I’ve begun work on my new game, A Dog’s Life. I this game, you play as either a stray dog or a pet. I have plans for multiple families that could adopt you, well as a firehouse needing a dog for search & rescue, a police department that want’s to use a shelter puppy as their newest recruit, & possibly even the national guard for even bigger search & rescue opportunities. Currently, only being a stray is available. When I get far enough with stray to have a decent game, I will start on the pet chapters. I apologize for not having more ready, but I want to start getting testers/help as soon as possible.
Currently it’s in its very beginning stage where I am just getting a basic storyline down, and I plan on updating every 2 weeks or so, according to my schedule since I am in college & have a toddler to watch.
I know its very early in its development, but I want to make this game a reality & am going to work my hardest on it, no matter how long it takes. With some help (suggestions, proofreaders, & anything else), I know I can make this game.
Just an update, I fixed the problem Phoenix_Wolf & I added something new to make the beginning longer. Will be updating a few times tonight to connect everything that’s new, hope you all enjoy!
I recommend you to make a ‘realistic’ game, please dont create happy perfect fantasy world to please a few millenials who dont know how hard is real life, and remember that you should not write your story, you must write the history of the player and the end must be according to the decisions made by the player, the life of a dog is not always pretty.
Oh I know it’s not. Dogs will die, you will almost get hit by a car or run into dog abusers or all manner of things. As a pet, there will be many times where it shows that even pets have their dark spots. I hate those perfect games where everyone ends up happy all the time & I refuse to make that. Yes, there are happy endings planned, but its going to take some very carefully thought out choices to get to them, & there’s a tradeoff for every breed, every stat, every family or dog. I’m not gonna make this game depressing, but its certainly going to anywhere from perfect fantasy lol
Updated again! Will be doing frequent updates this week, but starting the 16th of Oct, I will go to updates every other week due to my class times & workload.
The beginning (at least for purebreds & mutts) has been updated severely so that you see what happens before you go to the shelter. Obviously there is still work to do, but I’m hoping this adds an element of interest & a few early-choice stat raises
While this has lots of potential, I can’t really give credit for “potential”. Otherwise, every game mentioned here would be good.
I’ll be honest; this game needs a lot of polish. First off, could we possibly spend more time in the shelter? We basically have little to no knowledge of what life is like there, yet you want us to make this big decision of whether or not we stay or leave?
Also, could we possibly have the ability to start conversations with some of the dogs we see in the shelter? We know absolutely nothing about them so far, so it’d be nice to get to know them.
Really enjoyed this! I’m looking forward to seeing how the story develops.
As you’ve asked for comments, here are a few thoughts that occurred to me while I was playing through it:
Dogs perceive their surrounding more by scent than by sight. It might therefore be interesting to describe the main character’s surroundings more in terms of what they smell like than what they look like.
This could be a good way to offer the reader clues. For example, when you meet a new person you might notice that they’re wearing the same brand of aftershave that you smelled at the crime scene earlier. You might also notice that they’ve been sweating from a burst of exercise, that they’ve been petting a cat and that they’ve got cancer.
Similarly, that alleyway might just smell like garbage to a human. But a dog might be able to pick out the smell of rat urine, rotting meat and cigarette ash.
Having two separate life paths (pet and stray) might mean a lot of extra work, unless they’re going to cross over at some point?
Thanks everyone for the suggestions, & I am actually updating Shelter right now. You will actually start the game BEFORE going to the shelter, so there will be a few opportunities to earn some stat points before you ever make a decision. The Stray Dogs & Pets will interact with each other at crucial points, & even though you can’t change your mind about where you live, you can still act the way you want within the limits of having humans or not. @Protagonist I will take this into note, & since there is a Smell skill, I will keep that in mind about how they react to the shelter & other places. I actually planned the game to be large, & even though there’s technically two separate pathways, the Pet path has 4 families to choose from & three other groups that want a dog. So it’s going to be massive. I’m super up to the task though to try this. & once I have done more, I will focus more on spelling errors (excluding massive ones that don’t even read right), so thanks for pointing that out. I always misspell that lol @AAO I had someone close to me test this long before I posted the game & that was their first comment. I worked all night on making the beginning longer & today I am working on the Shelter itself. You will get to the shelter the same way, more or less, but all canines will react the same to you regardless of breed/species. I will try to make it better in the Shelter, so please feel free to give me some more ideas as I’m a little at a loss on what a dog would do from their perspective, not from a humans. @tooweiss I was unaware there was a book with this title, do you have any suggestions? Cuz unfortunately I cannot use Choice of Dog lol. Also, there will be some super sad parts, but I won’t spoil those yet!
