Salty here. First, I want to send out a big thank you to the 181 of you who filled out our poll over the course of the week. The game itself received about 1800 downloads, meaning almost exactly 10% of you filled out the survey. Thanks!
This post will be going over some of the survey results, clarifying what the answers mean, responding to the results, and detailing our future plans.
The Patreon Question
Over 50% of you replied by saying you were broke. Might I suggest robbing a bank?
The results were generally what I had expected. We’re putting some things together, and I want to have Corrupter Mode finished before we launch the Patreon. Considering the results from the poll, we’re definitely going to be proceeding.
6 voters said they would back the Patreon but wanted something other than Adventure Mode or Enhanced Mode. If possible, I’d appreciate it if you could tell me what, exactly, you would like to see. You can use the comments for this post, or the forums as usual.
On UI Design
The results for this question were overwhelmingly positive, with literally no “Despise” replies and 3 “I don’t like it” replies. While I must apologize profusely to the 3 of you who do not like the new UI, the needs of the many (178/181 = 98%) outweigh the needs of the few.
I still intend to have an actual artist go over the UI and make it look nicer at some later date, but resources are best directed to new monster art at the moment.
On Which to Develop First
When asked which feature you’d like to see developed most, if you could only choose one: 50% wanted new monster art, 30% wanted Adventure Mode, 15% wanted Corrupter Mode, 5% wanted more 3D stuff, and the remainder wanted “Other”. If you are one of the “Other”, please specify!
This is a very encouraging result, so the Patreon will be going towards funding development of new monster art and Adventure Mode. Corrupter Mode is almost done as it is, but it’s nice to see that the part of the project primarily done by me (Corrupter Mode, Adventure Mode) will not be neglected for the part that will be primarily done by Rune (More monsters) and any other artist we hire.
Unfortunately, this means that 3D mode will take a back seat. While I have no doubt many of you like it, it takes a very long time to develop and Adventure Mode will probably be in 2D only. 3D will likely receive updates at a much slower pace, if it all, though some parts of Adventure Mode (dungeon diving?) might receive 3D mode components.
On Team Communication
90% of the public were receptive towards my “Never shut up” communication strategy. While 40% were “Fuzzy on the details”, that’s to be expected given that this is the internet and most people are here for the game, not my jabbering.
The Favored Heroine is…
Mei won with 21% of the vote, followed by Lotta (19%), and Christine (18%). There’s a bit of a gap, then Talia (12%), Jeanne (11%), and then…
This is so sad. Buck up, Crowbar! Oh, and Sanya, I guess.
In all seriousness, we will be revising the character designs based on these results. Jeanne will be getting some changes, while Sanya will likely get an overhaul. I mean, Sanya lost to the joke option. You gotta be doing something wrong there…
The Favored Monster is…
This one really caught the team off guard. The Darkslave actually came in 1st, followed by Rilmani, Imp, and then Nymph and Pixie. Jester came in last (which, in fairness, might be due to Rune not having posted the concept art yet), with Podling and Harpy in 2nd and 3rd last.
I would also like to mention that I neglected to include the Fairy for some reason, so I will assume Fairy and Pixie share popularity positions.
Cow was deliberately excluded from the poll because this is basically the order I will developing monsters in Corrupter Mode. Imp is already complete, but that means Darkslave is next. I’m sure a lot of you like Cows, though, so they will certainly be featured somewhere in Adventure Mode.
We’re also taking these results into account for the story of Adventure Mode. While that mode will have lots of new monster designs, it will probably not be centered around Podlings or Harpies trying to take over the world.
(For reference, my favourite is Golem. Yuuta and Pashaimeru have not specified who their favourites are, but I’d guess that Pashaimeru likes Imps.)
Question and Answer
I left the last question as an open response to see what people posted. There were a few questions in there (you guys know you can use the forums, right? I’m going to keep linking this until you use it!) and some statements which needed a response. So here they are.
In case I don’t answer your question, don’t be offended. We got about 40 responses and this post is long enough as it is.
Question: What is Enhanced Mode?
Enhanced Mode is the new version of Classic Mode which will feature new monsters, drawn by artists by hand instead of the 3DCG assets currently used. The original mods and tools necessary to make the game’s art were lost years ago and Passelel is not interested in doing the work to recover them, plus there were a lot of limitations imposed by that form of art. Hand-drawn work has no limits, so we’ll be able to add things like Naga and Squids.
Enhanced Mode is in development, and will be developed faster if people back our Patreon when it comes out, as I will use the cash to hire artists to assist Rune. Volunteer artists are also appreciated in the meantime!
This is also why some of the transformations were more limited than what you might be expecting (someone mentioned that Cows are basically humans with a collar). The redrawn copies will not have limitations and can be more monstrous, if we so desire.
Statement: Mobile support would be amazing and I’d love you long time if you managed to pull it off.
Unfortunately, Mobile is a whole can of worms I’d rather not get into. I might upgrade the engine for mobile at some point in the future, but mobile development is extremely frustrating for engine coders like me since the baseline for mobile is really, really bad, and hacking things in that the library developers were not prepared for is depressingly common.
(Full disclosure: I have worked on a few mobile projects. I hated them. GL ES needs a lot of work!)
Statement: I’m really looking forward to future updates, but just be careful you don’t burn yourself out like so many other content creators already have.
Hah! I’m a professional. We don’t burn out, we power through it.
Statement: I feel the game needs a better difficulty progression.
1.80a has you covered, comrade.
Question: Will cupids ever make it back?
Angels vs. Demons is one of the stories we’ve been discussing for Adventure Mode (it has twists, trust me). I expect they will make it into Enhanced Mode sooner rather than later. You’ll also probably run into Seraphs, Cherubs, and new Angel monsters, too.
Question: Where were Jesters announced?
Jesters were announced in October or thereabouts in one of the forum announcement posts, but they haven’t had their concept art completed to the point of Rune wanting to do a post about them.
Jesters were coded into the original game but dummied out, and Passelel lost his hard drive before they were released. Thus, I figured they should be one of the first candidates for Enhanced Mode.
Statement: Please send help. I’m currently running away from the KKK before they hang my black friend.
While the statement is quite confusing (You’re the one running, and they’re going to hang your friend? Maybe it is your friend who should be running? Maybe you should stop them?) I can attribute that to the obvious haste.
My advice would be to run to a location where I currently am (Canada) and tell me where the white supremacists are so that I might crush them as all fascists are to be crushed. Glory to the revolution, comrades.
Future Plans
So this post is already stupidly long, and I will be making a post later on detailing our plans more thoroughly. For now, this is the truncated version:
Adventure Mode is a go.
Patreon is a go.
Enhanced Mode is a go.
Adventure Mode will contain new stuff. Areas, monsters, NPCs, game mechanics, story.
Passelel, the original HoP author, has agreed to help write and edit Adventure Mode.
‘Til next time.
Pandemonium Development 