No idea how I should name this post

Well, I guess I'll do this as game progress status report and personal life report all together?


Personal stuff:

Anyway, lets first get the ugly things out of the way.
Originally I wanted to get right back to working again after a couple of work free holidays.
That's when my mom called me, she's been in hospital the last couple days and... it looks like she's going to die soon...
The short version is:
She has blood cancer for more than 18 years now (with chemotherapy and everything that goes along with it). It's quite impressive that she made it this far, but it really looks like this is as far as things are going.

Of course I was well aware that this day might be coming soon.
But still...

At any rate, don't worry about me!
I've gone through a lot of worse things throughout my entire life (like almost everyone else does, right?).
So I'll be fine.

It's just a bit difficult for me to concentrate on programming, so stuff will take a bit longer than expected. But I'll do it, I can do it, and I will do it!
I'm also responsible for the webcomics script and stuff, and all of those things should be fine as well.

Since I'm driving to my parents place to visit her one last time, (~1000 km throughout the country) there's a chance that webcomic pages might be delayed by a day or two!
We should be able to pull it off to release them always on time.
But just so you guys know:
There "might" be delays!
In case there are delays, we will definitelly deliver those missing pages afterwards!

 I just figured I'll inform you about those"possible" delays and the reasons behind it.
(but as I said, we should be able to release them on time!)
And yes, don't worry, I'm fine!
I'm really grateful to have everyones support, and there really isn't anything I need right now.
Thank you very much, everyone!


Game Status:

I was able to program the basic combat stuff of the "test game" before Christmas.
All that's left to do is add some enemies (Cres already provided me with the graphics) and then add the random generation stuff.
Depending on how things are looking, I'll might throw this testing game out to the public sometime in january.
(I'm not sure about this though, maybe I'll do it, maybe not)

But please keep in mind, that this game just consists out of simple graphics and placeholder graphics.
As well as a lot of sketchy stuff.
It's pretty clear that this is a "test game", never intended to be a full-game.
The games main purpose is to figure some programming stuff out.
And it greatly helped me in understanding how dynamic lighting as well as random generation works.
(well, I haven't programmed random generation stuff yet! Just read a bunch of tutorials about it. It's the next point on my list of stuff I'm about to do, so as soon as I'm able to focus on this complicated stuff, I'll get to it right away!)

Hopefully we're able to get a lot more work done on the Sion and Medusa game in january.
That one will be a "full game", and we're intending to speed developement up as much as possible.
Originally I wanted to do a blogpost on some of the game mechanics I had in mind for that one.
But I'll get to that some other time.
It will mainly be a post about "how" I intend to use the random generation, and stuff like that.

Aside from that, I wish everyone of you a happy new year!
I hope each one of you guys and girls will have a wonderful new year, with a lot of good stuff that happens to you!

See ya in 2015!

Merry X-Mas!

We all wish you a merry christmas!


And here's a little present for you guys and girls:

Ferania: "I'm absolutely not doing this for you guys!"

Other than that, small status report:

I managed to get dynamic lighting to work as intended.
And I also improved some performance issues and other things that existed before.
(dynamic lighting is actually NOT needed for the Sion and Medusa game, I just did this because I was curious and wanted to learn stuff about it)

And I did several other things, which I experimented with in a "test game".
However, since this test game just consists out of place holders and some sketches, it's not really something I want to show.
Or rather, there's not really anything noteworthy to see.
(not sure if I release it at some point or not, it's really nothing important and I'd rather speed along work on the Sion and Medusa game)

The last couple days this year, we'll be most likely celebrating christmas, finishing webcomic pages... and... well, it's unlikely that there will be any major things happening this year.
Though I planned to do another blogpost about some game mechanic stuff this year.
But I guess that's it.

Other than that, I need to learn how to "randomly generate" some stuff.
Not entire levels!
But at least the content of each level.
That will be my goal for the next couple weeks, and yup, this is going to be used in the Sion and Medusa game.

Status Report

I'll keep this post simple and short:
We're still working on the game, but progress is slow.
(well, it's christmas time, and things get really busy at this time of year)

And yeah, we're also working on the webcomic and other stuff (commissions) as well.


However, I've spend the last couple weeks with getting back into programming.
I've optimized and finished some of the stuff for the upcoming game with Sion and Medusa.
Mainly the CG script thingy (difficult to explain, but it's the script that is responsible for displaying CGs, effects, and text etc.) and some other stuff.

Lately I've been throwing all those things into a testing-game for testing purposes.
But since this only consists out of place holders and stuff, there's not really anything to "show".

Anyway, things are working as intended.
I'm going to do some testing and programming on dynamic lighting and random generation in the next couple days/weeks.
(dynamic lighting just for the lulz, while random generation is needed for the Sion and Medusa game)

So, don't expect any demo release in december.
But we're still working on it!


P.S:
Please tell me if you're interested in my thoughts about the stuff I'm programming and about the progress I make.
It's not much to write blogposts about.
But I might consider writing more often on Twitter about those things!

Bandits!

The first enemy group we're working on is the catgirl/catboy bandit group.

As bandits they're mainly agile, but have lower HP than the other factions.
Overall you could say that they're the weakest of all the enemies.
But don't underestimate them!

Male bandits:

Female bandits:

There are 2 types of female bandits, they either have a bow or a whip.
Most likely we're going to swap some colours for the final version, so it's easier to tell them appart.
These are just first pixel graphics, so there might be even more changes.


We've been busy with lots of stuff in the last couple days.
But hopefully we're able to concentrate on the game in the upcoming weeks.
Well, at least we're making progress again!

As always, feel free to ask questions in the comments!


P.S:
I also swapped the "slave traders" out with the "Witch-Hunters" for several reasons.
The Witch-Hunters are part of the webcomics future storyline (they're an important part of the Deathblight world) and there are also gameplay-reasons for including them.

One of the main reasons:
As Witch-Hunters, they mainly have armor and weapons that are effective against magic users.
This makes them basically the most dangerous faction in the game, as the main characters both rely on magic.
And I figured it would be more interesting to have them as enemies, instead of simple slave traders.

Well, they'll get their own blogpost anyway, so I'll stop here.

current game project info

Lets talk about what's planned for this game!

But before we get to that, I have good news for all of you guys and girls out there that can't wait to play a demo version of this game:
Well... we decided to release the game VERY early on to our patrons on Patreon.
(most likely, if everything goes according to plan, we'll be able to do that in about ~4 weeks? maybe in ~6 weeks... it won't be a polished version obviously... but it should contain basic gameplay and of course hentai stuff!)

We will also update it on a regular basis.
Most likely, there will also be a very early demo version made available to the public.
But this "public" demo version won't be updated frequently.
Also our supporters on Patreon will get the full version of the game, once it's done.
(well, they'll get the newest version all the time, but I still thought I should point this out)
And yes, please keep in mind, that those early demo versions are not representative of the final version of the game.

Why we decided to do that?
Well, the two main reasons are:
- more money/funds for the game = more/faster progress
(eventually more additions/bigger games in the future)
- more early feedback = more adjustments can be done in order to (hopefully) create a better game

Ironically, those two things are what we lack most.
So I hope our decision to stick with Patreon fixes that in the long run.

What's planned for the game:

I made some adjustments to the concept, and this is what we currently have in mind.
(yes, we already started working on the game)


Two playable characters:

We tried something different with the pixel style this time.
I hope you like it!


4 enemy factions/groups:

- Kemonomimi Bandits (Catgirl/boy bandits!)
- Orcs (and goblins)
- Witch-Hunters
- Demons

Each faction/group has it's own game over scene (game over CG scene with several pictures) with the heroines.
Not every enemy has it's own game over CG!
So the whole group shares one CG.
(we wanted to do a small game, and this is the only way how we can achieve this)


5 game over CG scenes:

4 for the factions, 1 for the final boss.
"Maybe" we're adding another faction, but for now we'll leave it as is.
These CG scenes are not animated, but they'll have several pictures per scene and they'll have text (narrative).


Hentai sprite animations:

Quite a lot of them actually.
They're faster to make than CG scenes, so we're delivering a lot of them.
However, only male enemies get H sprite animations!
For example, there are female Kemonomimi Bandits too, but they don't do hentai stuff with the heroines. (and nope, the heroines can't do hentai stuff with them either)
This way we have a clear distinction between who does, and who doesn't have hentai sprite animations.
If we include tiny enemies like cave-bats... well... they won't have any hentai sprite animations either.
(but I think this is pretty much obvious, still I thought I'd better mention this)

With these measures, we should be able to include ~12+ enemies into the game, while roughly giving ~8 of them hentai sprite animations.
Which is pretty much manageable, I think.

And yup, those are all "ingame" hentai animations, no game over needed in order to see them.


How will the gameplay be like?

I really want to do a rogue-lite game this time around.
So I actually picked parts of the concept of Feranias game (the last game we worked on), and decided to use it on this one.
However, there will be some more platforming, and some actual leveldesign.
Since this is a rogue-lite and not a metroidvania, there will be no backtracking etc.

Sion and Medusa will fight lots of enemies, while using magic spells (and occasionally close combat attacks).
And they'll also need to do some platforming in order to reach the exit of each "area".
I guess it's better to cover all of this in seperate blogposts, using graphics in order to explain stuff.

Anyway, expect more fighting, less focus on platforming.




I'll do more blogposts this month, depending on our progress.
Next blogpost will most likely be about the enemies.
Some concept art and pixel graphics.

And as always, if you've got any questions, feel free to ask in the comments!

Creating new games!

I figured it would be a good idea to tell you guys and girls what we're up to.
Yeah, we're about to do a new game, and set the game with the kemonomimis (Ferania and the others) aside for now.


The reason for this is simple:

The game with Ferania is too big, and there are too many unknown things that we would have to test and explore first. Because of Crescentias arm injury we were not able to test if animated CGs really work out for what we had in mind.
And there's still some other stuff that makes this whole project pretty much a risk, as we don't know how long it actually takes or if it works out in the end.


In other words:

After ~4 months of not working on any game, we're starting with a new, smaller game project first.
We should be able to deliver this game way faster than the game with Ferania, that's why we're doing it.

Feranias game has planned to include:
- animated game over CGs
- animated grab CGs during gameplay
- 12 different enemies
- 6 bosses
- 1 final boss

which is... a lot...

Our new game has planned:
- regular CG scenes with text
- hentai sprite animations during gameplay
~5 different enemy races (Orcs, etc.)
- 1 final boss

which is, without a doubt, a lot less work to complete.

I think nearly everyone can understand that this game should be way faster to make, by looking at those numbers alone.
(and yeah, I tend to be stubborn when it comes down to sticking to the plan, which sometimes isn't that good, but it prevents me from adding more and more content that was not planned to include from the start lol)

Once we reached our goal and the game is "done", we'll look how well it's received and stuff.
Depending on the support we get, there might be room for expansions and additional enemies and things. But don't bet on it... if there's not enough support, we will simply leave the game "as is".
(and by "as is" I mean the stuff I mentioned before)

As soon as we've got some "minor" things to show, we'll hand the game out to our patrons on Patreon in order to get some early feedback and possibly more support through new patrons that are interested in the game.
(this is kinda a "bonus" to the already existing rewards, no extra reward tier planned for this, I'll cover this topic in a seperate blogpost once the time has come)


Game heroines:

Yep, it's 2 heroines this time.
The purple haired girl is named "Sion Valor" and she already had a brief appearance in our webcomic, the black haired girl is "Medusa Serpentine".
Both are magicians, and yup...
There need to be 2 heroines because of some stuff in the game mechanics that I had in mind.
(plus, other reasons... like... if we do a game with 2 heroines, it might attract more attention than a game with only 1 heroine, like everyone else does... right?)

It's still less work than Ferania, despite having 2 heroines.
Mainly because we don't need to give them different poses for casting different spells.
I mean, they both get their own graphics/sprites!
But they only need ~1-2 poses for casting magic, they don't need a new pose for each spell they cast.
(Ferania has attack combos and stuff... that's a lot more work)

I don't want to make this blogpost much longer, so I'll stop here.
I bet some of you might have a lot of questions, feel free to ask me in the comments below!
Also feel free to ask me questions about these two ladies ^^


P.S:
Ah yes, work on the new game will start around 1st november.
And yes, we WILL get back to Feranias game later on!
I have no intention of dropping that one, as I really love to make a game with Ferania.
(it's just too big and our funds are pretty much non-existing... and we only invested 2 weeks of work into Feranias game before Cres arm injury happened, so no big loss)
I really think it's better to start off with a small project rather than... well... trying to tackle something as big as the game with Ferania.

Are GoR games broken?

While browsing certain forums or randomly looking at other hentai game dev blogs or Patreon campaigns, I've recently stumbled over a lot discussions or statements about one big topic:

The "problem" of rewarding players in a hentai game by losing!

But is this really a "problem"?

I don't think so, at least, it's not really a "problem" or that big of a problem in my opinion.

Honestly, I guess I have a pretty much unique standpoint regarding this matter.

The reason for this is because I constantly have to think of the origins of game over rape hentai games.

And I think once people understand "the origins", it's pretty much clear why game over hentai games (game over rape, or short: GoR games) exist in the first place.

So, what are those origins I'm talking about?

Well, I think nearly everyone has played a "non-hentai" game with a heroine.

Some of those games have enemies that make stupid comments or do something else that implies sexual stuff.

One example would be the game "Bullet Witch", enemies in that game do stupid comments all the time, especially when the heroine is KO-ed, but instead of seeing something, you only see the "game over" screen, and hear some stupid comment from one of the enemies.

And yeah... that's pretty much it.

Those games, that don't show anything (well they are non-hentai games) but instead "imply" that something might happen afterwards are pretty much the origin.

At least that's what I think.

The reason "we" (as team) do GoR hentai games is because we want to tell the story of what happens after the heroine "fails".

It's not about rewarding anyone for playing badly and losing all the time.

It's because we want to tell a story, because we want to show what regular (non-hentai) games can't show. And yeah, it's also because it's about hentai content, I don't like the idea of showing a characters death and stuff, but hentai is okay.

I don't think that anything on this "mechanic" is broken or flawed.

It's just a way a game, or rather a story represents itself.

And looking at other hentai games sales and statistics (yeah I do that a lot), games with GoR seem to sell better than games that reward winning, but not having any GoR related content at all.

I'm just saying, people like it... so why trying to "fix" something that is not broken?

Some people might argue, that there is no "drive" for the player to actually win and succeed... but... there is!

People want to see all the game overs, which means, they have to progress in the game, see new enemies and lose against them. In the end, if you want to see the last animation/scene, you need to face the last boss, and lose to him/her.

Which pretty much means you need to get past all obstacles before the final bossfight.

And yeah... while you're at it, why not beating the final boss once in a while?

I really think, that there's no reason to "fix" anything here.

Some people like the concept behind GoR, others don't.

But that's personal preference, and everyone has a different opinion on nearly everything.

I myself actually prefer to NOT lose on purpose in a GoR game.

I like to fight as hard as possible, failing eventually, and then seeing the game over scene.

That's what makes GoR hentai games so special for me.

(unless they're way too easy and you need to lose on purpose... that's not something that excites myself... I need a really good, really hard fight, else it's not exciting)

Looking at the whole GoR from this point of view, it's pretty much like some of the "non-hentai" games out there, I mean regular games that are fun to play.

Take that, and add game over scenes to it, so the player sees what happens to the heroine once she fails. That's GoR! That's the idea behind it! That's the reason why it exists in the first place!

No need to fix anything here, it's not broken after all.

And, since this isn't enough for some people, I figured it would be good to add ingame hentai animations during regular gameplay whenever the heroine is knocked to the ground, but is not defeated yet.

This adds to the overall GoR-feeling.

But that's just my personal opinion, some people dislike GoR hentai games or don't understand the concept behind it. It's perfectly okay to do other kinds of (hentai) games.

I just thought it would be nice to voice this kind of opinion, as everyone else is constantly talking about how "bad" this whole concept is, or how "flawed" the gameplay is.

I must admit, yeah, looking at it from a game-design standpoint, it's weird to have the player "lose" sometimes on purpose, as there's some "interesting" stuff behind losing (the scenes and animations that come with losing).

But then again, the whole idea, and the roots of GoR are way way deeper.

I mean, it's not that you can "beat" the game by losing all the time.

You actually need to win (defeat the enemy) in order to progress.

So the basic principle of needing to "win" in order to "progress" is still there, right?

Well, that's my opinion on the whole matter, and I know that a lot of people might disagree with me there. But that's life, for every opinion there is, there is at least one other opinion that's opposing.

(on a side note: yeah, I don't like "victory rape" games at all... I really don't like them)

Anyway, feel free to voice your opinion in the comments below!

P.S:

I'll do a new blogpost about our upcoming stuff in the next couple days.

As I already mentioned on twitter, we'll continue working on games starting 1st november.

Also, the stuff we're up to might have something to do with chapter 1 - page 1 of our webcomic!

https://twitter.com/Wolfenstahl