Wednesday, June 15, 2016

I haven't really done much of a 'what I think about when designing Strive'  posts recently, so for a change, lets talk about psychology. Basically this is another post which is purely my thoughts, which may or may not be helpful to those, who consider succeeding in erotic game design...
My today's theme is a bit controversial, at least to me, as I want to talk about psychological realism versus involvement (I guess there's better word for that). I'm a hardcore 'down to earth' fan and if anyone actually asks me what I'm really good at, I'd probably point at psychology. Now this is a bit bothersome, as I tend to see absurd amounts of really stupid shit is mass media and can't really enjoy it when it bothers me. 

Whenever I work on some sort of fiction I try to set my mind on "I'm gonna do it the most reasonable way it could actually happen.", and same idea was with Strive. Originally I even spelled out that you basically play a villain, who kidnaps, rapes, brainwashes and experiments on other people. Because, really that is what makes sense for game's kind of setting. Old Huntsman done it pretty reasonable by abstracting from morals entirely, focusing solely on gameplay making his game a slave management trainer. That worked perfectly well with the setting in manner that there's no real choice for girls. They are stuck in another dimension - bla bla bla, be slave or be food. FC has no real problems regards that either, as world is crapsack and you are not forcing anyone by default. 

Now, I don't quite have such freedom as besides buying slaves you are actually encouraged to capture them as a central element of strive. Now, big shock, many people don't actually wanna play villain because of how psychology works and we still want to stay in line with social expectations we live in. 

So I took a bit of time and spent some time reanalyzing CoC, TiTS and Slablands (not only those tho, as I tend to pay some attention to most erotic games for research reasons). And there's one thing, which irritates me to no end when I see it, yet I perfectly understand why people are completely fine with it. Any rape implied scenes are done in a way, there's no rape whatsoever. You done tough fight, you move onto rape, opponent is happy as fuck, you finish and nothing ever brought up again. Yes, I do realize that most people would not enjoy outright rape simulator, but it feels like nearly every western erotic game I played is stationed in some parallel universe where only porn logic applies - everyone is perpetually horny, there's never anatomical problems, nobody ever complains and so on. Needless to say, psychologist in me is triggered very easily by this kind of stuff. Funny thing is that people's lack of critical thinking hits roof when theme involves sex and anything goes, coupled with nothing provoking knee-jerk reaction on socially unacceptable ideas, makes it pretty obvious why it is in such state. 

Hence why I originally went with two-sided option. You don't have to be an asshole, but that would be the most straightforward way of doing things. It took me some time to consider my options on changing it to be more appealing, and I decided, that rough treatment options are gonna stay, because really just straight vanilla bores me. And I'll have to achieve that by... ugh... justifying your morally dubious actions and shifting from 'rape-capture-train simulator' to something more neutral. Basically making more scenes where you would be attacked and have fair reason why it is reasonable (by modern standards) to make someone into your slave. I hope this way of doing things won't come across as trying to sit on two chairs. 

All things said, prepare for next version to be pretty different in feel from what it is right now (although it will still take plenty of time until release I guess). I also realized, that I do want some sort of leveling-progress system (never thought, that I actually would be excited about adding something so overused), but that won't likely happen until version after that, so that will be a story for another time. 

18 comments:

  1. I think this is a very good idea. It will make the world more living also.

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  2. Well you don't have to get rid of beat up, capture, and train aspect. You can leave it for people who want to be the evil player. For good players you could add more events similar to how you would recruit Cali and Emily.
    For example when you save the girl from the bandits you have a dialogue sequence to convince the girl to work for you.
    Or another example is to give a job opening to one of the girls in town who live in the slum.

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    1. Events are relatively obscure. I just gonna make both positive and negative events easy to spot.

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  3. I don't see a huge need to change EVERYTHING. Adding less...morally wrong options is fine, but it's not like you need to change the entire thing.

    I, for instance, can go the entirety of the game as it is now without raping a single girl, and I can still become financially stable with enough food to last forever.

    Sure, I kidnap tons of girls, but I treat them well, I don't brand them, and I even let them decide if they want to leave or not (in other words, I don't really care if they run away or not. I get 'em for free, so I don't lose anything.)

    Of course, you could go the evil kidnapping rapist route and destroy their minds until they obey. But that's not my style. The girls are in prison 1 night tops.

    Adding less 'evil' options would add variety, and thus, make the game a little more fun, in my opinion.

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    1. I'm not really gonna change 'everything', just that encounters will be less about 'you find a lone girl in the woods for you to kidnap'.

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    2. What about just adding the new encounters along side the current ones? Those who aren't too keen on kidnapping can ignore the originals, and only do the new ones, while those that might enjoy the kidnapping can still do it.

      It doesn't bother me in the slightest. It's a game, after all, not real life. Therefore I can still enjoy it even with morally dubious situations. I do tend to stick to my morals as much as I can though. Hence my 'no physical or mental raping' play-style.

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    3. That's the general plan. I actually restructuring areas while I'm at it to make world more progressive/connected.

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  4. hmm well I do understand the post but sometimes people want to play the bad guy such as dungeon keeper or overlord and sometimes people want to play the knights in shining armor such as final fantasy or Zelda as well as sometimes they want to play something in between like an anti hero. that being said I know a few of my friends can't stomach things like rape and so on. personally I see it as a game it's not like I can or would ever do anything I do in a game. generally games that let you be bad usually gives a choice of not so bad or horrible.

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  5. i like the idea of being able to choose either side of the coin. what i think most important is how the girl reacts to your actions. if you do something evil, the girl reacts with fear and terror. if you do something good the girl reacts happy and excited. capturing the emotions of a person in text is not always easy, but you have done good at it from what i have seen so far. i am looking forward to what you add next to create more depth. i do not know anything about coding and but i know it is not easy. keep up the good work. i am willing to proof read any text and events if you need help with that.
    p.s. is there a post anywhere with a game walk-through to see if there are any events i missed and requirements i have forgotten?

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  6. i like the idea of being able to choose either side of the coin. what i think most important is how the girl reacts to your actions. if you do something evil, the girl reacts with fear and terror. if you do something good the girl reacts happy and excited. capturing the emotions of a person in text is not always easy, but you have done good at it from what i have seen so far. i am looking forward to what you add next to create more depth. i do not know anything about coding and but i know it is not easy. keep up the good work. i am willing to proof read any text and events if you need help with that.
    p.s. is there a post anywhere with a game walk-through to see if there are any events i missed and requirements i have forgotten?

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    1. Thanks, that's a valuable input regarding reaction, and I'll be sure to try to reflect on that.

      There's no real walkthrough of the game so far (as there's not much in terms of content yet), but I gonna make special events more obvious in next version as I rework world/portal structure to build around main quest.

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    2. could you tell me exactly what the requirements are after you meet lis. because everytime i go there, there is just an empty chat, never buying the snails.

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    3. Have to get entrancement spell first from special encounter (sidequest) from ancient forest. Yeah... it's pretty hidden in current version.

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    4. Thanks. i am excited for your next release. keep up the great work.

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    5. I fully agree that how the victim/servant/whatever reacts is critical here. I think the author of Free Cities says it well when he says "If the game confronts players with an easier path whose price is the tiniest sliver of one's soul, so much the better." That price comes in the form of humanized reactions and visible consequences.
      In addition, I would like to say don't lose hope about writers; I'll volunteer when my situation allows me more privacy to write this sort of material. Give me a week or two.

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  7. It took me a while to figure out how to induce nyphomania. When I did I attempted to meet a special order from the guild, but was told my companion did not meet requirements (human, big breasts, nymphomaniac, virgin) despite her being all of those things.

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    1. I'll be altering repeatable quest system in next versions, it seems to be buggy right now.

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  8. >Any rape implied scenes are done in a way, there's no rape >whatsoever.

    I am with you here.

    And I think the reason for this state of things is, that some people (like some people I've been intimate with) believe that if rape is to be erotic, it has to be a game, it has to be fake on some level.

    In CoC, for example, it's never a fight for survival, it's mostly a question of dominating someone, proving one's worth, so the resulting sex scenes are not rapes in physical terms, the "recieving" partners is usually just a strugglefuck.

    Now some other people, they do realise that what is sex and pleasure for one partner can be simultaneously a hell and pain for another, and some people are aroused exactly by this very fact.

    I guess in the end, it all comes to; how truthful you can be with yourself about certain things.

    Anyways, I'm glad there are developers who are catering to ... let's say, different kind of tastes.

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