crushstation

Super quick dev post!

Hey guys, super quick dev post because I've worked right up until the second I have to rush out the door!  I had a great sprint day today, things are going great, and I am excited because I have a full day's writing planned for the next sprint day, which is tomorrow.  I promise a detailed update tomorrow night!  Have a great Friday night everyone :-)

Sprint 004, day 1

A consultant advised us to trying working in two-week development "sprints".  This is our first attempt!

Hey guys!  I set up a new Trello so you can follow along with the progress of the sprint.  It's a bit basic right now (just the task names), but I'll write up some more details over the next few days.

We completed one of the tasks already – completing a w...

Sprint 004 plan

A consultant advised us to trying working in two-week development "sprints".  This is our first attempt.

Hey guys!  Here's the plan for the next two weeks.

The main goal is to release a Beta version of the Sex Engine Playable Prototype to Operators+.  This will be followed by a general release of the prototype, giving everybody a chance to experience the new type of sex scenes we're planning.

We also aim to add the "In This Year" pass...

Mentoring day

Firstly, I want to say that I feel uncomfortable when I spend time organising instead of working.  It feels much more comfortable to spend time writing a sex scene than it does to write rules for sex scenes.  

After having just taken a fortnight out of production to do just that, spending more time on project management was kind of a scary prospect.

But...

Back on the prototype!

Hey guys!  I was able to get back to work on the new sex scene prototype today.  I adjusted the prototype so it now has basic versions of the new sex scene mechanics, and got back to writing.

Now I have all the rules I think I need, I'm hoping that progress will be quite fast.  I'll keep you posted as I work.

Over the weekend I experimented with Jira.  I'm not quite sure that I'm structuring the tasks with the right degree of granularity, so I've hired a Jira e...

Jira weekend

While I worked on the Big Fucking List™, Hyneman set up a new project management app for us to use.

The Dev Trello is getting cluttered, and the Big Fucking List™ is just a document on my hard drive that will soon be out of date.  We need a way for the whole team to access, edit and maintain the list.

The solution Hyneman chose for this is an app called 2019-11-22 18:35:53 +0000 UTC View Post

Yay the Big Fucking List™ is done

I'm absolutely certain that important things are missing from it, and we'll definitely need to add more to it as we move forward.  But, for the first time since I started working on The Big Fucking List™, things have stopped popping into my head when I look at it.  

So I'm calling version 1 of The Big Fucking List™ complete.  I've attached a PDF for you to look over.  Please discuss it here, or in Discord, or on our new 2019-11-21 17:20:59 +0000 UTC View Post

Nearly done

Hey guys!  Sorry I didn't post yesterday, as planned.  The team at my Real Jo...I mean, my old job, took me out for drinks instead of letting me just slip away unceremoniously.  The main handover's now done – I still have some outstanding meetings and tasks (for example, tonight I had to take a long phone call to clarify the current situation on a sub-project), but they'll gradually fade away.

Over the past few months, I've scaled back the amount I was wor...

Probable delay

Hey guys!  I spent today at what used to be my real job – before I resigned in order to work on Female Agent full time – doing a handover day with my replacement.

We were supposed to finish today, but IT problems ate up a lot of our time.  So now I'll need to also spend some time with her tomorrow.

It'll probably just be a half day, which means I'll still be able to work on Female Agent's Big Fucking List™ tomorrow, as planned – but I may not finish...

Checking it twice*

I worked more on the Big Fucking List™ of all tasks today.  It's complete enough to call finished, but World Famous Game Designer specifically instructed me to complete the list, so that's what I'm gonna do before I publish it and move on to the next task.

WFGD wants me to try working in a different way in the future.  His idea is that, while I'm working on things like game mechanic design or writing sex scene prototypes, the rest of the team (and those in the commu...

Making a list

Hey guys!  I had a good day today.  My main effort was writing a big fucking list of every dev task, as suggested by World Famous Game Designer.  I made good progress on this today, and should finish shortly.

I also spent some time responding to more great feedback on the rules.  Some great new ideas have emerged from the community!  Today I added new rules for Quirks to the 2019-11-15 18:45:29 +0000 UTC View Post

Mini dev test version

Operators+, thank you for your generous support.   Here's a mini dev test version for you to try out.

THIS IS NOT THE FULL PROTOTYPE.  It's just a few passages, to give you guys a feel for how we're changing the structure of sex scenes in the game.

Note that the old structure – repeatedly clicking various sex acts from a list, until the male NPC's arousal bar is full – is totally gone.  The new structure has transitions between loc...

Getting feedback

I expected to receive one or two comments in yesterday's rules draft.  I was surprised to see dozens and dozens of comments, questions and ideas!

I want to say a sincere thank you to everybody who's contributed feedback so far.  We'll be taking a few days to properly assess it before we start implementation.

There were a number of concerns raised about some of the design choices.  I think I replied to all of the comments made here and in the documen...

Making rules sexy again

Okay, I've finished the first draft of the new Sex Engine ruleset!

This draft is 35 pages long.  At first glance it may seem like overkill to write rules for things like Vaginal Penetration.  

But imagine trying to write a penetration scene without being able to get information from the game like what's the relationship and attraction level between these two characters, or even just what does it feel like?

The ruleset will serve as a foun...

Nearly there...

Hi guys!  The documentation is now very nearly finished.  I've typed up:

• New stats that the agent needs
• New stats that NPCs need
• New Status Effects needed for calculating things like arousal level and closeness to orgasm
• Rules for a new mechanic that tracks the agent's sexual self-esteem during the mission
• Rules for determining how attractive the agent finds an NPC based on looks and age (initially) then chemistry when they interact 2019-11-12 20:29:17 +0000 UTC View Post

Documentation day 1

Hey guys!  It felt so great to be back at work today.  I'm sorry again for the long break, I felt like shit Wednesday afternoon to Saturday.  I'm fine now, though.

I finished documenting most of the new rules, and am expecting to publish them very soon.  More news on the next dev day, which is tomorrow.

It feels great to be back.  :-)  See you tomorrow!

I survived

Hey guys!  Sorry for being out of action for so long.  I think I had 'flu.  :-(

I felt okay today, so I did some work documenting the rules.  I'll do some more this evening and get in a full day tomorrow.

Just wanted to post and let you all know I am still alive.

Sick day

Hey guys, sorry but there's no dev today because I'm sick. I'll aim to get right back into it tomorrow. Sorry for the delay.

Eureka!

Okay, it's done!  I've drafted a new set of rules that govern attraction, mental & physical arousal, various sex acts and NPC AI during sex scenes.

I was having some challenges making them all fit together in an elegant way, especially the NPC AI rules.  When I playtested them (using a D10 and a pen and paper, because that's how I roll 👴🏻), the NPCs all behaved either like timid pussycats, or like they were Pascal White and they'd just snorted three lines of...

Quick dev report

Hey guys! Sorry for the late (and short) dev report. I've been struggling a bit with some final issues today - having some second thoughts about mechanics that I thought we'd need but may in fact be overly complex.

I need to look at it with fresh eyes which I'll do tomorrow, when I will also provide a better dev report. Just wanted to let you guys know I have been working today instead of goofing off.

Call notes

A few days ago, I had a call with a World Famous Game Designer* who gave me some advice on how to run the project better.

He had lots of positive feedback for the game, and he said that the things I'm struggling with (e.g. features taking longer than planned to implement) are things that big studios struggle with, too, and there's no magic bullet.

On the one hand, it's reässuring to be told by a senior game industry figure that you're doing a pretty good job; on the other hand, I...

Rules Day 6

I'm on the last part of designing the new Sex Engine rules: working out the exact mechanics that differentiate a blow job from anal (and therefore making your agent's bedroom decisions meaningful).

As I've been saying for a couple of days: it's very nearly done.  I thought I might be able to release it today, but while working on the exact relationship between NPC penis size and the agent's new tightness and wetness stats, I had a great idea for a new mechanic tha...

Mentoring

Hey guys!  I had another solid day of working on the new rules.  They're very nearly ready to publish.

I also had a mentoring call with an actual World Famous Game Designer*, who had lots of praise for the project (yay!) and some fascinating advice on the changes I should make.

I want to spend some time absorbing his ideas, but I'll post an update on this soon.

The new rules are nearly done, so I'm going to get right back on them on the next dev day, which is 2019-10-29 21:07:58 +0000 UTC View Post

Nearly there

Hey guys!  I'm nearly done with the improved Sex Engine rules.  There are two big new mechanics – firstly a kind of sluttiness/"corruption" scale, and secondly a way to use mutual attraction to tweak seduction/sex/morning after/reflection scenes.

There are also lots of little new rules (like a new NPC stat called Virility that affects how easily the NPC gets an erection during sex scenes).

All this stuff is done to first draft standard.  All that's left i...

Balance

The comments section of this post featured an interesting talk started by Vysirez.

This all seems massively complex considering there is currently not a whole lot of story/gameplay to the game. I'm still following the patreon cause it's only a dollar a month, but it's been a rather long time since the demo came out and the character creator is nice, and the backs...

2019-10-27 17:14:16 +0000 UTC View Post