Something Naked This Way Cums

Hello everyone, it's time for a quick update on AW development :D

Besty got into the catnip again and was posting all sorts of depraved things on the Discord server, so I thought I'd throw a little hand-holding into the post image. And since it probably isn't obvious, the title is a reference to a classic Ray Bradbury novel.

I don't have a ton to report when it comes to development, mostly because I'm still working on the main storyline stuff and I don't want to spoil anything. Besty has nearly finished expanding the number of date spots and the number of actions at each spot. The most interesting will probably be the addition of sexy actions that can be performed at date locations to spice things up a bit. Besty will be moving on to start coding clothing into the sex scenes. Once I get to a good stopping point with the main story, I'll also be moving over to work more on the sex scenes up until release.

A New Achievement

Because it's been a while, I thought I'd go ahead and share an update on my wife. For those unaware, she has colorectal cancer. We are pretty sure that it's stage three, but we won't really know the details--such as her chances of survival--until after the surgery. So far though her response to radiation therapy has been encouraging, and they've gotten better at treating this type of cancer over the years.

We've had some time to adjust, and in the end, you just have to keep moving forward.

She's going to be leaving next week for Hawaii, where she'll be having surgery. Sadly the circumstances mean that it's not possible for me to travel with her. It's a four-week trip, and with my day job and the need to take care of the kids, I'll be staying on Guam. We've got family flying into Hawaii to be with her so she won't be alone, and the surgery itself is pretty safe as far as major surgery goes.

And since I'll be stuck at my day job, not much is going to change in the near future as far as AW development is concerned, so you don't need to worry about that. I'm lucky to have a job that doesn't have a lot of work unless something goes wrong. I maintain things so they don't break too badly all that often, so I usually get about 80% of my dev work done while at my 'day job'. So... even though It'll be hectic the next month or so, it probably won't have too big of an effect on AW.

Though... when things really go wrong at work, it can be a nightmare. I'm reminded of a certain incident where the employee from a local telecom accidentally (I hope) unplugged a cat5e cable in the modem/router area of our server room... and then decided to plug it back in... to a random port. 

Anyways, thanks for all your kind words and support since this whole cancer thing started back in November. I don't always know what to say, but I do appreciate the sentiment. And of course, thanks for all your support of AW. It's really meant a lot to me to have this goal and community in my life. With everything going on lately, it's been really comforting to be able to work toward a better Appletree ;)

Thanks for reading, I'd better get back to work! :D

o7

ThaumX

Back to Nature

Hello everyone, it's time for another update on AW :D

I'll start with some good news: I've fixed the issues with saving the game that happened in the v30 release. As it turns out, there was a combination of issues. Firstly, there was a bug in SugarCube's code that caused an error rather than reporting that the local store size was exceeded. Since Twine games generally don't have as much data as we do, it probably hadn't come up before. Second, it turns out that the cookie data adapter included in SugarCube also doesn't work, though I haven't investigated why that is the case.

It turns out that the bulk of extra data from NPC portraits being stored as complete SVG data was really bloating the size of game saves. To fix this, I started saving NPC portrait data in a much more efficient format. Now, game saves are about 5 to 6 times smaller, and using all the save slots won't exceed the local storage limit. This also has the benefit of making saving and loading faster again as well. I've maintained backward compatibility, so old saves will work in version 31, but save size will remain large for old games.

Early in the month while Besty was still enjoying a Russian New Year, I was focusing more on some left-over to do tasks, and getting some things fixed like game saves. Now that he's back, I've been working on the main storyline again, along with the basis of some of the assistance/work quests that go along with it.

One thing I've done is made sure that the majority of cheat modes are now working. They were originally a list of planned cheat modes, but we got a bit behind in making sure they worked... so it was time to take care of that. All but one cheat mode works (NPCs start off liking you more), which is on hold temporarily for technical consideration. I also added a new cheat mode called Milk Tank that increases breast milk capacity without changing the lactation rate. I've also added a couple cheats to help manage addiction as well to the status cheats.

I resized the status bars a little bit and added one for milk capacity (if not lactating, another stat is shown instead). This makes it a lot easier to see when you need to milk yourself.

Body portraits now show up for NPCs when viewing NPC details. The portrait system now has 3 new belly sizes for pregnancies, and I had to add a penis option to the female body portrait so that futas like Lily wouldn't look strange. Not counting the penis which is NPC-only, the number of body portrait combinations is now up to 32,440,320.

Here's a sneak peek at Lily's Place, which you will be able to visit to help work on fixing her crazy machine, and to participate in other main story events. After you start helping her, she'll give you an access key to get into her basement. This will make it possible for you to work on progress quests whenever it's convenient, and add an opportunity to see what Lily's up to from day to day. 

That's all for now, it's time to get back to work!

Thanks as always for your support!

ThaumX

Winter Fun

It's the first dev blog post after the release, so you probably know what that means; it's time to talk about what's next!

Before we get into that, I want to take a moment to talk about the game save issues that have cropped up with the v30 release; how to fix the error, what to do to avoid it, and what the cause is. 

Fix: If you start seeing an error when trying to save the game, the error is going to persist until you run the save system flushing code I build into the "delete all" command. First of all, save your game to a file so you don't lose it. You can load other saves you wish to keep, and then save to file as well. Once you have, press the "delete all" button on the save menu, or use the save wipe found in the game settings page. Once you do this, close the game and reload it.

Prevention: The most surefire way to prevent this issue from cropping up is to use the "save to file" and "load from file" options to save and load your game. This bypasses the SugarCube plugin that's causing the problem altogether. Another option is to reduce the number of NPCs in your games in the system settings menu, which will reduce the likelihood of the error occurring. 

Cause: The exact cause is unknown. It's related to the SimpleStore code found inside the SugarCube story format, and I'll figure out what's happening eventually. It doesn't seem to be an issue related to save file size, at least not directly. I suspect it's related to the addition of SVG data to the female NPCs, based simply on the timing. It's likely to be a timeout issue that occurs when save data is being serialized for storage in a cookie.

Whew, now that that's over, let's talk a bit about what's in store for version 31!

A milk fullness status bar that appears when the PC is lactating

The main things we're going to be working on this month are the addition of main storyline content and more improvement/expansion for the sex scene system. I'm also planning on enabling or fixing some left-behind cheat modes like the APD Retirement Fund cheat for not getting arrested. Finally, I want to add some new variations to the body portrait, particularly things like larger pregnancy bellies and possibly milk, and enable viewing female NPC body portraits.

The storyline content will be something a little different than what we've seen so far. It mostly revolves around the start of some work quests that require the player to spend game time on the quest task until the quest is complete. These sorts of quests will have a beginning and end and will be interspersed with more direct quests such as seducing an Institute employee to get your hands on a rare widget Lily needs.

For the sex system improvements, I want to focus primarily on expanding the content and adding more kinky text to action text variations. I'd also like to create some new actions for lesbian scenes and other unique scenarios.

We'll definitely have our hands full this month!

Thanks to everyone for all your support!

ThaumX

The Body Release - Version 0.30

It's finally time for the version 30 release!

The most notable aspect of this release will certainly be the portraits. We've got new SVG-based portraits for female NPCs and the player character. We went with a more realistic style, which I think you'll appreciate. We also added Koikatsu-based body portraits into the game, a long-awaited feature. There are currently 20,275,200‬‬ combinations possible with the body portrait system, with room to expand that over time. 

We also focused a good deal on improving the game's playability with bug fixes and mechanic balancing. We also added in a new feature tentatively called the status record to the character menu. It's a log of the last ten changes to a status variable such as health and happiness, which includes a basic description of the cause behind each change. This should make it much easier to find out what's affecting your character, which hasn't always been easy for some causes. It should also let us add more status effects for more obscure events, which we've been avoiding due to potential confusion.

We've also got some new content, of course, though this time it's more location-based rather than being focused on a specific job or path. We've also added in some minor mechanics and abilities that had been put on the back burner, such as being unemployed, tanning, and handling lactation at work and overnight. 

Overall I'm pretty happy with what we've got for this release, though I am a little disappointed by my experience with Koikatsu. Despite using a fairly comprehensive list of mods, it was still rather difficult to get the kind of effects I was hoping for to represent muscle and weight. We have a few limited texture overlays to represent more muscular or skinny characters, but it'll take some hand-drawing on my part to get the planned amount of physical body shape into the game. The Koikatsu character generator was also somewhat limited when it came to pregnancy, but I was able to craft some overlays for a standard pregnancy (I'm planning on more for larger bellies with larger pregnancies later on). On the plus side, I was able to get some decent definition for hips and breasts, and I've perfected the workflow to add more detail as I have time. Let me know what you think about the Koikatsu body, and what you'd like to see with it!

We hope you had a great new year and that you enjoy this release, thanks for all your support!

ThaumX

Change Log

Known Issues:

• Autosaves from older versions may still suffer from the passed-out bug, but autosaves in v30 should work fine. 
• There are still a couple Besty-Bugs where clicking the reply button on the text message screen (with only 1 dialog message) will cause an error message to appear. This won't hurt anything or hide any text, it's just annoying. 
• Some job application results job descriptions don't fit into the provided space in the prologue skip menu (cosmetic). 
• Invalid/bugged scheduled dates/hangouts brought forward from older versions will still be invalid/bugged.
• Occasionally the female portrait in the NPC interaction interface will be off placed with some meaningless text above it. 

Stats:

Words: 2,138,380

Characters: 12,802,602

Code Lines: 191,146

Body Portrait Combos: 20,275,200

Changes!

In no particular order, as usual...

• Fixed the Teat Enhancement treatment so that it doesn't cause breast enlargement.
• A green checkmark will now appear in the dating status window when your relationship is eligible to advance.
• Players will now milk themselves while at work.
• The amount of canisters filled is reported on the job results page.
• Added the e-vie overnight breast pump to the game
• Players will now leak milk overnight (losing it) if they overproduce while sleeping.
• If owned, the amount of milk/canisters collected will be reported on the sleep screen.
• Updated the Items Cheats!
• New improved display for cheat adding items to your inventory.
• More game items are now included in the cheats.
• Added a 'furniture starter pack' with mostly high-quality furniture.
• Fixed a bug where Besty duplicated the item key for a home item (liquor cabinet).
• There are now dreams in the sleep display!
• 6 standard dreams, which are mostly quirky and fairly unique.
• 2 dreams for unsatisfied characters
• 2 dreams for pregnant characters
• 1 additional dream for late-stage pregnancy.
• Lactation fixes and tweaks to improve the experience.
• Higher capacity and lower production speed for higher lactation ability so that milking isn't required so frequently.
• The overproduction bug has been fixed.
• Milk will no longer accumulate while pumping breasts, will be pumped instead.
• Added a status change recording function, called the Status Record
• Records are can be accessed from the status page of the character menu.
• Records include a brief description of the cause of the change.
• Records include an estimated change value and are color-coded for positive and negative changes.
• The included status items are happiness, stress, companionship, vigor, satisfaction, and health.
• Hundreds of status changes are now categorized this way :D
• Fixed a bug preventing ovulation (and thus pregnancy), and also caused an incorrect "days till ovulation" reading.
• Created AW_Fixer.ps1, a patching script for already released game versions.
• It should be much easier to release fixes for minor bugs now, rather than doing an entire re-release.
• Fixed the StartNap() function to properly display output and apply nap effects.
• Description of the nap and effects are now properly displayed in a dialog.
• Added a new "napping" image for this display.
• Hucow transformatives breast growth balanced.
• Mammarex growth now less extreme.
• Lactamax growth is still based on initial size and number of previous doses, but growth overall is less dramatic.
• Bovinex will now increase breast size to a minimum of 1750cc (up to 2000cc) if the player has breasts smaller than this when treated.
• Bovinex breast growth for already-large breasts now ranges from 350 to 500cc only.
• Hucow ears and tail now properly display in the character description.
• Balanced the overnight health regeneration.
• Standard regeneration has been slightly increased.
• Negative health effects of addiction are milder and have higher required thresholds to be applied.
• Still debating if cum and creampie addictions should have health effects removed for non-withdrawal addiction.
• Changes to the overnight environmental status effects.
• Some minor balance tweaks, increasing the importance of cleanliness and reducing the importance of furniture.
• Environmental effects will now stay within certain thresholds and will not cause suicide or other negative outcomes by themselves.
• Note that having very low happiness due to these effects will still make it easier for other game events to 'push you over the edge'.
• Jobbing system improvements.
• Players can now actually be fired for poor job performance.
• Players can now quit their job voluntarily.
• Quitting or being fired will mark you as being unemployed, and therefore unsuitable for continued residence in Appletree.
• Players can obtain a "self-employment" visa so that they may remain in Appletree even without a traditional job.
• This will let you live as a prostitute, hucow, brood mother, etc. without having to hold down a job.
• Players who are unemployed without a visa will eventually be repurposed (bad end). 
• Players will receive notifications from the Appletree government about their unemployed status before they are repurposed.
• Added a Visa Office to the town hall building downtown.
• Players may go there to obtain a self-employment visa.
• There are various possibilities that can occur based on your stated form of self-employment and whether you meet minimum requirements for being self-employed.
• You can give a blowjob to get around any of these requirements.
• Added several guns to the game that are available for purchase.
• The guns each have their own characteristics, but there are not currently used in the game.
• Intended for more complex combat in specimen-escape and other fun events that haven't been written yet.
• Guns can be used for the random rape/assault events to defend yourself.
• Some guns are considered illegal, but nobody is going to bother to check.
• Added the Pump & Dump Guns & Pawn store to the game.
• Located in northeast downtown.
• Special scene added to convince the shop clerk that you can be trusted to browse the illegal firearms.
• A new "read something" item added to the player's living room.
• Body portraits are now a thing.
• Currently, there are 20,275,200‬‬ combinations, though this number is much bigger than it feels in-game.
• The body portrait is capable of displaying female NPC bodies, but this is not currently enabled.
• The player's body portrait can be viewed on the right side of the character menu.
• Clicking on the portrait will pop up a dialog displaying a larger view of the portrait.
• The portrait displays all 8 hip sizes, and the four smallest shoulder sizes. 
• 31 breast sizes can be displayed, ranging from AAA to ΩB cup.
• Large areolas can be displayed.
• Large and inverted nipples can also be displayed.
• The Fertility Seal medical tattoo is displayed and changes slightly while pregnant.
• Ten variations of pubic hair are available, in addition to the default shaved/hairless look.
• Four different labia appearances based on labia size.
• Pregnancy is displayed in 4 stages based on fundal height.
• Currently only displays up to a single full-term pregnancy. Larger pregnancy bellies are planned (pregnancy bellies have to all be drawn by hand).
• Your groin will become messy if you've had a creampie and/or have cum on your genitals/groin.
• There are some limited chest/belly textures for characters that are buff, very skinny, or have low muscle mass and low weight.
• Eventually want to improve muscle and fat display, but this must be hand-drawn.
• Fixed Fertili-Tea to properly apply a fertility boost.
• Fixed the issue causing autosaves to immediately jump into a passed-out scene.
• A lot of minor bug fixes and little improvements that I didn't bother to write down and thus don't remember!

Besty's Changes!

I keep telling him to do a better job with his change log... We'll get there eventually.

• Manual images now appears once the system they are about is triggered. 
• Thaum Translation: some of the tutorial images now properly display when using a game system such as jobbing or dating the first time.
• Tan was added, now sunbathing will temporary change your skin color.
• Thaum Translation:
• You can now sunbathe in the residential recreation area.
• Tanning temporarily makes your skin color darker, the tan fades over time.
• Tanning does not affect the skin color of your children.
• Bring total number of base cookable dishes up to at least 20 (19, oh come on I can't do it anymore)
• Thaum Translation: There are now 19 cookable dishes in the game, they are all pretty unique and/or Russian.
• Cooking Lich Meat will curse your game.
• NPC and PC portraits for female characters are now here!
• Thaum Translation: New SVG system similar to system in use for males to generate face/head portraits for female NPCs and the player character.
• Existing NPCs from saved games will maintain their existing portrait.
• Tried a different look from the existing male SVG portraits.
• New lesbian sex scene in the recreation area (1500 words)
• Thaum Note: I think you can find this in the tanning area. It's fun.
• Changed fixed the order of the stuff on the main screen. Now weather goes first.
• Fixed all the stuff you have reported this month. (And more stuff you have not but we fixed it anyway lol)