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Poll

Personality traits - mechanical function

  • Personality traits are selected once and remain the same throughout the game. 6
  • Personality preferences are chosen at the start, but change through the game based on choices. 21
  • 2020-05-29
  • 27 votes
{'title': 'Personality traits - mechanical function', 'choices': [{'text': 'Personality traits are selected once and remain the same throughout the game.', 'votes': 6}, {'text': 'Personality preferences are chosen at the start, but change through the game based on choices.', 'votes': 21}], 'closes_at': None, 'created_at': datetime.datetime(2020, 5, 29, 1, 0, 52, tzinfo=datetime.timezone.utc), 'description': None, 'allows_multiple': True, 'total_votes': 27}

Content

Hi everyone! 

Just have a quick question about personality traits in the game. I've already posed this on the Discord server but wanted to post a poll here on patreon too!

Right now, the personality traits are chosen once at the start of the game, and remain the same throughout. They are set up as a boolean, which means that each trait is either true or false. You tend to be stubborn...or not. And if you're not stubborn, you're adaptable. You can't be both.

From the beginning I've realised that this is a fairly simplistic of setting it up. Sometimes I've thought that it's too simplistic and there should be more nuance to the personality traits. And have considered putting them on a scale where each trait is measured on its own. For instance, you could be somewhat stubborn and somewhat adaptable. This would allow a little more nuance in the personality customisation.

I'm curious which you guys would prefer or find more interesting.

There have been some concerns that this is more difficult to code. It's not. It's a little more difficult to manage and plan. But coding is more or less the same.

With a numbered scale, the idea is that choices throughout the game can impact your scores. So if you make choices that lean toward stubborn - even if you've initially selected "adaptable" as your trait, you can swap over to being more stubborn than adaptable.

My concern with doing this way - other than it being a little trickier to manage - is that I don't want to give the impression that GS is about stat raising or something where you have to keep an eye on your romance level and all these personality traits.

It's not about stat raising and I don't think I want that to become a focus. So...I don't know. 

Anyway, vote below and let me know what you guys think! 

Comments

Aeantiz L Kamenwati

Personally (and I'm in the minority apparently), I prefer to just select the traits and be done with it. Mostly because "some LI prefer certain traits". If the traits are basically sliders, then it tends to get very stat raising. But, if you don't tie any of the "good" endings (or any ending at all) to specific traits, then they are just flavorful and not just stats you have to raise to romance the one you want. So I think it rather depends on how you handle the traits. Hope that makes sense.

Steamberry Studio

I definitely do not want it to feel like stat raising. And I worry it would take on that connotation even if you don't ultimately need to adhere to a given LI's preferred traits to get his best ending. I don't want people to feel like they have to watch the stats closely, but I also don't want want the personality traits to be pointless. It's difficult to find that balance!

Aeantiz L Kamenwati

Well as someone who doesn't particularly like stat raising games, I thank you for having that concern. Personally a "stat raising game" is a game that actively punishes players for not adhering to specific stats. In terms of "otome" games that means something like death, bad endings, or missing out on key scenes be they story or love ones which usually means you don't get the best ending. In text based games, usually it means game over try again. I don't think if you don't tie the traits to something, it will be pointless. Maybe I'm weird but I really liked the silver hair addition to the scene with Reuben. It could be something as simple as that, or like it is now and some options are locked without the specific stat. They are more there for customization and replaying (thank you for the flowchart btw...every game should have one, it is lovely to know what scenes I haven't unlocked) as well as some story/world building opportunities. But again all my personal opinion shared in hopes that it helps to have another perspective, and I wish you the best of luck in finding your preferred balance. I cannot wait for this game, well I can obviously, but it's a lovely little glimmer of happiness to get updates on it every so often, which is much needed. So thank you.