Friday 30 January 2015

Newlife 0.2.6 is now available

Hello everyone! Thanks for playing my game, and if you're new here then I hope you have a great time :)
Newlife 0.2.6 is now available and you can get it using the links on the right-hand side of the blog. As usual saved games & characters from earlier versions won't work with this one.

Because Newlife is a Java game, you need java installed to play it. If you don't have it already, you can get java from http://www.java.com/.

You only need one of the jar and exe versions, not both. The game is the same, but the exe will only work on windows and should tell you if you don't have Java installed instead of showing as an unrecognised file type.
Some browsers block .exe file downloads, so I recommend the jar version as the primary one.

Changelog:
  • Fixed some typos & text issues. Thanks to players Zia, Cubano, Mdy, TheHologram, tffan123 & erik198 for reporting problems they found.
  • Fixed a bug with the character creation screens where enabling/disabling of some trait checkboxes wasn't working properly when personality options were selected. Thanks to Erik198 for reporting this.
  • Changed the Look & Feel of the UI to Nimbus. I'll be interested to hear if people prefer this, and especially if it fixes the problems with the UI for Apple & Linux users.
  • Added a proper character sheet. Use the button on the week planner to open it or press 'C'. You can use 'C' and 'Esc' to close it as well as the button.
  • Standardised the sizes of the various Newlife screens to support a future improvements to the UI.
  • Added a link to the character screen from the Scene window. The shortcut key is 'C'.
  • Started gathering some stats to show in the character sheet. More may be added in later versions – let me know if there are things you want to see there.
  • You still need to buy the pill from your GP the first time you start taking it, but after that you can stop & restart taking it using the character screen while planning your week. The “go on/off the pill” actions have been removed from the GP.
  • Added a new event – this is the follow up to an existing work one.
  • When a man buys a drink for you, it now mentions that he gets one for himself too. This was getting him drunk before, but hopefully it'll be a bit clearer why your bloke suddenly has trouble walking.
  • Added a choice to let the man choose what to get when he buys you a drink – thanks to simonmoon5 for suggesting this change. His choice of drink may give clues to his personality, although the decision code is quite simple at the moment.
  • While shopping for clothes, you can now double-click items in the shopping list to buy them.



If you spot any issues, typos or bugs then please report them either here or on one of the forums I post in. Of course I'm happy to read any feedback even if you don't find a bug!
In particular, if you're a Mac or Linux user who had issues with the old UI then I'd like to hear if things are better now.

Have fun with the new version :)

Tuesday 27 January 2015

Progress update

Hi all, I've had a very productive couple of days and I'm well on target with the latest batch of changes. I've managed to completely finish the UI changes for the next release - I'll put up a picture so you can have a look.

Now I just need to add some content, and it'll be ready to go. It looks promising that there'll be a release at the end of the month.

The new character screen - click to see it full-size

Sunday 25 January 2015

Newlife 0.4 release - voting candidates

Hello everyone!


The vote for 0.4 will be next month. 0.3 will be out either late Feb or early March, and 0.4 will take up the next big chunk of development time – probably up until May or June.


Only voter-tier patrons who successfully supported Newlife in January will be eligible to vote. That means that if you want to be involved in this vote you need to become a patron this month.
Patrons who join next month won't be able to vote for 0.4, but they will of course be able to take part in future votes once their pledges have started being properly processed.


Release 0.4 will be more focused than 0.2 or 0.3, but I'll still sometimes be making small tweaks and improvements that don't take much dev time even if they don't fit the theme.
I've put together a shortlist of major updates. This isn't every change that'll be in the final version of Newlife, but I think it gives a reasonable choice for voters.
You'll notice that some releases are bigger than others. Bigger updates have more content, but they'll also take more time to develop, so go ahead and vote for a smaller one if you want and don't worry that you're getting less stuff.


Some planned updates weren't added to the list because they have pre-requisites. If you've seen me mention a future major update and it isn't in the list, then you can leave a comment and I'll let you
know why – I might have just forgotten to include it in which case it'll get added if you remind me.


Two worth mentioning:
  • A sex update is due at some point, with a stamina system and new traits. The game is already heavily skewed towards sex content though, so I don't want to do an update built just around shagging yet.
  • Lesbians can't be added until the Friendship update is done.
There'll also be a new big sex or makeout scene as part of 0.4. If there's one that especially fits the theme then I'll do that, but otherwise I'll put options out for a vote – perhaps in March.

I might make some changes, but here's my preliminary list of the candidates for 0.4:


Work & Career
  • Complete the Sales career with new events and branching promotions. The current elite saleswoman path will have an alternative where you become a sales team leader. This will use different skills and have different events.
  • Add a special event chain for high-level sales jobs.
  • Add a new management skill for the team-leader path.
  • New events with worse consequences for poor job performance and/or high stress levels.
  • Career-related activities such as spending your weekend on a training course.
  • New career, probably office work. This won't be fully complete for 0.4, but it'll have a basic groundwork with some unique events. The new career won't be based on the Charm skill, so it'll provide an alternative for socially inept characters.
  • Add a way of switching between careers.
Romance & Marriage
  • New events for characters in relationships. Both romantic and otherwise.
  • Marriage proposals.
  • Weddings and wedding nights.
  • Bad relationships – argue with your bf, let out your stress at him, dump him or be dumped.
  • Some consequences for cheating, although probably just a simple system at first.
  • Special traits & events for scumbag boyfriends. Is your man a drunk? A cheater? A cheating drunk? Now you can live out your dream life of being woken up in the middle of the night by your husband staggering home pissed and expecting to have his way with you.
Friendship
  • No longer does every relationship need to be about love or sex! Now you can meet men & woman, build relationships with them, and make close friends.
  • New activities, events, scenes, that allow you to make friends and spend time with them.
  • A friendship skill that lets more outgoing characters have tons of friends, while shy mice can only be close to a few people
  • Friends will give you passive bonuses based on their personality & traits from the little moments of socialisation and contact you get every week.
  • Improved relationship system where making friends isn't based on sex.
  • Female NPCs.
Storyline
  • Help Ivy fix her machine, or be doomed to the life of a healthy and beautiful young woman... forever!
  • Choose from a variety of tasks with multiple solutions. Maybe Ivy needs a special component – you could study so you can make it yourself, use your charm to convince a technician, break into a workshop and steal one... or use your feminine wiles to seduce someone into helping.
  • Cackle maniacally as you learn the mad science skill and suffer yet more unforeseen experimental side-effects. The fools called you mad, but they are the ones who will be mad, mad with envy once you perfect your greatest invention!
  • Once fixed, you can use Ivy's machine to adjust certain aspects of your new body.

Femininity
  • A new life as a woman? But you're a man! Just because you have soft silkily smooth skin and full pert breasts doesn't make you any less masculine!
  • Resist the change and act as manly as possible.
  • Wear manly clothes.
  • Most men might find this unappealing, but maybe you'll find one who likes tomboys and have a proper bromance together. You can have lots of sweaty sex in a bromance, right?
  • Lots and lots of changes to existing scenes.
  • Resist the change unsuccessfully, and give in to your womanly urges.
Homes & money
  • Men will have jobs now, and different amounts of money
  • Be given presents or treated to expensive dates by rich men... or eat fast-food on the street with poor ones.
  • Move to new homes, with unique events for each neighborhood.
  • Pay your rent, or suffer the wrath of your landlord.
  • Call the handyman to fix broken appliances. Your fridge is just running sooooo hot and you really need him to inspect your plumbing.

Daily life
  • Maybe you just want to go about your normal life, but better. If so, this update is for you.
  • Get a pet and bond with it. You can't have sex with your pet (of course), but it might be able to help you in your love life. Different events will be added for different pet types.
  • New stuff for your home.
  • Hobbies for your free time, with new skills and events.
  • Go to the park and feed the ducks.

I'll contact next month with information on how to vote. Until then, have a think about which updates interest you most, and I'll be happy to answer any questions you have.

Thursday 22 January 2015

Newlife 0.2.5 is out with a major bug fix

Hi all, Newlife 0.2.5 is out and can be downloaded using the links to the right.

This one fixes a major bug that could cause 0.2.4 to crash. Make sure you upgrade from that version asap!

Changelog:
  • Fixed a typo reported by HF user deathevn.
  • Fixed a bug which made the game (usually) crash at the end of the week if your character got pregnant. Thanks to angelecdominion and grommile for reporting this, and especially grommile for posting a stack trace which let me find the bug much much faster :)


Let me say sorry to anyone who's lost a game to the crash bug in the last release. It was one that showed up when your character got pregnant, so I want to especially apologise to those of you inclined to baby-making.

Newlife 0.2.4 is now available

Newlife 0.2.4 is now available and you can get it using the links on the right-hand side of the blog. As usual saved games & characters from earlier versions won't work with this one.

Because Newlife is a Java game, you need java installed to play it. If you don't have it already, you can get java from http://www.java.com/.

Changelog:
  • Various small bug fixes. Many thanks to tffan123, simonmoon5, middling emu and cubano for letting me know about issues they found.
  • Fixed a bug that meant that men were never generated with the “Likes Oral” trait.
  • If a man's cock is out then the Describe Characters description will now tell you if he's wearing a condom.
  • Some small changes on how relationships are first set up. The effect of negative charm in particular has been reduced which means that shy characters won't be disliked by everyone they meet any more. Bitchy characters have a larger charm penalty than shy ones, which means they'll still be widely hated unless they have the outgoing or flirty traits.
  • Added a text description of the player's attractiveness to the “Describe People” output. However, NPC's preferences has a huge effect on what they find attractive, so even if the description says you're attractive or unattractive to most guys there might well be exceptions.
  • The placeholder character information in the week planner screen now shows how much money you have. I know this is ugly, but a proper character screen will be added soon.
  • Fixed a bug where characters with no money could only choose water to drink, even if their date was paying
  • Guys will no longer autonomously put on a condom if the player is pregnant.
  • Condoms will automatically be removed when you end a makeout, even if you didn't have sex – that's because it's maybe a little silly for guys to end up wearing one for a whole date, even through dinner, because they wore one early on.
  • Modified the short descriptions for some skirts.
  • After leaving a sex or makeout scene, your arousal will be reduced to a (fairly high) maximum value if you were on the verge of orgasm.
  • Capped arousal increases from sex talk.
  • Added a new scene. You can access it if you go out in town on a date with a sleazy man.
  • You can go to your GP & chemist as an activity on weekends.
  • Added a new trait: forgetful.
  • Added the pill. I think I updated up all the text that implies you might get pregnant, but if you see any while you're using contraception then please let me know!
  • Men won't autonomously use a condom if you're on the pill
  • Men now might not be carrying condoms, making it impossible for them to agree to a request. The player can buy condoms, but you only have access to your supply at home. Men are more likely to have condoms for situations where they anticipate sex – this includes all dates and the nightclub.
  • Slightly increased the chances for most men to use condoms when asked, assuming they have them.
If you spot any issues, typos or bugs then please report them either here or on one of the forums I post in.

A quick comment on the pill - to go off the pill you need to go to the doctor again. This is a placeholder because eventually you'll control your contraception through the character screen, but that isn't ready yet.
The things you can buy at the doctor/chemist are also not limited by money at the moment. You do get charged for them, but if you don't have enough then it should just put you in debt (i.e. negative money) and still let you make the purchase.
I might change this, but what I really want to do is make the pill have a small weekly cost instead of a large upfront one. That'll have to wait until I add a framework for such temporary effects though.

Have fun with the new version :)

Sunday 4 January 2015

Newlife 0.2.3 is now available

Newlife 0.2.3 is now available and you can get it using the links on the right-hand side of the blog. As usual saved games & characters from earlier versions won't work with this one.

Because Newlife is a Java game, you need java installed to play it. If you don't have it already, you can get java from http://www.java.com/.

Changelog:
  • Improved how men are chosen for nightclubs. You'll now always get 4-6 men on a night out, which will usually be slightly more than earlier versions.
  • Fixed some text bugs – thanks to Cubano & Engai for reporting these
  • You can now buy stuff for your flat (the activity is available on weekends).
  • Some possible actions on dates are now only available if you've bought the right stuff for them.
  • Reduced the stress reduction from relaxing. Yes, that means those activities are actually worse now. Yes, I know that's the opposite of what people have asked for, but...
  • You can now buy entertainment stuff to help you relax. Buying all the possible choices will make your relaxation actions more effective than they were before.
  • Added some text to the intro to explain why you're naked when you leave Ivy's machine. But I'm not sure if I ever confirmed that the player was wearing clothes at all, so maybe before you'd just optimistically arrived at Ivy's door stark bollock naked.
  • Added shortcut keys for starting a new game, loading a save game & saving the game ("n","l" & "s" respectively). You can also use Enter to start the week from the week planner screen. Thanks to mke for suggesting this.
  • Added a small chance for npcs without the Likes Oral trait to initiate the oral scene anyway. This is just from standing makeouts - only the player gets to initiate oral in bed.
  • Added some new npc dialogue lines to the oral scene that were suggested by HF user Cubano.
  • Slightly reduced the threshold where someone is considered an acquaintance instead of a stranger. This will make it a little easier to get people on the NPC browser because it's only strangers who don't appear there.
  • Renamed the “Browse characters” button to “Browse Relationships”, as suggested by tfgamessite user Subli.
  • Added a Quick Start option from the main menu (shortcut key: Q). This skips the intro scenes and just presents you with the 2 character creation screens. Quick start defaults to Tweaked/Editable for converting the male character to a female one.
  • Moved the Finish button out of the background tab and to the bottom-right of the screen. This should save players a click if they're using saved characters.
  • One new random event.

If you spot any issues, typos or bugs then please report them either here or on one of the forums I post in.

Have fun with the new version :)

Saturday 3 January 2015

The Event Lottery

Hi all, with the first month of Patreon pledges being processed I figured I'd post about the $20 Event Lottery reward.


How it works:
  • Every month I'll pick one $20+ patron at random.
  • This will happen after the pledges have been processed for that month and only successfully-processed pledges will be eligible. This means that to be in the Event Lottery for February you need to sign up as a Patron In January.
  • The selection will be completely random: I'll assign each patron a number and then use a random number generator.
  • The winning patron will be contacted privately via Patreon message. In case they want to be anonymous, I won't identify them publicly but I will make a blog post telling people that a winner has been chosen.
  • I'll expect the winner to get back to me within a week or so. If they don't then I'll make another random selection and choose a different patron instead.
  • If there are no patrons at the appropriate level then there won't be an event lottery that month.


What the winner gets
  • The winner gets to choose one medium-sized event that I consider appropriate for the game: definitions below. This will then be added to Newlife in one of the updates that month.
  • If the winner's requested event isn't one I consider appropriate then they'll get to pick another, as long as they're able to come up with one I do think is suitable within a few weeks of being notified that they won.
  • It's up to the winner whether they want me to mention that the event's an Event Lottery one in the changelog. I'd like to do this (so people can see I'm fulfilling my Patreon obligations) but it's ultimately their choice.
  • If the event is listed as an Event Lottery one then the winner may choose to be credited in the changelog as having requested it. I won't do this unless they specifically request me to. In this case I'd need them to give me the name or username that they want listed – I'm not going to assume that they'd want their Patreon id used.


How much can the winner participate?
While I get the final say if there's a disagreement about how best to implement the new event, the winner can choose to have either just a small amount or a large degree of input. For example, if you win:
  • You could just send a short description for an event (e.g. “The PC is seduced by a circus clown who impresses her with sexy balloon shapes”) and just let me handle implementation completely.
  • You could alternatively send me a long description detailing what you want to happen – anything from a paragraph up to pages of text. This doesn't need to cover all possibilities: if you want you can just script your preferred path through the event and then let me tie up the loose ends myself.
  • Or, you can ask to be fully involved in scripting the event, in which case I'll correspond with you to decide the best text descriptions, different paths through the event, and actions available for PC & NPCs.


If you send me a proper written work such as a short story then you need to be the writer as it would otherwise be a violation of someone's copyright if I used their text in the game. You also need to give me permission to use your content of course.


What counts as a medium-sized event?
A medium-sized event is one that takes me no more than a few days to write. These will always be less than 1000 lines of code – usually around 800.
It also can't require extensive future maintenance work. If your event would need heavy re-writes or additions when other planned changes come in then it's probably too big.
Big events include sex and makeout scenes as well as some of the more complex other ones such as nightclubs and dates in town.
I'm not willing to write “cut-down” versions of a big scene because that's sure to be annoying for players who'll see it as excessively limited compared to other scenes of the same type. There are some milestone Patreon goals that'll involve adding big scenes though and if there's demand for it I might add a “big event lottery” reward tier – that would be very expensive though because a big scene is a lot of work.


Examples of medium-sized events currently in the game include:
  • Next Morning scene
  • Your boyfriend visits when you're stressed
  • Your boss is upset in the canteen at work
  • Persuade your boss to give you a promotion
  • The final introduction scene (where you can touch yourself)


What events can't be added?
I reserve the right to refuse any event. If you're not sure, then just ask me. If you have a bunch of ideas you think will be rejected then you can put them all together in one message and I'll let you know which (if any) I think are okay.


You can also ask me about your event idea without having won the lottery first. Just send me a Patreon message, comment on the blog, or post it on one of the forums I reply to.


Here are a list of topics that I won't add to Newlife. Most of this should be common sense I think, but I'm going to list it anyway in the hope that this will reduce the risk of hurt feelings if a winner finds their favourite idea is rejected.
First, the general categories:
  • Any illegal content. This is especially content that's illegal in the UK, but I don't want to get my players in trouble so I also won't add anything that's legal in the UK but illegal in a country I have a decent number of players in.
  • Any borderline or gray-area content that's maybe not illegal but getting close to it. This is important because I don't want to risk misinterpreting the law and getting in trouble, and I don't want to get in trouble if the law changes to be stricter in the future.
  • Any content I find morally offensive.
  • Any controversial content such as real-world politics or religion. I include racial stereotypes here even if they aren't offensive ones.
  • Any content I find physically disgusting, even if it's something that I consider morally fine. Just because I support the right of two consenting adults to do some things that turn my stomach doesn't mean I want to spend days writing details descriptions of it.
  • Any content I think will be unpleasant for players in general.
  • Anything that violates copyright or that includes real-life people. A scene where your character meets a randomly-generated celebrity would be fine, a scene where they meet a specific named real-world one would not.
  • Any content that can't be properly implemented using the current code. For example, you can't request events with female NPCs until I've actually finished the code for them.
  • Any content that can't be done properly without code or content changes that would take more than the allotted time to complete. This includes events that imply such content will be added. For example, you can't have an event where the PC is promised a job in the circus unless I've definitely decided to add such a career and also set aside time to add it in the near future.
  • Any content I think will make the game outright worse for players in general.
  • Any content that is seriously inappropriate for the setting. For example, I'm not writing a dungeon-crawl event where the PC takes an afternoon off to slay orcs and find treasure.


Some specific examples of things that won't be added. This is most definitely an incomplete list:
  • Underage adult content (that's under 18. I know the age of consent is 16 in the UK, but it's still 18 for adult games).
  • Bestiality.
  • Sickness, injury or death in an erotic context. In fact, I'll usually only include very minor injuries even in a non-erotic context. See the scene where the PC can thump the perv client who gropes her as an example.
  • Sexual violence or domestic abuse. Having the player beat up a random perv who touches her up is ok, especially if I write it in a comedic way, but you can't hit your bf and he won't hit you.
  • Rape. This is actually the main reason I wrote this list – I think this is the only one that gets requested a lot.
  • Blood in any sexual context – this includes the unrealistic and IMO rather icky porn cliché of “virgins bleed the first time”.
  • Any of the more icky bodily excretions.
Well, that was a long list and I hope I'm not seeming too negative. I think it's all pretty much common sense though. Just wanted to be clear that I'm not promising that I'll add literally anything!


Event pre-requisites and conditions
Well, I'm glad I forgot to add this section earlier, because it means I can end the post on a bit more of a positive note!

There's several ways your event can be added to the game:
  • Tied to an activity. You can see this with the Nightclub event. If you want I can add an activity for the player to do (possibly with some conditions) and your event will then trigger anything they do it.
  • Random for an activity : each activity can only trigger one event. If an activity doesn't have an event that always fires for it then you can add a random event that'll appear sometimes. For example, you might want something special to happen occasionally when the player goes to a fashion show.
  • Random for a time-slot : this is the most common situation for random events. Maybe your event would just happen sometimes while the PC is at work, or maybe in the evening regardless of what they were doing with their time.


Every random event in Newlife also has a set of pre-reqs which can be almost anything in the game – traits, relationships, skill levels, clothes worn, obscure combinations of things etc etc.
This is one way of keeping your event limited if it would otherwise be too big. For example, you can have an event that only happens if the PC has large breasts and is wearing a low-cut top. In that case we wouldn't need to worry about writing content for smaller-chested women.
Events that fire for activities don't have pre-reqs as such, but the activity itself can.



I'll contact the winner for the January lottery soon. If you're a $20 Patron then start thinking about events you want to add, and you can contact me if you have any questions. Thanks again for your support and I hope we can make an awesome event :)