[Poll] [Syrup Town] - V5 Progress and new Hentai University mod

Hello hello all! v5's been chugging along and there's new stuff to talk about. Thankfully I was able to escape playing the new palworld update long enough to make some progress. There's a few things on our agenda to day so let's dive in!

New HU mod: Talia by cptmikehawk420

There's a new mod character for Hentai University by Cap!

She's been added to the online version, just go to the game console:

For offline players you can download her here: https://mega.nz/file/buIXzYpK#6vp2kv55z4T4dgIp9bC0jkVKJmJIQugrGuAz6fHAIYg

Extract in the hentai university folder, then go to game console to enable her.

Her first appearance is in the shopping district. If you get stuck be sure to try checking around in the evening, and be sure to buy the security camera item from the shopping district.

Mary-Lou Finished

The central focus of v5 is done, introducing Mary-Lou. I think she might be a bit too one note, at least until her impregnation. Because I made her third scene so long her entire character ends up being "wants to get pregnant", moving from stuttery nervous gal to 100% done with this impregnate me now over only three encounters.

She's gotten a fair bit of feedback on the public test server, speaking of:

Pocketmanz overhaul conundrum

I was having fun with palworld and decided to make a new card set based on them. **Just for now**, I've disabled the old cards to test ideas on the PTR:

As you can see I made a lot! Finding loose cards can be fun, but I also wanted to try making actual packs. If that one tcg pocket app can make an advent calendar pack-puller fun, maybe I can to? But doing that needs more cards than I currently have.

Still, there's a lot to consider. The design space is pretty overwhelming, there's feral vs anthro versions to consider, flat chest vs booba, normal sized vs shortstackified, and all in addition to whether they have a dongus or a vagoo.

You'll need to use the even the funko pops cheat and it'll show all the pal cards. All the old pocketmanz cards images are broken while I test this stuff.

If you do pop in to look at the cards, be sure to let me know which ones are your favorites so I know what to avoid cutting (If I need to cut any)

I feel like I've managed to break it down enough that I can run a poll:

Question 1: How to organize and display the male/female versions of cards:

Group everything together

+ Omnivores can collect everything

+ No need to add extra buttons

+ All cards display together

+ Combining cards will be easier to code in

- Memory issues due to the amount of cards onscreen

- Similar art between male/female cards will stick out

Separate male and female cards by set

+ Omnivores can collect everything

+ Cleanly separates by carnivore and vegetarian modes

+ No worries about similar male/female art

- More buttons to deal with

- Will need to use brain and think about cross-set card combining

Make female cards replace male cards when in vegetarian mode

+ Way less cards to clean up

+ No need to add extra buttons

+ All cards display together

- Every male card will need a direct female counterpart

- Omnivores won't be able to collect male and female cards

And question 2: Lots of cards, or fewer cards:

Multiple sets of cards per pocketman, combinable collectables

+ Lots of cards

+ I can give player packs of cards instead of singles

+ I can do multiple bodytypes/poses

- Hard to make cards feel distinct and special

- Needs many cards to account for male/female/futa variants

- Less polish per card

- Need to separate cards into pages to prevent memory issues

- Balance between male/female cards might be skewed

One set of cards per pocketman

+ Less cards to clean up

+ Cards feel more memorable / distinct

+ I can be sure there are the same number of male / female cards

- Harder to pick which bodytype I want to go with

- Harder to fill packs

- Lots of art I like will be dropped

Of course direct feedback would be very helpful too. Should I do something specific with rarity? With bodytypes? I haven't coded it in yet, but there are male/female/feral/dickgirl tags in the code for future content filtering.

Keep in mind all the cards have already been generated. I feel I'll probably go crazy trying to cut down and pick just one set per mon, though I could make a dedicated shortstack set later? I don't know, this is all too much brain power for a minor thing meant to make exploration more fun. Please do the brainwork for me...

I can't actually separate into multiple polls so I'll just add all the options at once and let people vote for multiple things.

[Preview] [Syrup Town] - v5 Progress So Far!

Salutations all! Real quick status update to keep you all in the loop. I'm currently working on Syrup Town v5, focusing in on one thing at a time (mostly) has been great for my productivity, and I've been able to focus better overall.

So! What's done so far?

Mary-Lou

Mary-Lou is nearly done. All her images are generated and polished, all the framework and such are already in place, all that's left for me to do for her is the writing.

Structurally she'll go really fast, you'll already be invited to her home and be able to do repeatables by the time you're done with v5, since in order for her to believably pregnant her 4rd encounter is a week long impregnation marathon, which will actually be 4 scenes in one and uses 22 images. Plenty of writing to do!

Helena

I made some progress on Helena already, but there won't be a ton of new stuff for her. Actually, I'm weighing options right now. I could let you resume your tour from before her breaking point, maybe add some new scenes in that in addition to the anal and repeatable scene I already have planned, but maybe instead I should make a new set of tour scenes which accurately reflect her post-friendship character? But what would those scenes be about?

Expressions

The new expression sets for Cayenne and Mary-Lou are fully done. Mary-Lou being pregnant most of the time made things harder, I had to do a full extra set of arousal sprites and her clothes for her non-pregnant expressions. These new style of expression sets are still hard to do, there's no easy way to get all the cropping and cleaning done.

I'm thinking that I'll need to do a poll for the non-furry version. I could release it with v5.5 as planned, but I might need to remove the ability to change clothes and just have them be simpler single expression sets. I'll need to do some testing to know for sure.

The main issue is probably gonna be the hair, the simpler designs of the furry cast means that RemBG gets a lot more of the background removed properly. I'll keep you all updated and get those tests done soon to get an idea of how long that simpler approach will take.

Pocketmanz

The pocketmanz rework is going smoothly. My plan is to separate the cards into some categories, and the weirdest ones will be put in a secondary set unlocked through a "monster-fucker liscence" obtained at the museum. This way pocketmanz like magnemite and weedle won't traumatize my vanilla audience, and all the... Let's say connoisseurs will have a lot to dig into.

Misc.

I take breaks on the weekend and just work on whatever. Usually this is just more Syrup Town but this last weekend I wrote a bunch of documents and generated a bunch of images inspired by Vanillaware titles.

The documents are mostly just math and potential mechanics though. This weekend I plan on exploring stuff and seeing how crazy trying to get a super simplified RTS working in javascript will drive me. GrimGrimoire meets Unicorn Overlord, but with porn. And shortstacks.

It'll be fun designing a game with actual gameplay, though without being on a team I don't think I'll be able to flesh it out into a full game. Maybe I should work up some kind of game adoption program where I generate art, build the engine, and give a design document and give the starting push to other game developers? I think that'd be neat. I get messaged by quite a few creatives interested in starting their own games but don't know where to start.

[Release] [Syrup Town] - Syrup Town v4

Play Syrup Town online here: https://noodlejacuzzi.neocities.org/syrup-town/

Play the mobile version online here: https://noodlejacuzzi.neocities.org/syrup-town/mobile

Syrup Town v4 Version Download (webp version): https://mega.nz/file/XrwWUTTD#l5DFxHuTQ5xENUDpN0BlZgAihwPLdy6K9xA0i6xY_OQ

Upgrade Pack from v3 to v4 (webp version): https://mega.nz/file/uv5xhBTK#QxIjU10dpXbxmqDvXgU98Ll79-EXJISpTLxPn2PVN7w

.apk Version for Android Devices: https://mega.nz/file/iuAQTRyQ#8glPPTHn08cnMBogk3lLY0rjCDm08xpgYtb29yEusGg

Syrup Town v4 Version Download (png version): https://mega.nz/file/GqoQ2SqR#K8V1LB4Evuf4i8u3xIU8nX3JqymOxnvtp4jsYYYWSBw

Upgrade Pack from v3 to v4 (png version): https://mega.nz/file/23Zj0SZT#FkP3kQfnUHd7dyTnBetsGAa7r582KoFrVAnaJP5Z6Vw

As always, I recommend the .webp version of the others, there's no noticable quality drop I can see and it's like 1/3rd the size.

Content:

• New Character: Helena the Hyena
• 6 New scenes for Angelica (with sex variants)
• Wallbutt scene for Madame Sharly

Other changes:

• Overhauled how Angelica's chat system works.
• Overhauled the images for random encounters.
• Overhauled the images for the tarot cards.
• Added alternate tarot card art for if the player has vegetarian mode active.
• Re-did Angelica and Helena's model from scratch to use a new paperdoll system similar to the player's.
• Added more expressions for the player.
• Replaced a number of trophy images that just used the character's standing or nude sprites.
• Added a trophy explaining how to unlock wallbutts.
• Changed the formatting of save titles, new saves now display things like scenecount. (All are still backwards compatible)
• Added a new Tan skintone that looks closer to the old dark skintone.
• Added items to Bluebell's store that let you change your skintone and bodytype.
• Replaced Mary-Lou's magazine to reflect her upcoming design.

Bugfixes:

• Fixed an issue where the png and webp versions weren't loading the other formats as backups.
• Fixed an issue where a number of trophies were missing images.
• Fixed a number of clothes that didn't fit on the female model.
• Fixed a large number of mobile styling issues.

• Fixed a number of bad images and typos.

  

  Noodle

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  I was so close to releasing this in May! The update's probably still buggy, but I hope doing some polishing of the mobile version was worth it for a less buggy release.

I mentioned it last time but the expression sets are waaaaay more time consuming than I expected. It could mean that the non-furry version will have to wait a bit longer, or I could not include outfits for its first release. Only Angelica and Helena have new models at the moment, but for v5 I plan on updating Bluebell, Cayenne, Sharly, and Mary-Lou for sure.

I also wanted to add proper tarot readings using all of Sharly's new cards, but that'll have to wait for a future update. Angelica and Helena were both pretty mechanically complex characters.

Angelica's content continues exactly where she left off. Each day her lust will passively increase, and talking to her while it's maxed will lead to a scene. Otherwise, she'll give one of her non-horny chats.

Helena takes you on a tour of the town. You get scenes over time when getting the tour / gathering things with her, but to actually progress you need to tour the forest orchard and get that special scene.

Future Content

Noodle

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Progress progress progress!
Actually, there's enough planned for v5 that maybe I should split it into two smaller updates for more frequent releasing?
Though, new characters are usually a lot more work than adding to an existing character...

In any case there's also the part 2 for even further beyond content:
However there's a few things extra I haven't put on that list yet:

• Making different skintone variants for all the images with disembodied hands/crotch pov
• Adding text to all the game's repeatable scenes
• Rewriting the logbook to be less vague and more accurately reflect the progression of each character
• More jiggies

With those in mind, what kind of stuff should I prioritize? Anything you think I missed? All feedback is welcome, I hope you'll enjoy v4!

[Syrup Town] [Preview] Juuuuust about!

Hey y'all! I was really hoping I'd get a release out every single month, and I got really close!

• Angelica and Helena's new expression sets are done!
• Six new scenes for Angelica, six scenes for Helena handling her intro in one fell swoop
• I added new expressions for the player (31 expressions now, up from 12) for each skintone
• I fixed a bunch of defective images, typos, as like I mentioned in the last post improved the intro, tarot cards, and added the new browner skintone.

The expression sets are waaaaay more time consuming than I had thought. I completely underestimated the amount of manual work I'd need to put into every expression, especially since the jump to illustrious means the errors are more noticeable. I also like adding visual effects like hearts to the aroused expressions, which while more work, I think help each scene's readability.

For Angelica I had to re-do her entire dialogue system while also making sure it wouldn't break for players already partway through her content. There's sex variants as always, though one of the six scenes is completely different if Angelica's got a dick vs a pussy. Her new stuff will continue exactly where she left off.

Helena's got a mechanic where she tours you through town, and while some are short I did have to write in some fluff for every location in the game. Plus, her scenes use more of those player shots I showed off before, which take a fair bit more work than the average image. Future updates will have her invite you into her home! I made sure to have lots of subby carnivore stuff with Angelica especially since not everyone will like playersub content.

Beyond that I re-did Mary-Lou's magazine and logbook for when she's added in the update after the next one, added more Angelica chatting scenes so it wouldn't start repeating itself too early, added Helena's morning crossover events with almost the whole cast, and I re-did the way save data is written so it gives more useful information like how many scenes you've gotten and what mode you're playing for when I add the FeMC route. (It's still all backwards compatible, of course)

With that, I have just four things left on my checklist:

• Gotta update the subscribers list
• Sharly's wallbutt scene,
• I generated new images for the achievements so they aren't just the nude standing sprites, I need to crop out the backgrounds and implement those
• The mobile CSS is all totally out of whack, gotta fix that

That last one is the big one. I could probably take out the other three in a few hours and release, but I've built up a lot of technical debt and things are breaking. Even right now I open the logbook and see things are squashed.

The new content's already up on the public test release server, and a few volunteers are helping by pointing out any bugs I missed. Big thankies to them, and to you all for sticking around! If you have any last minute thoughts or avatar requests, feel free to send them my way here or via discord.

But one more thing!

While the game has character customization, most of the time when the player character is meant to be in the scene, they're just a disembodied hand, penis, or its a crotch pov shot. But one of Helena's scenes focuses directly on the player's backside, so I made variants based on skintone, otherwise it'd feel weird and jarring:

I've always planned on going back through all the images and making variants for different skintones, it just hasn't been a priority yet. Is this something I should focus on for v5? It wasn't on my roadmap but if it's something you'd like to see, I'll see if I can get it done alongside all the other stuff.

[Preview] [Syrup Town] - Progress Progress Progress!

Howdy folks! Quick post today going over the things I've finished in the last week.

I've updated all tarot cards:

All 21 tarot cards, and I added veggie versions of the tarot cards which means no more missing cards for vegetarian players. I redid a number of other shots as well of the random encounters and intro too, though the Pocketmanz cards will have to wait until v5 for their overhaul.

Aside from other things like bugfixes, fixing wonky images, adding some new color palletes, I'll also be adding a new third skintone closer in tone to the original dark skin:

I had a grand ol' time playing around with some shots I'll probably use for the eventual female protag route:

Some shots of Helena:

And a pretty tough sequence I built in pieces on a white background (I'll add a proper background later):

And finally, I think I'm happy with this final look for the new non-furry cast:

I like how they strike a balance between being taller to appeal to the more vanilla crowd, while also fitting in with the Syrup Town artstyle!

noodle

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How do they look? Still too chibi, or just right?
I needed to re-do the expression sets anyways using the new model, and to include a few more expressions per character. Lemme know what you think!