Realm of Darkness - Refactoring Edition

Hello! It's time again for an infrequent update about the game I've been working on.

This week has been pretty rough because I've needed to completely rework how the UI is going to operate. I wasn't at all satisfied with where it was at, and I'm much happier with it now.

That of course means there hasn't been a lot of content implemented, but the content that is there is looking much better.

I've recently played 'Degrees of Lewdity' and recognized superior design when I saw it. If you want to check out that game, it's located here: https://vrelnir.blogspot.com/

There are some fun and interesting transformations in that game, but in my mind they suffer because they're not true physical transformations. And while you can turn yourself into a cow and get milked, there's no real consequence or bad end for doing so. I would much rather have a hard end condition where you can indeed fail, and fail badly - because that's where the fun writing is!

Still, it's worth a look if you have some spare time.

Here are some relevant examples of UI design ideas I've borrowed from that game:

'Degrees of Lewdity' allows you to select options using keyboard shortcuts. This makes it a ton easier to navigate (and to debug). Using code from the below link, I've implemented this in all existing passages of the game (that took quite a while, the game is starting to grow).

https://www.reddit.com/r/twinegames/comments/5t73zc/keyboard_driven_twining_tutorial/

Better to get that done now rather than later, I suppose.

I have changed the sidebar to display your current state. This used to be in a menu window, but I realized part of the fun is seeing your body slowly succumb to the strange transformations of this world you're in, so now this sidebar dynamically updates during your adventures.

Adventure stats are TBD and will go in the side bar when I've figured out what they should be. While you are trapped in a dungeon, there will be different stats that apply. For example, you might have to deal with an 'intelligence' and 'obedience' stat while trapped in 'The Farm,' which will affect possible bad ends.

The side bar menu items now open in a window instead of taking over the passage display. This allows me to show inventory and other stats while keeping you in the same context of wherever you are in the story, which simplifies story flow tremendously. The inventory screen is not finalized - lots more changes are likely to come!

I have added an achievements menu which shows you what you've managed to achieve in the game so far. This state will persist across runs of the game on the same browser (using the local browser store). This should act as a guide to let you know what content you've seen, and what you're missing. Yes, I will be adding some bad ends that will be quite difficult to find. A bit of a treasure hunt, as it were.

With these changes in place, I'm finally ready to start working on some new content. Yesterday I spent time brainstorming three major dungeons:

1. The Farm - If you are unlucky enough to find yourself here, you'll slowly become more like an animal. The current possible paths will include male and female cows, horses (ponygirls, yes!), and pigs. I'm open for other ideas, but I need to keep the list short for now so that I can get something implemented.
2. The Cathedral of Domaya - If you join the church, you will partake in Her milk and help her to bring others into communion with her. The church is harboring darker secrets which you will get a chance to explore.
3. The Research Lab - Run by a literal computer, the lab is building a Hive of Drones to take over World's end. If you're not careful, you will end up a mindless Drone. The Hive is exploring ways to generate high end milk from its Drones. There might be a way to incur dissension in the ranks if you play your cards right.

Yes, there's lots of milking that's going to happen, and competition between the different dungeons. I wasn't initially planning that, but it's going to work out that way. It sounds like fun to me!

I have a few other dungeons on my list, but they're not fleshed out yet:

• The Bee Hive
• Dominatrix Dungeon

Eventually I'd like to to tie this all together by making a 'good' end for the story... and if you succeed in the dungeons, you ought to be able to unlock a management game to make good your gains. And I'd like to implement a simple sexual fighting system. And transformation items. And flesh out the town. And program in paths for the different hypnotic outcomes you will experience.

As you can see, there's plenty to work on. I'm hoping to be able to put out an initial version of the game by the end of this year, but no promises!

Realm of Darkness - 4th of July Edition

It's been a few months, and my health hasn't really improved. Fortunately, lockdowns are lifting and I'll be able to see doctors again soon. In the meantime, I figured I would give an update on the Interactive Fiction story I've been working on, currently titled 'Realm of Darkness.'

The backstory is that you are a magical girl, stolen from Earth and brainwashed by demons in a realm called 'World's End.' Their goal is to send you back to Earth to capture the other magical girls and make them permanent slaves of the demons.

Written in second person, you will be attempting to escape this extra-dimensional world without being transformed into a strange new creature. You probably won't be able to avoid being bred by the inhabitants, or changed in strange ways - but will you end up leaving a servant of the demons, or your own person? You decide!

Pretty much anything is going to go in this world. You start out a woman, but can choose to become a futa, if you wish (or, depending on the bad end, if you don't wish). Since there's going to be lots of humanoid critters in this place, there's inevitably going to be furry type sex, though it should be obvious and avoidable depending upon what you choose to do. This is pretty much carte blanche for my strange and bizarre imagination to run wild without any restrictions.

There will definitely be lots of latex and milking, of course, as well as all kinds of bizarre and unfortunate transformations.

I do plan on posting this on tfgames when I have enough content, but that will be quite some time, I'm afraid. I need to have enough that I don't feel like it's too incomplete to post. Ideally it would have a nice vertical slice with good bones I can add flesh onto.

That said, let's talk about the battle system.

Your goal is to beat the enemy by one of three methods - draining their HP to 0, raising their arousal to 100, or dropping their willpower to 0. The type of attack you choose determines which stat you are targeting. In the image below, it's just your bare hands, which do HP damage.

Each attack costs a certain amount of stamina to perform, which limits how often you can use your attacks, and the amount of damage you do is determined by the attack.

At the same time you are attacking, the enemy is also attacking you.

The status box tells you which body parts the enemy is attacking. They can be attacking up to three different body parts with a ~33% chance to hit each part, but it's random which body parts are selected. The same body part can be selected multiple times, which means there is a possibility that the enemy will select the same body part three times, giving them a 100% chance to attack that body part!

This can be useful, as every round you are given the opportunity to block an attack on one body part.

When the enemy hits a body part, it becomes bound. If enough body parts are bound by the enemy, you lose, so it's in your best interest to block as many attacks as possible.

As the battle goes on, there are fewer free body parts, and therefore less body parts for the enemy to choose. This makes it easier to block attacks, which is useful when you're trying to remove the last 10 HP from that stubborn demon!

I have plenty of bad end ideas. So far, I've written only about ~11 of them, but there will be plenty more to come.

Here's a sample of some of the things I'm currently thinking of. These are just some of the ones I haven't written yet... there's plenty of others that I'm not showing. :)

I don't have a time frame for release. It's pretty much going to be a 'when it's ready' situation. Rough guess is at least a few more months before I have anything of consequence. I'll try to periodically update here when I find the motivation.

In the meantime, I have a bad end involving very long tongues to write.

I hope you all have an excellent fourth!