content: https://imgur.com/a/Du4dW7p  Here's how it looks now: https://imgur.com/a/FTJJSdE  As you can see, the second picture is much more compact.  I was trying to fix a bug with the hold durations, but it took so many clicks to figure out which needs had active hold durations (I have to expand this whole tree to tell), so I decided to put all the hold duration information on one line I don't need to expand.  This'll make my life easier.

If you made it this far into the post, congratulations :)  I feel like I've been rambling the whole time, but it's kind of enjoyable.  I don't get to write much words lately, mostly code :)  That'll change in the near future though, because some lewd scenes are coming soon!