Well...at this point, that isn't saying much. Doubling nothing still leaves you with nothing after all. But during my recent road trip up north to pester and pounce various peoples, I pondered and pontificated as a man can only do when driving 12-18 hours a day and chain-smoking.
The result? Some sort of loosely assembled ideas for why this game is taking place! It's thin...horribly thin. And probably pretty damn lame, too, but it is at least some form of story.
The general idea is that the player is pulled from the clutches of Batche and Red (from the first game) by a mysterious benefactor, leaving you still partially changed...but at least away from those nuts. Or so you think. As it turns out, the woman responsible for getting you out was actually after another of the competitors. She runs this world's version of a brothel, you see, and as it happens, Red absconded with some of her hired help without asking first. This isn't a great surprise to anyone who knows Red, as he tends to do EVERYTHING without asking.
So, the player is given a choice: take her henchman's place and work for her, or scamper off and try to make your own way in the world. Either choice is just fine.
Choosing to stay with her will provide you with a base of operations, income, and direct assess to the main plot line if I ever get around to fleshing it out. Basically, she'll name her own terms for you: she gives you jobs to do, and depending on your performance (and the shape you are in when you get back), she'll either give you a promotion or a demotion. Get demoted too far, and you'll find yourself providing entertainment for her paying clients... But being promoted is a good thing, and will probably still end up with you being changed somehow. Folks around here tend to prefer others to be in a pleasing form, after all.
The goal of the little jaunts she sends you on are to collect things she plans to use to secure her power-base, taking over Batche and Red's territories and basically setting herself up as a slightly less evil overlord. Refusing to serve her will allow you to do this yourself, but it will be more difficult and you'll have to gather information in other ways.
Also resulting from these rambling musings were a few other little tidbits I am going to try to implement. The most interesting one being a combination of ideas from Hypnodragon and Elder Scrolls (yes, I have been playing Skyrim, but wasn't when this occurred to me).
You see...you are basically in hell. And in hell, souls are currency. So, what better fade for your defeated foes than enslavement, with you binding their souls in servitude? Thing is...down here, souls are pretty much all people are. Not exactly flesh and blood, so binding their souls just means forcing them into submission and bending them to your will...and allowing you to bend their shape to your whims as a result. There are all sorts of big long boring theories behind it, but the point of it is that people want these enslaved critters, and will barter for them gladly. They may end up reshaping their new acquisitions into clothing, weapons, items, tools, or just diminutive little house pets for their own amusement. Who is to say? This also means that the battle system isn't going to be about hack and slash so much as it is a pure contest of wills, trying to force each to the other's whims. Kind of like Change Match, if you've ever played that one.
Other thoughts involved things, ideas, or places I plan to work into the game, such as Boobco Castle. It's a setting blatantly ripped off from The Unending BE Addventure, but that's okay. I don't mind. XD As the name alone might suggest, the theme for the entire area is centered around breast expansion, so I have plenty of motivation to make it a reality...so to speak. Traps aplenty, along with a few interesting NPCs and foes for you to vanquish, Yay! Might even be a few puzzles involved, if I am feeling particularly sadistic.
There will also be a maze. A labyrinth, more accurately, featuring changes of all shapes and sizes. The goal is to weaken the player, so TG and Shrinking will feature here, but at the lowermost levels? Cow-girls and Minotaurs and lactation, oh my!! If, that is, I manage to work in non-human type TFs without breaking things too badly. Probably can, but dunno yet.
I am also considering adding age regression into the mix, but that will not only be a bitch to code, I'd have to implement some kind of triggers to prevent there being any kind of sexually explicit junk in the game when you are below the legal age limits. Some people don't care about that sort of thing, but I'm a picky bastard. Probably won't end up putting it in at all, though, just cause it'd be such a bitch.
Need a themed area for bunny girls and bois, too. Just haven't thought of anything fitting, yet. Maybe an illusionist's lair, done up like a giant indoor funhouse or carnival...hmm. Needs further pondering.
I have, as of this writing, got all of the TF system translated over with the pieces I intend to use, and the ones that I don't worked out without breaking it. Still needs further tweaking, followed by a hell of a lot of streamlining to smooth over my butchery, though. For one thing, I want penis expansion to be more of a thing. I mean, you can lose it, right? It's only fair to be able to take that in the other direction, and with all the attention to blowing up the tits...well, I'm all about equality. At the moment, though, max penis length is around 12 inches. I plan to bump that up to around 36 inches, along with all the mechanics needed for it to actually make a difference beyond just the numbers in your description. I don't expect most of you to ever encounter this little problem, as I'm sure you'll be doing everything you can to lose that sucker as quickly as possible...but ya never know. ;)
I have already got a bunch of cursed items in there for your TFing pleasure, with more on the way. Currently in development is a class of item that becomes part of things and will allow the occasional NPC or critter to interact with them, affecting you in the process. Still a work in progress, but the test item, just for example, is a dial that attaches in the center of your back where you can't reach it, and will allow anyone close enough and interested enough to adjust the settings...and thus increase or decrease certain things about you, the player. Like your height, breast size, IQ, ect. Once I have a working example to build on, I will add some others. Like that broach for Boobco Castle that inflates your tits a little every time you walk through a door. Or a corset with assisted laces that people can tighten with the press of a button.
Also in development: Critters and the AI to handle them. They are in there, but I'll wait on fleshing them out until I start doing the AI for the NPCs.
Next on the list of things to do: start building the map and the areas in the world, and hexes.
Yes! Hexes and curses that have lingering effects. Not as powerful as the outright TFs, they change you a tiny little bit either over time until certain conditions are met, or when certain conditions are met! ((like making your IQ drop a little every day until you manage to track down and enslave one of the rare virgins in this land, vice making your dick shrink a little more every time you touch women's clothing.)) Also will need to include a way to remove curses that isn't too easy, but doable. Probably a damned cleric somewhere around that will help you out for a steep price. Or hard to find priests that will undo curses affecting specific things they simply don't like, like huge tits. Have to see about that.
Anyway, also on the agenda: Clothing. Still need to decide how I'm going to handle that. Should I make it an actual thing as I planned, or go with the much easier method of just using tables and text? Or should it change with you at all? Should you have to go find new clothes because yours don't fit any more? Might use this method, with only some occasional effects actually changing things. A trapped pressure plate that turns your shoes into high heels, or increases the height of said heels, is one example of that. Or a trap that turns your shirt into a corset, which might then end up getting locked onto you if you keep it on around the wrong people! Yes, clothing will have benefits. Not only in the way the people react to you, but in the form of protective magics that make some things about you harder to change. I'll probably allow these to be adjustable, so you can wear the clothes you like and still get the effects you want out of them. Might have to have some souls fashioned into custom clothing...but this actually works pretty well, now I think about it. I'll try coding it next time I'm working on the game, and see how it goes. Should be much, much easier than the other two ideas I had.
Well, I have other thoughts...but I'm too tired to remember them. Bed time for me! But rest assured, the project is alive and well, and so am I. To the dismay of nubile young women everywhere...
