Writer's Blog: Telekinetic Strippers and Kidnappings

Chapter 8 is now completely playable . . . albeit two weeks later than I'd hoped and missing Rosy's scenes. I also want to elaborate on the last bit of the chapter, but that's getting added to my To-Do List (which I should really post a picture of, because it's comically long).

Link to Demo: https://dashingdon.com/play/wildelight/project-dingo/mygame/

Demo Word Count: 245k

Average Playthrough: 59k

I've also put together this month's Patreon schedule!

What's Coming in April:

4/11: Rosy's scenes added to Chapter 8

4/12: Mind Blind Short Story #1 (inspired by a discussion on the Sanctum of Spoilers)

4/13: Delivery development poll on romance dynamics (ooh la la)

4/14: Lady Death Chapter 8.5

4/16: "Another Perspective" Side Story (I'll be sending out messages now that I know what I'm doing for the new UCRT/Hero Zero tier rewards!)

4/18: Saucy Side (featuring Glitch)

4/20: Mind Blind Short Story #2 

4/21: Lady Death Chapter 9

4/24: Live Q&A (Times TBA)

4/28: Chapter 9 Update for Patreon Demo (don't worry, the link will remain accessible throughout May!)

4/29: Nick's Interview

And of course, Mind Blind blooper reels and maybe even another Delivery sneak peak of The Cottage's actual owner (Ev is very sexy and also very murderous).

Additional Goal for April: Release Gray's route for Cupid Calamity (drop date depending on how smoothly Chapter 9 goes).

I'm a little late getting started this month's schedule out due to focusing on finishing up Chapter 8's rewrites. I think I like the way that Gray's scene turned out? I need to replay it as low-relationship with Gray to see if things still work, but I'll do that once Rosy's route is out.

For now, I want to talk a little bit about momentum. 

Basically, momentum ensures that the plot keeps going forward even when Button wants to curl up into a little buttonball and cry. Emotional resonance is something that's really important in Mind Blind (my goal is to make you empathize with your MC), but it's also essential that the narrative not become too introspective. First off, because written introspection always risks not echoing player perspective, and secondly because introspection doesn't actively progress the story. It's important in driving character development, but Button also needs to be proactive enough that stuff, well, happens. I want your characters to have agency. Total emotional paralyzation, although a realistic response for a person in real life coping with Button's situation, can't be an option for the game.

As we approach the point where depressed Buttons will be getting an intervention (which requires both a high depression stat and certain decisions that I can't yet elaborate on), I'm contemplating with how to balance player choice with the plot necessity that Button is at very least not going to try to get themselves killed in action. (I may have let Button get too dark, but I felt, and still feel, that those responses are authentic and necessary to include.) It's cheap and unrealistic for Button to say "well, I'm now pumped full of serotonin due to the Power of Friendship!" Yet, at the same time, it would be equally unfeasible that the other characters would allow a severely depressed individual to continue being involved in a potentially deadly operation. 

Yes, I said "allow"! Since Operation Hemera is a government-adjacent mission, it's about more than personal autonomy. Letting someone serve who really shouldn't be serving would be irresponsible and harmful of Rosy. Already, that ethical line is being straddled by sending in an unqualified recruit . . . and not straddled in the good way, like Button on Grayson's chest in this last update.

The main dilemma, then, is this:

1) It's possible that Button may be extremely depressed and need support in order to get to a place where they're emotionally capable of fulfilling their mission.

2) My solution has been to have an intervention by other characters, calling Button out for devaluing their own life (and thus making reckless calls during their mission).

However

3) Forcing players to accept this help compromises player freedom and roleplay.

Yet

4) Allowing Button to completely implode isn't a pathway that I'm interested in writing (nor do I think the other characters would enable Button to continue working undercover if they were a risk to themself).

My current compromise is to give Button a unilateral win in the story (let's be real, there's been been too few wins in Mind Blind).  Providing a glimpse of hope (the emotion, not the mother, although she may appear too) will thus set Button on a less despair-driven path (not a fix-all, but a fix-some). A secondary possibility is Rosy-mandated therapy, but that has the downside of, once again, slowing momentum and distracting from the overall plot.

It's a tangled emotionally web I've woven, but I'm hoping that it'll eventually be unknotted so that certain Buttons don't just . . . shut down. Because the plot bits are really good, guys. Seriously. I sometimes just vibrate with excitement, knowing what twists and turns lay ahead.