2020: The Year in Review

This will be the first in a few end-of-the-year posts I plan to write between now and early January. Reminder that there will be no January update, monthly updates will resume in February. Patrons who join before January will not be billed for January. I have already waived the upcoming billing cycle. These posts are not being produced in place of game updates, they're just something I can do while I'm unable to work on the game.

In this post I want to look back on 2020. While the game launched in August, I had long been working on the game, since mid-2019 or so, though at a slower pace prior to launch. Chapter 1 is done, I'm taking a small break, and it's the end of the year, so it's a great time to look at the game and talk about the progress we've made. You can think of this as December's State of the Game post, but I hope to get more in-depth than normal. So let's get started!

Metrics

As you're likely aware, I keep track of a few different metrics and report them after each update. These are meant to give players an idea of how big the update is and what's included, as well as a sense of how far along we are. The current metrics as of v0.5.0 are going to be discussed in this post. The v0.5.1patch, coming in a few days, will likely change some of these numbers a bit, but these are fairly accurate for year end numbers. Good enough, at any rate.

My metrics are imperfect. It's difficult to get completely accurate measurements for certain things. For example, word count seems straightforward, but the amount of bespoke scripting in the game adds “words” that inflate the count, while words contained in code elsewhere, particularly dynamic descriptors, are generally not counted at all. Not to mention that many requests and story events feature multiple exclusive paths, so a request that's 2000 words long might only feature 1200 words when actually played, so even if I were able to get a completely accurate word count of only the game's content without any scripting and including any dynamic content, it still wouldn't be fully accurate to the actual played experience.

This is just an example, other metrics have similar issues. For example, exploring the forest and exploring the lake are two different activities, because they are fed from (mostly) different event playlists. Gathering however, I count as one activity in two locations, because gathering doesn't really have a lot of content anyway and it doesn’t change between locations much. I have to make a pretty decent number of decisions about how to actually count things like this all the time. I also have to decide how to handle activities that are temporary, like those in the flashback sequence, or maid academy training. Right now, I don't count these at all, but I think that creates another issue: the game metrics say there's twenty-something activities, but there's actually more stuff to do then that indicates.

Anyway, that's enough backstory. I just wanted to shed a little light on these counts and how inaccurate they are. Things like the number of requests and potions and CGs are obviously not subject to these concerns at all.

Word Count: About 130000

In terms of a novel, Succubus Stories would clock in at around 520 pages, assuming around 250 words per page, which is the average for novels. Adults read at a rate of about 300 words per minute, which gives us about 7 hours and 20 minutes. Of course, given this includes some scripting, mutually exclusive branching paths, and optional content, I don't expect playtimes to actually reach that. We probably make up for some of those things with gameplay mechanics and repeated events and scenes, but I expect the game to be more in the five hour range. I believe you could spend eight or more hours playing SS if you liked it, though.

While some scripting is included in the word count, I do not count code-only passages, like those for widgets, and most of the game’s major systems are handled in JavaScript anyway, with only bespoke scripting, like adding or taking money, or rolling social skill checks, being handled in the game’s text, so in spite of the caveat, I feel that my word counts are pretty accurate in general compared to most Twine games. Without any intervention, the Twine app tends to inflate word counts simply by not allowing users to selectively exclude any passages from the counts. Tweego is even worse, seemingly including engine code and user scripts and CSS, along with other data in the counts for at least tens of thousands of extra words, and often much more.

All that is to say, I get more accurate counts than the default counts provided by Twine or Tweego, but you can still expect my counts to be inflated by some amount. What amount? It’s honestly hard to even guess. I may investigate this in the future, but for now, I feel like what’s best captured by the word count is a rate of growth. This month only clocked in at 15,000 more words than last month, but I’ve been regularly putting up additions of 20,000 to 25,000 words for the most part. I expect 20,000 words per month to probably be a reasonable average, but it depends on a lot of factors, so please don’t take that as a commitment.

Requests: 11

Requests are and will continue to be a big part of SS, and that’s down to how the game is structured. I wanted the game to have a significant focus on optional content, but with big rewards and significant world and ability changes built into them. In general, the reaction from players to most requests, and to the idea in general, has been quite positive.

All requests unlock a special trait that usually has a powerful but much more limited effect compared to normal traits. In addition to the trait, most requests also unlock a new activity or feature. For example, the gloryhole activity in the tavern or the ability to freely enter the stocks (a feature that provides a different twist on an already available activity). Some rare requests even offer brand new character abilities, though there is really only one of these right now. More abilities are on the way.

As we’ll see later in the progression portion of this post, I believe progression is incredibly important to the game. Requests are a way to provide interesting, non-linear progression through a narrative, while providing verisimilitude in the world and letting the player have permanent effects on the world around them and on their character and relationships. I think requests provide so much utility to the game and really do help improve its depth. By the time I finish the game, I hope to have more than fifty requests, and even after the game is complete, I plan to continue adding new requests as I add endgame and postgame content and work on mod support and other things.

Requests are probably going to be the biggest thing you do in this game by the time the game is complete, featuring the lion’s share of game content.

Encounter Scenes: 212

Encounter scenes, or scene components, are the short, 100-200 word descriptions of actions in the encounter system. With the addition of the new encounter type in v0.5.0, we’ve exceeded 200 scene components in total, and they are fairly evenly split between player and partner actions, with the player character having a few more than her partners overall. I plan for this number to hit 230+ as I add more scenes for the new encounter type over the next update or two.

In general, these scenes do help to keep encounters feeling fun and fresh and stave off the eventual, inevitable point where they will begin to feel repetitive. Ultimately though, no amount of random content can be completely free of repetitiveness. It’s like entropy, it’s coming for us one way or another. Still, more scenes will help keep players invested for more of the game. I think the current number of scenes is enough to carry the player through the first chapter and maybe even a bit beyond, but there are five chapters planned.

This is ideal content for additional hired writers to tackle, though, so expect to see these numbers continue to rise over time, hopefully providing the needed variety and freshness to carry players through the whole journey.

I used to keep count of events, but I’ve stopped. The bespoke, randomized events in a variety of event playlists also help spice things up and keep players from being forced into encounters over and over again.

Activities: 28

As mentioned above, activities are a hard thing to count. In general I try to be as fair as possible. There are several places, for example, where the player can masturbate, but really there are two varieties of this activity: home and not at home, with the not at home one gaining a bit of extra stuff if there are other people around. I counted this as two activities, but you could probably make the argument it should be one, and I could probably at least justify saying it’s three. And therein lies the problem. I think it’s a better metric than events, but it’s still not perfect. It doesn’t really give players that good of a sense of how much stuff is in the game either, because peeing is an activity too, but, I mean, it’s just peeing so the fact that it and prosititution and exploring all count as 1 activity each kind of makes a mess of this metric. They aren’t all equal in terms of the actual investment you’re going to have in them or the time I expect you to spend on them.

The takeaway is that I have no idea how to count events/activities/sandbox content in this game. Expect me to continue to try to find a better metric to express the amount of sandbox content as we go. And if you have ideas, I’m all ears.

CGs: 40

Ah, finally: a basic, easy to count value.

There are forty CGs covering all sorts of different lewd behaviors and sexual scenarios. I will continue to fill out more content types with their own CGs as well. Watersports/golden showers are probably next (separate from urination, which is already in the game). I also want to add groupsex CGs, but I expect these to be complicated and slow to produce.

I have vague plans to redo some CGs I’m not happy with as well. The player character has also had some subtle redesigns and changes over time as well.

I don’t count it as part of this metric, but the player and Priscilla both have a set of portraits in the game. Other characters are coming soon. Roland is probably next, but we’ll see.

Progression: 22 perks, 75 traits (includes request traits)

As I said above, progression, particularly non-linear, activity-based progression, is a big deal in SS. It’s one of the core features of the game. You get perks based on what you do. Your behavior advances you along several different sexual experiences and fetish tracks, ultimately culminating in perks which unlock brand new actions, activities, and abilities. This isn’t necessarily a brand new concept, but I think SS implements it in a pretty unique way.

One of the core things I wanted to do in SS was create a game that felt satisfying the way a “corruption” grind does in a lot of other adult games, but without the corruption meter itself, and with a more varied and less linear grind. Corruption is fine, don’t get me wrong, but it’s a linear scale, and it’s not really appropriate for a succubus who is already pretty “corrupt.” I think I have mostly succeeded in replacing corruption with something that works well in the perks system. I think it’s more interesting and more fun than a corruption meter, but I’m obviously biased.

Traits help round out the character progression experience. You have very little direct control as a player over your perks and social skills as they sort of come naturally as a consequence of your behavior and gameplay. Traits are meant to help you focus on the type of gameplay you want to focus on, make those activities more rewarding, and generally provide bonuses and interesting choices to make. I think traits are probably on the whole pretty boring, there’s nothing super crazy exciting, but I also think they’re necessary in a system that sort of otherwise hums along without direct player involvement. I think when players invest points themselves they feel more connected to their character “builds.” SS isn’t an RPG, there aren’t really builds, but I think you know what I mean. It’s a very no-frills style of choice and consequence, too.

Potions: 27

The other beating heart of SS other than progression is alchemy. In a lot of ways, it’s the game’s main conceit. I am pretty happy overall with the alchemy system and mechanics. I think the suite of potions the player can unlock ranges in quality, but going forward I hope to introduce more interesting potions concepts. Many feel utilitarian to me at this point. More potions like the lactical, piss liquor, whore liquor, etc that change scenes or have more direct and engaging gameplay effects need to be introduced. Stat-changing potions and potions that essentially function as prepared-in-advance skill checks are fine, but I think they fall short of their promise in a game as mechanics-driven as SS.

I don’t have any plans right now on how to get here, to more interesting potions, but it’s probably gonna take some time to implement the internal systems needed once I do. But it’s on my radar. I want to make more potions that do some more interesting things as we go forward, so I hope you’ll look forward to that!

Also expect at least one major overhaul of alchemy progression in the coming months.

The Story

Succubus Stories will have a five-chapter-long story with a shorter prologue and a sort of freeplay-style epilogue. The game will end, but you’ll be able to basically keep playing the game in the epilogue for as long as you want, doing mostly sandbox content and unfinished requests. I plan to add a new game plus feature as well after the game is completed. I also want to add mod support, hopefully before the game is completed, hopefully sooner rather than later. After the game is done I may also work on some official mods and continue expanding some content, but we’ll see what happens. It’s too far away to make definitive plans.

Overall, though, if you’re wondering where we are on our journey, we’re probably 20% to 25% of the way to a v1.0.0 release. Development will not stop when the game reaches v1.0.0, but it will be a complete game that can be played from beginning to end. Counting post-v1.0.0 development, I can estimate that we’re probably closer to 15% of the way there.

As far as the actual story goes, the first part of chapter 2 will be released in February, and will continue through monthly updates until it’s over, when I’ll probably do another big side-content update like this month’s. Then we’ll start chapter 3, and repeat the process. I think it’s possible that I can get through subsequent chapters faster, since a lot of core gameplay features were added alongside chapter 1, like the consequences and reputation systems, expeditions, maid work, etc. As time goes on, there’s simply going to be less of these missing/planned features for me to fill in. Less progression to add, too. Eventually, most updates are probably going to become almost purely content, kind of like v0.4.0 was.

I already expect to turn chapter 2 around faster than chapter 1, and I think going forward, we’ll see the game come together pretty quickly after we hit chapter 3. We’ll see what happens though.

Conclusion

It’s been an awesome ride so far. Thank you all so much for your support. It really does keep me going and I love working on this game. I think it’s probably a bit corny since it’s “just” a silly porn game, but I really am passionate about this project.

While I’ve certainly made some mistakes along the way, and there have been wrinkles and issues, I really believe in this project now more than ever before, and it’s all thanks to your playing and your patronage. I hope you will continue to support this game going forward, and I want to continue to earn your trust and support to the best of my ability.

I am taking some time off, about two and a half weeks, from direct development starting on the 20th. I will still be able to push hotfixes and patches if necessary, and I will make posts on the patreon in the meantime, so I’m not gonna be completely MIA or anything. I expect v0.6.0 to arrive in the first week or so of February, kicking off chapter 2. I hope you’ll join me then.

In the next post,which will be for patrons only. I will cover some of my thoughts and reflections on the game so far, basically a self-critique and analysis. I’m obviously biased, but the point isn’t an unbiased look at the game, but rather a way for me to share my thoughts and where my head is at. I also want to hear from you any opinions or reflections you have regarding this first leg of development. You can comment here, or reach out to me in any of the normal ways.

I will also hope to release a poll for $10 patrons soon. If you’re a $10 patron, stick around until you see that poll, since you’re already paid up to February anyway since January is being waived.

You can expect a few other posts, too, including maybe some technical and process stuff if you all are interested. Some will be for patrons only, some will be public, so keep an eye out. Until then.