WEEKLY POST - June 22nd 2025 - Civilized dialogue

Catalyst name:

Last week's poll to decide the name of the Catalyst compound landed on M.A.C.
However, I realized soon after that there actually is a brand of cosmetic called M.A.C, and I thought that was maybe a little too weird.
On top of that, while writing dialogue, reading out-loud "the M.A.C." seemed off, so I decided to make a little compromise.
The final name of the compound is "V-MAC", which stands for "Verdaptin Mutation Amplifier Catalyst", Verdaptin being another option I liked.

Dialogue segments:

The bigger part of the week was spent on actually finishing the code of a big interactive conversation segment with Johan, which will feature roughly 12 topics.

This segment differs from Elena's in the sense that it will be broken into 2 parts:
The first part is obligatory (like Elena's in the initial release) and only lasts 4 topics.
After that, there's an intermission sequence.
Then, you get back into the conversation segment, but this time, it's optional, with a button to skip it in the top-left corner of the UI.

This conversation segment also differs from Elena's in the sense that for several topics, I've coded it in such a way that you can unlock them through more than one topic.
Example: you can unlock the topic about Elena by talking about Laura with Johan, or by talking about Serum Trial Subjects.
This will allow you to chain the dialogues in different ways, where Elena's dialogue unlock order in the initial release was linear.

Also, as I was writing, I realized there were more topic icons that I needed to make:

First, I realized the 'Myosei Shinka Dynamics' logo was incorrect, and with the help of my friend StrongGirls, I was able to fix the kanjis to mean "Wonderous Life Evolution", instead of what it previously meant, which was "Weird Progress". Japanese is such a funky language.

Then, you have the icon for serum-trial female subjects, followed by the V-MAC icon.
I've added the idea of the Gynaflex compound, which is meant to help the growing girls keep their feminine assets (to better explain how a muscle-growth serum can cause breast expansion and avoid the manly bodies caused by steroids).
Then you have the topic relating to the risks Alex and Johan are taking (YES, this IS a Back to the Future 2 reference).
Finally, a generic icon to represent work, and one to represent lab work.

State of writing:

I just mentioned how I did a bunch of writing this week. Basically, I decided to re-think a lot of story-ideas I previously had.

Initially, the plan was for Johan and Alex to be working covertly on the serum, constantly talking and acting like they'd get fired if anyone saw them working on the serum.

But after a bit of surface-level research, I realized that it made no sense for them to even be working in a privately owned laboratory, using lab equipment owned by Bionovalis, stealing chemicals from other lab teams, with 0 supervision, and with the freedom to test willy-nilly their formula on random female test-subjects, as well as bringing home samples of the serum.

I had to decide just how risky their operation was, because it was getting to a point where, realistically, if a superior found them out, they'd be fired, prosecuted, black-listed and ruined for life. I would have to balance this out with some corporate story involving corruption, blackmail, negligence... which is not where I want the game to go.

Basically, I realized that some ideas could lead to a weird overall tone for the story. I want the game to focus on muscle-girls and less on corporate shenanigans. So I've had to downplay some of those aspects. They're still being discreet about it, but I've made changes in regards to Johan to imply that they're no longer at risk of being fired.

All in all, I think the Lore of the serum and the whole Bionovalis Lab deal is now in a better position, and I'm looking forward to where it's going.

I'm currently writing the scene with Elise Dubois, and I'll then add a short conversation segment with Laura.

Dialogue with Elena:

After that, the next big challenge will be to rewrite the dialogue of Chapter 1 with Elena.

For example, part of the changes to Chapter 1 forced me to remove the whole bit about Olivia Oak, the rising female wrestler. Although I want Olivia Oak to still exist as a world-building element, she's not a serum-user anymore, since the serum is locally made by Johan and Alex. Because of that, she can't be an argument for how well the serum works either.

So I'll need to replace her with some photos of Laura taken in a "not creepy" way by Johan.

Another change I have to make is to prevent Alex's dialogue to sound like he's a completely depraved drug-dealer, trying to manipulate a girl into taking some un-tested serum.

So, in this new version, Elena has already kinda been Alex's girlfriend for a while, and Alex has been working on the serum specifically for her, already knowing that she wants to become stronger.

The recent survey also highlighted an obvious thing : aside from her looks, a lot of players just never got to know her well enough. Which is perfectly normal for those who don't read my weekly posts, the biggest additions to her character are yet to come in the update.

Point is, I'm working on beefing-up the dialogue segment with Elena, by making sure that talking about her job is no longer a comedy-bit that makes fun of her and paints Alex as a shallow guy.

Similarly, I want to approach the subject of Elena's parents and early-life, to deepen her personality and hobbies.

If I am to expand the game beyond Chapter 1, I want you guys to be able to connect with her more. I also want Alex to seem like he's in love with Elena and not just the idea of seeing her naked body throbbing with hard muscles.

Not a couch gag:

I've been considering more and more the idea of making an additional sprite for Elena where, early enough during her conversation segment, she'd propose Alex to just fucking sit down on the couch.

I mean, who the fuck talks for 30 minutes while standing still in the middle of a room with a couch and a bed 3ft away?

Now, I know, that would be a bunch of additional work : a whole new sprite with variable facial expressions and a new background. But also it would look pretty cool, seeing a close-up of Elena sitting next to you... right?

Low on animations:

I was expecting to be able to churn a lot more animations this week, but I'm just dead tired right now.
Basically, I've done the following animation, and I was very displeased with my result. I feel like I haven't done justice to the sprite. I mean, her pelvis is moving too much, the rigging around her belly-button is off, and her left arm isn't following the heaving of her chest.

So I've spent my morning essentially re-doing the rigging, and while I was at it, I've learned a new technic which will make my life a bit easier when animating future sprite. So... my failure led to some good.
Anyway, this is the re-made version that I've just finished 1h30 before usual-weekly-post-time:

There is a second animation I wanted to have done, but it's unlikely to be finished by the usual weekly-post time, I'm still cutting it into pieces.

I know last week-end I was saying that I should be able to make more animations. I've been unexpectedly distracted all week by the (admittedly self-assigned) task of making progress on writing, conversation segments, re-ordering of the story, and re-writing things to get the tone right. This has left me little time and energy to work on animations.

Hopefully I can give some equal attention to writing and art next week, but you know, progress is progress.

That's it for this time!
Have a nice Sunday! Cheers!