On the free version, I’m having issues with my character continuously becoming dehydrated and there’s nothing to properly manage it. It’s causing the health problems making me lose money in the process.
Is there anyway to stop it or is it a bug?
Also, I wanted to bring up a bug that’s been brought up before with the kidnapping scene and how paying off the debt doesn’t trigger to leave. As the money goes into the negatives, it soft locks the game.
It seems like there are a couple of people in financial trouble. Many seem to be affected financially by the currently increasing prices. Basically, similar issues I am hit with.
No, I am not planning to host Gain of Life inside the browser. I’m also not planning to create an MMORPG game. The plan is to send HTTP requests from Ren’Py to a web service to fetch data. I am not planning to make Gain of Life support multiplayer.
The issue is that Gain of Life is not a classic visual novel with a tree-like structure. Gain of Life has more attributes of a Sandbox game than a visual novel. However, my goal is to combine both. Within the last versions, I tried to decrease the repeatability of new features. Also, the newer features have more conversation with characters in general. Sometimes also based on how the player/NPC recently changed. Did you play the new versions of the last months? Did you find the improvement within the newly added features? This would be valuable feedback for future versions since I could try even harder.
In a tree-like structure, it’d be a lot easier to implement such weight-gain conversations since each branch is somewhat linear for itself. Usually, it’s not possible to reach the same branch with different attributes (except there is a path for that). For example, in Health+, if I remember correctly, I implemented a structure to determine what Lisa will tell the player about the development of their health/weight. To do that I need to store the player’s weight at certain points of time to then compare how their weight developed since then. That’s a lot of hard-core balancing stuff to do, since I will need to take the decision of how much weight per time is considered as low by the NPC and what as high.
In real life, if you meet a person, e.g., daily, and they gain some weight over the time of a year. You will notice at some point. Your perception won’t compare them to what they weighed yesterday. Instead, your perception would remember the person of quite some time ago, when they were thinner. For the game, I’d have to put this into a mathematical algorithm that determines how the NPC perceives the player. Detecting a mathematical pattern on how you perceive weight gain over time is a hard thing to do. For the digestion system of the game, I tried to orient myself to scientific studies. However, there are no studies on how weight gain is perceived by others. Honestly, I wouldn’t know what kind of scientific purpose such a study could have. To be realistic, the algorithm must be at least somewhat correct, and the math needs to represent reality.
Actually…this would be a classic use-case for Machine Learning. I could try to train a Naive Bayes model to perceive players’ weight changes. Let me put this on my to-do list. I’ll have to investigate whether there is a way to make sklearn part of Ren’Py. I could try to re-program Naive Bayes in Ren’Py and then use that…
For the new features planned, I already considered modifying Ren’Py to integrate new Python packages. If I figure out how that works in the last step of my current plans, it should not be a problem to integrate machine learning as well.
The kidnapping bug was a super nasty one and was fixed within the June-release, last month. You’ll find both bugs fixed in the current Patreon version. Especially the kidnapping bug was really complex to solve, which is the reason why I will not fix it again for the free version. This bug will be resolved when the free version is replaced with v0.35.0 (or higher) sometime in the future. I’m sorry for that, but it’s not worth spending so much time on outdated versions to fix bugs again.
No worries, just wanted clarification on those issues so thanks for replying.
Well, because it is python and open source, this is technically possible. You might end up spending a lot of time on the backend that distracts from progress on the story / frontend, but it would be a fun technical challenge at least.
With all possible respect, I think you’re focusing on the wrong things in this game. You have this enormous breadth of content with absolutely no depth:
_classes.rpy: if(self.weight < 400000):
return 0
elif(self.weight < 4600000):
return 1
...
elif(self.weight < 14800000):
return 26
else:
return 27
And it’s all a shame because this game has a lot of promise! But until the core features of the game get fleshed out, I’m dropping paying for it. I don’t want new, shallow features. I want the game’s core stories to continue.
I comprehend your points, and I can understand that you do not want to support the development anymore if you think that the development goes in the wrong direction. The falling numbers already made me feel that something is going wrong. Unfortunately, I did not receive much feedback like yours in recent months, which worried me (because I had difficulty identifying problems while I knew they were there, and I was stressed on finding something to add to the monthly versions). I try my best to be open to any feedback and I try to consider any of it. However, if I don’t get any, it’s hard to work on it.
But now I did, so there is something to work on 
After finishing the computer science class, you unlock the option to get a job as a programmer. The programmer job was added last month. Though, this job might be too flat for you again.
This is a bit embarrassing and very easy to fix. Already done. These mistakes happen when you do repetitive tasks, such as the weight stages currently. These issues would be addressed with the new image engine.
I do not have any comments on your other points. I see the improvement potential of those. It’s a bit easier said than done, but I will work on improving them. I guess I will have to put my focus a bit more on writing the story and thinking about it - rather than adding new programmatic add-ons. And that is what I am going to do, focus on the depth of all the story “paths.” I should have enough time within the next few months to do so. Again, thank you for your honesty.
I agree with others have been saying. There’s a lot of great concepts in the game with a lot of great potential storylines. The main issue is the lack of player feedback and the fact that there’s nothing that’s been really fleshed out yet. I think it’d be better to focus on completing some of the storylines first and adding more reactions to the changing environment.
Some ideas I have is create small events at certain weight milestones. For example, perhaps after every 5 or so weight levels a small scene triggers to acknowledge how big the player is getting. Something like struggling to put on clothes, getting winded, slowing down, etc. Just something to reward the players progress and add some fat fetish content. You should also add reactions from NPCs as well. Like having Jessica comment on how badly you need to workout after you hit a certain weight level or your office coworker making snide remarks about your weight. You already have Jane occasionally reacting to the players weight, have more of that! And you can do the same with NPCs, give them small events to show them reacting to how fat they’ve gotten. Like Jessica getting lazier or the police women pinning a fleeing criminal down with her weight as examples.
As for the world itself, it would be nice to see our influnece on it. Perhaps if the social media mechanic is fleshed out you’ll see woman copying your style and getting fatter once you become influential enough. Or flesh out the politician path and let us enact laws and polices and eventually see actual results.
In essence, there’s a lot of good set-ups for scenes here, focus on adding pay-offs and depth.
Yep, the decision fell: No more completely new stories to come, for now. Absolutely right for the feedback. The more feedback and ideas I get, the better. I always love reading them.
Definetly, I explained the challenges of these features:
I will definitely try harder with these features as well.
I like the addition for the police girl. That shouldn’t be too complicated. The Jane reaction thing is not an optimal solution. I will try to replace it with a more accurate, natural algorithm. I’ll think of something, maybe a re-usable algorithm to check these things.
This is definitely on my to do list. The politician path certainly was something I thought of when I started creating the game. It should be something a little later in the game, which is why the “side-stories” were added. I remember when I started we had the problem that college was super boring since there was nothing else to do. Now all these small features were added to spice things up. It seems that now the time has come to harden these things and start building on top. I thought of social media having an influence on your political career (popularity), but the idea of having people copy your style certainly is a good idea as well. I’ll add this to my list 
Thank you for your honest opinion. I appreciate it a lot 
I think I’ll be able to make the game fit your needs better.
Hey first of all good on you for taking such feedback. I have to echo some of the others opinions currently. The game has great potential but i did find with each update it doesn’t feel like it’s progressing personally.
The college and work features are nice but they don’t serve a point at the minute and i eventually saved up for a car only to find that when i went to the beach nothing really happened. For me and it’s only my opinion there’s really limited character interactions and it makes the game feel hollow despite all the obvious work you’ve put into it!
If it means anything i’d focus on fleshing out the college and work scenarios. Even if it was little things like bumping into the other college characters at different places etc if that makes sense?
I hope this doesnt come across as too negative i do want to say there’s a lot of good things about the game, the MC sprites are well done and some instances are really good, i just felt like the core of the game needed fleshing out a bit which is why i dropped from the patreon.
I appreciate and respect how open you are to feedback, it’s very mature of you. I’ll certainly be keeping up with your progress now!
I can give a try to the latest version soonish and give my feedback if you’d like? I’d definetly be interested in some of the concepts you mentioned in your reply to me.
And thanks for taking the time to respond so well!
I’ve already gave advice awhile back and still stand by parts of it. The game currently feels as expansive as an ocean, but feels as shallow as a pond in the latest free version
For a different kind of feedback, I’m gonna be honest on my thoughts on why I stopped supporting the game from a financial perspective. $15 $11.50 a month is a hard pill to swallow, and rarely did I feel like I got my money’s worth (back when it was 13.50). Coupled with how old the game’s development been going, I imagine some may just be in the same boat and don’t want to toss anymore money after investing more than a AAA game’s worth or so into your patreon. I personally threw in ~$70 after being a patreon for 5 months and felt a little robbed for what little content was added after paying my first month of Patreon
Different people will have different levels of feeling burned out financially, but let’s assume someone’s been a patreon since Day 1. They’d have to spend $525 ~$450 if they supported every month, or $262.5 ~$225 if they supported bi-monthly. For some, that’s a lot of money to put aside for only one game that seems to have no end or goal that it’s working towards, and people will hit that point I’ve reached financially with the game. Especially when there’s other games in our niche community that only cost $5 a month to support development for (or per update release for games that don’t release monthly).
I’m glad development is shifting to closing off existing content, and I wish you luck in getting numbers back up on Patreon if you take what people have said to heart this time around.
The comments are the reason why I started this discussion. Comments seem to follow a pattern, which is good 
All that’s left is to follow their advice, which is a bit easier said than done. It will take me a couple of months to address all concerns and get back on track.
Well, the car indeed is a bit disappointing, currently. I could integrate it to give the player an advantage when moving around to other, already existing locations. Maybe similar to the bus ticket. I’ll think of it. For the character interactions, this is something I need to work on.
That’s where I will start. Increasing the benefit of college and extending the politician story.
I understand, but I feel like that this makes no sense, as long as characters don’t receive more of their own personality, if that makes sense.
This reinforces previous statements. It is part of the plan.
I always am open for feedback. The more details, the better. It makes it easier for me to understand.
I apologize if the $15 tier felt expensive and didn’t meet your expectations in terms of content. The reason for this discussion is that I want to gather information of what people think. This input then goes back into game development, and then increases the value of the Patreon memberships again, financing further development. It’s important for me to strike a balance between providing valuable rewards and ensuring the sustainability of the development process. However, I want to clarify that there is also a more affordable $10 tier available which grants access to the newest game versions as well (just not for Android).
Regarding the length of the game’s development, it may be a bit frustrating. Game development is very time-consuming, especially if you do it alone and part-time only, and I apologize if it has taken longer than you expected. Noting, that Gain of Life would feel “further developed” if I had made the decision of working on core features earlier. This will be a challenge since I will have to rethink my current approach and change my way of working. Let’s hope that there will be proper results.
The cumulative amount can become significant over time, especially for a niche community. Each person has their own limits when it comes to financial investments in games, and I respect that. However, I’m afraid there has not been a single person following the spending pattern you mentioned. If Gain of Life followed the dimensions of AAA games, I would most certainly be working full-time on the game - probably with a team. The way it is typical for AAA games.
I will try to make contributions feel worthwhile again by closing off existing content. I hope you can understand though that the current situation does not allow me to lower prices, the best I can offer is to keep current ones…
My goal is to address the concerns mentioned in all the valuable comments above - and I think that if I properly do that, the game will keep financing itself and allow me to keep developing it. Though, what I need to do is to arrange this feedback with my own thoughts and find a way to handle it. Obviously, if my thoughts followed the feedback, the above comments would not have happened. Mindlessly following them will 1. not improve the situation (because new content will be bad) and 2. take the fun out of working on it. So that’s the challenge in it for me.
I didn’t even realize there was a price drop to $11.50, and went off my gut with the $15 pricing. Looking at receipts, turns out I was supporting back when the monthly cost was $13.50, but I believe the point still stands on pricing being a bit steep. I made some edits to my previous post correcting my accidental misinformation there, sorry about that.
I completely understand the struggle with game development, especially as an indie developer. It’s amazing how many developers on this site have been able to go so long on creating content, be it focusing on one big game or multiple smaller ones. I personally think it’s amazing that you update consistently each month, and I wish you the best on completing existing content while finding a good life-work balance by the sounds of your current situation.
I mostly wanted to share my sentiment on what I thought may have lead to a 30% decrease in Patrons based on my personal experience and thoughts, but if the data says otherwise, then by all means, you can disregard what I’ve said. I’ve only been playing the free versions and following the change log updates, so I’m still interested in seeing the project reach completion. It’s just hard for me to justify putting in more money into the Patreon as an average Joe after how much money I’ve already dumped into the game.
I’ve taken a few hours to play the latest version, and I’m ready to give my thoughts.
There are many changes I like since the last version I played. However, there are also some longstanding frustrations. The storylines with Jane and others are fun, such as Jane’s breakdown or the study test you participate in. However, these do not feel integrated at all. They cut in in the middle of random activities and hurt the immersion entirely. Sometimes the writing is charming and fun and sexy, serving a variety of kink perspectives… and sometimes its pretty awkward and forced. I don’t really dig Trevor, he feels incredibly flat as a character. The only options for Jane feel like Mutual Gain, Help Jane Lose Weight, and Be a total Bitch. Which is a shame.
The models for our main girl are gorgeous of course, with a charming variety of clothing upon many weight levels. However, I care less and less about how fat I’m getting, whenever the world is a silent static box. Jane just… stops reacting to my gain, no matter which “route” i’ve done so far.
The game feels a hundred meters wide but 10 feet deep, as before, but has improvements. I’m frustrated to see the computer programming class’ addition, even though its a half-decent story and concept, because its a NEW and half-finished/not very deep side-story, in a game flooded with half-baked side stories that already needed more TLC to them.
I want to live more in this world. However, I feel like only sometimes do my actions have weight, pardon the pun, which guts the entire concept pitch of the game. Its tough to be invested in going to parties, making social media posts, or working a variety of jobs, when the game feels increasingly empty, even at early moments.
Why do I care about jobs whenever my money adds up to houses and cars that do… nothing for me, basically.
Why am I investing care and time into making social media posts, spending time with Jane, or getting fatter, whenever the posts do NOTHING, Jane shuts off and becomes a silent project-completion-background after a certain point, or when no one, not even Jane, responds to how fat I’ve gotten. Seriously, I am stunned that there are dozens of locations to go to, including a beach bar, a spooky mansion, a kidnappers hideout, a casino, a hospital, and more, but no one seems to comment on my weight changes or personal choices. I want Trevor to care, is he repulsed or turned on??. I want the nurse to body shame me. I want my various friends to comment on it. Do my parents exist? I want my boss and coworkers to say something. I want to get stuck in a desk in class. I want to struggle through doorways or chairs for my house or car. I want my character, no matter how self-insert she is, to be able to express opinions and feelings more often. I want her to be embarassed or turned on or whatever, more than just 4 conversations with Jane.
The game has so much content, and is adding new content constantly, but rarely if ever expands sideways. I like the new stuff, but I don’t really care about a computer programming class or a spooky house or a beachside bar, whenever Trevor has less personality than a Sim and the nurse at the hospital has static dialogue for weight gain, regardless of how truly fat I get.
I like the game and obviously had fun with it, but it offers diminishing returns the longer you play… which is unfortunate. I am hopeful to see more content and rooting for this game to get better and better, but I do have to say, I don’t want to continue to Patreon support, especially at its current or heaven forbid past rates, as long as the direction is “this whacky new sidequest” each update, and the characters and locations that have been there since Forks was still in development are incomplete and lifeless after weight stage 4.
Thank you so much for taking the time to write this. I see your worries and all I can do is strengthen what I already posted earlier because it all applies again.
However, your message breaks it down into a lot more details on an emotional basis. This gives me some valuable insights. I will make plans for how I will try to apply a whiff of life to the game. In addition, I will consider all details mentioned in the comments I received, including yours.
For the relationships, I will definitely need to create a system to make decisions, as mentioned above. Machine Learning could be a way, there might be a simpler one. To make it seem realistic and to cover the whole range of weight stages available for the main character, I will need to write a whole lot of dialogs. Though I think, it’d first be better to work on the personalities of the characters inside the game. Otherwise, these remarks won’t be worth anything.
I will not be able to fix these things with an update. I won’t with two. This will be a process over the next months.
The July update has a couple of uncertainties, which I would like to resolve before releasing. I do not think that I will be able to finish it on the 7th.
I’m glad to see that you’re taking my feedback well, and I do really hope that you manage to right the ship over the next couple updates. Nothing happens instantaneously, take your time and do it right.
If you don’t mind, I’d like to report a number of other oddities I noticed about the game:
player.addAction(int((price * price)+200), price * 50, 6)), then a large bucket of ice cream adds price = 11; int(11 * 11) + 200 = 321 calories to the player. A large bucket of ice cream is only the caloric equivalent of maybe two servings of Breyers? You might be better off with the base size being a single “scoop” of ice cream valued at a certain number of calories, and every stage after adds an additional “scoop”. If the $1 ice cream is 1 scoop or 120 calories, then the large bucket, now 11 scoops, would be 1320 calories instead. Seems more realistic that way.0_0_default) while others have her flat on her feet (i.e. 10_2_default). Additionally, while all of the images are sized the same at 720x1080 pixels, the MC’s position in those sprites seems to shift and change with every image. This creates the result in game of her appearing shorter or taller from one scene or outfit change to the next. You should probably standardise this so it’s not as jarring.jane-story.rpy you seem to switch suddenly from using jane.romance to player.rm.relationship(). This is an issue because during jane_act1_event3 some of your code paths call player.rm.startRelationship(), and without the points locked up in jane.romance the romance will fall apart the moment it’s fired. Additionally you didn’t actually call player.rm.startRelationship() at any point during the “Birthday Cake” path, even though you have comments about the relationship starting there. And without having that active relationship with Jane, 24 other code paths are locked out according to my editor. That’s a lot of missing content!I see. I will check that out and debug it accordingly. These issues are hardly noticeable when not directly looking at the source code.
I will not fix this, since I plan to replace all character sprites with the release of the automatic image generation engine.
Thanks for explaining, I will investigate this. I think the issue is that there is an event that cannot be triggered currently and that delivers the last point required. I copied your explanation into my todo list to investigate this issue for once and all.
True 
Good point
I just opened the Trevor-party files. I haven’t opened them for two years. Identifying what past-SirMister intended to do with certain passages is quite tricky 
It is interesting to see how my coding evolved since then.
Actually, I could share this here. It is a bit technical, but I think many here will be interested in these values anyways. The values are just for now, they will probably need further optimization.
These are the rough plans for the following few updates. A couple of these plans will come with the July version: HTML Document download
Feel free to share your thoughts