I found an odd loop in the opening sequence on the “farm stolen” path.
Summary
I chose closest bandit, farthest bandit, closest wolf, farthest wolf. I went for bodyshots instead of the exploding barrel, thinking of a straightforward style of combat.
While I was attacking the wolves, the narration sometimes described bandits charging at me, even though they were both down.
Screaming as you hear the shaft of your arrow break off, , his wolf stops automatically trying to check on his owner.
Here’s one. This sentence was also a little confusing - who is screaming? - and has some odd commas.
When I picked the fourth option, “farthest wolf”, I was here:
Thanks. I’ll look into this loop. At least the barrel can help break it for the moment!
Edit: I’ve got a plan to break the loop but it’s taking a bit longer as I changed my mind halfway through and believe I’ve found a way to make the code more clearer and less likely to get itself confused (albeit at the price of splitting the code up a bit more).
While I still work on the loop I thought I’d share the revised “Ways or the Bandit”
Originally they were true or false booleans but I switched to a 5-star system which was meant to show how much you followed that way.
But thanks to my poor choice of words a lot of people read them as actual skill stats which they weren’t meant to be, at least not in a traditional sense.
In the revised version which I’ll push once I’ve finished rewriting the loop bug. The Ways are back to being booleans and are more about beliefs.
Summary
The Ways explained:
Way of the Bear - you believe in brute force, presence, and intimidation to achieve your goals.
Way of the Wolf - you believe in nimbleness, and moving unseen and unheard.
Way of the Owl -you believe in knowledge, and sight being the most important of your senses.
Way of the Fox - you believe charm and a quick wit will get you through most troublesome encounters.
Way of the Spider - you believe in patience and waiting for the right moment to act.
Way of the Boar - you believe in enduring whatever life throws at you.
The idea is you pick one originally and you can follow another two during the story. (Thinking chapters 1,3 and 5)
Those “Ways” are a really intriguing idea - having skill checks be simply “do you have this skill or not?” rather than “is this skill high enough?” seems like a great way to encourage roleplaying over tactical choices. However, I’m not sure how well they fit into a Robin Hood story; they seem more like something inspired by Eastern martial arts traditions than mediaeval folklore. Maybe if they were renamed as “outlaw archetypes” or something like that - “brawler”, “hunter”, “trickster” etc?
I may have to change it from Ways if more people see them like that. It’s more like traits that come to mind when thinking of the relevant animal. I.e think of a bear and you think of power and an intimidating presence. Think of an owl and you think knowledge etc
Ah, got it! Using animal traits as symbolic representations makes sense, bears for strength, owls for wisdom, etc. It’s a cool way to tie character traits to familiar imagery. Just make sure it’s clear in the story so readers don’t misinterpret it as literal animal connections. Sounds like a neat concept!
Just finished playing through it and I’m excited to see more in the future! I love the idea of a Robinhood IF. I’m enjoying Salah the most so far, even if the interaction with him is pretty brief ^^
I think my only suggestion would be to fluff it up a little. Obviously the choice is ultimately up to you, but I feel like the pacing of the story is a little too fast with very little time inbetween events to really digest what’s happening. I also think it might be interesting to- instead of starting with the background lore- starting in the cell and sort of discovering overtime why Robin ended up in there to begin with. I also think taking a little more time to get to interact with people + process the jail scenario would be nice since the escape seems to happen fairly quick.
I suppose overall I think it may be best to piece this chapter up and extend the content of each big plot point so it doesn’t feel like I’m hopping from one thing to another per page if that makes sense. I’m not sure if you feel the same way, but I hope my words are at least helpful in some way! I am enjoying your writing so far though, and I look forward to seeing what else lies in store for Robin ^u^
I’ve updated Chapter One with the revised Ways of the Bandit.
The Ways explained:
The ways are a series of beliefs that bandits tend to follow, and each one is named after an animal that is said to embody the traits linked to it.
The Bear - You believe in brute force, presence, and intimidation to achieve your goals. The Wolf - You believe in nimbleness and moving unseen and unheard. The Owl - You believe in knowledge and sight being the most important of your senses. The Fox - You believe charm and a quick wit will get you through most troublesome encounters. The Spider - You believe in patience and waiting for the right moment to act. The Boar - You believe in enduring whatever life throws at you.
I also think I’ve fixed the bug where people had dead guards when they hadn’t killed anyone and figured out the loop issue.
I have also laid the groundwork to add two new actions for the prison section where you can hang out with Nell or Salah if you choose to meet them (although it is just the actual choices, the scenes will be added over the weekend).
There are also a few other under-the-hood changes.
Thanks for all the feedback so far; it is always appreciated!
I was trying the demo but after the first few choices it bugged out and said “Chapter 1 Line 58 non-existent variable” and won’t let me continue. It seems like that for every choice there
I tried it again but it still doesn’t work. I also realized it’s not just like 58 but other lines for the same choices.
It’s the first choice you can make after choosing what happened to your family and it’s presented with choices such as “I’m excited he chose me to help” and “I want to hear about his heroic deeds”
However I decided to try and opening it on a different device and now it works fine. I don’t know why it works on one but not the other but it just does.
