VN/TEXT [Sadtaco] Legend of Eros: Worlds Defiled

Sadako · Mar 18, 2014

Legend of Eros: Worlds Defiled

LEWD is an erotic text adventure game, currently in development.
The goal of the game is to create a persistent living world that’s constantly changing by your actions.
Even when you log off from it, the world will continue to change, leading to new an unexpected experiences when you return.

You play your own character. Whether that’s breeding aliens, spreading around nasty things, rising up the ranks of “space academy”, buying up all the panties repeatedly and then burning them so no one can afford panties, or just trying to fuck or not fuck every single thing – you make your own story.

With enough support, there will be millions of words of content, as well as an immeasurable amount of procedurally created content. The engine is already in place to make this happen. LEWD is similar to MUDs (multi-user-dungeons) and other online text adventure games of the past. What I've mainly set out to do with it is to make a new engine that is far easier to make content for, with a powerful and flexible

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, and to make the game itself very accessible.

I originally started LEWD with a prototype I made in about 3 weeks in May 2013.
Then I spent a few more weeks with it to both gauge interest and to figure out all the sort of features I'd need from an engine, and how best to set up the workflow for tools to make content for the game.
That's why you see a long gap of nothing happening. I didn't have the support to work full time on it at the time, and had a bunch of work to get done elsewhere, and was still figuring out where to go with it.

It was about a year later before I started working on my new engine, which took a long time. I've just recently got all the content then working on my new engine, worked on finding new writers, and...
Alpha 1 is now released!
This is the first release with the game running on my new engine, along with some more polish, features, and about twice as much content as the old prototype.

Some of the additions and changes since the old prototype are:

Almost 100% more content
Redone and improved ways that content is parts and descriptions are generated for your character
Improvements to the character generation and how you can personalize descriptions (It's a huge disorganized mess of listing out like 100 body parts, I know. That's just alpha things)
Client modding API for character descs
Feedback system for supporters to leave their feedback on scenarios
First of its kind(I think) Patreon rewards system. Patreon has no API for this, so I made a bot to handle it.
Updated rendering
Updated, more flexible, quests system
Efficiency improvements and slightly prettied up interface
Changes to the networking to use interpolation in many places so it feels more responsive
More improvements to polish, down to how sliders for stats work, selecting traits works, updating stats outside of chargen, it not waiting until the end to tell you if name is empty, and all sorts of little things like that
Lots of little bug and annoyance fixes, such as how the scenario box would move around when pressing tab (which should only happen when there is a chat window below it to scale against). Hopefully fixed that bug with getting "stuck" and unable to move
More settings, including the ability to disable NPC images for a more text-only experience
Progress/character saving
All new tutorial, which is more of a walkthrough and should be far clearer.
An introductory preword about the world
Updates to the site itself
This is still just the first alpha release, and just the start. There's lots more to come

How to play; there are two ways to currently get early access:
1. Either get a hold of a key from a supporter who has gotten some, or by being one of the older registered accounts on the LEWD website that'll be emailed keys fairly soon (probably for Alpha 2 release).
This gives you access to the

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) that is typically a bit behind the test server, but unlike the test server doesn't go down for updates and debugging often.

Keys can be redeemed on your

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page, and you can find your keys to share or use there.

2. Support our

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for instant access to the test server.
The test

All you need to do is pledge on the Patreon, and then you can link your Patreon account to your LEWD

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for instant access.

Then you can play right now on

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!

Otherwise, you'll just need to be patient and wait for wider access.

LOOKING FOR WRITERS
Generally we're looking for writers whenever there is room in the budget for more.
See:

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to learn how to submit an application, and if you have the talent when a position is open I'll let you know.

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(#lewdgame @ irc.rizon.net)

Sadako · Mar 21, 2014

Re: [HTML5] Major updates to LEWD - and a new game making engine

Okay so, just all of a sudden there is an exciting new thing I have to post about.

Epic Games just announced the public licensing terms for Unreal Engine 4 yesterday, and they're really great and exciting.
Just last month I was sort of mulling over options. Usually to get an engines source code, which you need to modify it to work for an MMO, it's hundreds of thousands of dollars. Wasn't sure how negotiations for a license for a porny game would go, too.

With this, instead of spending ~2 years making my own engine which frankly would lack some of the graphical features and just not be as good as UE4(Not really any shame in admitting that), I can just spend <1year modifying the UE4 to integrate it with my MMO server and some other things.

I wrote in more detail here:
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So that second game, the 3D Hentai MMORPG could come a lot sooner. Within just months I can have some in-engine things to show off.

Sadako · Sep 15, 2014

Re: [HTML5] Major updates to LEWD - and a new game making engine

There's some art

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for many of the characters now.
I consider it mostly placeholder art. I'm sure I'll have opportunities to work with different artists later on.

There's also some art I had done, but I don't have content in the game to use it yet. I uploaded those to an imgur album so you all can see it in the mean time.

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Also if you registered an account months ago, you may need to again. A lot were cleared out in some major changes I was doing to improve security.

pino · Sep 15, 2014

Re: [HTML5] Major updates to LEWD - and a new game making engine

Why is nobody replying to this?

It looks awesome? How is the progress going? Do you have people trying your server out?

Would it be possible to create a simple turn-based game with a limited set of choices each turn, and some variable testing? Let's say a game, which basically is: kick high, kick low, punch high, punch low, and then a formula to see if you hit your opponent. And then next turn, you can do the same. Stuff like that?

Sadako · Sep 15, 2014

Re: [HTML5] Major updates to LEWD - and a new game making engine

I'm not positive. o_o

I think the two major things were
1: Didn't have artwork before. Even for those that like text-heavy games, artwork is still a big bonus.

2: Can require a lot of reading about the engine, tools, plans, and so on, for it to really be exciting. The content is rather basic at the moment.
And plus it's just screenshots and writing about them, and nothing yet where someone can just jump in and try making a game themselves yet.

Oh and 3: I'm horrible at marketing stuff and making it sound neat. D: Me writing way too much doesn't help this. I do think the alpha speaks pretty well for itself as far as being smooth and polished, though..
And "It's as easy as making a Wordpress or tumblr site" isn't actually relateable to everyone.

To answer your other question, yes easily.
Being able to store and test variables is well, a very basic thing you tend to have in anything that claims to be object oriented.
There is tons of things that are possible that I simply don't use in LEWD.

There are many functions built in for math stuff. Add, divide, is greater than, yada yada. You can chain them together for some formula. You can save that chain as "macro" to keep reusing.
For things that the visual scripting isn't possible to do (it usually is), like say you want a really complex system of filling in or draining a room of oxygen where it has a natural "flow" to it, there will be ways to custom write functions in Javascript. But most of the time you don't need to know how to code, and you just click the buttons to chain things together.
I wanted it to be not much harder than simply posting stuff on a blog like Wordpress, but to also have the capability to do anything if you do know how to code, like what is done with making plugins for Wordpress.
If you're asking if you could have two actual players doing that, instead of with an NPC, then also yes. You just need to store a reference to each player in a variable for your object that does the fighting, and you can reference the two of them, mark whose turn it is, etc.

A "combat API" is something I want to add to the tools. Currently you can hand make it by using the "custom objects" part of the tools, but I'd really like to make a general purpose combat engine that can be switched from turn based to real time with the same scripting on top. Though that's quite a bit down the line since it's not something I'll use in LEWD. It's also possible to make plugins for the tools themselves to add stuff like that, just like how on Wordpress you a plugin can add something to your admin panel with its own menus.

And yeah, people are trying it from these threads.
That's roughly 50 people on there now playing at the time of writing this. Judging by the current load on the server, I think it could probably handle at least 800 concurrent players.
It's just running on a little $15/month(not counting bandwidth costs) Amazon t1.micro. It can scale up fine. I have been really anal about performance because of how bad Byond is, and how much it sucks to hit a ceiling of something not scaling to fit demand. There's also partial code in there for multi-server-single-sharding like EVE online, where different areas can be run on different servers with one master server in case it winds up being so popular that I need to fit tens of thousands on a single server.

Progress has been slow lately mainly because I took a 7-8 week break. I haven't been able to work full time on this yet. I need people's support really badly to finish it. I have some plan to announce on something soon.

Sadako · Sep 18, 2014

Re: [HTML5] Major updates to LEWD - and a new game making engine

There were a lot more bugs in the game since the engine rewrite, many people pointed out. I've gotten the vast majority of them fixed, so there is a lot more content visible and working correctly than there was when I posted earlier.

Sadako · Nov 7, 2014

Re: [HTML5] Major updates to LEWD - and a new game making engine

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I decided to changed directions a bit and focus on the engine, and getting that available to anyone to use for free to make games with.

I was making these tools so I can have people who are just writers, with no programming experience, who could add rich and dynamic content. I made it really open ended, so anything can be done with it.

Before I planned on making LEWD and improving the engine along side and giving it back to the community. I think the better thing is to put the engine and tools at the forefront.

I think it's just the more interesting thing, for people to easily be able to make their own games easily, and for them to be easily available to everyone on the web, with their own writing, artwork, or SFM gifs/webms, and so on. It'll also help me to get the engine even more matured and capable for LEWD earlier on.
Part of this change is, yes, because it was hard to find people to help with the content.

There's way more information on the engine, tools, and how it's going to work on that site above.

I want to launch a Kickstarter, so I can purchase more servers needed so people can make their own games for free. I also still have a few last things to do to make that happen, such as the programming and server infrastructure that'll allow these game servers to be instantly instantiated when someone requests one.
I want to do that this month. I'm working on a video that'll explain what it is, and what you can do with it, more easily. Assuming there is enough hype and interest, I guess. @@
Otherwise, I may end up waiting until after the holidays, and making a card game and an RPG example with it in the mean while to show more of what it can do, as well as getting a draft of a proper client API done.

stuntcock42 · Nov 7, 2014

Re: [HTML5] Major updates to LEWD - and a new game making engine

Sadako said:
Creightr <snip>

It's a neat idea. I expect that the biggest hurdle will be attracting an initial population of game developers.

Ideally you'd want to grab an existing multiplayer game which runs on antiquated code and a poorly-optimized backend, with [microtransaction | subscription | donation] being reliant on manual checking and data-entry by the game's admins. I've seen a few MUDs which fit these parameters. If you could convince one of these guys to migrate and relaunch their game on the Creightr platform then you'd get an initial population with a predictable PCU, a modest revenue stream, and (hopefully) a success story which can draw in additional business. Player would be happy with the improved UI and responsiveness; developers would have greater freedom to implement new features and grow the game; administrators would enjoy reduced overhead costs (since they can retire their single-purpose MUD servers and pay for the rackspace that they're actually using).

There are a few potential complications, though:

source and content protection
- some creators are going to be hesitant to upload custom scripts, UI modules, tilesets, etc... onto a free-to-play public platform. You'll need to convince them that their content cannot be easily leeched and turned around into a lookalike/knockoff game.
- I don't know enough about PAAS. Maybe this reassurance would be technical (encryption, obfuscation) or maybe it would involve legal policies.
adult content
- the Creightr website mentions separation of NSFW content, but -from a business perspective- it's going to be tough to convince the next "Angry Birds" guy to launch his game on a platform that's best-known for porn.
content migration
- a developer's self-esteem is often tied to his mastery of his tools. You're asking them to leave something familiar (e.g. RPGMaker) and become a newbie again.
- Even if someone is eager to make the switch, it will be daunting to think "okay - I need to spend the next two months migrating and reimplementing all of my game's assets" on a new platform.
- It might be helpful if you included some technical details, such as "Creightr can run ActionScript natively" or "You can magically import an entire RPGMaker game by pressing one button" or "Unity integration is planned in version 2.4"
- You mentioned multiple developers working simultaneously on a single game. This implies the existence of workflow tools (automerge, version control, changelogs, local-remote filesync, Git support, etc). If you plan to offer such features to developers then you might as well describe them -- this may be a substantial improvement over their current collaboration process (e.g. "zip the RPGMaker project and email it to me so that I can spellcheck it")
- live server vs test server. If you're pitching for multiplayer games then devs will expect the ability to publish changes into a test environment. Maybe even multiple different environments (e.g. devteam only --> designated beta testers --> all subscribed customers --> fully public).
players
- I didn't see anything about players in the pitch. This may be because you're worried about content creators first, but it's still worth considering.
- key question: Why would players be interested in Creightr (aside from the obvious "I want to play LEWD and it's only available on Creightr")?
- For example - the Ouya console insisted that every game needed to have a free demo. This wasn't necessarily a good idea (and Ouya was a pretty foolish venture) but it offered players a unique value proposition.
- What if I've sunk 500 hours into a free-to-play Creightr game and then the developer decides to make it pay-to-play? Am I just screwed? Do I have the right to continue playing the old free version, but without any of the new updates? Or is this all at the discretion of the game dev, since it's ultimately his IP?
miscellaneous webhosting
- you might be able to encourage some novice game developers to make the plunge if you offered some simple webhost stuff. "Launch a game on Creightr and we'll setup a wiki and forums so that you can easily communicate with your players!"
- If you want to get fancy, you could give players limited access to devtools (so that they can submit bug reports and feature requests in a structured fashion).
- It's probably in your interest to keep players "onsite" - congregating around your platform (and looking at your ads) rather than having them post strategies and walkthroughs on the Creightr forums rather than, let's say, ULMF.org.

Sadako · Nov 8, 2014

Re: [HTML5] Major updates to LEWD - and a new game making engine

I wanted to reply with your formatting, but not being WYSIWYG made it a bit of a pain. Bare with me.

"It's a neat idea. I expect that the biggest hurdle will be attracting an initial population of game developers."
Hum, perhaps. But the thing is that it doesn't need your traditional web developer. I think one of the biggest things I can try to attract is artists who have a web comic, and writers. People who didn't think they were capable of making a game and getting it out there, before having something like this.

I think think it'd be nice to have something like Space Station 13 on it, but... that's not going to happen overnight. They need it running for that to happen.

"I didn't see anything about players in the pitch. This may be because you're worried about content creators first, but it's still worth considering."
I'm going to skip here because it's related.

This is just me.. sucking at marketing stuff. :/

I think getting players excited is the most important part, I'm just not sure what to do on that end. Like, I say it makes it easier to play games. It has a lot of underlying systems there that are going to make it much easier for people to make polished games with things like keybinds, scaling UIs, etc.
So... it's a lot nicer to have a smoothly running web game, than to have something clunky in flash, and/or something that requires you to install TADS, RAGS, or something like that, right?
But I don't know how to really put that across well and make it "exciting". I also don't want to say "Byond and RAGS suck, that's why".

Developers aren't going to get on board until it's all running, the API for a client is there, the API for plugins is there, plugin publishing is all working nicely, and so on. But these aren't things I can do without the server infrastructure in place and a bit of capital. So, really, I need to get lots of players excited. There's more of them. Developers are going to be more hesitant because they need to see exactly all what they have available, and that's simply not all available yet.

It's really more about the players, and people who didn't think they could make a game, right now.
I'm not sure what I need to do to attract those.
I mean I think it should be super exciting that you can just think of a name, click a button, and you instantly have your own game running and tools to modify it with, but I think I'm failing to get that across. It's like the tumblr or wordpress of making games. Anyone can make a game like anyone can make a website or blog.
And it's those who I really need to attract the investment from, since I think developers will be more hesitant until it's actually all available.

"some creators are going to be hesitant to upload custom scripts, UI modules, tilesets, etc... onto a free-to-play public platform. You'll need to convince them that their content cannot be easily leeched and turned around into a lookalike/knockoff game."
Indeed. The web is mostly open source.
But wordpress and free forum software has tons of plugins. I think this is one of those "build it, and they will come" things. If it's popular, people would rather have a plugin on it than there stand alone thing.
There are many HTML5 client game engines out there that can be pretty easily plugged into Creightr, to make Creightr the backend that delivers content and runs the logic of the game, with minimal effort.
The thing is, that lots of stuff that's on the web, and already free, works with Creightr with minimal or no extra work. Creightr is the server side of things, primarily.

Plus, I have many plugins I want to make myself. Like I want to make a card game, and part of that would be a lobby plugin for the whole thing that involves someone making a lobby and waiting for another player, or choosing to play vs AI. That'd be a plugin that'd be useful for lots of games.

"the Creightr website mentions separation of NSFW content, but -from a business perspective- it's going to be tough to convince the next "Angry Birds" guy to launch his game on a platform that's best-known for porn."
See Tumblr and Wordpress, I'd say.

You mentioned multiple developers working simultaneously on a single game. This implies the existence of workflow tools (automerge, version control, changelogs, local-remote filesync, Git support, etc). If you plan to offer such features to developers then you might as well describe them -- this may be a substantial improvement over their current collaboration process (e.g. "zip the RPGMaker project and email it to me so that I can spellcheck it")
You missed that there was a "next page" button under that, I think. The next one goes in detail.
It's a wikipedia style revisions system.

What you create in the tool and send to the server is JSON, which makes merging and other operations on different versions easy.

"What if I've sunk 500 hours into a free-to-play Creightr game and then the developer decides to make it pay-to-play? Am I just screwed? Do I have the right to continue playing the old free version, but without any of the new updates? Or is this all at the discretion of the game dev, since it's ultimately his IP?"
The later. I mean, you run that risk with any web game.

If I raise enough on the Kickstarter, I do want to make the game server open source, which will allow people to make downloadable game packages that run single player as a desktop application. That would allow players to play old versions.

"you might be able to encourage some novice game developers to make the plunge if you offered some simple webhost stuff. "Launch a game on Creightr and we'll setup a wiki and forums so that you can easily communicate with your players!""
I haven't yet mentioned it, but yeah I planned to have the alpha open to more than just kickstarter backers. If someone has a game on another engine they want to port, they can sign up and get into the closed-alpha that way too.

That is also a good idea, but I need to really see what my costs are. I guess I kind of assumed most of those people already had their own running forums and such.

"If you want to get fancy, you could give players limited access to devtools (so that they can submit bug reports and feature requests in a structured fashion)."
Anyone will be able to make a free game with complete access to the tools, and report bugs. They just aren't available at the moment.

"a developer's self-esteem is often tied to his mastery of his tools. You're asking them to leave something familiar (e.g. RPGMaker) and become a newbie again."
It'd actually be possible to recreate the RPG Maker tool in Creightr if someone really wanted to...
But um, yeah I suppose. I think in RPG Maker, it's difficult to make a game that doesn't clearly look like every other RPG Maker. Creightr offers a lot more freedom. Different games are actually possible in RPG Maker, but it's hard.
I think the tools I've made are super easy, but of course that's my opinion. A lot of what I want is feedback on how to make them easier, though, since what I consider easy can be very different to others.

There will be no automated porting. That's just not possible.
I did plan on an Unreal Engine 4 plugin, though, to make UE4 MMOs.

I'm also offering for them to not be constrained by engine limitations, and making their game available to tons more players who will visit a link, but didn't want to have to download something off megaupload. I think there are too many plusses over things like Byond and RPG Maker to list to make up for that downside.

"live server vs test server. If you're pitching for multiplayer games then devs will expect the ability to publish changes into a test environment. Maybe even multiple different environments (e.g. devteam only --> designated beta testers --> all subscribed customers --> fully public)."
True, though beyond the scope of what I'd go over in that page. There's lots of things that are possibilities that I could list out, but they're pretty minor compared to the unique things that Creightr does offer and have over all the other offerings. I didn't want to list out a bunch of things that you can already do on such and such just to say "hey, this does that too". That'd be an extremely long list.

Sadako · May 27, 2015

Re: [HTML5] Major updates to LEWD (Looking for Writers)

Updated the original post to reflect that I'm looking for writers. I hope some of you, or perhaps you know someone, can help me out with this.

Sadako · Jun 2, 2015

Re: [HTML5] Major updates to LEWD (Looking for Writers)

I'm going to be selecting writers in 2 weeks, so consider this a bit of a last call to get a submission in.

I really need more potential candidates if I'm going to be able to continue this. If anyone knows a friend that might be a good fit, if they can't themselves, let them know about it~

HentaiWriter · Jun 2, 2015

Re: [HTML5] Major updates to LEWD (Looking for Writers)

Sadako said:
I'm going to be selecting writers in 2 weeks, so consider this a bit of a last call to get a submission in.

I really need more potential candidates if I'm going to be able to continue this. If anyone knows a friend that might be a good fit, if they can't themselves, let them know about it~

Okay, going to the actual "tryout" thing, I think I know why people aren't joining this.
I've got a small background in coding stuff, but even then, this submission process is overwhelming, even with the tutorial.

While I think the game concept is great and the current setup obviously shows a lot of work put into it, especially with multiple tutorials, the sheer number of settings you have to set/code/write would simply frighten away almost all writers who are experienced writers, but not experienced coders.

To add onto that, with the type of personality/mental strengths that most writers have, most writers are generally not great coders, and vice versa. I'd highly suggest recruiting writers based on their writing skill alone, and then if coding them into the game yourself is too time consuming, I would suggest hiring a second coder just to do that particular role, given how much of an importance writing plays a part in this.

I would love to write for this, but the time it would take me to set all these settings and code in all this stuff within the writing would just be too much/highly likely I'd screw something up, and it's probably the same for quite a few other writers, unfortunately.

That said, I would still be happy to work with you in correcting some of the grammatical/spelling/word flow problems within the already existing text for the game, and continue to bug-test the game as well too

I'd also be happy to promote it on Tumblr and such if I were working with you also, of course.

tl;dr Again, great game, great concept, awesome amount of effort you're putting into it, I just think that the skillset you're aiming for to recruit new writers is scaring most of them off/not commonly found, which might be why few people are applying. I'd still be happy to bug-test and fix up the currently existing English in the game along with future writing (as well as promote the game) though.

Sadako · Jun 2, 2015

Re: [HTML5] Major updates to LEWD (Looking for Writers)

HentaiWriter said:
I'm unable to submit an example as of right now, but I will be sometime soon; can you wait until the 10th or so at latest?

HentaiWriter said:
II also noticed a few spelling/grammatical mistakes if you wanted me to PM you about them (in the demo, I mean).

EDIT: Noticed a few bugs too, including one that might prevent people from playing, so tip to people just trying it out; don't use your mouse wheel to scroll through choices, as it scrolls the background in/out, and if you do it enough, you'll press play only to be greeted by blackness/empty space

Well yeah, 10th is more than 2 weeks from now.
I plan to select at the 15th, pretty much.

I fixed a few major mistakes just today, but the thing is that all this content there is a different format (think PNG vs JPG), and I can no longer transfer it to the new engine if I make changes. Those things I fixed today will still be there on the new engine until I re-fix them.
I already converted it to the new engine's format a month ago, but already deleted the code I wrote for that. So I'd rather just wait until I've fully switched over to the new engine before getting that stuff fixed (which'll be soon, if I have enough writers).

As far as the background scrolling, yeah there is a number of things with that renderer and I've already reprogrammed a good deal of it, including fixing that, it's just not on that old version.
There's still a problem with it just drifting out on its own slowly over time that I need to look into once more important things are done.

tl;dr Again, great game, great concept, awesome amount of effort you're putting into it, I just think that the skillset you're aiming for to recruit new writers is scaring most of them off/not commonly found, which might be why few people are applying.

Well, a lot have said they were going to try a few days ago. But yeah, I felt they might get scared away by the whole "real development", thing. So I think I might have enough submissions come 2 weeks from now, but I really don't know and want to help make sure.
I'm not willing to make it less professional, though. I want to make a really quality adult game.

HentaiWriter · Jun 2, 2015

Re: [HTML5] Major updates to LEWD (Looking for Writers)

Sadako said:
I fixed a few major mistakes just today, but the thing is that all this content there is a different format (think PNG vs JPG), and I can no longer transfer it to the new engine if I make changes. Those things I fixed today will still be there on the new engine until I re-fix them.
I already converted it to the new engine's format a month ago, but already deleted the code I wrote for that. So I'd rather just wait until I've fully switched over to the new engine before getting that stuff fixed (which'll be soon, if I have enough writers).

Understandable

When you transfer that over though, let me know!

Sadako said:
Well, a lot have said they were going to try a few days ago. But yeah, I felt they might get scared away by the whole "real development", thing. So I think I might have enough submissions come 2 weeks from now, but I really don't know and want to help make sure.
I'm not willing to make it less professional, though. I want to make a really quality adult game.

Well, I don't think it'd make things any less professional if you had people write up the whole story they'd want to write up, and then you coded it into the game yourself; making stuff simpler for everyone involved by having them do what they're best at is IMO more professional than having things be complex and difficult for people working on the project

Sadako · Jun 2, 2015

Re: [HTML5] Major updates to LEWD (Looking for Writers)

The problem is that people that submit content have no way to understand all the crazy things you can do with it. It could be pretty boring and static.
Like you can have areas that go back and forth from one side ruling it, to another, to it being in the middle of some fighting, all based on what player(s) are doing.
I think it's harder for people to get their head around how to write content for that, without seeing what they can really do.

And even if someone is a great writer, well I still need people to input it while I'm improving the tools or game client itself.

Did you see that Everquest Next reveal video, per chance?
The things it describes being able to do, are things I already built my engine around months prior.

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The sort of stuff, writers need to "sit down"(well discus on a dev forum together), and figure out what sort of consequences all these things should have not just on an individual, and the world, and to sort of cohesively write together.
Just plucking a bunch of NPCs with a bunch of fuckscenes here and there doesn't do that. It requires a higher level of organization and thought around it all, as well as knowing what is actually possible. (Which is roughly anything is possible, but when you tell people that, they still tend to have this limited scope of what they think is possible)

stuntcock42 · Jun 2, 2015

Re: [HTML5] Major updates to LEWD (Looking for Writers)

Sadako said:
Like you can have areas that go back and forth from one side ruling it, to another, to it being in the middle of some fighting, all based on what player(s) are doing.

This level of content would probably be excessive for a text-based porn game. If Fenoxo's success is any indication, then people are interested in seeing characters adapt to the player's actions: fall in love, become estranged, get corrupted, become rivals, etc.

When the writing, UI, and game mechanics are based on "human-scale" choices (e.g. walking around, arguing with people, fighting a handful of opponents, having sex in pairs or small groups) it becomes difficult to present a narrative about a continent-spanning battle (or orchestrating a coup d'etat, or even a small city being invaded) while maintaining tone and engagement.

Skyrim attempted it, but - even with the huge resources at their disposal - the sense of ongoing civil war was underwhelming and the consequences of victory were miniscule. And,

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, only ~25% of the playerbase even cared enough to push the civil war through to completion. An indie writer couldn't afford to spend that much effort creating complex adaptive content which ~75% of their user base will ignore.

Mass Effect kinda-sorta promised to deliver on this goal. They maintained the human-scale actions (dialog trees, walking around, moral choices, cover-based shooting) in the context of a galaxy-spanning war. The galactic stuff didn't really respond to player actions, but players mostly didn't mind because the characters did respond (and had interesting personalities, conflicts, secrets, etc).

Alpha Protocol arguably did deliver on this goal, and people hated it. The problem with adaptive content is that players can see only a small fraction of it during a single session (or playthrough). So you either let them experience the story as-is (which makes the story seem confusing and incomplete - "Did that lady just switch sides?" "Is that the dude I spared in Act II?" "Did the endboss just get killed offscreen???") or include a lot of cutscenes and context clues (which increases development workload, and potentially makes the gameplay experience feel repetitive or condescending).

I think it's harder for people to get their head around how to write content for that, without seeing what they can really do.

I think that it's over-ambitious to expect writers to create such content for a "launch title" on a new platform. Even if I possessed all of the necessary skills, I'd be reluctant to sink 1000+ hours of development into some kind of revolutionary MMO-SLG/MUD/RPG/BBQ.

Encourage people to submit content, even if it is just "a bunch of NPCs with a bunch of fuckscenes here and there." If the writing shows promise, then point them to tools and ask them to weave their content into scenes (with rudimentary text-parsing, interactivity, graphics, save/load functionality or server-side persistence, etc). If they're overwhelmed then try to recruit some JS programmers who are willing to handle those tasks, based on the same revenue-sharing system as the writers.

Let them create a few visual novels, sprite-art roguelikes, or sexy text-adventures with WASD map movement. Build up your library of resources (or compatibility with existing libraries) for combat mechanics, multi-touch gesture input, animation, audio synchronization, etc...

People will be more willing to experiment when they can see that the platform itself is reliable and extensible. And when they've received a paycheck for their less-ambitious earlier work. And when they've seen that other games on Creightr are experiencing 1000+ PCU and earning $5000+ in monthly subscription/donation revenue. And when they've built up a working relationship with other writers, artists, programmers, etc... whose skills would be needed to make the project succeed.

Did you see that Everquest Next reveal video, per chance?
The things it describes being able to do, are things I already built my engine around months prior.

Is there an API document somewhere? I clicked through the public Creightr website, but it looks like the same "introductory" material that I saw a few months ago.

HentaiWriter · Jun 2, 2015

Re: [HTML5] Major updates to LEWD (Looking for Writers)

^ Great job detailing the problems with the current iteration and tryout process, like I'm not meaning to BASH the game, it's more that I WANT this game to succeed as it does have potential, but right now just too many good writers will be turned away from even trying out, let alone making content for all the reasons you listed in your post.

I do hope the OP considers taking writing only submissions and then alowly letting people adapt to the programming side of things, but as noted in your post, the vast majority of writers will not use those features and even less of the playerbase will actually notice or use them, it's just human nature.

(This is why I made the databanks and storyline optional in Future Fragments; they sre important parts of the game TO ME, but I realize probably 60% or more of the playerbase will barely touch them.)

Sadako · Jun 3, 2015

Re: [HTML5] Major updates to LEWD (Looking for Writers)

stuntcock42 said:
This level of content would probably be excessive for a text-based porn game. If Fenoxo's success is any indication, then people are interested in seeing characters adapt to the player's actions: fall in love, become estranged, get corrupted, become rivals, etc.

When the writing, UI, and game mechanics are based on "human-scale" choices (e.g. walking around, arguing with people, fighting a handful of opponents, having sex in pairs or small groups) it becomes difficult to present a narrative about a continent-spanning battle (or orchestrating a coup d'etat, or even a small city being invaded) while maintaining tone and engagement.

Aren't there a number of MUDs that have things somewhat change around like that?

What you're saying is analog to "Why don't we just play Pong? And make Pong clones? People buy them so that's what must be what people want. Why advance technology to make even more?"

Maybe porn games are small and tightly focused because that's the scope that most people that make them are limited to.
The tools or capabilities aren't there for most people to make something more.

Scarlet Blade is basically something that people play to jerk off to, and it's pretty popular from what I can tell. There isn't full on fucking, but yeah.
I think the reasons there aren't full on fucking is more political. A big publisher is okay with some tits and ass, but suddenly people are picketing when there's actual fucking.

And just doing writing for content instead of all those other things makes it a lot more straight forward.
It's not a matter of just writing that story in Everquest Next, for example, but they also have to have all these flags and maybe decorations changing. Maybe the castle is destroyed and you see it slowly building back up. That's a lot more technical work than just writing that is happening for those.

But yes, I understand why this isn't done a lot. You write a million words of content, and someone may only see 200,000 words of it in a "complete" playthrough because of the way their character is and the choices they made keeps the other content from them.
But that's why I designed a lot to where it shouldn't feel too cramped or too hard to find stuff even if there was millions upon millions of words of content. There's all sorts of planets and moons. Some of them could have multiple "landing" spots on them. You can add points in space for even more areas, or on asteroids. Even more, from there, it can spread out from the landing spot (like how Wilderness leads to the Colony). You can have multiple floors, and even endless floor traversal like

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It seems like you say people wouldn't like that. Well, I think many people would, and I've gotten tons of positive feedback just on what's already there. It's a matter of getting it done.
Personally, I don't like most of these games, not to sound like a snob. I role play a ton, and find I get way better quality and experiences there. I have fairly bad carpal tunnel syndrome and it hurts me to play games where I have to click all over, because they aren't polished enough to have hotkeys and such. I tend to not like the art... I also tend to not like single player games, since I'm a super social person (but of course LEWD will retain that single player option). And I don't like the limited scope. Hellmoo is pretty awesome and certainly not limited in scope, but it's still clunky. I think I can do it all, and people would love it.

edit: I should add that some people clearly like persistent games, since Sangrila and Hellmoo have a lot of concurrent players, despite how clunky and hard to access they are. And you could sort of say that F-List is an indicator, too.

If they're overwhelmed then try to recruit some JS programmers who are willing to handle those tasks, based on the same revenue-sharing system as the writers.

Did you look at it? There is not javascript in that part of the tool.

Check the original post, that's what you're missing.

I realize now everything I said previously in this post is pretty moot, since you were thinking of something else, but I'll leave it there since it still has some relevance.
Creightr is going to be free, so people will be able to freely try it out and make stuff like you said. It says that on the site. It is not available yet, however.

HentaiWriter said:
I do hope the OP considers taking writing only submissions and then alowly letting people adapt to the programming side of things, but as noted in your post, the vast majority of writers will not use those features and even less of the playerbase will actually notice or use them, it's just human nature.

I absolutely would accept those in the near future. But I need people that can do both to get this going and really moving forward.
There has to be some overlap of people that can write smut, and people who can use a tool to input it into the game. After I have those, and the game gets a big bigger, I'm sure it'll snowball into people wanting to submit their content on the forums that a dev can then add in if it fits. If I can't find those people or they don't exist, it'll never get to the point where purely text submissions can be taken...

stuntcock42 · Jun 3, 2015

Re: [HTML5] Major updates to LEWD (Looking for Writers)

Sadako said:
But that's why I designed a lot to where it shouldn't feel too cramped or too hard to find stuff even if there was millions upon millions of words of content. There's all sorts of planets and moons. Some of them could have multiple "landing" spots on them. You can add points in space for even more areas, or on asteroids.

I wasn't criticizing this aspect of the game design; I think that this is a good idea. I was responding specifically to the idea that old-fashioned writers constrain themselves into old-fashioned static scenes rather than taking advantage of the scripting environment (and/or multiplayer interaction possibilities and/or persistent world storylines).

I agree with you that these are important areas of development, and that video games are held back by the inexperience or unwillingness of writers to experiment with them.

I felt that it would be more appropriate to recruit lots of writers and then train/mentor/encourage a few of them into becoming next-gen writers, instead of putting up a sign that says "only next-gen writers need apply."

But your counter-argument is valid. You're trying to get this thing off the ground. You can't afford to spend dozens of hours coaching apprentice writers, debugging their misspelled variable names, and trying to explain the broader possibilities inherent in the new design space. Especially if these guys haven't actually committed anything to the project and could walk away at any moment, taking with them the "sunk cost" of your mentorship time.

If you can recruit a few talented writer/scripter guys, then perhaps they could potentially assist and train the aspiring writers while you work on supporting and improving the backend systems. But now I'm just speculating about stuff which is none of my business

It seems like you say people wouldn't like that.

Not exactly. I think that they'd enjoy the experience. I think that they don't favour it heavily enough to justify the "gamble" of additional development effort if you're aiming at a mainstream audience. This does not, of course, apply to niche markets with more discriminating customers (e.g. veteran MUD players who would scoff at a game engine which disallows freeform PvP interactions).

Heck - one of the

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has mechanics, code architecture, and design which are generally derided as godawful.

Did you look at it? There is not javascript in that part of the tool.

Are we talking about Creightr, or LEWD, or the author-submission process? I skimmed through

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and found some nesting statements which would be recognizable to a JS programmer.

Code:

Glancing down at your (if naked){bare body}(if !naked){(if !top){%chest(if !bottoms){ and }}(if !bottoms){%bottomHalf}}, Caysey pauses before giving an, “Again?”

Arguably, this stuff is text-parser markup rather than actual JS. But nonetheless, the UI is littered with programming terminology: constructors, functions, conditions, events, boolean logic, visibility modifiers, etc. It may be possible to write a scene without typing out a single curly brace, but the experience is still going to be intimidating to someone who lacks a programming background.

Even the colour scheme suggests "IDE" rather than "word processor." Which is why I thought that it might be useful to allow plaintext submissions and then ask a JS (or python, or whatever) programmer to review the inbox and try to adapt the most promising stuff into gameplay scenes.

HentaiWriter · Jun 3, 2015

Re: [HTML5] Major updates to LEWD (Looking for Writers)

stuntcock42 said:
Are we talking about Creightr, or LEWD, or the author-submission process? I skimmed through
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and found some nesting statements which would be recognizable to a JS programmer.

Code:

Glancing down at your (if naked){bare body}(if !naked){(if !top){%chest(if !bottoms){ and }}(if !bottoms){%bottomHalf}}, Caysey pauses before giving an, “Again?”

Arguably, this stuff is text-parser markup rather than actual JS. But nonetheless, the UI is littered with programming terminology: constructors, functions, conditions, events, boolean logic, visibility modifiers, etc. It may be possible to write a scene without typing out a single curly brace, but the experience is still going to be intimidating to someone who lacks a programming background.

Holy crap, I was looking at it without even seeing stuff like that, I was just going off of the drop boxes that deal with stuff like the "roll" and etc.

Yeah, I can pretty safely say most writers will see stuff like that and instantly be scared away, because I've been sitting here for like 10 minutes trying to figure out how to even make sense of that code, and heck, I've at least got a little experience using Multimedia Fusion 2 (which again isn't CODE-based and is a far cry from *actual* coding, but still, you get what I mean; most people writing will have never programmed or coded anything, ever).

Like, I literally have no idea what any of that means beyond POSSIBLY the part where it says "if naked" and "if !naked", not even the slightest.

You talked about not having the money to hire a programmer; there are programmers who would (like the writers) work pro bono if they felt they would be guaranteed dividends later on, likely some of them even on ULMF, and Kimochi.co/forum has a place specifically to hire people for stuff like this.

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