Version 0.977b is already available for download for subscribers of the Super Best Friend tier ($25). To view the post with this version, follow this link: https://www.patreon.com/posts/released-0-977b-158224127
Version 0.977a is already available for download for subscribers of the Best Friend tier ($10). To view the post with this version, follow this link: https://www.patreon.com/posts/released-0-977a-157414808
So, it's been a week and a half since the last weekly update. We've accomplished a tremendous amount of work in that time. It's the most we've ever accomplished in such a short period of time, which would probably have been a full-fledged update two years ago. However, first things first: there's a lot of content, and the weekly updates will be extremely lengthy.
First, randomized NPCs. Let's start with messages. Last time, as some may remember, we slightly reworked the concept of the message system for randomized NPCs, but it's rather odd that they don't message you, right? That's changed. Now, randomized NPCs will message you if they have your number in their contacts, and they can do a lot of things: send nudes, simply tell you what's happening in their life, how their day was, they can express their feelings for you via SMS, ask you to come over to your place, or even ask you out on a date. A huge number of possible requests, and even more variations within these requests: a huge pool of different types of messages, consisting of 1,000 variations. You might receive sweet messages from your girlfriend, who will tell you how much she loves you, from a friend, who will tell you how she almost got hit by a car, or from your enemies... Date invitations.
All these messages depend on the character of the RNPC: the more vulgar and daring ones will send nudes, ask you out, or invite you over. The talkative ones will write all sorts of nonsense that doesn't even require a response, as if they're writing to themselves. When messages are received, they are displayed directly in the corresponding game control interface, next to the icon for opening the phone interface.
Another major change, and even improvement, is the improvement of the AI of randomized NPCs: now NPCs don't show aggression towards their friends, friends always have high relationships with each other (this wasn't the case before, which could cause some problems), and couples always hang out near each other and try to be together... Couples? Yes, randomized NPCs now date each other based on their orientation and relationships. You can find out whether an NPC is dating in the corresponding tab in their bio, under the "Relationships" category. If a relationship is active, the partner's name, gender, and ID will be displayed, allowing you to find them. Here you can see what it looks like:
It's much harder to initiate romantic or sexual contact with NPCs in relationships: each player has a different inclination to cheat. For some, cheating is as simple as a hug, while for others, being naked is completely normal. The initial cheating rate depends directly on the influence stats and personality of the NPC. The NPC can also be gradually corrupted, increasing their propensity to cheat simply by communicating and spending time with them. Furthermore, over time, the NPC may realize that the relationship is undesirable and break up with their partner. Your character can also request this from the NPC, which they may agree or refuse. You can also get rid of the partner through any other means available in the game: setting another NPC on the desired NPC, being aggressive, etc. - in this case, their relationship will dissolve.
This mechanic does not affect the relationship between your character and the NPC unless the corresponding feature is enabled in the content filtering settings! It is always permanently disabled, so for people who don't want the NPC to cheat on them, they won't do it.
Another new feature aimed at enhancing the immersiveness of the entire NPC system: when your character approaches a randomized NPC for the first time in an hour, they greet you and react to you before any interactions. There are over a thousand of these reactions: each depends on their personality (arrogant or aggressive NPCs react differently to the player), the level of your relationship (friends/lovers/dating), and the time of day. This allows you to better understand the NPC's personality, whether they are open to conversation, and determine their mood for dialogue. It also adds immersion: some NPCs give you a feeling of "tenderness," some "danger," and some can even be nasty.
Another minor new feature is the gradual unlocking of RNPC biographies. A full biographie is no longer available from the start of the game; it must be learned gradually, and fully uncovering a biographie can take about 30 minutes of gameplay and active interaction with the RNPC in a game session.
We're working on a scene. We presented it in the previous weekly news, but it was still in the sketch stage. Now there's some interesting progress https://x.com/kaitosi11/status/2054834479718428915
And finally, the last interesting content addition for randomized NPCs is events featuring them. We've added a little over half a dozen different types of events to the game, but the most important of them is the recreation of the "Yandere" archetype in the game. And yes, they now fully exist: if you date a girl with the "Stalker" trait (70 courage and 70 criminality in the influence stats), she can punish your character or get rid of what she considers a problem. All of these events are quite long and varied, but their main goal is to recreate the feeling of "problems" for your actions.
Secondly, the plot. What can we tell you about that? We've redrawn another 18+ scene featuring the main character, Meiko Tsukasa, and have already integrated it into the game: https://x.com/kaitosi11/status/2053057389629481306. Five more redrawn scenes have also been integrated into the game: they support various breast sizes and are fully optimized for the game's resolution, something that simply wasn't possible before. We've also integrated ready-made sprites for two story characters: the Journalism Club leader and Mikoto Ohayashi. They're already available in the game, where you can see them.
Third, system updates. What can we tell you about the overall update? A new language is available in the game: Spanish. The entire game has been translated into this language, and you can select it when you first launch the game or in the game settings. This update applies not only to this specific update, but this language is also available for public access right now in the corresponding versions.
Another minor change: we've added a barbell weight for a one-rep max to the bench press system in the "Gym" location. You'll be able to beat your own records, making this system less boring: a one-rep max depends on your character's strength and experience with this movement, and it looks like this:
We're also introducing a new sublocation that's already available in the game: the Medical Station. There, your character can rest and replenish their energy, which is especially helpful on higher difficulty levels.
Fourth, bug fixes and code refactoring. We'll limit ourselves to a full changelog here, as our weekly updates have been running significantly longer. We haven't yet covered some of the work, so you can read about it below:
New content:
A new language has been added to the game: Spanish. The entire game has been translated into this language, and it is available at the start of the game/in the general game settings.
A new global system and mechanic has been added, allowing NPCs who know your character's number to message you. They can tell you how their day was, ask you out on dates, express their feelings for you by declaring their love, invite you over, ask you out on dates, and even send nudes. There are over 500 different message types, each unique and revealing a different side of the NPC, bringing them to life. Everything depends on your relationship, as well as the NPC's influence statistics. The more active they are, the more frequently they send messages; the more vulgar they are, the more nudes they send; and the bolder they are, the more likely they are to ask you out on a date.
A massive global system and mechanic have been added that allows randomized NPCs to date each other based on their sexuality and relationships. You can find out whether an NPC is dating in the corresponding tab of their biography, under the "Relationships" category. If they are in a relationship, the player's name, gender, and ID will be displayed, allowing you to find them. It's much more difficult to initiate romantic or sexual contact with NPCs in relationships: each player has a different cheating propensity level. For some, cheating is as simple as a hug, while for others, being naked is completely normal. The initial cheating propensity level depends directly on the NPC's influence stats and personality, and the NPC can be gradually corrupted, increasing their cheating propensity simply by communicating and spending time with them. Among other things, the NPC may, over time, realize that the relationship isn't worth it and break up with their partner. Your character can also request this from the NPC, which they may agree or decline. You can also break up a relationship through any of the other in-game methods: setting another NPC on the desired NPC, being aggressive, etc. – in which case, their relationship will dissolve.
A little over half a dozen different events have been added to the game for randomized NPCs: in some, yandere girls with the stalker trait seek your character out for cheating, in others, weak characters thank them for their protection – there are many events, and most of them are aimed at recreating the "yandere" archetype in the game.
Now, when your character approaches a randomized NPC for the first time in an hour, they greet you and react to you before any interactions. There are over a thousand of these reactions: each depends on their personality (for example, arrogant or aggressive NPCs react to the player differently), the level of your relationship (friends/lovers/dating), and the time of day. This allows you to better understand the NPC's personality, whether they are open to communication, and determine their mood for dialogue. It also adds immersion: some NPCs give you a feeling of "tenderness," others of "danger," and some can even be nasty.
Over half a dozen scenes featuring the story character Meiko Tsukasa have been redrawn: the quality has improved, the scenes themselves support different breast sizes for Meiko Tsukasa, and overall, they are much better quality than their predecessors.
The sprite of the story character Mikoto Ohayashi, who appeared in the Vocal Club storyline, has been completely redesigned and redrawn and is already integrated into the game.
The sprite of the story character, who led the journalism club and spoke at a meeting for an independent newspaper, has been completely redesigned and is now integrated into the game.
A new possible location—a medical station—has been added to the game, in a sublocation of the "Academy" location. There, your character can rest in the Academy locations without attracting the attention of NPCs.
Now, the biographies of randomized NPCs are gradually unlocked in the corresponding tab: the higher your relationship with the NPC, the more they are unlocked. Full biographies are no longer available from the start of the game; they must be learned gradually, and learning them fully can take about 30 minutes of gameplay and active interaction with the NPC in question during a game session.
During bench press in the "Gym" location, the barbell's one-rep max weight is now displayed: it depends on your character's strength and experience with this movement, making this minigame more enjoyable, as it allows you to beat your own records.
For location-based activities, specifically "Swimming" and "Sunbathing," NPCs have added corresponding events, using existing visual scenes.
The distribution of NPC activities among each other has been comprehensively improved and refactored: NPCs no longer display aggression toward their friends, friends always have high relationships with each other (this was previously unheard of, which could cause some issues), couples always walk close to each other and try to be together, and numerous other fixes have been made to make this module more stable and less buggy.
The combat system and related systems have been comprehensively refactored and improved: everything has been redesigned to be more modal and functional, and a completely different AI has been added. This AI has completely different methods and systems for defending against attacks and the attacks themselves: all of this is now tied to the NPC's combat experience, as well as its influence statistics. Brave NPCs are prone to greater risks, while others are the opposite. A hidden "Fatigue" system has been introduced in the AI, making them less inclined to defend vital points. A huge number of changes to the AI will make fights more interesting, and in some areas, much tougher and more challenging.
When playing as a female character, the "Swim" interaction in the pool/sea now displays a corresponding scene.
The system for "getting rid" of randomized NPCs through appropriate interactions/events has been improved. This is now a completely more logical system than before: a new NPC does not appear in place of an NPC. Information about the old NPC is retained, but it becomes "inactive," making it only nominally possible to completely eliminate a game session.
NPC hooligans now do not attack NPCs with whom your character has a good relationship (above 50) if your character has a high Authority stat or high overall Physical Attributes.
Fixed bugs:
Fixed a bug where asking a randomized female NPC to send nudes via phone or text message would ignore the chances, and she would send them with 100% certainty.
Fixed a bug where, when using the RNPC writing interface, the game could throw exceptions in rare gameplay situations without any reason.
Fixed a bug where the gender detection system in text did not work correctly with Chinese, which could cause some issues, especially when using the biography and other systems.
Fixed a bug where the fight system, when initiating a fight and attempting to attack, would simply throw exceptions without any reason, making it impossible to do anything except run away.
Fixed a bug that prevented buttons in the fight interface with randomized NPCs from clicking properly and instead of functioning as fully functional buttons, they simply clicked. Additionally, hover button options have been added.
Fixed a bug that could cause the game to throw exceptions when attempting to initialize player data upon entering the corresponding interaction menu.
Fixed a bug that could cause the game to throw exceptions when attempting to move from location to location in certain specific and exceptional gameplay situations.
Fixed a bug that could cause the game to display an excessively low frame rate when opening the club management interface through the corresponding categories.
Fixed a bug that could cause the game to throw exceptions when attempting to create a randomized NPC and its copies in the corresponding character library interface.
Fixed a bug that could cause the game to throw exceptions when attempting to create a save through the corresponding game menu and/or loading a save.
Fixed a bug that could cause the game to freeze and crash when attempting to skip time by 60 minutes in rare gameplay moments.
Fixed a bug that could cause the game to throw exceptions when attempting to change a hairstyle on a female NPC through the NPC's editing interface.
Fixed a bug that caused the game to freeze/stutter when attempting to load the NPC's appearance, which could cause the game to crash completely.
Fixed a bug where, in the brawl interface, if it was the NPC's turn to attack, it would appear that you were still attacking when selecting a body part.
Fixed a bug where, in the brawl interface with randomized NPCs, the game could write logs in the logs category without taking into account the gender of the randomized NPC your character was fighting.
Fixed a bug where, when the language selection menu was open, a message would appear in the corresponding interface indicating that the font was not rendering the text when using custom translations or Chinese.
Fixed a bug where the "Text Speed" setting would display the parameter as a fractional value instead of an integer, as intended.
Fixed a bug that could cause exceptions when attempting to determine the date for sending messages in the messaging interface for randomized NPCs.
Fixed a bug that allowed randomized NPCs in a location to interact with randomized NPCs located in other locations.
Fixed a bug that allowed randomized NPCs to interact en masse with a single person, which looked odd when one was fighting, another was discussing something, and a fourth was hugging.
Fixed a bug that caused the male sprite to become deformed when attempting to display it on the screen, with a small chance of doing so.
Fixed a bug that could prevent your character from skipping a turn during fights with randomized NPCs if your character attacked with any weapon, potentially causing the player to become permanently stuck in this state.
repaint the whites of their eyes to match their skin color.
Fixed a bug where opening the RNPC editor during a game session using the Patreon subscriber console or a cheat code could cause the game to display errors preventing the interface from being used.
Fixed a bug where, if your character had a base hairstyle between 6 and 9, they could appear bald in the 18+ character scene with the "69" position.
Fixed a bug where your character could be kicked out of the academy by a guard in absolutely any location after a certain amount of time or in certain gameplay situations.
Fixed a bug where an exception could occur if your character had a certain perk and when entering or being in any location other than your character's apartment.
Fixed a bug where your character could appear bald in the clothing customization menu and/or certain other similar interfaces.
Fixed an issue where your character could appear bald in certain scenes.
Fixed an issue where text could overlap in certain buttons in the randomized NPC editing interface when playing in English.
Fixed an issue where, when playing in English, the game would simply display the clothing ID instead of the normal clothing designation in the clothing selection interface.
Fixed several connection issues with game servers that could cause the game to assign the wrong role/privilege based on a Patreon/Boost subscription in some rare gameplay situations.
Fixed a bug where mod downloads could simply be interrupted without any reason if the download itself was done through our game servers.
Fixed a bug where the game could throw exceptions when attempting to connect to game servers in certain rare gameplay situations.
Fixed a bug where, after prompting the player to move to another location and selecting a location, the game would simply teleport the player there without interacting with the NPC.
Fixed a bug where your character could have four arms when performing missionary with a female NPC when activating certain functions and buttons.
Fixed a bug where the story character Suzuki Matsui would appear as an old character in the gallery interface on your player's computer, rather than a new, redesigned one.
Fixed a bug where the hair and color of female NPCs in scenes with non-R-M characters would sometimes appear incorrect.
Fixed a bug that could rarely cause an exception when opening the phone through the corresponding interfaces.
Fixed a bug that caused female NPCs to always have pubic hair, even if none was actually coded for. This also included the non-functional "Always Shaved" rule and other NPC interactions that affected this.
Fixed a bug that caused all female NPCs to have no pubic hair after a game session was generated. Everything now works as expected, and they will have pubic hair if needed.
Fixed a bug that caused the story character Suzuki Matsui to appear as an old character in the diary interface, rather than a new, redesigned one.
Fixed a bug that could cause the game to freeze completely during some very rare gameplay moments on PC devices.
Fixed a bug that could cause the game to throw exceptions when attempting to open your character's PC at certain rare points in gameplay.
Fixed a bug that could cause an exception when attempting to communicate with a randomized female NPC after opening a scene with them.
Fixed a bug where purchasing certain perks/skills from the relevant menu could result in exceptions and bugs.
Fixed a bug that could cause certain perks/skills to not function properly—instead, they would be completely useless, making their purchase a waste of money.
Fixed a bug that could cause the game to display incorrect attribute values for your character, ignoring certain effects that influence them.
Fixed a fundamental bug that allowed randomized NPCs to interact indefinitely with NPCs with ID 0, breaking their communication mechanics in the group activity system.
Fixed a bug that prevented recent events from being recorded in randomized NPC memory after any interactions with them.
Fixed a bug that caused the old menu to open instead of the new gift menu in some rare gameplay scenarios.
Fixed a bug where, when trying to gift something, the game could throw exceptions immediately after clicking on the corresponding item you wanted to gift her/him.
As you can see, a huge amount of fundamental and important work has been done to make the game more immersive. This includes a huge amount of text and content, creates various in-game situations, and is simply necessary to make it more engaging not only for existing players but also for newcomers. The next full update will be released, as usual, on May 27th, although these weekly updates are one day early. We can assure you – the full update will contain even more content.