Himeros Hotel - Adult Adrift Adventure 1.04

[Seztworks]

Hiya zelek

There might still be a bug with Scruffy conversations. After the last adrift developer update I had some issues with And/or restrictions. But it should not block you from continuing the path.

If you have shared the pictures of Celeste to get the bed the next step is to ask scruffy about your uncle. He mentions the uncle twice in the trade you do for the bed. After this you might be able to talk about computers (If that bugs you should still be able to "buy computer").

I will need to add a conversation response for computer if you need the upgrade but you haven't gotten far enough with Scruffy to ask for it. Non-liniar story telling. Wooo.

It does seem you can get the last Frey scene right now before getting the bigger computer. My bad. No harm done. Will fix for future. So only thing you have missed is the tome and computer upgrade that gives a couple more porn images.

Gem, Frey and Scruffy are the ones with any major content. Everyone else is there for support. Might be an odd event here and there but nothing major.

For docx:
I will look into the things you mentioned.

[Seztworks]

Current minor fixes going into B020.

Changed the use computer error to not mention talking to Scruffy about an upgrade. This is misleading as he might not be ready for that. New line is "Have to keep an eye out for an upgrade." Should hint about upgrade option but not tell where it will come from. Scruffy will then lead into the upgrade talk when he is ready to help.
Waitress path could ignore an upgrade restriction. Off by one error. Fixed.
Clarify hole use. All is working as intended. Just not explained in the best way.

General developer update:
Have written down ideas for the next 30 events. This includes flowcharts, story points and character links.
Have completed 5 of these so far. How many events and scenes will end up in the first beta is unknown right now.
Also after the alpha bug hunt (I took a small break from code) and spent 2 days putting the final touches to the overall story. This includes having written the story and dialogue for the endings of all 3 games. So I am sure where everything connects and ends.

[redle]

Changed the use computer error to not mention talking to Scruffy about an upgrade. This is misleading as he might not be ready for that. New line is "Have to keep an eye out for an upgrade." Should hint about upgrade option but not tell where it will come from. Scruffy will then lead into the upgrade talk when he is ready to help.

I do understand the desire to build a complete story. I also understand the reason for a hard-set progression order for events. Even so, my own preference would be to come up with a better "fix" for computer conversation problems.

As much as your chain of conversation topics may make sense, blindly blocking logical progression when it skips a link in the chain can cause serious problems and frustration.

The player buys his first computer from Scruffy. Later he decides he wants to buy another computer. It isn't outside the scope of reasonableness to try returning to the original source. What I mean is, whether you specifically tell players to ask Scruffy or not, many people will try it with no further hints. To have that topic of conversation be blocked/unknown until the player happens to have some completely random, unrelated conversation (in this case, speaking about our uncle), is a questionable design at best. If you want to have both talking to Scruffy about the uncle and completing all porn watching on the laptop, be prerequisites for purchasing a better computer, that's fine.

All that said, the way to implement it is not to obfuscate the path so that the player is less likely to try it out of order. A better way to address it is to specifically handle each out of order case. If there is going to be exactly one single order for all conversation points in the thread, there still needs to be conversations for them when they are at the wrong time.

I ask Scruffy about uncle prior to buying the laptop: "I don't know you well enough to tell you about my friends."
I ask Scruffy about a computer upgrade before asking about my uncle: "Your uncle gave me that laptop. If he thought it was good enough for me, why shouldn't it be good enough for you?"

Responses can be whatever you want. The above are just random comments that may or may not fit your overall plot. The point being that they aren't canned responses that make it seem like the player is doing something completely wrong. They let the player know that something was at least implemented in this direction and that possibly this is even the right place for the attempted activity, but requires some unlocking still.

What doesn't work...
>ask scruffy about computer
Scruffy doesn't appear to understand you
>ask scruffy about uncle
Your Uncle's a good man. I can buy all sorts of technology from him.
>ask scruffy about computer
I can sell you an upgraded computer if you can afford one.

[Seztworks]

Hi redle
You are right. I might not have worded my last reply correctly.
There still is a plan to have all the conversation options with the janitor as you suggest in your post and many of them are in the game but not working at the moment because of some issues I had with adrift after a upgrade. There are still some options missing but I hope I can correct them over time as more people take "unplanned" trips through the paths.
The fix I mention was only to streamline hints and not as a end all solution to the problem.

You do mention handling every case and I will try my best to do this. As the janitor path is the first one implemented I picked some choices that I now would not do again. Having every step requiring a specific user action (ai. Ask, Share or Buy) was a noob mistake and a big learning mistake as well. This opens up a lot of issues with out of order actions and here we are.

It has helped me make a better plan for future events and implementations and if I can't make the chain behave it might get a slight redesign before the end. When all is said and done the janitor path could end up being the most complicated from a player perspective and as such that would be fine. If I did do a similar implementation for the rest of the game with the needed error cases and conversation options, I could be looking at at least twice the amount of development time without any reward for the average player. So going forward a path might have 2 or 3 restrictive links and not 5 as the case is here.

The janitor path is linked to boss progression, waitress progression, room progression, porn progression and finally janitor progression. Some or most of these can be done out of order. No idea what I was thinking

[Dole]

For me Frey have a bug in Version 0.17.

I can´t give Scruffy her pictures. I saw her two times in the shower and he tell me all time I have no pics from here.
Frey said I have to be at 22 in the restaurant and then nothing.

[Seztworks]

Developer update.

After surviving the holidays with the family I caught an infection in my left arm and I am just getting over the antibiotic treatment. The arm is slowly getting back to normal and I will be getting back into work. Starting out slowly with a read through and error fixes. Content additions should follow soon when I don't have a fever anymore.

Sadly this pushes back the first beta some weeks. But at least it will be more polished then.

Want to wish you all a happy new year. 2016 is going to be interesting.

/Seztworks

P.S. Dole tip. Sorry that I didn't get back to you regarding your post.

When you meet Frey in the restaurant at 22 ask her about porn again or reward. Will look into making this more clear.

[Skelaturi]

First: use the fever and the drugs to get amazing but crazy visions for your game
Second: write them down
Third: Get better
Fourth: Continue development

And well i could say happy new year to you too, but apparently you had a rough start already. So instead i am gonna say: May the rest of the year be better.

[xviii]

I'm liking the game despite the alpha state, but it is all very confusing as others have already said. Still, if others suggestions are being implemented I look forward to the beta's

I'm stumbling around pretty blindly in this game, but one big odd thing for my playthrough so far is the below:

I have no idea how to find/unlock the training room or meet taylor even though in other areas I have progressed pretty far.

I have seen celeste and frey's strip teases, bought the laptop and had scruffy clean my room and upgrade my bed for the celeste pictures. Recently I've talked to scruffy about my uncle but can't seem to go any further. I can talk to him about the computer again, which I guess is the new one? Anyway I need more money for that.

As others have said it isn't very clear what to do next and I feel like I can't really just generally ask the characters about very much, but I'm not very good with these kinds of games.

eg. I've asked Zoe about Lara but can't seem to talk to her about anything else... I agree with what others have said that there really needs to be some kind of menu showing options of what to ask/talk about. I've played many command line type games and as I've said I'm not great at them, but when fleshed out properly there is usually enough to ask the characters various things so that they seem almost like a real person. Having them not understand you with just about everything until a certain criteria is met makes them seem robotic. Maybe adding in some general discussion/small talk/flirting stuff with them would make the characters seem like people you can explore. If some of this ties into the story then even better.

Anyway thanks for the great game so far. Hope you are feeling better soon as I am looking forward to the first beta.

EDIT:

So I have upgraded the computer and scruffy asked for pictures of Frey but doesn't understand when I tried to share them with him. I got the computer though and he took the money, I'm guessing he didn't get the pictures also (it didn't say he did) or that it's not important now. I've seen Frey in two HC pictures now but talking to her further about it does nothing. Again, I can spy on Taylor but besides that I've never even seen her anywhere... This is really odd and makes the story very disjointed, I'm not sure if I'm missing something simple or just haven't progressed in one area enough.

Again... sorry...

I know about 'gem' from this thread so could ask Zoe about her and she confirmed that she was the fitness model. I already tried asking the fitness model her name in many different ways both when she was alone in the lobby or with Frey but got nothing. I have no idea how to progress with her or even find Taylor.

... I found where zoe asks you to take the lotion to Gem. I'm guessing I've broken something because I wasn't even meant to know her name. Anyhow it tells me that "Gem doesn't seem interested in the bottle of lotion" and I have no idea what else to say/do. Is this normal? how am I meant to know what to do?

... Ok, so 'use lotion' was what I needed to type. This seems a bit forceful like you just walk up and start rubbing lotion on her or just using it on yourself. These kinds of things need to be a lot more intuitive or at least have a lot more commands trigger the same event.

... I got to the end of Zoe's path with finding her in my room and finally found Taylor on the roof. The problem with finding someone is that I never know what (if anything) to say to them. I also saw celeste in the shower for what it's worth. I'm still totally lost at this point and have just resorted to going to all rooms at different times of day.

... So I asked her about Gem. I don't know what/if anything I can follow that up with and she doesn't give me any directions to help the situation and not having access to the workout room makes it seem like I can't help. From reading this thread though it seems like you obviously can. So lost with everything that happens.

Ok. Finally I ran into gem at the right time of night.

... I got all the way up to the photoshoot with gem. She tells me that Frey said I could upload the photos to her using my badge and I feign knowing what she's talking about. Asking frey or celeste about badge, uploading, photos or anything else I can think of does nothing. How do I move on from here?

[Seztworks]

Hello xviii

Good stuff. Thanks for the feedback.
I agree completely that a lot of conversation options are missing or lacking. Especially for the girls that don't have a path yet.
More will be added as I add more content and as more people test that content (A lot of command words and conversation options are being added based on feedback as I can't predict what people are going to do at all times. I try )

You seem to unlock more and more. But yes some events are tricky to find at the moment. Unlocking training is at this time pretty late in the Gem path and you are getting closer.
I will add your comments to my todo list.

There are some dead ends that seem weird at the moment because the content ends without explanation.
If you have upgraded to the big PC Scruffys path is done for now.
Gems path is listed in the text when you reach the current end.
Everybody else has 1 or 2 events but no end marker. I wouldn't waste time trying to find content for them at this time.

Regarding lotion task. There are 10 commands at this time. What did you try that didn't work for you?
"use lotion" is weird in context of the situation. But was added as a general command that will be possible for most items. For easy of use for newer players.

"upload pictures" should solve your problem. I will add conversation options to the staff regarding use of the command.

[xviii]

Thanks for the help. With the lotion, from memory I tried "give lotion to gem", "ask gem about lotion" and other stupid things like "open lotion".

I added where I'm currently up to in my last post but I'll put it here again, EDIT: nevermind, I see you updated your post also Thanks.

... I got all the way up to the photoshoot with gem. She tells me that Frey said I could upload the photos to her using my badge and I feign knowing what she's talking about. Asking frey or celeste about badge, uploading, photos or anything else I can think of does nothing. How do I move on from here?

As for improvements, there have been at least two instances in the recent dialogue with girls where 'then' is used incorrectly and it should be than. I have saves so can go back through it to find the exact sentence if you like. Grammar and things like that are minor in the grand scheme of the game at this point but for the final product it will matter when everything else is so polished.

Okay for some actual corrections using the 2nd photo scene:

1. She looks back over her shoulder.
"I can't show any more then this"

Should be than

2. You smile at her.
"You won't have too. Not anymore then..."

Should be to and than

If you aren't getting further help with this I can offer more help but right now these simple mistakes are all that I've noticed.

[xviii]

Oh one other thing, before scoring any eXperience with Gem, I had got two from:

Celeste or Zoe (not sure which) and Frey in the rec room where she gives you a bj so I had an X score of 2. On undertaking the story with Gem when training in the gym this dropped back to 1 at some point. At the end of everything with Gem it is now 4. Is this normal? Also in the full game will the eXperience change the outcome of sexy scenes? It seems like the last shoot with Gem could have ended better if you lasted longer but I'm not sure if I'm just reading into it too much.

[Seztworks]

I have corrected the things you have mentioned earlier.
Regarding scoring and numbers.

All the numbers besides E are not that useful right now. Just for debugging.
X going down is mistake at this point. The variable for experience is just above the one for endurance so they sometimes get mixed up. Fat fingers. Will fix.
Any "erotic or sex scene" should increase x by 1. This will be an indicator of how far you are and will be used as a check in some cases.
The scores won't affect any outcome of scenes. Just access to them.
Gems path is very innocent and her scenes end with the single nude shot. (It fits with her story and being the first path but also slightly restricted by the lack of good fakes for the model.)

[Skelaturi]

Shouldn't you be in bed, resting that arm and fever of yours?

[Seztworks]

Yes. Will do.
Fever has broken. The rest will follow shortly. Only doing minor corrections.

[Skelaturi]

Yes. Will do.
Fever has broken. The rest will follow shortly. Only doing minor corrections.

Young man, that is not how it works. To bed hush hush.