It possibly could, though that would involve modifying the script used for the tent crystals, which isn’t my forte sadly! That said, I’ll look into Khur and the Magma tunnel and see if maybe an event in one of those places is triggering the bug, and if I can’t figure it out then I’ll ask around and see if someone more skilled can look into the script for me.
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Holy shit, Axugaem 2 is still being worked on! I know what games I’m gonna be reviewing soon lol.
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Just finished a playthrough of your first game after two of your second(had to check out the Nell/Lani and Caldryn/Evelyn storylines. I had an unexpected amount of fun-but I think you said yourself this is a game first, weight gain second. The first game was solid, but I was really impressed with how much you improved with the second. The thing I disliked the most was the escape chance in encounters, which someone else mentioned. I felt like I was getting battered early on in the game by random encounters I couldn’t escape. This wasn’t a problem in the second game, which was much easier combat-wise.
I’m new and and I don’t know how to grey my text, so SPOILER WARNING
Some constructive feedback:
Like others have said, the iron gut competition is a real challenge, took me at least ten tries to win- I’d recommend reworking that, and/or making it re-playable for those of us who failed on a playthrough and didn’t realize the consequences.
In terms of housekeeping: Crocodon meat drops are way too low(the encounter chance is already low, and to just get the smugmouth bass out of it sucks), and I must be doing it wrong, because I cannot nail lash plants to the ceiling
On the Grinning Demon, when you are assigning jobs, Linda wants the cannons but she’s not an option to choose(Abby seemed to work fine though)
I am missing one of the relics- the giants horn I think its called. any hints?
I was able to pick up the demon core in the magma tunnel twice, and deliver to Ferra twice, seems like a bug
If this has already been said, my apologies, I don’t mean to be repetitive
The Nell/Lani Split is interesting- being able to fight Nell at Khur was cool(thanks Elmira), I do wish we had the chance to fight and see Lani as well(Elmira was ready so that was a small letdown), and I hope the character we didn’t choose joins the team at the bridge.
I wish we had the choice to grab Cedric or Ashley(sorry Cedric, I want the vampire girl not the edgy boy), so I hope they come around further along in the game.(also in westhaven, I must be dumb because it took me forever to figure out how to trigger the core worm fight, so maybe altering that to be more self explanatory)
Elmira and her adipomancy is the unsung hero of the game- just checking, her fat skill works on the Melkai, succubi purger and flirt, Nell, and Sally(She liked it lmao), Right?
Fingers crossed that the skill will soon work on the pigwomen(although I don’t think there are any we can fight currently), the mermaid ladies, the angels, and Maddie/Lani.
In terms of picking sides, Nell is a better fighter, Lani seems lackluster, but Lani is a nicer character to travel with(plus, fat Nell!). So maybe Lani gets a hp/defense buff? She seemed squishy-Evelyn too for that matter
Siding with the angels was a nicer storyline, but fighting the angels(with Elmira skill “working”, as it doesn’t visually right now) is a contender for sure
it would be super cool to have a mini art gallery, Edypos style, showing character changes and such(maybe in the floating museum?)
In that same vein, having a small animation play with your teammate whenever Elmira uses her injection skill would be a major addition to the game(I wanna see my fat teammates, whoops)
The only way I have found to technically “fatten” a teammate was with the gallonmelon, and it seemed temporary, but maybe I am missing something.
In terms of difficulty, I think you were right on the money, the hardest bossfight was against the Twins with Cross and Linda(whoops failed that three times, had to be liberal with the surpris fruits)
speaking of cross, all those wind skill locations in the world are inaccessible until we have cross(next update?) correct?
I assume that eventually other Biri treats will be implemented soon, is there any other use for them besides stat boosting? Is there a max stat cap?
Having the colosseum(like from Axugaem 1) in game two, where you can fight tourneys, but also custom battles would be very cool(like replaying boss fights, or just exp grinding). That way we can fight all characters even after choosing a side in Blightwood too.
I think my favorite characters were Evelyn and Vespa, and my favorite boss fight was versus Evelyn or Maddie. Least favorite characters were Caldryn and Cedric(sorry boys)
Overall this was a serious game that I really enjoyed sinking 20 hours into, it really brought me back to the Pokemon red gameboy days
I’ll score you a 9/10(not that it matters, you make your game how you want), but I think you’re doing great work Axl, and I await your next update!
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Thank you so much for this crazy-thorough review! I want to get back to you on all of this as best I can since you brought up a lot of good points as well as some very reasonable suggestions that quite a few others have voiced! Right now I’m prioritizing real life (academics, paying rent) over Axu2 work but I will do my best to come back with a more thorough reply asap!
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Yup, it’s a slow-burner but it’s getting there!
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axlwisp, is there a different way to encounter those gators in ironfruit jungle?
They can be found either as a random encounter on the jungle part of the world map, or as a rare event when fishing in the river running through it. Folks have mentioned that the encounter rate is pretty frustratingly low, so I’m planning to bump it up in a coming patch!
Thanks for being patient! I’m back with some thoughts on the things you brought up here:
First and foremost, I’m really delighted you enjoyed both Axugaem 1&2 so much, and I’m happy to hear that the encounters in 2 are less of a pain since I absolutely felt that was an issue in the first game upon looking back after the fact. In an ideal world, I’ll update Axu1 somewhere down the line and smooth out its difficulty curve in doing so, but I’m at least glad that 2 is heading in the right direction!
The Iron Gut competition is at the top of my list of priorities for the next Axu2 update (possibly even the next patch at this rate) since -as you noted- a lot of folks have expressed frustration with it. The most immediate change I’ll make is to add graphics that appear during the contest that indicate bloat level and amount eaten so that it isn’t as much of a shot in the dark. I was hoping to have said graphics implemented by now, but I kept putting-off doing that for varying reasons. I’ll definitely consider making it replayable too, or at least giving some fair warning that it’s a one-shot thing. For some reason I’m attached to the permanence of it as an event, but I realize it’s a major bummer to have to save scum if you want to do a completionist run or just win the darn thing!
Noted regarding the crocs and lash plants as well! I’m adding some more spawn locations for crocs in the coming patch and increasing the meat drop rate so that the quest isn’t a headache. The lash plant quest is currently glitched, so I’m sorry about that!! But I’ve determined the problem and it will be fixed as well for next patch!
Linda not getting to operate the cannons is more of a joke than a bug, since nobody in the party trusts her to do that! I might make that a bit clearer if it’s confusing.
The ogre horn is at the top of a cross-whirlwind in the Thunder Highlands ^^; This has pissed-off a few people so again, sorry! The good news is you aren’t missing anything, and you’ll be able to grab it as soon as Cross becomes a permanent party member!
Thank you for reporting the demon core bug! I’ve looked into it, and it’ll be fixed-up for next patch! I took a look at Drakkus Isle and the core worm quest as well, and I’ve beefed up the dialogue a bit so that it’s a bit clearer what to do to progress.
In terms of choosing between characters, I’m gonna hold firm in my vision for the game, which is that you can’t get every character in a single run! It would be cool to have Lani and Nell on the same team (or Ashley and Cedric for that matter, or Nell and Cedric/ Lani and Ashley), and I won’t banish the possibility of it happening far, far down the road, but as it stands I want to keep big choices like that impactful and a major part of what makes each run unique! The Ashley/Cedric ‘choice’ isn’t really a choice the first time through, so I think if I were to bend on this matter it would be with those two. There isn’t really a reason why they couldn’t both be recruitable (at least compared to Lani/Nell and Ev/Caldryn where they’d literally kill eachother lmao)! Storywise, there will be other points in the future where Ash and Cedric are both in the party, so if possible I’ll consider letting you have both of them permanently.
Elmira’s Adipomancy is definitely one area of the game that will be added to more as we go! I’d like to have the vast majority of the enemies be fattenable, though the way I have it implemented currently is a bit programming-intensive so it might be a while before that happens! but rest assured that the mermaids, pigwomen and angels will all be fattenable at some point, and I don’t see a reason why Maddie and Lani won’t be as well, probably sooner than later given the content of the next planned update! Also to confirm, adipomancy should still work on all the mobs you mentioned.
I’ll buff Lani’s HP and Ev’s MDF for the next patch given what you’ve noted, as I think those are largely shared sentiments!
I really like the idea of the mini art gallery! That’s something that wouldn’t be too tough to add, and there’s space for it in-game, so I’ll keep it in mind for future updates! I also think that having an animation play for a ‘successful’ use of Adipose Injection is a great idea, though it may be a while before I get to it since it’d take a bit of extra work to do-up some nice animations for every character!
Gallonmelons are temporary (bloating rather than fattening,) but in terms of permanent weight gain, Biri’s treats will do that if you feed Abby/Vespa enough (10 I believe, though gallonmelons and brapples do add to the weight variable, which should decrease the amount of treats needed if everything works as intended.) There’s only one stage of weight gain for them currently, but like a lot of the stuff mentioned here, it’s a part of the game I’ll keep adding to going forward! Also since you brought it up below, there isn’t a max stat cap atm, at least not one that I’ve added manually! RPGmaker VX Ace has pretty high stat/level caps relative to what I have planned for Axu2, so there should be a good amount of leeway there, but if it becomes game-breaking then I’ll give it some more thought!
Again, super-glad the difficulty feels right! I felt the Twins were fairly challenging as well, though I did worry about them being -too- challenging. Ideally they should require or at least encourage the player to go on the defensive and outlast their setup, but I’ll keep an eye on what folks say about their fight. And yes, you’ll have to wait until the next update when Cross joins-up to access all the whirlwind locations!
There is a colosseum planned for Axu2, and it will absolutely have some replayable boss fights at some point and in some form! I won’t spoil too much there since it’s a pretty big feature and I know people really enjoyed it in Axu1, so I’d like it to be somewhat of a pleasant surprise! But that said, if all goes well, the first bit of colosseum content should come with one of the next couple of updates!
I’m happy you liked Ev and Vespa so much~ Maybe that’s my personal bias leaking through, since I really enjoy writing those two characters! But I’m planning to give underdeveloped characters like Cedric some more content soon since it’s probably kind of difficult to relate to him while his character sprite doesn’t match his face sprite at all (and he only has one face sprite, now that I think about it…)!
Thank you, thank you, thank you again for the review, and for all the interest and engagement with the game! I’m hoping to push the next patch soonish… As I mentioned before, life’s been hella busy, but I’m hoping to have the big issues like the lash plant quest fixed within the next couple of weeks!
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I try downloaded it to my laptop and it won’t show as a folder on my laptop. is that weird?
Depends. Do you know how to unzip it?
Sorry to bother anyone here but I’ve come to ask how I can recruit Elmira, I’ve reached until just before the lava caverns and have received a quest from Elmira that involves reuniting the sonic elementals with something.
From what I Gleaned from their dialogue it says somewhere after the sandy area so I’m assuming it’s after the town that gets destroyed after you beat the pink girl.
Go into the Sand Swamp from the left side and go down. You’ll end up in the Thunder Highlands part of the world map. From there, go to Melody Grotto, which is fairly close to the sand swamp entrance. The quest should be pretty straightforward from there!
Thanks for the help it took me a while to realize that the swamp area you go through is actually called the sand swamp, I just thought it was a regular swamp till I read the name at the top.
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Okay, so…I’ve finally been really digging into this game. It’s a lot of fun, besides feeling like I’m just getting mercilessly teased with ‘there’s stuffing and weight gain elements in this game, and you can show off being gluttonous, but who knows if you will ever be able to pig out and get huge’. Having seen some of your art over the years, Axlwisp, I was really hoping to at some point get to where I had to have my party shove me through doors to waddle into a building, and just how crazy stuffing could possibly get - admittedly, I did expect putting this all into the game would be hard. The gameplay and story are still good, but the teasing is getting to be so sparse and minor it’s starting to get frustrating.
Speaking of frustrations…I imagine the wind things would have required picking the other group in the beginning, but how did I miss being able to fish? Oh, and how do we beat the eating contest in the cat town? I had hoped (especially with what the pig lady says when she wins) there was a way to gain weight (and for more than that reason), which would help…I have yet to find it. Being a glutton hasn’t helped, even when it seems to allude to having expanded my capacity and/or appetite. I also can’t figure out if there’s a specific rhythm, since being careful not to get bloated (as it basically yells at you not to) generally gets even worse scores, because you have to waste too much time belching. I don’t know if each button press is a food item or part of one, if I should do it slow or fast, and if it makes a difference (does too fast pile up too much, and there’s a passive recovery of fullness if I don’t go too fast, despite it being an eating race?).
At least I have a new pirate tsundere(?) maybe someday girlfriend(?), who likes cooking and feeding people…so I have hope. Even if the meal after returning to cat town was…disappointing in the food regard. I’m sorta wishing there was a walkthrough/guide for this game, because there are so many choices, and so much content (even if it’s maybe lighter on some of the content I was hoping for than I thought it’d be). Speaking of…
It still has been a fun experience, being teased and left to dangle for hours aside. I am enjoying the game, even despite the limitations imposed by it having been made on such an outdated version of RPGMaker (such as having to alt+enter to make if not tiny, that doing so resizes everything else I have open if I try alt-tabbing, and that I have to unplug my controller to be able to properly play). Kink-content aside, it’s plain a lot of work and love went into making this.
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Thank you for taking the time to play the game and give your thoughts! I hear you totally on all of this! Lack of immediately accessible fetish content has been a common criticism I’ve heard about the game, and I think that especially in comparison to more recent stuffing RPGs it definitely can come off as teasing. The good news is that this is a facet of the game that I’m hoping to address in the coming update! The eating contests will be getting a new UI with a bloat meter and score count (among other things) to help make them less confusing, and I’m working on adding some more fetish content across the board as well.
If it helps, Vespa is dateable! In fact, she can date a couple of characters, and I’m working on a good bit of content involving her for the coming update! I’m going to keep streamlining the choices and whatnot so that the game is a little more forgiving in letting you know when a big decision is coming up. The problem I’m facing is that I have way too much planned for the game still, so a lot of the big fetishy plot threads and sidequests aren’t as fleshed out as they could be. But all that does mean it’s something that should become less of an annoyance with each new update!
Admittedly, a walkthrough would be nice but I don’t want to put that burden on anyone right now with the game still in-development. I’ve had it suggested that I just upload a playthrough of the game myself, and I may do that at some point, but until then I’d encourage you to check out the discord if you’re looking for some of the game’s more hidden fetish content (since there is a fair bit of that currently!) The community is pretty helpful and thorough in that regard!
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I may just check that out, thank you. I can’t help wondering what all I may have already missed.
I do wonder how being Vespa’s girlfriend, being as gluttonous as possible when given the chance, and trying to find ways to egg Vespa on (including making it clear I ‘don’t mind’ people gaining) hasn’t gotten me on the express train to Vespa’s love of feeding people - but I imagine maybe that’s something I just haven’t gotten to yet, or hasn’t been added yet? Regardless, I am definitely looking forward to whatever is planned (especially if I can use the old saves, because oof would catching back up take some time), and I still enjoy playing the game a lot even despite hoping for more of the ‘fetishy’ stuff. Much as I’m surprised to see the relative lack of people stuffed bigger than houses (given your art on DA), I’m also pleasantly surprised to see just how fun the story and character interactions are - and just how bloody much there already has been, and still is, to do. Most games around here take 5 minutes to 2 hours to beat. I think I have like 35+ hours into this already, admittedly with some dragging my feet and searching for things I might have missed.
Speaking of the time I’ve put in so far, I hope you don’t mind when people ‘cheat’ while playing. Since so many games put in too much grind and filler (even without things like curvy enemies or ‘fetish’ actions from enemies), I tend to usually give myself money and the like with a save editor (I really hope that doesn’t upset, it strangely seems to with some people). My point for bringing it up, though: I noticed there are a number of items in the game that don’t seem to do anything. Is there a reason they’re still in the item lists? I noticed there’s maybe 5 versions of Devour, for example, and only the one you can buy from the party’s ssssstalker works. There are also a couple that look like they should do something, but I guess don’t? (The angel cakes don’t go to Ev?)
Oh, and I found a couple bugs and/or bits of weirdness, but I don’t remember most (I wish I’d written them down, but the game messes with tabbing out if in full-screen mode). I do know that giving Vespa Gallonmelons will cause her to start crab-walking. Oh, and pissing off Vespa about her weight when you’re in the wrong spot causes her to trap you in a box she yeeted you into.
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All old saves should be transferable between each new update that comes out for the foreseeable future! I try my best to work on the game in such a way that people aren’t punished for playing it, and having to restart it every time a new update drops would be pretty punishing!
On that note, and relevant to the fetish content, a good strategy to use if you’re interested in exploring more of the side content is to have multiple copies of an old save that you can progress from in different directions. The game definitely has a lot of branching content, and that’s so players can have a new/different experience with each playthrough, but I know it can get pretty overwhelming, so keeping backups can help with that. This is most relevant with relationships since there are/will be quite a few options there: for example, Claire can only enter a relationship with one person per playthrough at the moment, so you’d need multiple saves if you wanted to see all the relationship content for her (there isn’t a ton yet but there will be!) Same goes for Vespa, which is particularly relevant because the coming update will add a lot of relationship content for one of her potential partners but not so much for her and Claire (since that’ll have to wait for Capital City to be added to the game.) Don’t worry though; some of that feeding content is coming soon, and the rest won’t be far behind! In terms of larger stuffing sizes, that is something I’m working on, and there just might be a bit of that content coming with the next update~
I don’t mind folks using save editors as long as they know what they’re getting into! Adding a ton of money and supplies won’t bug out the game, but adding specific key items and items that aren’t-yet-implemented might! To your point though, a lot of the items in the list at the moment are placeholders, such as the duplicate Devour tickets. It’s my way of trying to keep things semi-organized by reserving spaces for any new tickets I might want to add in future updates. Others (like the angel cakes, which are in fact related to Evelyn) just aren’t implemented yet, but it’s very likely that they will be at some point~
Thanks for noting the bugs! I recall there being something wacky with Vespa and the Gallonmelons but I’d attempted to quickfix it before… evidently not successfully though!
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Ah. Now I know not to expect getting the Capital City yet. Good to hear about coming content. Will there be more weight gain, as well, or just bigger stuffing sizes? At current, I just tend to stuff a Gallonmelon down the MC’s gob every time I can get to camp (and she’s not still under the effects of one), to keep the appeal running…so I was hoping there might eventually be a way to not only get bigger, but to also stay bigger (at least somewhere like currently, with temp sizes being beyond that). Definitely hoping to have the option to really cement what kind of appetite the MC has, and letting it come back to bite her (in a not too-problematic way, so it doesn’t cut off important things) if choosing to make her appetite out of control. The more possible connected shenanigans (you know, the sort like Vespa getting back at her for teasing about the weight, or something of the like) the better.
I’m really glad to hear you don’t mind the save editors - and I definitely know what I’m getting into when I use them. I’m always careful not to just give myself things that might break/bug the game. Speaking of that, and your topic on branching paths, I do make new saves each time I make what seems like an important choice (like becoming Vespa’s girlfriend, or siding with the Angels), but I don’t know how likely I really am to go back to those and not just replay. Replaying can be a slog, but there’s normally so much that might change from one decision (like who do go with in the beginning) that I expect too many following branches to ever keep track of saves (especially without being able to name them). They do help, if nothing else, with possible edit bugs, though.
I can’t help wondering if the Bubble Kelp shenanigans can negatively impact relationships - and what else there might be of them in the future. I did notice there seems to be some interaction between Bubble Kelp and Gallonmelons, at least.
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There’ll definitely be more weight gain in addition to more stuffing! Claire weight gain is something I’ve essentially been putting off because it would involve going back through every cutscene and flooding each one with conditional branches to ensure Claire’s sprite shows up correctly in all of them, but it’s something that will certainly have to happen at some point, and it may be that there’s an easier way to do it that I just haven’t thought of yet! Like a lot of things, it’s a work in progress, but at the very least there will be some temporary wg at some point to do with her and Vespa’s relationship~
You bring up a good point in terms of replaying, though depending on how much you replay it, I don’t think it’s really necessary to start right from the beginning every time. My suggestion is to keep one base save/set of saves for Lani’s route and one for Nell’s, either just after leaving Grok or somewhere in Del Nyan, since one of the biggest requests I get from people is an option to skip the opening so they can get to more of the stuff they haven’t seen yet! It’s your call ultimately; if you’re having fun with the game and don’t mind the opening then more power to you, but I’d say (discarding the big Lani vs Nell choice) there aren’t a lot of major branching plots/subplots until after Del Nyan anyway!
Nice catch with the bubble kelp-gallonmellon interaction! I’m certainly hoping to add a few more fun interactions like that in the future. I dunno how far I’m going to get into the ‘psychology of bubble kelp,’ but lorewise it isn’t really addictive so I guess it would depend on how much the player chooses to indulge in it (and whether or not whoever they’re with minds!) It’d be fun to do some scenes involving Claire and one of the melkai characters getting up to kelp shenanigans, but I can’t promise anything to that effect just yet, so we’ll see!
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Is there a way to add a conditional that just checks for current applicable sprite? I don’t know if that was the plan or not, but it would be a way (in theory, as I have not made any games like this) to allow for a wide (heh) array of possible size sprites - at least until/discounting the need or desire for eventual sizes having an impact on the cutscenes. I will admit that it would be very appealing to have some cutscenes change based on weight (maybe even opening new options), but just having the weight display properly in cutscenes seems like a sufficient early step. But, taking that early step might just leave having to repeat/undo the same work later, if you wanted to add the fun of weight interactivity…
I did figure the earliest I might want to regress to replay options was the choice between Lani and Nell (currently on the Nell route, as I have a weakness for redheads and consider blonde overly-popular, to the point of being unappealing), but I figured that’s near-enough to completely restarting the game. Well, besides the fact that you can accidentally use your grapple ability (when still unsure when and how it might come up) to completely skip a number of early items in the watery puzzle area (I was deeply concerned this would be a trend at the time it happened, which actually caused me to start making back-up saves before I began running into real choices or playing with editing my saves).
If I might suggest interactions, I think the Gallonmelon and Bubble Kelp should probably be at the root of most of them, unless just trying to basically give yourself a system of alchemical interactions to worry about implementing. While it could be fun to have something like consuming two innocuous items in sequence causing inflation or weight gain, it would create a lot of work (and might be a tricky surprise for some people). With Gallonmelon and Bubble Kelp, you at least have some good idea what you might be getting into - unless you just want to add hints to the descriptions of a couple items you really like the idea of combining, especially for anything that might not be only temporary. In terms of the Bubble Kelp, there are allusions to it as though it’s like a drug for (I assume the MC is Claire - I wasn’t sure, because the game gives the option to rename her, which I did) the MC. This could play into interactions that might be meant to do things like increase her likelihood to have compromised self-control in relation to things (maybe even food, if not just done through food-related choices, or events connected to the oh so devious and demonic Vespa 
). I would imagine Gallonmelon would affect either the capacity of the MC in certain circumstances (either based on if she’s currently bloated by one, or based on how many she’s been exposed to). Oh, and my question about the Bubble Kelp in relation to social interactions is mostly related to the fact many companions seem to be mystified or even annoyed by the MC when ‘under the influence,’ and I wanted to be sure interacting with them like that wasn’t getting me negative points in their eyes (since it’s fun, despite having so limited a collection of interactions).
Speaking of temporary and permanent interactions with items, and what might be expected - the way they’re sometimes described, and the very noteworthy effect on a certain inn keeper taken into account, I would have expected eating too many of the healing fruits (especially the big and max varieties) to cause gaining after enough of them. I imagine this is not the case, though, given our talks here…