Mid-Game Roadmap (Patreon)

Bit of a game chat with you guys today. As I mentioned previously, this month I'm going to be adding 'Begin mid-game phase development' to the Liberator poll, which will be going up this weekend. There's a lot going on there, so I want to lay out exactly what that means (and to have this post to refer back to in coming months if it's passed over this round). So, to clarify, when I'm talking about the 'mid-game', I'm referring to the following features and changes:

Unlock Requirements. I will activate the currently unused requirements for certain scenes, and expand on some of them. This will, obviously, make the game somewhat harder, and I left this off at the start because I didn't want to force people to grind through a limited amount of available content at the beginning. These requirements include:

* Office Upgrades. These will require citizen recruits, and some upgrades may have different options which lead to different customizations. There may need to be some reworking of Director scenes to account for these options.

* Director Meetings. You must have the office upgraded in order to press the directors further down their path.

* Department Visits. Finishing off Department plotlines will require some influence over the directors, allowing you to reduce the usage of inhibitor drugs in their departments.

* Scene Requirements. Certain scenes like Department plotlines and Random Encounters may have various requirements which will be turned on.

Score Mechanics Reworked. Right now there's one current 'Advancement' score which is fairly meaningless. This will be reworked into two different kinds of points: Liberator Points and Infiltrator Points. These will...also be somewhat meaningless until we get to the end-game phase of development, as they will determine what sort of ending you can receive, but there are some other associated changes:

* Specialist Recruitment. Different Recruitment selections will give different points.

* Department Epilogues. Department Plotlines will have their endings modified allowing you to help direct them down one path or the other.

* Other Scenes. Most scenes that currently give points will give points to both categories. How many points things give will likely be rebalanced as we get to the end-game phase.

Specialists & Missions. This is the main category for totally new content during this development phase, and will help put a lot of spotlight on the Specialist characters. These features include:

* Specialist Relationships. As you continue your relationship with your Specialists, you will gain the ability to do Loyalty Missions for them. Complete these, and you can choose to evolve the relationship to Platonic or Romantic levels. The 'Platonic' option exists as the Specialists are the only gender-locked characters, and so they may not be everyone's type, but going for Romance will unlock, obviously, more smut content and possible threesome scenes with other Romantic Specialists.

* Away Missions. Once you've recruited your second Specialist (Hellfire being your first freebie), you will have the option to go on Away Missions, both to the Figura planet and onboard the Station. These Missions will offer a variety of challenges which will lead to a variety of rewards: Recruits, Impersonation Skill, Liberator/Infiltrator Points, and possible other bonuses. The first version of these missions will be simple text based challenges, but once the basics are down I intend to look into adding some sort of exploration aspect to them. Completing these missions with certain team setups may also be the requirement for some of the threesome content mentioned above. Note that this content may be a little unbalanced while some of the Specialists are still missing from the game, and aren't adding their skills to the mix.

A final note I want to make is this will be a long phase to complete, and will likely mean a month or two without a lot in the way of new adult content. If you'd rather put that off, you're more than free to continue voting for more species introductions. But if you've been waiting for this game to have more, well, gameplay, then this will be your opportunity to decide. So, as I mentioned, the poll will be going up this weekend, but I wanted to give everyone a chance to read over what it means first (and if you want to discuss in the comments, feel free to add your thoughts). See you then!