Public Release: Beta 1.00

Emergency Public Release

We interrupt our weekly scheduled progress reports for an emergency public release. There were some potentially game-breaking issues in the previous version (such as your mana getting converted to gold at the end of a dungeon run) that were quite difficult to hotfix. So instead, here is a full fledged release.  This contains a number of bugfixes, changes and quality of life issues. The two bosses are still PATREON | SUBSCRIBESTAR only. For more details, refer to the changelog at the end of this post.

Progress Report

Tutorial Rework

The problem with the old tutorial popups was that nobody read them. I watched a streamer play the game, promptly close every tutorial, start the second dungeon with only Aura and Tomo, and die horribly. It is known that tutorials are hard, getting people to spend time reading and remembering when they just want to play the game. So let's fix that.

I played Palworld some time ago, and one of the things I really liked was the tutorial. They are small quests that guide you through the early game. Unlike tutorial popups, you want to read them since there's a reward. They are also available until you learned the specific lesson, so they will always be available at the correct time for the player.

As Palworld also shows, it's always a good idea to take mechanics that work from other games. So I'm using this system. It's a bit more handholdy, since Ero Dungeons can be quite complex, but it works fine. Now that the mechanics are mostly finalized, the tutorial should also stay up to date.

Quality of Life

Patrons get access to a special feedback forum on the Discord. Recently I posed a question there regarding quality of life improvements, and spent this week implementing most of them. They are listed in the changelog, but I'll show them here as well.

The largest thing that got reworked is the filtering of adventurers and items in the guild. I recently found out about the Window system introduced in Godot 4, which allows filters to be much more versatile since they can be shown in a popup window.

And here's a screenshot for the adventurer list:

Scripting Rework

You probably have no idea how poorly scripts (the stuff that decides how equipable items/quirks/crests work) were programmed. The internals were a horrible clump of spaghetti. They hadn't changed at all since the first Ero Dungeons version and couldn't really be expanded. Since the Patreon is quite successful, I'm probably going to be using the code for a long time, so it was time to rework it internally.

This is all to say that you can encounter some new and mysterious bugs with the equipment since I cleaned up the whole scriptable code. But, now I at least understand it, and can extend it.

This allowed me to implement a new AT clause, which allows to apply a specific script to an ally. For example, the script below will add extra bonus damage to the adventurer in front (and even more damage if that one's a prisoner).

There's also the NOT clause, which inverts a condition for a script.

Gear Preparation

I'll start working on the remaining 273 pieces of gear now. Let's see how many are finished by next week.

Public Changelog

Beta 1.00 

This is mostly Beta 1.01 (since that one was quite stable) but without the second boss.

Major:

• First custom boss dungeon.
• 10 new slime enemies.
  
• 50 new encounters for those 10 enemies.

Minor:

• Goals are now shown in combat.
• You can now teleport between cleared rooms by clicking on the minimap.
• Unique rarity for preset recruits.
• Boss dungeons are now shown in the top bar of the overworld.
• Clarified lust_conversion and lust_recoil.
• If normally a curio wouldn't give any loot due to kleptomaniacs or bad luck, it now gives 25 gold, to show you it isn't broken.
• Custom maps (such as the tutorial) now have correct minimaps.
  
• All dungeons layouts are now 3D under the hood, this currently is only used for custom dungeons.
• Loral, Coriander, Nalia, and Yikai preset.
• You now get a warning if you try to exit a rescue dungeon without rescuing the target, thanks Haraberu!
• Dungeons are counted as successful if the exit room was visited. You can then retreat from anywhere out of combat. Thanks Haraberu!
• Presets are now always marked as special.
• Salve now also cures bleed.
• More scripts for modders, thanks AFKgjiAE and PeteTimesSix and Luei!
• Lust gain no longer increases satisfaction slightly.
• Lust loss no longer increases satisfaction.
• Corruption advancements on kidnapped pops are now added to the log.

Bugfixes:

• Mana was granted as gold in the end of dungeons.
  
• Some dungeon layout were incompleteable.
• Ranks didn't get updated after grapples.
• Making cursed classes swappable through quests also made them recruitable.
• Quest dungeon markers didn't get disabled correctly.
• Bunch of censorship and typo fixes.
• Parasite quests were parsed incorrectly.
• Bunny cuffs showed above weaponry.
• Curse quests would destroy equipment.
• Morale effects weren't refreshed when morale changed.
• You can no longer select different starting adventurer rules at the same time in custom rules.
• Horse gear wasn't correctly cursed.
  
• Ratkin Stronghold curio choices could lock the dungeon.
• You can no longer skip past the river.
• The boss didn't count as cleared if you saved in the middle.
• Clearing the boss didn't count for the mission completion.
• The milk gain from the quest didn't parse correctly.
• Using presets too often in the custom rules would crash the game.
• Desire actionscript had confusing description.
• Red and Black skintight suit were displayed incorrectly on a pet.
• Incorrect newlining on the HP tooltip.
• Pressing clear destiny points would immediately clear the points instead of waiting for confirmation and wouldn't update the UI.
• Censorship settings wouldn't get saved in case of some specific save configurations,
• Mana didn't update when rerolling goals.
• Couldn't click dungeons in part of the top of the overworld map.
• Expressions weren't working for the Kneel puppet.
• Durability of the outfit can no longer be restored when pregnant.
• Fixed ripostes when cocooned.
• Made the game more robust against poorly formed mods.
• Girls could get lost during an upgrade to fewer jobs.
• If you saved during a quest dungeon, the quest wouldn't couldn't as completed.
• You could get stuck in a wall in the first boss dungeon in a map transition to the left.
• Mods are now correctly hidden on mobile.

Early Access Changelog:

Beta 1.02

Major:

• A new tutorial system.
• Underlying scripting changes.
• Updated swamp music and new guild and overworld music.

QoL:

• Filtering of gear in the guild has been spruced up and reworked.
• Filtering of girls in the guild has been spruced up and reworked.
• Girls only start barking when you haven't done any inputs in a while.
• Corruption advancements on kidnapped pops are now added to the log.
• Tokens are now shown in the top panel of the Adventurer Overview.
• The game now shows when and by which mod gear has been added.
• When assigning girls, the game now remembers where in the list you were.
• The quest button in the guild is now color-coded and always available.
• You can now favorite adventurers, marking them and making them always show on top of the guild list.
• Team party icons have been improved.
• The unequip all button has been improved.
• Quest rewards are always identified.
• You can move provisions in stacks by pressing shift.
• If items are hidden by equipment filters, you get a warning.
• You can change the positions of accessories in the guild.
• Tooltips will show which parts of conditions are applicable to the current adventurer.

Minor:

• The internal data for Quirks, Wearables, and EquipGroups has changed, mods from previous versions will break.
• Some translations are now added to the game internally, so they always work on export (e.g. on Android).
• Russian translation, thanks Himir!
• Underlying equipment texture changes.
  
• Added a create_encounter console command.
• Latex gear has been rebalanced.
• More modding scripts.
• Desire textures are now moddable.
• Reworked the ratkin prison in forest rescue missions.
• Provisions have been rebalanced.
• Dungeons can now pick from multiple equip groups.
• Modding improvements (sets are recognized, new error system, headers are automatically fixed).

Bugfixes:

• Loot was being saved incorrectly, causing crashes if you save-loaded into a combat, but only sometimes.
• Safety measures against those very hard to detect save corruption crashes.
• Forevix quirk was partially broken.
• One doll was missing, and two were missing from the dollmaker curio.
• Orc magecarrier targetted enemies instead of allies.
• Effects changing all_stats would also increase saves twice.
• If you had more than the maximum amount of set items, you didn't get any set bonusses.
• Saving and reloading in combat would reapply dots.
• Random gained items can only be lootable/rewardable items.
• Some tooltips went off screen.
• Rolls visual in stagecoach was incorrect.
• Anti-cowtits censor didn't work.
• Heal command healed negatively to 0.
• Overencumbered label wasn't centered.
• Fixed the white square bug for the rubberpuppy tail.
• Fixed some minimap icons in Boss1 dungeon.
• Some room curio didn't show reinforcements correctly.
• Hovering over a curio quest would duplicate curio counts.
• Stronghold curio was hidden.
• You can no longer capture stuff that was guarding a capturable human.
• Custom background would persist after combat.
• Hatchlings weren't weak to fire. 
• Parasite censorship wouldn't replace parasites in encounter.
•  Fixed incorrect hatchling and parasite censorship. 
• Outfits didn't show the exhibitionist friendly text.
• Goals and crests changed in combat wouldn't update UI.
• Quitting out just before a curio combat would invalidate the encounter making you win by default.
• You can no longer access the equipment and classes of kidnapped or recruitable girls.
• If an adventurer got captured in the same dungeon she got rescued or recruited from, she wouldn't get her own rescue dungeon.
• Very very rarely curio girls would disappear upon save-loading.
• Incorrect slime fighter texture.
• Missing pasties and dildo pants texture for kneeling puppet.
• Cursed adventurers custom game rule didn't work.
• Provision points could be fractional.

If you want early access to these changes (and the second boss dungeon), support me here:

PATREON | SUBSCRIBESTAR