Hello, thought I'd make an update post about my current project The Midnight Room. I'll keep this post spoiler free, but I will discuss some of the technical stuff about the game. My primary goal is to improve the way I made Next Door Girl April. There were a lot of lessons learned making that game, and hopefully I will be able to make better games because of it.
NDGA stat system
The first thing I thought about improving, was the stat system in NDGA. So stats, or stat, in NDGA was really simple to manage for players and me developing the game. With just one thing to keep track of, there wasn't much difficulty in playing the game. Every choice that you made had a single effect on this stat, raise it, lower it or do nothing to it. The problem with this is it was just too easy, especially since I didn't prevent using the back button to change your mind. In order to add challenge, I put in a few tricks that rewarded following up on 'bad' choices with higher gains than you would have gotten had you made 'good' choices. The tricks worked, but they were only bandages to cover up a structural problem. So for Midnight Room, I knew I would need more stats.
MR stat system
One option is to just break down sex appeal into different stats, like attraction, physical attractiveness, mood, etc. The problem is some of those things are difficult to change with player choices, or just mundane like taking a shower. The addition of taking a shower in NDGA v 035 was kind of a joke, and I don't think it added anything to the overall experience of playing the game. What follows is my new approach, so don't continue reading if you'd rather wait to see it in the game.
