Patron's Exclusive - "The Original Sin's" Project (Patreon)

Reader beware:

This is going to be an important but longer read than usual. If you ain't up to that, I feel ya'. Take it at your leisure.

Introduction - "The hell is this post about?":

I've been trying to think of a way to explain to you all what's been occupying half or more of my working time as of late for a while now, but I never managed to come up with a concise AND comprehensive way to go about it...

However, seeing how I've finally managed to push "this project" past the barely conceptual stage, I figured that, concise or not, y'all had at least a right to get a bit of a peek into "what" I'm trying to do here.

"So, how'd we get here?":

If you're a hardcore (and I do mean hardcore), old-school follower of my work, you maybe know that I owe my initial interest in illustration, adult content, game developement, visual-novel scripting and, pretty much, my current-day profession as a whole to an obscure, fossil-class, old-ass Raising Sim game called "Jun Ai Monogatari" (or "True Love Story", for you dirty saxons :D). I used to play this game from dusk till dawn forever back in the... Late 90's-Early 00's (time doesn't flies, it fucks), and ever since then I've held a fascination with Visual Novels and it's many forms (from Kinetic Novels all the way to Raising Sims and everything in-between).  

That's why, if you found me because of my MSA games or their related works and pieces (which, statistically, is the lion's share of my audience), I decided to go the route of a short, kinetic "Visual Novel" with it. Because it was a way to fuse both my goals back then into one (namely, a "thank you" to my, at the time, very brony-heavy supporters, and a desire to try my  hand at my own skills as a VN writer, artist, designer and producer).  

Thankfully, the rest is history, and a pretty successful one, all things considered.  

However, I always wanted to make something... "Bigger", if you will. After all, MSA 2 is probably... What, 10-15 minutes worth of playtime? (without clocking the wanking time, of course... You know who you are, don't think I don't know what u doin' with my stuff >:D). I want something that can give the player HOURS. A LOT of 'em. And choices! That's half the fun of, like, 70% of Visual Novels! And why not make it happen on a completely new and original world? Maybe in the world of "The Sins"? Our crew here has existed for years, yet we never got into their world and story beyond very little tidbits here and there!

Well, maybe it's about time we do something about it, goddamit!

"The Original Sin - A Raising Sim-Game!":

("Concept Design 05-A" - The Player Character accessing the "Scheduling" menu for the day)

"After barely escaping from a "CFU's Requisitions Team" with little more than her life thanks to the timely intervention of a mysterious, dark-skinned, blonde gunslinger sent to her rescue by the enigmatic voice guiding her through the radio, our [Player Character] finds herself absconding from the Union's territory, forced into exile past the misty, impenetrable Carmian Sea, where the criminal haven formally known as the Independent City-State of Mysia, the infamous, titanic megalopolis built on steel and blood, lies.

It is here where our [Player Character] will be brought to meet with her newly-found, secret benefactor and unlikely savior, Nym Rose, prostitute and stripper extraordinaire, owner of the "Original Sin" erotica nightclub and, most importantly, ruthless criminal Boss of Mysia's Redlight District. Under her... Generous (?) wing, you will be given a second chance. A new life. A shot to rewrite your history from scratch!

You have a full year to repay your debt to your new "family" in whichever manner you see fit, and you may as well make a name for yourself while you're at it!"

("Concept Design 03" - I don't know what "Rilkaine" is... YET. Man, placeholders are harder to come up with than you may think, sometimes.)

If you're familiar with Raising Sim games, then you probably know what to expect in regards of "gameplay loop" here: Each new day, you begin by planning out your activities from early morning all the way out into late at night, and then run your set schedule. Your choice of activities and jobs will determine how your traits and skills develop, the people you'll be more or less in contact with, your strong and weak points, and depending on your personal decisions and stats (and, many times, a bit of luck) the branching outcomes to the resolution of different events will determine how your story evolves and progresses.

"That's all nice and dandy, Fate, but what's the plan to actually make it happen?":

Well am I glad you asked! (You didn't, but shut up).

Right now, my idea is to divide the development of this game in "phases", if you will. We're past the "conceptual" phase (because I already know what I want to make when it comes to gameplay loop and basic story setting), and we're now tiptoeing along the edges of the "developement" phase (aka: hard coding).

The game (or at least, my current conceptualization of it) is basically going to be divided in two "segments". The "narrative" segment in one hand (aka: the story bits and events that happen as you run your daily schedule depending on what you chose, your stats, the roll of the dice and so on), and the "gameplay" segment on the other (aka: the images attached to this megapost, basically. Check your mail, use items to boost traits and skills for the day, keep tabs on your energy levels and funds, and decide how to organize your day before running it).

("Concept Design 04" - I've yet to make the bars and counters for the right-side pannels! Look away!)

Right now, I'm working on the "gameplay" segment. As in, I'm literally coding the screens you're seeing here (well, not EXACTLY these. These are references I made for the real thing, but you get the idea). At the moment, the phone through which you control your actions (the UI, basically) has a few responsive buttons coded already, and I'm coding the "Schedule" panel, which's probably one of the more complex ones along with the "Stats" one, which I haven't touched yet.

To make things easier to understand: First, I want to code the "gameplay loop". I want to see that the "core" of the gameplay works. Pick your schedule, run your activities, see the numbers of your skills rise and fall depending on the math for each activity (i.e.: Lifting weights increases your Strenght stat but lowers your Energy), and once I make sure the "loop" works... At that point, it's all just a matter of writting the story bits in-between and making the "final assets" (aka: character sprites, animations, music and sound design, etc.)

I say "it's just all a matter of...", but that's probably the part that will take the longest... But IF I get the "gameplay loop" to work SOLIDLY (and that will involve beta-testing, btw), then even if the rest takes a lot longer, the uncertainty of if "it can be made or not" disappears, which is kinda what I want to achieve first.

In Conclusion:

I decided to limit this big-ass exposition to my paying Patrons only, for now, mainly to, for one, not generate unreasonable expectations just yet, given how "early-stage" things still are (although development is quite further along than what I've shown here, to be fair), but for another, and more importantly...

I want to hear your thoughts about it all!

What do you think? What do you expect? Do you have any ideas or commentary about the project  you would like to share? If so, please, make sure to leave a comment!

For now, however... I'm going back to the CODING BOARD!

Fate out!!!