Fun facts and behind the scenes about CoG v0.2.x (Patreon)

Just like I did for v0.1.0, it's been a bit over 2 weeks since the release of v0.2.x, so I have a healthy batch of fun facts for you!

Once again, these contain spoilers, so that's your heads up! Here we go:

Gameplay and Game Design Stuff

Mulligan Math

• In a way, you get a "free" mulligan at higher Weight. Since the way the starting hand works is: You first draw 6 and then draw at the start of your turn.
• At 0-19 weight, you only draw 1, bringing you over to 7.
• At 20-44 weight, you draw 2, which means you draw the 7th card and the 8th one won't trigger because you reached maximum hand size. However, if you mulligan, you will start with 5, and draw both of those cards. That means you can mulligan once and still end up with 7 cards.
• And of course at 45 and higher, that means you can mulligan twice without "losing" cards.

Statuses

• There's a little bit of intricacy to the way statuses behave: when they count down to 0, they get turned off, but still stay in the status bar for one more turn. This is so that you can't repeatedly inflict the same status for the entirety of a battle.
• If you haven't looked into the Game Rules section, it mentions chaining, that is, one status can activate another. As far as I know, neither opponents added in v0.2.0 actually use statuses that do this, but the system is already in place!

Misc.

• The game is currently a little over 13,100 lines of code. Phew, that is the most I've ever written for a single project for sure.
• The Exercise Level currently goes up to level 5... as far as I'm aware, you're highly unlikely to reach it by the end of Day 28, but the rewards are already coded in!

Jogging Minigame: the messages that appear in the middle of the screen are randomly pulled from a pool. There's more messages at higher Weight, because as it takes longer, it makes sense for there to be more variety, since more messages get shown in a single session:

• 0-15 Wgt contains 6 unique texts.
• 16-31 Wgt contains 8 unique texts + 1 more if musk content isn't disabled
• 32-43 Wgt contains 11 unique texts + 2 more for the same reasons
• 44> Wgt contains 16 unique texts + 3 more, same reason again

That also makes this the only place in v0.2.x where the content settings are actually applied. The rest of the options are there for future content!

Fishing Minigame: here's all the types of things you can get from fishing:

• Fish
• Money
• Utility Zest
• Cards!

Music

• Stage 2 and Stage 3 of battle music (when crossing over 20 and 40 Weight respectively) have two different starting points, so if you start a battle when your weight is at those stages, the music can start in two different ways.

Some visual Stuff

• The mouse cursor changes depending on your weight!
• The initial background in the title screen changes according to the time on your device!
• This next one has been a thing since, v0.1.0, but the title screen displays the last background that was used. So if you exit back to the title screen after playing, it continues to display whatever was in the background earlier!
• Ted's beard grows over time, and when it gets scraggly enough, he shaves! You can see him shaved on exactly the last day of v0.2.x, Day 28
• Not sure where to put this one: if you're not a fan of the scrap clothing, the starting T-shirt is up on the store after you're done with that encounter!

Dialogue and Writing

• There is a little bit of plotline done for Ricky, which advances every time you lose and end up in the hospital. That is, dialogue for the second and third loss (with the encounter in the forest being the first).
• At the gym, when the player makes the remark about whether it's spelled threadmill or treadmill, that is in fact me writing it into the dialogue as threadmill and then realizing it's not spelt like that after scouting for sound effects.
• Ikem's name was originally Norman. In turn, the pub owner's name used to be Edgar and his design was based on the man that is on the card art for "Instant Boost" if you've played the prototype.

(There he is!)

Here are the places where the dialogue changes depending on your weight:

- Barber's

• Beau has different dialogue when you visit him, including your first meeting, getting a haircut and after.
• If you used your save file from v0.1.0, try starting a new save file and visiting Beau in the intro (where there used to be nowhere to go) and then getting a haircut right after the forest.
• The check that happens there is based on what Weight he last saw you with. While it has the same outcome either way, the initial topic of discussion is quite different.

- Misc.

• Various small details at the Pub, Fishing and in the Park during the intro.

Now for other ways the dialogue and plot changes:

• If you lose the fight against Darwin, Ted steps up instead and learns to use The Fattening.
• There is currently a bit more dialogue and plot development for this than if you win, but of course there will be more for both.
• Ted will end up fatter because he had to fight, but he will also start losing weight over time.
• If you beat Darwin, since Ted doesn't find out about the Fattening then, he'll just stay at the weight that Darwin inflicted on him without losing any of it.
• If you tell Beau that you find him attractive, he'll be more flirty in some of the dialogue.

- The conversation you have with Beau the following visit after you fight him has several variations:

• Depending on if you won or lost, of course.
• Depending on how much weight he's lost since that day.
• If he lost, he comments on how fat he got you by the end of the fight.
• Similarly, if he won, he comments on how close you were to beating him.

- And now here's some deep insider info on content featuring Beau

• You can already challenge Beau for rematches in the game. However, the option only appears once he's back at 0 Weight.
• ... since v0.2.0 ends on Day 29, that means you'll only ever get the option if you really throw the fight and Beau ends at a low Weight that he's able to work off fast enough.
• There's currently already dialogue for when you fight Beau for the third time and win.
• As far as I know, the only way to reach this dialogue in time right now is to forcefully lose the first 2 fights without fattening Beau too much.
• There's also a tiny bit of luck going into this, since Beau loses Weight somewhat randomly, he still needs to lose the 4 Weight you are forced to inflict on him in the first fight.
• If you try to get to the third fight as quickly as possible, you will likely end up leaving the hospital the second time on Day 23, that leaves you with 5 days to lose as much Weight as possible before confronting him the third time where you have to win.
• Take this more as a fun fact about content that's already in the game. It's actually kinda tedious to get to this dialogue yourself with the current date limit...

- Speaking of: there are two non-standard game overs during Beau's first fight

• If you fill your deck with a bunch of self-fattening cards, you can force yourself to lose before the fight even begins.
• Since Beau only awakens The Fattening after you get him to 4+ Weight, he won't realize what's happening as you get fatter in front of him.
• The first variation is if you're wearing Gordon's Clothes. They will last you the entire fight right up until you pass out.
• The second variation is if you're wearing any of the smaller clothes that get destroyed once you get too fat. Then the fight ends even before you hit maximum Weight.

- And some other stuff:

• If Beau's fat enough, there is a chance of some extra dialogue happening upon visit (when you're able to get a haircut). You can just exit and revisit if you're trying to get this dialogue to trigger.
• If you have the same name as any of the characters, they will point it out. My favorite so far is Ikem's as that one does a bit more than just have him point it out.

Damn, that was a girthy list of fun facts. If you made it all the way down here, I hope you found them as fascinating as I'd hoped you would.

As always, thank you for reading and supporting the project!