Public Build: Gamer Struggles 0.1.5.2 (Patreon)

What whaat?? New build? Huge apologies for such a long wait guys, I have gotten an internship at a company which really squeezed the time that I am able to invest into developing the game. Still, I’ve been doing what I can, and during those two months of development we’ve cooked up lots of fun features to show you guys! 

P.S Android players will have to wait just a couple more days for us to finalize adapting the game to the platform 🙏

Public build 

This is a public build that comes to replace the good old 0.1.2 which has been available to itch users for quite some time now. itch page will continue to receive updates regarding mechanics and general improvements. However further NSFW content will still be available exclusively in Patreon!

Changelog:

Block/Parry system:

Thanks to Nella, the block system is now fully functional. If timed correctly, it will result in a parry, stunning enemy for a few seconds for you to land a couple of free punches within. Hopefully that will spice up the gameplay a bit!

Stamina rework:

From now on only dashing takes up stamina points. Attacking is completely energy-free. An issue that arose from that is that spam-punching is now a completely viable strategy. To work around that, I tried raising the knockback which proved to not be enough. However I do have a few other ideas which I will present below.

EXP system:

Was a really fun feature to work with! I was going for something Minecraft-like regarding the exp drops, while the upgrade system itself took inspiration from the way they implemented it in Dark Souls. More upgradeable stats to come. With potentially special upgrades further down the line. Now that I think about it, it's probably a good idea to also display the actual values of what player is upgrading.

Sex system rework:

New features for the sex mechanic, as requested we added a struggling mini-game, with which the player can escape the sex scene. Inspired by Eris Dysnomia, dialogue boxes now pop up during sex animations. To be fair those are basically placeholders, as we have big plans for overhauling the sex animations. As with the new sex system we are now able to create more advanced sex sequences. Sex progression is from now on automatic, with manual controls only left in the gallery.

Level/Checkpoint selection:

The days of being locked to the last reached checkpoint are now over, with a new area selection system you may freely move between checkpoints you have visited.

UI rework:

Reworked once again! This time I’m actually fairly happy about the result. Every UI panel has been standardized to use the same color scheme, fonts and layout in order to ensure that the style is consistent throughout the game. Player UI has also been overhauled. I feel like this new layout is a lot more reusable, as I already implemented the same design for the bear boss.

(Before)

(After)

(Player UI)

Dynamic player portraits:

Speaking of redesigning the player UI, I’ve fully redrawn Chiro’s portrait, with it now having multiple versions depending on the state and her outfit. For instance, after getting creampied by one of the enemies she will have mayo over her. Saving at a checkpoint resets it to normal.

New enemy:

Long awaited Bibi is now available in the beach area with a new sex scene! Just so you know, because she is using a new enemy system, she wasn’t compatible with the current gallery. Gallery will be overhauled in the upcoming updates. Until then, just make sure to keep one alive for uh, research purposes.

New platforming features:

New kinds of platforms and obstacles! Mostly as a demonstration at the moment, as it will be refined later when I properly sit down and finalize the level design.

New default bindings:

After enough bullying towards my initial control layout, you guys finally got your way, changed it to what Patreon comments told me to. Now you can play the game with just your left hand. Hope you are happy >:(

Binding display:

Displayed bindings (In tutorials at the beginning of the game, for instance) now correspond to the actual active bindings.

Enemy HP bars:

HP bar above enemies.

New hit/death particles:

Also cooked up a few new particles I’m really happy about! The effects when the enemy gets hit or dies feel a lot smoother and more coherent with the rest of the game. One effect I’m still yet to update is the warning before strong attack.

New player death effect:

Playing around with time is always a fun thing to do in Unity. I added a little slow-mo effect for when the player dies as well as a vinyl stop effect for music. Small but pretty neat!

Bugfixes:

Screen scaling bug:

Probably the most game-breaking bug of previous versions, as on certain resolutions, it would make the main menu go off screen, preventing the player from doing anything with the game. Has now been fixed.

Enemies not showing up in gallery:

Long living bug caused by how perma-death worked. After killing all the enemies of a certain type, the enemy would also sometimes disappear in the gallery. 

Known Issues:

Continue progress: 

Just so you know, if you press the “continue” button, it is likely that it will result in a black screen. That isn’t really a bug, but more of a result of the checkpoint system being  overhauled while not resetting your save data. Thankfully the game Isn't too long and it won't take you too much time to catch up.

Noclip:

If you exit a sex scene while two or more enemies are standing right on you, there is a chance you will noclip through the ground.

Damage box bug:

In rare cases, damage boxes do not get turned off when taking a hit, which can result in enemies or player damaging other entities even without seemingly doing anything.

Gallery shenanigans:

Because of the new sex system, some of the gallery features might seem odd. The gallery will be overhauled to properly support it in the near future.

Future Plans:

Sound overhaul:

Something I’ve been looking forward to is fully overhauling the game's sound effects. The way I see it, most of them currently feel somewhat unsatisfying, and a lot of the sounds are completely missing. Something I’m especially disappointed by is the state of sex SFX. So In the next update, I’d really love to change that.

Sex animation overhaul:

A bit of Gamer Struggles lore: we initially had a lot of trouble with animation artists because very often, after completing just a singular task they would leave the project without a heads-up or explanation. What it led to is what got at hand, where almost every animation was made by a different artist. To make things worse we were initially working with a fairly low budget and could not afford remaking them. However now we are finally able to give them a big remake, making the animations standardized, increasing the quality of animation itself and creating more advanced sequences.

Improvements to the fighting mechanics:

As I said in one of the paragraphs above, spam-punching has become a viable option now that there are no stamina limitations on it. To work around it I’m thinking of making different player attacks having different settings. For example the last attack could have a higher knockback value in order to let players still sneak in the few first attacks smoothly and then make the last attack a strong one, which will push away the enemy from players reach. To encourage parry usage we could raise the damage while an enemy is parry-stunned. Might be time to also buff the enemy now that player is a lot stronger.

Level redesign:

We got plans to expand the areas between the existing checkpoints, add puzzles as well as add locked areas. By locked areas I mean doors you can only access after reaching a certain level or reaching a certain milestone. Which would go hand in hand with our new upgrade system as well as checkpoint selection. I think that would be great for making those areas re-visitable. Speaking of re-visitability, permanent enemy death feature will be removed, to give players an option to meet the enemies again without gallery or starting a new game, and grind the exp if that's something they would want. I’d remove that feature in this update but I’m afraid we already got too much on our plate to spend time on testing that too.

Next boss:

Aint gonna spoil too much but uh:

Please let us know what you thought and what you’d like to be improved/changed! Big thanks to all of our Patreon supporters, without you we would not be able to continue working on the project

Build can be downloaded below!

Enjoy <3