Okay so, this won’t go too specific since the game is still being made but I want to highlight a few things that the people who gave me feedback on the alpha said (about 7/20 folks took the survey, 9/20 folks actually played it and the other 11 haven’t gotten to it yet due to time/conventions/scheduling). The alpha was finished and given to my friends on the 10th of March, so it’s only been a little over two weeks. When the other people play it, I’ll add an addendum the next subscriber post I make.
The survey itself had a lot of specifics I was curious about, as well as asking them about the writing, the characterization of Kazumi, and about the fetish content in the game. The fetish content part of the survey was split into two groups, people who liked Weight gain, breast expansion, ass expansion or neet/lazy/nerd stuff, and those who didn’t usually look at that sort of thing. People who answered that they “Sometimes” enjoyed the former were lumped into those who did like it. I go into specifics of what people answered in the subscriber post linked above if you’re curious.
The generalized feedback was that the game’s writing and characters felt natural, the way that Kazumi and the Player Character interacted felt like they were genuinely friends. The fetish content felt like it was woven into the game, with most players finding it charming and sexually gratifying. One of my friends said the game felt like “a friend simulator” more than explicitly a dating sim, given the one route they played out of the four that were available. Note: The various routes have different relationship levels with Kazumi, from Professional Manager to Dating.
Everyone loved Kazumi, they loved her design, the way she interacts with the player. Some players stated that she had a very positive high energy personality that was strong, but never felt obnoxious. All of the players loved how much she physically grew during the game’s progression, and how she grew.
I’m going into a lot of detail here so I’ll cut it a bit more concise. I did receive some constructive criticism, so I wasn’t being 100% praised. A few people pointed out that the UI needed to be a bit bigger, which is something I’ll have to do If/when i make an Android port. A few typos that needed to be fixed. Emoticons would line break incorrectly (easy fix). People wanted more toys to click on (already planned). And people wanted at least one more full body pose for Kazumi (Semi planned). There’s also some other stuff I went into more detail that would require a lot more context but I can say that everything I received notes on, aside from some bugs and typos, were things I was 100% already thinking about.
Now I know people are going to be thinking, when is this game going to be finished? You just did an alpha, surely the game is like a year away from finishing right? Lol. Lmao.
The entire programming of the game is essentially done, the entire script is done. What needs to be done is 95% asset creation, including more music. I am one person doing all of the art and programming. My wonderful and talented co-writer is there to assist me, thankfully, but she’s not creating any assets for the game. Soon I will ask people to give me some references to work off of for a specific part of the game, but I want to approach it in a way that’s fair to me and people helping me. Clarification, I might be asking people to take pictures of food that they eat when they go out so I can get an idea of some very silly, tasty, and/or gorgeous looking foods. But, I don’t want to put the call out for it yet because: 1) I don’t want people to submit photos they didn’t take themselves. 2) I don’t want AI. And I know that some people don’t know how to read so I’ll 100% most likely have both of these rules broken. This is why I might just ask my friends instead of the public. Going back to the first sentence of this paragraph, there are some things I need to clean up on programming, and little quirks I want to add so that’s not all 100% done, but that’s all considered extra and not a focus.
I’ve thought about asking artist friends to help me make the ending pinups, or additional art for my game, but I felt like I do kind of just want to use this project as a complete test of my skill as a creator. I have amazing, fantastic artist friends who would lovingly help out if I asked, but there is a part of me that just wants to make everything myself. Soo… That kinda just adds a lot of time to the creation of this game, but it does give me 100% control. Will this change in the future? Not sure. If anything I could just ask them to create promotion art when the game is close to finishing.
On the music side of things, the game needs a lot of music and I need to work out the sound I want. I’m not a musician, and I have a musician friend who will help make the soundtrack, a lot of musician friends actually, but… I need to actually figure out what the game’s SOUND is, and from there figure out how to get musicians to collaborate on that sound. This is the one part of the game I’m incredibly stressed out about because I have the least amount of control over it, and it would require direct paid compensation to work on. But I want to have an OST worth listening to outside of the game. I love music!!!
Okay, that’s it for the public Mochi Moshi post. I know I wrote a lot so it’ll be a long time before you hear any more from me. I’ll let everyone know if I do go and ask people for food references publicly, if not no big deal. Also if you want me to post a picture of how the game looks, it looks exactly like the prototype images. Not a lot has really changed and you’d have to see it in motion to really get the full idea of how the game is progressing and I’m not really going to do all that. You just have to believe me and my friends that the game is being made and if you don’t then you can tell bbwchan about it. I’m very confident this game will be finished and that it’ll be something I want to play when it’s done. The smile on my face I get still reading the dialog that my co-writer and I wrote is fresh. I find a lot of joy in Kazumi and I hope that in the future you guys will feel that joy too.
Actually have this screenshot since I used it in the Bluesky post:
But for now, this is all you guys will hear unless you give me money to support the project and read the logs on Patreon or Subscribe Star (Links in previous Forum Post). You don’t have to give me money though, I won’t beg for it, but I do make like only 200 dollars on Patreon, which is crazy low comparatively but I don’t mind. I just love making art and having fun. If you’re worried about being double charged, subscribe on the 1st of the month until Patreon forces me to switch to the god awful Netflix style model in November that I’ll endlessly bitch about in emails to their corporate.
OKAY BYE BYE LOVE YOU!!! <333 (also feel free to ask questions or whatever I don’t mind answering them, just be nice to me ^^)