[RELEASING 3rd O(R)CTOBER 2024- WISHLIST NOW!] An Unexpectedly Green Journey (orc life-simulator) [1.5+ Million Words]

[anon12679161]

@NumberedEntity

@Lance_Heyden If you like, I will put in the final credits as a betatester since you’ve done such a great job. Up to you!

Completely up to you. Not doing it for any sort of recognition, I’m playing and enjoying, the game reminds me a lot of Life of a Wizard, one of my favourite ever Hosted Games, and I love that there are more people doing “life simulation” games. It really doesn’t take too much more effort to take some screenshots while I’m playing to help out.

Also, please note I don’t expect you to fix the things I find immediately (though it is impressive how quick you are able to fix them). Feel free to just bookmark the post and come back to it when you do a housekeeping update if that suits your workflow better. I don’t want bug squashing to get in the way of writing too much.

@NumberedEntity

There is another factor. The most legendary tasks need a high Belly Rank score, representing the training your guts have had.

Yeah, this was my problem when I first tried it. I tried doing the festivals too early and got really bad scores and THEN went around increasing my appetite. Should have done it the other way around.

[NumberedEntity]

Haha, I know I don’t have to fix those things right away, but it gives me brain worms knowing they’re there.

I think, at least for me, the appeal of a life simulator using choice script is that it is less railroaded than playing a character in a predetermined story arc. The problem is that a life simulator may be seen as directionless by some and therefore has a risk of boring the player. For this game, there are/will be over-arcing story elements, although they may not become apparent in every playthrough. If your orc takes on greater responsibilities, they will be more railroaded into certain events- such is life.

One of the hardest tasks will be in continuing to have your orc be a roamer, rejecting the more legendary paths of shaman, warlord, unifier and big belly, as he ages. I would like a player to play a whole orc’s life just wandering around if they chose to. The rigours of the world may mean this would be a shorter life.

In my mind, I have sort of mapped out what I will be doing to bring this game to eventual completion.

1- Complete 'legendary paths. First, the war chief/king/ unifier path. Next, the shaman paths. Next, the other city paths.

2- Add dark path events and endings. Including an option to remove the curse.

3- Add the ‘world arc’ events, when you finally confront the evil lurking in the shadows, for those who want an epically heroic orc.

4- Expand world events to cater to non-legendary orcs wandering the world, so they can get a lifetime’s worth of action. (This may take a while).

5- Add significant events chains, like the bounty hunter path. Add more events catering to infamy. Add flavour to the big belly path- I think getting ingredients to make your own legendary dish would be fun. Add ageing events and sort out how your orc will grow old and eventually pass away. I do not intend to make age feel burdensome, there will be no rush to ‘do things’ before time takes you.

6- Do all the other stuff.

There will be a crossover of these. There may be additions or some might not be doable. I have lots of it mapped out and the good feedback, so far, has helped spur me on.

Cheers!

[Dragomer]

Very interesting. A few bugs like the ‘meet the dark elf’ event repeating and the year system being a bit confusing but it has potential.

[NumberedEntity]

Hi Dragomer,

Dark Elf bug squished!

At present, when a baby, every event you take part in adds 6 months to your life. When a child and onwards, each event adds 1 year (except for a few).

I feel this is fine. Problems arise when you start travelling the world. Some age counts need to be tinkered with here. I do not want to add a year for empty events (areas you are just passing through or where you have completed the event already), with the exception of those at the extreme end of the map (to represent great distances travelled.) Time is not added to the player’s life for merely chatting to clan visitors, shopping, seeing the shaman for healing and for most minor events within a larger event. If you choose to go to the tourney and then choose to play the Test of Agiltiites in that tourney, you won’t become 2 years older.

Some of the smaller events may not warrant adding a year and this is something I will run through again at a later time. Some events add more than a year, like going on a campaign with the Green Legion or being locked up in prison.

Although gamified, I would ask the players to imagine a year’s passing to be filled with the trivia of orc life. The choice the player takes is merely the most important event of that year. Our human memory tends to haze over time, most of the trivia blurs into the background while we remember specific high-points and low-points. These, then, may become instrumental in shaping who we are, even if as a reaction against them. At the very least, that’s how I see it.

Cheers for giving my game a look. Hope you visit again to see how it’s coming along.

[anon12679161]

Another round of typos and bugs (the little bastards are getting harder to find).

Warrior Git Run

*noisily (although I’m sure eating something too nosily would also be an issue)

*of

*picture not loading
*spraying?

*and
*that or which

*quiet

*is

*You know I’m struggling to find typos when I start pointing out missing spaces

*Either are settling or just settle

This may just be me misremembering things, but I didn’t get a personal boar in this run. All the events I did during my childhood were in the barracks, so I didn’t do the longdrop event where I train a boar. I did do the plains event where you round up a herd of boar, but I don’t remember that giving me a personal mount. Also, it would be nice if you got to name your mount. Can’t remember if you do or not in the training event, but every time I’ve seen a reference to him it’s been named Porclin.

Dragon Fight
This is just for reference on whether this needs to be balanced or not.

These were my stats at the start of the dragon fight. I feel like they are quite decent for a rageful, heavy armor, warrior type. Going through I seem to fail MOST of the fight option.

Both failures

Both failures

One success (crack the dragon) one failure

One success (race towards the dragon) one failure

One success (dodge and slash) one failure

One success (hack the tail) one failure

So out of 12 combat options only 4 gave me the chance for success. Given this is meant to be a difficult fight maybe this is where you want the balance of difficulty. But it felt like a MUCH easier fight when I was doing a Krog chosen run, even though the fight itself doesn’t have any Krog specific choices. Without knowing exactly what stats each option is testing I don’t know if maybe this character was just particularly ill suited to the dragon fight (though you would think a battle focused orc would be best suited).

*orcish

*Missing full stop

I’m not sure if this really makes sense if you choose not to take the title Kings of the Orcs.

*harness

*make

*shot
*Missing full stop

*wielding
*streets?

*redirected

*This took place after I had already exterminated the elves

Also got this message after I had already slaughtered the elves
*Extra capitalisation

*Capitalisation

Extra code tags

[NumberedEntity]

Another great run through there. Have fixed these issues.

I think the recent addition of the diplomacy info really helps to build the idea of your orc being a terror!

The dragon fight should be very hard. I intentionally added warnings in the text and the ability to flee, just in case it was too much! You did a good job of beating it. It could need tweaking a bit so I’ll add it to the list. Your stats were very high. Looking through the code, with strength and presence over 70, you have a good chance of beating it if you pick attacks favouring more brutal actions. There was one strength check (to charge right at it) which needed 80+ strength. I have brought this down to 75.

In trying to cover how a variety of orc builds might cope, my thinking was that, no matter how strong you are, a dragon will always be stronger. The strongest orc will have trouble against a full-grown dragon in a trial of might. For this fight, the hardest in the game so far, I gave the lightly-armoured warrior orc build a few more advantages

A dash of speed, cunning or magic might play more into the vulnerabilities of such a big, strong beast. I may well add other events to explore to help beef up your orc even more. Perhaps I should sprinkle in a few events that help prepare strength-based warriors or even add an item to Fingol’s Orcporium?

Many thanks, Lance. This really helps me in creating a good game. The fact that you can play through it several times and not get overly frustrated or bored, despite the typos and occasional bugs, makes me feel I’m on the right path.

Will be adding these fixes in the next large update, out in approximately 2, weeks if all goes well.

EDIT: Also have found the problem with some images not showing. CSIDE is not case-sensitive when reading and displaying image names. *image Picture.png will show the file picture.png

DashingDon is case-sensitive and will not show that file. I’ll be renaming the image files for the next update too.

[anon12679161]

@NumberedEntity

I think the recent addition of the diplomacy info really helps to build the idea of your orc being a terror!

Agreed!

@NumberedEntity

In trying to cover how a variety of orc builds might cope, my thinking was that, no matter how strong you are, a dragon will always be stronger. The strongest orc will have trouble against a full-grown dragon in a trial of might. For this fight, the hardest in the game so far, I gave the lightly-armoured warrior orc build a few more advantages

A dash of speed, cunning or magic might play more into the vulnerabilities of such a big, strong beast. I may well add other events to explore to help beef up your orc even more. Perhaps I should sprinkle in a few events that help prepare strength-based warriors or even add an item to Fingol’s Orcporium?

Ah, you know what, this makes sense. Also makes sense why my Krog blessed run seemed easier. I had much higher cunning (and all round decently high stats). I also understand how hard it is to balance something like this, given that you could come directly to this fight basically as soon as you are an adult orc.

[HaydenJK]

Wait you can fight a dragon? Any instructions please.

[anon12679161]

@HaydenJK

Wait you can fight a dragon? Any instructions please.

Not sure how many spoilers you want. Spoiler free - seek out Mt Skyspear in the West and search for a cave.

For more details

Head west and climb Mt Skyspear

As you climb you will come across a “crazy” old woman. You will need her to tell you about the existence of the cave.

Once you get to the top of Mt Skyspear you will have an option to find the cave the lady told you about

Hug the left wall to find the dragon

@HaydenJK

So I got cursed. Anyway to avoid it?

Not sure about avoiding it (there are several places you can potentially get cursed if I am correct so it would depend on where you are) but there is an item you can buy from the imps at the Orcporium at the Dust Clan camp that can cure curse.

Further, I believe if your piety is high then Krog will warn you when you are about to touch or wear a cursed item.

Or, just embrace it and try a corruption run

[HaydenJK]

So I got cursed. Anyway to avoid it?

[NumberedEntity]

Hi Hayden,

You can buy an artefact from Fingol’s Orcporium which has the potential to cure a curse. Pifagorcas’s temple can also cure you if you are not too far gone.

Later, I will put in an event chain where you will be able to go on a quest to remove the taint too.

As Lance said, you can embrace the darkness and relish the demonic transformations and necromantic abilities of a ‘possessed’ play through. You can become very powerful like this, particularly if you take the king’s path. Be warned though, in the full game, at a certain point of no return, you may be compelled to follow the demands of the darkness rather than control it.

[anon12679161]

I love that the game remembers this.

Only a couple of typos this time.

Friendly Git Run

*doesn’t

*a ladder

*missing words “he is”
*missing word “are”

*the? (I’ve tried avoiding correcting things orcs say because quite often it’s an intentional choice to get across how they sound, but I think this is just a wrong word inserted here)

Just a suggestion but I’ve never had this option fail, even if I’m doing a very much not focused on fighting run, so as long as you are trying to be a “good” orc this just seems like the objectively correct choice.

Maybe, if you are an orc that isn’t focused on fighting choosing this option still succeeds, but potentially gives a hit to constitution based on injuries obtained during the fighting?

*Extra punctuation

*Extra punctuation

*Fighter’s

*squireless

*Porclin

*Unnecessary punctuation

*After?

[NumberedEntity]

While it is true that a part of me dies every time I am forced to confront a mistake, I am tough as an orc and will repel those barbs like Legion armour to elf arrows!

Your investment of time in my game has truly helped. It is great to smooth over typos, but squishing the bugs is such a weight off my mind. I dread to think how I would have found everything by myself.

The game is very complex now with hundreds and hundreds of variables, though I do my best to partition them into sets so I can keep track of what is needed for different sections. I even mapped things out in Twine, but the structure has become a spiderweb. Thankfully, for me, the later sections smooth over some of the many earlier variables as I have combined many into new variables to reflect their general intent more simply.

I’ve added ‘memories’ to my list. I will add more once the game is complete. With the barbarian visit, by listening to his information on the appropriate race, you can easily dispatch your opponent during the Coming of Rage fight. Even without a tangible effect, just a callback to a player’s previous action could be very satisfying.

Since this is my first choicescript game, I am putting in things that appeal to my preferences, as I do not know the expectations of the community (there seems to be a hard preference for deep romance options, which this game is not about at all). It is good to get confirmation that other players enjoy the little touches too.

I raise a tankard of grog to you!
Cheers!

EDIT: These fixes will appear in the next update.

[CaesarCzech]

@NumberedEntity

there seems to be a hard preference for deep romance options, which this game is not about at all

Eh community likes Deep Story, romance is just something that is easiest to make Deep. look at @malinryden work or At the Infinity series by @Cataphrak to see alternative. I think adding some sort of “How History sees you” into epilogue might help in this regards. Anyway you dont need romance just dont hesitate to add philosophy or actual moral dilemmas basically community likes Deep it has some preferences in terms of flavor of Deepth but the Deepth no matter the flavor is most important.

Also looking at code this is either wrongly set or the weirdest name for value i ever seen

*label kingwork
The fact that you have even survived to this age is something, for an orc. Most die before they reach their 30th year. One day age will begin to whittle away your strength and constitution; the unconquerable curse of time. Hopefully, this time is far off, yet the clock of destiny ticks and tolls relentlessly while you secure your rule over the following years. Adorning yourself with kingly regalia, you must prepare to rule.
*set set 5

Btw just realized your inspiration with Baborcs :).

Also kind of want to know just what is gonna happen with tree and Sapling.

IMPORTANT ONE. Those are options i get after i got Chief Achivements despite the fact that i already dealth with hills before. Something is looping around.

A pack of wild orcs have set up a slave compound in the Dust Clan. You can buy more warriors for the horde here or sell your slaves.

A new settlement has sprung up around holy Krog’s Rock, in the central plains. Undefended, these fools are ripe for subjugation.

The western hills teem with human barbarians. They must be dealt with!

BTW you over me a new keyboard due prodigious ammount of drink it due to the description of foreign legion

[NumberedEntity]

Hi Caesar,

Thanks for playing through the game and pointing out stuff. I appreciate the help in putting this little green world together.

Haha, I do have a variable called ‘set’- it adjusts the equipment. I was going to change it, then forgot about it, and now it is what it is.

With the hills issues, I have checked through. If your orc has fought in the hill battle but lost and survived or has just fled, this option will still come up but you will get a second, different battle to take part in. If you have never taken part in the battle, you will get a similar event to the original battle. I have inserted a variable to the victory conditions to ensure it fires correctly, but will need to test it. It should be fine now. (fingers crossed). Will include it with the next update.

Haha! I think the foreign legion would appreciate a drink-soaked keyboard, particularly if the drink in question rots your belly and makes your eyes water!

I love the idea of an obituary-style epilogue. I’ll add that to the to-do list. It stops death from feeling so abrupt and will definitely make a player feel more invested in their green alter-ego. Such a great way to round off an orc’s life!

Cheers!

[CaesarCzech]

Just got another bit of feedback but could you add bit of flavor for situation where you have Dark Elves settled try to negotiate with Elves and negotiations collapse over them demanding you eliminate them and then you tributary them or conquer them ? because i was bit surprised that Elves of all people wouldnt mention the irony of Orcs being willing to try diplomacy but said diplomacy crashing because the Orcs are too honorable for what Elves demand.
(Just throught this could basically be solved with variable and few lines of flavor text)

Anyway i have to say that i cant wait till i can kick Cyclops butt. Will we have chance to recruit our own Fellowship ? would be interesting to try to recruit halfling elf etc. Perhaps final battle could have outcomes from everyone except you dies to everyone survives ?
(this one is IMHO a much bigger suggestion so i have no problem with this one not being accepted.)

You honestly put me into situation where i dont know what would be good suggestion and what would be too demanding because all i see is something that is pretty deep and AMAZINGLY wide.

Cant wait for more.

[NumberedEntity]

Hi Caesar,

I take the point of adding a bit of flavour text there and will add that to a future update to get an appropriate elven response.

I would say that the elves expect you to side with the Drak Elves since the arrogant bird bones view orcs as nasty beasts, just a simpler, more stupid version of the hated Dark Elves.

In my mind, I sum up orc diplomacy like this: 'It’s 'good to 'elp your mates. If they’re not your mates, bash ‘em (or run away if they’re too nasty).’ Though, of course, as the player you can be a merciless brute or a more enlightened fellow breaking the mould.

The cyclopes will get their comeuppance, or your orc will die trying. Or join them, maybe… My plan for the showdown is a vast battle, where you may, or may not, be joined by the other nations of the world.

It is a fantastic idea, to add a fellowship path, although that isn’t planned out. Part of me worries that it will be an epic amount of work to add to an epic amount of work and I don’t want to lose the thread of everything in the game already. Since this game is not divided into chapters, although I do have hub areas, I run the risk of becoming overwhelmed with variables.

It has made me think, though, that for an older, wandering orc (who isn’t a shaman, city builder, big belly or chief/king, adventuring with a group is a great way to provide adventure in the world, even if not for beating the cyclopes.

Great feedback! Thanks for supporting this game.

Cheers!

[Zarkrai]

@NumberedEntity Regarding gender, does that mean it’s determined by pronoun or are you male only?

[Zarkrai]

I saw that early in your childhood, you can interact with a wolf pup and name it but it runs away soon because one of the adult orcs showed up. Does it shows up later and are there any other pets in-game or even a pet system?

[anon12679161]

@Zarkrai

I saw that early in your childhood, you can interact with a wolf pup and name it but it runs away soon because one of the adult orcs showed up. Does it shows up later and are there any other pets in-game or even a pet system?

The wolf event definitely does have repercussions in the future.