This week saw a new release for
House of Hellish Harlots [text] that added the Imp Harem to the House. This is a pretty big waypoint as the Imps were the last of Round 5 elites. With them in place I can finally start to move to next stages such as upping the number of playable rounds, correctly zoning the harlots (so dangerous high-tier harlots don't show up in Round 1), and finally put a proper public demo out for the art version of HoHH.
My plan for HoHH [art] was to use the Round 5 elites as temporary endbosses for a demo that only runs to 5 rounds. There is still a fair bit of work to be done here as I need to port the 5 elites over, finish off the notebook code for them and the rest of the low-tier harlots, and generally add a little more polish so I can put it up on places like
itch.io without it looking like crap. I'll leave off talking about that for now. I've got a big TODO list and I'll keep chipping away at it while writing the Round 9 elites.
HoHH [text] is where I'd like to focus on for this post.
The text version is in an awkward spot. It would make sense to pause development and put all my attention on the art version. I think it's going to be a while before I've ported all the harlots over, especially if giving them notebook functionality as well, so I think the text version is still the best place to release new harlots, and I think they will eventually all go in here and it will be given a proper ending where the player survives the last queen and earns their freedom.
What I shouldn't do is add new features to HoHH [text]. The two codebases have diverged enough that trying to add anything fancy to both is a recipe for disaster. At this point I don't want to make any changes to HoHH [text] that muck about with the core code. Adding range boundaries for the harlots is fine. This was implemented from the very beginning and is just a minor change to the init data for each harlot.
The Round 9 elites will work a little differently in the text version. My plan was to have their sub-scenarios unlocked after receiving clues from harlots in preceding rounds. I'm not going to mess with existing harlot scenarios, so for the text version the player will just get a choice of all 3 (or randomly 2 of 3) right from the outset.
One thing I will add is additional lore drops from The Barman, Elegant Woman and (maybe) The Madam. This will add background to each of factions within the House as well as giving the player hints on what is needed for each faction route.
At the moment I have 3 release tasks lined up for the text version.
1) Add the arachne high-priestess of smothering Round 9 elite.
2) Add the nautical huntmistress + aquatic hounds Round 9 elite.
3) Raise the playable round cap to 8. This will require a couple of things:
- Setting the round boundaries for the existing harlots (1-4 for mid-tier, 5 for the elites, 6+ for everything else). The player will still be able to select them outside of their range by talking to the Madam.
- Adding the faction lore the player can learn from The Barman. Maybe also The Madam, but she will be evasive and her information unreliable. This is to keep the NPCs to their designated roles – Elegant Woman for individual harlot information, The Madam to set up socialising with harlots, and The Barman for overall information on the House and its factions.
3 is probably a pretty small release. I want to get back to putting a harlot out every month, and as the rough drafts of two of the Round 9 elites are already written, that should be doable. If I have it ready, I'll bundle 3 in with one of the elites. If an elite isn't ready by the end of the month, I might make 3 the release for that month.
Currently my plan for August is to write the Kitsune Courtesan rough draft and add the Nautical Huntmistress to the House.
If I get a chance, I'll also keep chipping away at adding notebook implementation for the remaining low-tier harlots in the art version of HoHH.
And that should keep me busy for the next month or two. Pop any questions down below.
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