Living with Titan for 2 months

These past 2 months went by fast and they were very productive.

I managed to design all the remaining areas of the game and our level guys managed to deliver them a couple of days ago. Talking in numbers, all the levels (both indoors and outdoors) ended up being 154 and almost 60 of them were made in these past 2 months. Originally, Titan was adding every area on his own, but to add so many levels... he would have to work exclusively on them for many months to get them done. These areas still need to be linked together and be polished but this is indeed a huge milestone!

All these new areas have a lot of new art, riddles and interactive elements such as horizontal lifts and ENP locks (you need to shoot energy bullets on certain slots to activate doors or lifts). New hazards also were added: Robots, lasers, falling platforms, electrical grounds, toxic lakes and clouds to name a few.

Titan is now working on the last 2 Queens. Succogi, Succalice and Golem are done programming-wise but I still need to finish their animations.

We will try our best to finish as much as we can regarding Voms' timeline for the next 2 weeks that Titan will stay with me. When Titan leaves, we will keep working on the project and try to release Vom's story as a complete game. The rest of the characters will follow as free DLC, hopefully soon after.

We wish you a happy new year and we will end our post with a positive message!

New Map and more

It seems one of the largest complaints people have of MoGi: Origins is the fact that it's easy to get lost. Up to now, if you had to go to a certain place, that destination in your map would shine red, or if you had an item, the location to use your item would also shine red.

Originally we thought that was an efficient enough system, but the complaint nevertheless, has not died down.

Considering we currently work like 2 feet away from each other instead of 2 million, the conversation inevitably came up. We realized that there might have been faults in our old implementation. For one thing, if the destination was not somewhere you had discovered yet, nothing on your map would appear red. Until you explored the map to the point of seeing something red, you would have no reminders of where you to go either.

Not only that but the "Missions" that Voms has, are brief in introduction. If you step away from the game for a bit, or decide to go hunt for Map Sex Scenes instead, it would be hard to remember your current destination, and that would also aid in getting lost.

To fix this, we're doing two things.

First, we're adding in Destination circles

Instead of outright showing a red version of the destination on your map before you've discovered it, we're going to show a general circle for the region you're supposed to go in. A general destination of where you're supposed to be. It'll leave the exploration a tad bit more obtuse, but will always be visible so there's a strong indication of where you're supposed to go.

Second, we're adding COM conversations

This is something we've kind of wanted to do anyway, but never thought to tie two and two together to use it in such a fashion. It'll be an on-demand conversation in the pause screen. Before you restore communications across the island, Voms will talk to himself, about what his destination is. Afterwards, there'll be an NPC talking to Voms. If you guys have any ideas regarding that, we're willing to listen to your suggestions.

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Progress wise we've completed QUITE a few levels. Succubus Ucogi is also programmed and Succubus Alice is well on her way to being finished. Succogi still has quite a few art assets that need to be completed for her to be live however. We want to show you guys the fruits of our labor but we can't. Please be patient with us.

If you were a Patron for the month of December we did send you guys sneak peaks into what's been done regarding Ucogi.

Our primary goal however is to have Titan finish as much of the game's programming while he's here and in speaking distance of Veins. That and the consistent progress we're making is inspiring our level guys to work hard as well.

"Lead by example" is a more powerful statement than I thought it was.

Honestly, we can't thank you guys enough for sticking by us and communicating with us. We'll do our best to make a game you guys are happy with.

Living with Veins for a month!

Yup, it's been a month since Titan went to Veins' house. What's done so far?

We released a good beta during the first week. After that we designed the Labs (new levels with a lot of new art, riddles and hazards), corrected most glitches in a 100 pages document that we were collecting for years, we remade the map system, updated the parallax, programmed all normal MoGi and we polished a few things, such as Voms jump (you have more control now).

The new levels can show that the game starts getting serious!

The last few days, Titan is programming Ucogi and Veins is animating her. For the first time we are working on the same thing side by side! Ucogi needs to be as perfect as possible. This is her WIP so far.

As crazy as research can go, we made an Ucogi skin for Kilik from Soulcalibur 6. Ucogi indeed has similar moves to Kilik, and it's fun to see her in 3D!

Asking for Feedback

How do you guys feel about the Platforming, and the Puzzles of the game? 

How do you feel about the game's difficulty?

 

We're currently designing new levels and as we're doing so we're weighing our options. That's hard when we don't know what part you guys enjoyed the most.

Towering Beta v1.62

New Beta! With new stuff! Can't say anything more without spoilers!!! Actually... this image displays things you can expect from our new release! So go play it!!!

What we did:
For the past 10 days Titan lives with Veins and we both work non-stop to finish the game. We are working on many things, both new and old. The list is huge but just to name a few:

• updated Pumpkin sex scene
• gold canisters
• video cut-scenes
• balancing enemies
• fixing glitches
• link rooms
• find sound effects and music
• rearrange texture pages for memory efficiency
• additional art for thumbs and "versus screens"
• correcting riddle rooms and map logic

We managed to do so much in 10 days and we wanted to share it with you in this huge beta release!

All normal MoGi are programmed (only Erubetie's sprites are missing). There are a few sex scenes still need to be done: Blue, Vampire, Erubetie and Troll. So there's a lot more work done in the background that we are not ready to show yet. Also, we hired a few new level programmers to help us with the level design.

What is next
Veins has to finally design Ucogi and Alice for the game. At the same time, Titan has many little things to fix and add, such as parallax, in-game cutscenes, NPCs, dialogues, THE GREEN PANELS and all that. For the next 2 months we aim to complete at least Voms' timeline.

So far everything looks bright! All we need from you is to drop us a line and share your enthusiasm with us! It means a lot!!!

A reminder but since lots of new objects have been made and old objects have moved around, you'll need to start a new game because loading from an old one will have a corrupted savefile T_T. The game allows you to try and load, but that might cause glitches. It's up to you.

EDIT: Dropbox is SYNCING quite slowly today. If the version you have is not the latest version, plz give Dropbox time to update.

One week's progress

It's been one week since Titan has come to stay with Veins. Progress on the game has gone quite well since then. To be honest, the amount of progress is much more than we expected for only one week. We've had some ups and downs getting used to the new environment (especially the food) but overall things have gone better than we expected so far.


More than one MoGi has been programmed each day, including Cyclops, Purple, Vampire, Troll, Blue, Zombie, and Alraune. The only normal enemy MoGi that remains to be done is the skin for SlimeGirl Blue, Erubetie. She's a "skin" in name only. She functions differently from the original SlimeGirl Blue.

Veins is working on a cut-scene for the towers. Our world has been relatively static so far. The most change that's happened has been the event at the start of the game with the MoGi escaping as well as a tractor falling into some water. Hopefully this cut-scene breathes more life into the world of MoGi origins.

We will definitely release a beta within the next few days so you guys can see the new content for yourself. It's been fun looking at the MoGi in development and seeing their weird glitches. In fact we'll share some with you.

Titan meets Veins!

On October 26th, Titan traveled half the globe to meet and stay with Veins.  The road to this was a bit rocky, but we felt this was a necessary step to speed up the progress on our game. We're already seeing the benefits of only working 2 feet away from each other instead of 2,000. As Veins draws, Titan can give direct input on what he sees and how it would interact with the game. As Titan programs, Veins can give direct input on the visual aspect like the hitbox, enemy placement, and fine tune numbers like the speed of animations. Previously, this would be very slow. The new workflow already feels more satisfying.

Titan will stay at Veins' house for 2.5 months. We plan on finishing as much of the game as possible, completing at least Voms' timeline. Our goal is to complete all levels, enemies, bosses and characters during Titan's stay.

The best part about all of this is that we're really pushing each other to make good progress. Emphasis on the good. The feedback now can come from any time and things can move in the correct direction before they're finalized.

Game dev is hard, especially if you work from far away. Many things went wrong, but team Erogi is still here, fighting to finish MoGi Origins against all odds. We felt the need to change our methods drastically and it is clear that this course of action is our best bet to complete the game. A big thanks to all our supporters on Patreon for making Titan's trip possible.

SlimeGirl Black is Back

My friend Womanime will make a new HD art of SlimeGirl Black in the following days, for October's Patreon rewards. Feel free to suggest possible sexy poses of Black with Voms! You got until Friday, so give it a shot! Or 10!

You need to log in to Patreon and go to Team Erogi's Patreon page, find the post and write there. I may pick one of the suggestions for Womanime to draw, or I may be convinced to draw anything you vote, from the amount of hearts each opinion gets! Start commenting and share the love!

I will take into consideration anything posted here, but in Patreon you can vote with hearts which suggestions you like the most, and it works as a free poll. Actually... anything I see here I will also post it on Patreon myself. So, be cute, kinky and creative!

Black is a small but heavy girl made of tar. Not very flexible but she has great endurance. Her most obvious asset are her big boobs, so let's use them in creative ways!

Autumn Alraune

Alraune is completed! Her sex scene was very complex to do, mainly because of the many moving parts. She has probably the most layers than any MoGi before her... over 80! I recorded the making-of procedure and I will post it in Erogi's Patreon for anyone who supports us with $1 or more.

What is left to do for Voms timeline (by Veins):

• 3 Queens and their sex scenes for Voms
• 4 MoGi sex scenes
• 2 Hostage scenes
• 9 screens (levels) and a few rooms (the layout is complete in draft form)
• Cut-scenes, whenever possible.

What is left to do outside Voms timeline (by Veins):

• 2 Rudy transformations and their sex scenes
• 2 Queens for characters other than Voms
• Sprites / animation for Ucogi, Alice, Ninjuco and Vor
• Vor's introduction level.
• Wrap-up the story and dialogues, enemy placement, translations to various languages, Guidebook and playtesting.

August Blue

During August I finished the sprite animations of SlimeGirl Blue. At 186, she has the most frames than any other MoGi, more than double compared to most other enemies! Blue is very versatile: she can throw projectiles, hurt Voms if he tries to touch her, walk on ceilings and drop on Voms if he tries to walk beneath her! I recorded the entire animation process for all our Patreon supporters.

There is a re-skin to be done for Blue, Erubetie from MonsterGirl Quest! I will take the liberty to make Erubetie different to Blue, for enemy variation and to avoid any confusion.

There are still a few Queens, extra MoGi, Hostage scenes and sex scenes to be made, but Blue is the last of the normal MoGi enemies that I had to do for the game! Many of the MoGi in the list are not in the game yet, but they will be added as soon as Titan has free time to work more in the game. I will work non-stop on the sex scenes once I'm done with everything else, so that Titan won't waste any time working on the game once he arrives at my place at the end of October. Sex scenes are easy to add, but the rest need special work to be implemented, so I need to focus on the actual game for as long as I can.

-Veins

Titan's Ticket

In our previous blog entries we described many of the difficulties we faced and in how many ways we tried to fix everything within our power. No matter how hard we tried, there were always new challenges. This could not go any longer, so for the past few months we discussed the possibility of meeting, staying together and work on the game non-stop. After a lot of ups and downs, Titan finally managed to get a ticket to travel to Europe. He will be staying with Veins for a few months in hopes of working hard to finish the game. Titan will travel at the end of October, which is great news for the game itself!

We are currently working on Cyclops, the most challenging MoGi Queen so far. Cyclops is quite large, so having a good camera that really focuses on the action is really important. We're experimenting with different ways to handle that. Cyclops as a boss also has to be tougher than our previous boss, so we're balancing numbers regarding that. We're also fine-tuning her animation and creating more regions to walk around in, as the boss battle takes place at the towers.

We really are very close though, and are grateful to anyone who is currently reading this post. Thank you for your interest in our game. We'll do our best to make a product everyone will be happy to play.

Patreon Status and Developer Talk

So there are a lot of design decisions we had to make for our game from the onset, and the game's gone through a lot of changes.

This is what Succubus looked like.

I decided to take the time today to explain why we chose to shape our game the way we did, as well as the changes we've decided to make to the game to stay on Patreon.

First, we've changed Hostage scenes to be Map Scenes.
In a game like ours you only get to the main adult content when you're losing. We didn't want it to feel like we're punishing the players for playing the game correctly, and we wanted to inspire more exploration so we thought... How about we add Hostage scenes where you have to go around saving guys from Mogi having sex with them? If you play the game right you still see the content you came to us for. Patreon has a zero-tolerance policy for rape, so we're going to frame that aspect of the game differently. They aren't really being, raped, the guys are choosing to do it, but the girls are a bit overzealous.

From now on all mention of Hostage scenes will be Map Scenes, and the dialogue when talking to them has been changed as well.

Second,  we've specified that the smaller MoGi will not be having any adult scenes. Any longtime followers of the game already knows that we had no intention of giving the younger characters any adult exposure, but it wasn't clear so we made it so.

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EDIT: Looks like we're back up. Well that was a small ordeal. I hope any developers who are looking at our page and going through anything similar can take something away from our experience. For our patrons and fans. Thank you for your patience.
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What we're working on?
We're working on the Cyclops bossfight. The actual boss sprites have actually been done already. Titan's programming it now, while Veins does the adult scene. We hope to have something to show very soon.
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Just to add some small tidbits of information for you guys to digest, the Map Scenes weren't fully our idea. It was due to you guys.

When we were starting out, we thought we'd stay the course and do what other games generally did, as we saw no apparent flaw in their design decisions, but through constant communication with you guys multiple things changed in our game. Through playing the game, we remember some of our players lamenting the fact that they had gotten better at the game. We struggled to think of a solution to have people see the adult content, w/o necessarily losing. Obviously we increased the game difficulty, but surprisingly, the skill gap in our audience was QUITE wide. We didn't want to unnecessarily punish our worse players but still wanted to reward better ones. This is how Map Scenes came to be.

Our sex minigame also took form due to the direct influence of you guys. Originally, we had a mash to escape system(like we do with Slimegirl Black), and we thought it worked well. The thing was though, unlike pixelart titles our game has a lot to take in when it comes to animation. Since the actual animations are quite large, our fans were lamenting the fact that they couldn't just relax and enjoy the animation at their own pace.

The challenge became how would you have a high pressure minigame, where you can take your time to solve it so you can view the animation.  Our current minigame is our answer to that challenge and we wouldn't have come up with it w/o you.

The takeaway here is that if there's anything you guys don't really like or feel isn't directly explained enough, we'd be happy to communicate and make changes to more suit your needs. The adult scenes withstanding though, as those are kind of spoken for...

Our Patreon page is Under Review

Our Patreon page is currently under review. After reading the community guidelines we realized we were a bit too lax in showing adult content on the page. Our intro page had the Neko Paizuri scene and our intro video had adult scenes shown in it as well. We've changed that and asked for a re-review of our page. We hope it doesn't take too long...

We're sorry for any inconvenience this may cause.

SuccuBeta! v1.352

 

The long awaited beta is here! After a lot of struggle and hard work you can finally play the Communications Tower. Two new MoGi appear as well: A sex-starved Succubus Queen was observed back in the area between the city and the tunnels, so you are advised stay put and wait for help! Also we got reports of various citizens trapped by Alraune tentacles crying for help! I can't imagine why, the lucky bastards! Bottom line, the area after Red is dangerous.

This Beta is far from perfect. Please report any mistakes or glitches you may find.
Please Delete Progress and Delete Data because small things changed early in the game affect instance ID's and mess with the savefile.

Veins' thoughts

The good news:

Titan is coming to my country for the Summer. We would be house-mates and try to finish the game once and for all. Well, we have to wait for his visa to arrive and book tickets and deal with all that procedural crap that wastes time. But this is a huge step toward finishing. Coming from America to Europe for 2 months (or more) requires huge sacrifices but this had to be done. Titan ended up being completely unreliable for the past 2 years due to personal issues and this was the only way to deal with the game's crisis. I hope that he will actually manage to come... I won't believe it until I see him in person!

The bad news:

It's stuff you already know. No updates, no Beta, nothing. We got some messages in the last post, of people tired of waiting. I know, I feel the same way. Actually even more so, because I'm here every single day talking to Titan, asking him for updates. He is constantly a few hours away from finishing the Beta. But always something happens. On March 1st he told me he wants 5 hours to finish it. Today, 52 days later.... oh man, it feels ridiculous to even continue that sentence, so I won't! Fuck my fucking life.....

Titan found new 2 level designers and I also found new 2 level designers (currently we only got 1 active designer right now). All of them are waiting on Titan to finish the Beta. His work is pilling up, and we need those designers to finish levels so that when he comes here (where his time would be limited), we wont be wasting time waiting for the levels to be done!

I write all that here, not just because we promised transparency, but as a desperate way of mine to force Titan to work. Titan knows all that, but writing all that here it's like having all my thoughts gathered. I have to believe that he does everything in his power to get shit done, but it's obviously not enough. We lose fans, we lose support, we lose faith in ourselves. Apart from that, the rushed work shows. I want the game to be better, but if there is no time to finish a basic fucking beta, then how can there be any time to do small fixes that really matter?

And it's more than that. level designers are waiting on us, people who love the game are waiting on us. The partnership between me and Titan gets shaky... when he returns to America, surely he will return to the current pace of doing things. And then, how can I trust him on some new project? At this moment, I don't see that happening. I hope I'm wrong. I may find other partners or I may learn programing and make games on my own... I don't know. But there are options.

The future seems uncertain. Once more, it all depends on Titan. I hope he comes to my country as he promised (I can't be sure of anything anymore). When he comes, we work hard. When it is time for him to leave... then we reevaluate the situation. Fuck, if this fails.. I'm running out of ideas to save this project. Worst comes to worst, I would have to find a legit company to finish the game. But that entails a whole new world of risks, management and expenses, and it would be a nightmare to handle. But I need to bury all that for now and stay positive as Titan plans his trip here.

The ugly news:

You won't like it but I have no art or updates for the game this month. I took a small break from MoGi, to avoid getting mad on waiting for things to happen. Also it bothered me that there were only 1 or 2 comments on the Succubus sex animation (which was highly anticipated), and on the Wild West game. Frustrated from all that, and my personal life as well, and tired of waiting on others to make games, I decided to make a game on my own... a game that I started in a Game Jam 2 years ago, with a team of four (supposedly) award-winning programmers. They were utterly useless and abandoned the project, so I never got to finish it until now. I haven't done any Ucogi games in years, so yeah, this game is about Ucogi's first story. I made this game to fix my mood, and feel that I finally finished a damn platform game! I just have to find some fitting music to complete it.

I understand that this may be a game that you don't care about, because it's an asexual game about Chibi Ucogi. But if you think about it, in the long-run these are actually good news. I proved to myself that I can make a game on my own, and that if I ever want to go solo and make platform games with story, cut-scenes and riddles, I fucking can! (I just need to learn a new program to do games, because Flash gaming is kinda dead).

Veins' progress

Last week I spend almost the entire 5 days making SlimeGirl Purple. Her sprites are done and I'm very pleased with how she looks. I posted videos of the entire progress in my YouTube channel. Their original time is almost 30 hours long but I compressed them into 6 hours. I'm curious, is anyone interested in those kind of videos?

Purple's cute face as she gets a surprise hit

When SlimeGirl Purple was designed for MoGi CardFight, she had to fit the card's frame and she was designed to appear from the waist up, which was a bit awkward. So, I made the artistic choice to give her thighs in MoGi Origins. Usually I try to stay as close to the source material as possible but Purple needed a chance of improvement on her design.

SG Purple evolution

I remember when we started the game, one of the first things I agreed with Titan, was to give personality to every MoGi in the game, so that they don't appear like mindless puppets, used as sex objects. This holds true so far, with every MoGi having unique attacks and behavior.

Through animation I got the chance to explore more of Purple's character. She ended up being unique for many reasons. No other MoGi so far can dodge an attack, go "through" Voms, have a 2 hit combo attack or shows her naked butt in the game!

Draft animation of Purple's combo attack

On Patreon, I shared the game I was making on the side for 12 months, named Wild West Whores. The game may not contain my story, main characters but the guy who commissioned it, cancelled the deal... so the game is now a part of Ucogi Games. I hope it helps with the long wait of the new beta of MoGi Origins.

Regarding MoGi Origins... I still don't know when the next Beta will be out. Titan is struggling to find time to work on the game. This can't go on any longer, so he is considering my offer, of coming to my country and live with me for a bit. Then we can work on the game non stop and finish as much as possible. Until then I will keep animating new things. One guy is making new levels, slowly, but we have 4 potential new guys that can hopefully help out. It may take some time until these new recruits learn their way around.

Right now I'm working on Voms' "level 3 tool upgrade" which is a charging move that allows Voms to repel enemy projectiles. If you remember Voms got Ground Pound with the "level 2 tool upgrade" in the city, but he needed a more defensive move in his arsenal. This is the last of Voms upgrades and he will get it soon after he beats Cyclops.

  Stuff I have to do in the near future (for Voms' timeline):

• Remaining MoGi: Blue
• Remaining Sex scenes: Vampire, Troll, Purple, Alraune, Cyclops
• Remaining Hostage scenes: Vampire, Pixie
• Remaining Queens: Golem, Stheno, Succubus 2.
• Ucogi /Alice

While this blog's posts are usually monthly, I will be also posting smaller updates on our Patreon page from now on. I have been neglecting Patreon for a while now but I need to change that. It's where we get our financial support and I do need some feedback for my progress, so it seems more apropriate to post small stuff there, and bigger updates here. Of course I will keep an eye on both pages and reply to any comments or questions you may have, as always.

Inside a creator's mind

Hey, Veins here.

Today I'm in a good mood. Not for MoGi Origins, but for myself. You may not care about me as a person, but about my animating skills and the progress of the game, and that's fine. My work is what makes me feel useful. And I do feel the need to feel useful and worthy. This post will get personal, but I need to say a few things, so here it goes. I went to one of those self-improvement seminars. I was skeptical about it, especially after having watched Pen&Tellers Bullshit with such a theme. Being skeptical doesn't mean that I'm afraid to try and explore new things. And yes, I did try to debunk what they said in that meeting. But as trivial I found the success stories of rich people and as much of a show I found the arrow-braking necks, the actual advises were pretty on spot. And since my mind never stops thinking of "work", they gave me inspiration about a few details that I can use on Ucogi's church cult. You know, the Church that she grew up and they turned her into a cleaning goddess.

Also, since I was waiting on Titan to finish the beta (I was done with my part for the time being), I had some free time to scout for programmers that may help us with the game. In the last couple of months I participated in 3 Jams for that reason: Global Game Gam, Art Games Jam and Strawberry Jam. I even met a girl so perfect and pure, she could have been a real life Ucogi... without the big boobs! She is one of those people that you admire so much, that fills your heart with hope for something better. So yeah, the anti-social lil me, had a couple of good weeks, that lifted my spirit.

I needed that, because I wanted a small victory for myself. I haven't had one in a long time, ever since MoGi Origins got funded in OffBeatr, 5 years ago. Since then, everything else I do is bumping on obstacles. And unfortunately, I have to talk about all the negative stuff now which will decrease my good mood. But it's stuff that I need to share.

The crowdfunding was done on Feb 2014, 4 years ago. I was working with Titan 7 months before that to build the fist demo and I was working on the character design since 2013. I started this project when I was 34 years old and now I'm almost fucking 40! I haven't even done an Ucogi game in all those years. So yeah, I feel like a failure. MoGi Origins is one of the best things that happened to me, but that had a toll on me. For 5 years, I never truly got a break. I needed to have the story of 7 characters in my head, and enrich it with anything new I might experience to make the game better. The other day I took several photos of building with ideas that I can use in the game. The game has consumed me. And that's fine, I like it, but I was living so much in that fantasy world that haven't had the time to take care of myself. Even when my mom was sick at the hospital, I was doing sketches regarding the game. But the thing is... the game could have been completed by now. And that is killing me.

Granted, the game is huge and it's essentially 7 games in one. But Titan being absent for most of 2016 and 2017, we only had 3 Beta releases. All that without fixing any choppy work from earlier entries. There's a report that I keep adding stuff for fixing... it's 104 pages long. Without the images, that's 10.114 words. And to be honest, I'm not happy with the current state of the game. Titan admitted that this was too much for him to handle and that's when I started looking for people to help us out. I talked about that in the last Blog entry, so I will just post a video of a few conversations here, for anyone who might want to check in detail. The video is mostly about Jevar and MS Global who stole money from us. I do this because people need to be careful out there, because some people may think that I was lying or finding excuses about my dealings, and because making a game is not as easy as you may think. Many things happen backstage that you can never be aware of unless someone from the inside talks about them.

In the video I also included the guy behind Meet&Fuck games. You may agree with him or me, that's up to you. Finishing this game would be a small victory for myself, and even that was taken away from me, making me feel even worse about myself. In short, I thought that the MnF owner wouldn't reply because he didn't want the game any more. When he finally replied (1.5 months later) he didn't like my sex scenes, I called him a dick and he rejected the whole thing, blaming me that I wasted a year of his life. Which was unfair because I spent time working on it, while he was doing other things.

So, fuck all that. I take full responsibility for everything that went wrong. It is my fault. The self-improvement seminar was clear on that. But dammit I tried. Still, I don't consider this a failure, but a learning experience. The game I did for Meet&Fuck will end up in Patreon, for the people who actually support me. I was already feeling bad for working on something else while MoGi Origins progresses so slow, but to my defense, waiting on Titan for weeks and months at a time was soul crunching. I attended many Jams so far in 2018 is because I couldn't sit around and wait on Titan to do his job like I did last year. Working alone without signs of life from your partner... is maddening. Also I needed some time off from the game and my mind as well.

So far, I wanted to keep on doing art for MoGi Origins so that Titan would be pressured into finishing the game. But that wasn't the case since he told me that "I haven't finished all the art yet" which I felt it was unfair to say. At this point we only have 1 guy doing the level design and he is slow but I can't force him to work any faster. I'm kind of desperate and I am running out of ideas here. The seminar also said not to focus on the negative stuff but on "what we can do". And you know what? By accepting responsibility, I have to do everything I can to correct this. 

You guys don't want to hear excuses, but to see results. So am I. And what comes down to it, is money, your Patreon money. Since everything else has failed, all I can do is force Titan to record his screen so that I would know how much work he does, and I would do the same. Then we can get divide the Patreon money we get depending on how long we have worked. I think this sounds fair and it's something I can control, and hopefully avoid mistakes and delays in the future. 

Titan is good at what he does and he is the only one who knows what is going on in the game's code. Due to real life matters and other aspects he is not as punctual as he used to be. By having others doing the levels, he would have time to do more important things, like programing enemies and riddles. So far this path fails and recently I even proposed to him to come and live with me in order to focus and finish the game, even though we are a couple of continents apart. I have tried everything that I can think of, to make this work.

The truth is that I am a man who has a talent, I want to work, to create, to be successful. This wall of text is mostly about me and my mistakes and my dreams. The problems and solutions, the ups and the downs. But I can't finish this game on my own. Everyone needs reliable partners, help, support, a couple of positive words to keep going, even a hug. 

I'm working on board games on my spare time because I don't need other's help. I don't need a programmer or a musician because I program the game through the instructions manual. Actually I got a mini game of mine published 3 months ago and that was a small victory. But through all this chaos, I couldn't even celebrate it. It was swallowed by every other failure around me. Also, the money I will get from it, is peanuts. Regarding the Strawberry Jam, I had the graphics ready in less than a day, and 20 days later (today) the programmer hasn't even gave me a sample of the game. I hope I can finish it though, and share it with all of you.

Another guy wanted to make with me a point and click game which is an awesome opportunity to tell Rudy's story. I wrote the story in 1 day... and it's a story I have in my mind for over 10 years now. That guy hasn't contacted me since. But I'm tempted to do that story it on my own in Flash. So many lost opportunities for games... I guess I could share with you the game I made in the Art Jam with my team. I'm the camera guy so I don't appear in the video, and there is no porn involved but you might see a hot chick or two. The theme was Art and Politics, and it's a board game.

Oh yeah, you want to know about he next Beta. I don't know! I really wanted to name this post "SuccuBeta!", but you got my personal crap instead. Titan wanted to release the Beta since November but failed the December, Xmas, New Years, and February's deadlines. 15 days ago he told me he need 1 more day. Since then he only spoke to me 3 times, telling me that he will be back soon and that he will have a beta before the end of February. I even wrote that blog-post and it's ready to publish! Anyways, I told him 3 days ago that he has until Monday or I'm posting here. He never replied. So I'm posting here. So I don't know. 

I will leave you with a positive note. Of what to expect.

Years resolution and dev chaos

Veins here. And I feel the need to share a few things, even personal.

Apologies for not posting anything for  almost 2 months. We usually post something every month but we were sure we would have a Beta ready by the end of the year. That deadline was missed and then it was "wait for a few more days" and so on. New deadlines were at the 15 and the 19th of January. Bad weather and other issues occurred. 23 days have gone by and I have no idea when the new Beta will be released. All I can say is "soon". This has happened before, many times perhaps. From now on, even if I can't control when the next Beta comes out, I will try my best not to lose another month's post. To make up for missing December's post, I will write a lot of things in this one!

So what happened in 2017? 

Other programmers: 
It was a shaky year. Titan didn't do much work during 2016 and I faced him, trying to find a solution to this, so that we won't sink this project. We had a lot of heat because Breading Season had similar problems. Titan swallowed his pride and accepted the fact that he can't do the entire programming and level editing on his own (this is a huge game after all). I spend almost 2 months searching for new people to help out. Since Titan had his own demons to face, I approached a few guys from a site that hires programmers.
The first one hated the game and cursed me, saying that "this game is what goes wrong with the world today and I hope it fails". The 2nd guy needed the money but he didnt like the adult nature of the game so he declined as well. I was very desperate at that point, thinking that I wont find anyone to help out.
Then 2 more replied to my ad. Jevar T took $50 and never replied again without delivering anything. MS Global was also shady, a huge company that even made several calls to me but they never delivered anything after they got their $25 for the test level, except random spam messages. The funny thing with the was that they gave me a total price for the game's cost without even knowing how many levels and characters we have in the game! I got even more desperate, thinking that people either hate the game or steal from us!
Then 2 more people replied. JR was very strict when he was programming SlimeGirl Red and was paid a huge sum without delivering what I wanted. Titan ended up reprogramming Red from scratch and she is still not completely ready. We won't be using JR again unless it's super important. And also AD, who did many levels for us, but he ended up being slow and finally abandoned working for us on November. It took him 4 months to complete the Tower level and yet, he fucked up. Titan had to redo a huge part of the Tower (AD got married, went on a honeymoon and then he was working on his own mobile games, without telling us about these things beforehand).
Titan release the only Beta of 2017 on August. Around that time, NR, a friend of mine from the Ucogi forums wanted to join in. NR did a great job but sadly he is taking a break now.
Furthermore, I attended a Videogame Con around December, and approached several companies and individuals. Most were busy, some didn't want to work on the game, others were super expensive. But from all that I found yet another 2 people. One is working for us right now and the other is in training mode. The good thing is that these guys live an hour away from me and I can check on them personally.

Music: 
I contacted over 60 musicians via Facebook. Again, some were expensive, some rejected the project, many didnt reply and some were bad at what they did. I ended up with 5 musicians that did a great work. I cant wait to hear their pieces in the game! And this whole things wasnt like "do some music for me". I had to find music I like, give them samples and direct them. One of the things that stood out was this guy who wanted $500 for a track! He told me that he worked in Ubisoft and there he got paid $2500 for a track. Well that's fine, but Team Erogi doesn't get the 1/5 of what Ubisoft does!

Other stuff:
Well, on a personal level, I was on a pretty dark place too. My mom was sick for the past 3 or so years and I was even working on my sketchpad, while I was taking her to the hospital, a few times per month. She passed away 4 months ago and it was a tough time for me. I'm not saying that as an excuse for anything. I don't feel the need to excuse my self because I feel I did all I could. I'm proud I did all the above under the circumstances. As a side note, I got a card game published, and I finally finished making a flash Meet&Fuck game I took on a year ago (not published yet). I worked on my leisure time on these side projects, to keep my self motivated while dealing with everything else and waiting on the programmers and musicians to do their job. So I guess, despite any unfortunate events, this was a prolific year for me, even though I didn't paid much attention to myself, health-wise.

The actual art of the game:
We only had 1 beta this year but a lot of work has been done in the background. The sub-weapons and Energy poweups were designed and implemented. Cheat engine, map shortcuts and Red Queen exist in the game now. New menus and save system for every playable character is designed. New levels by several programmer have been completed (although not accessible yet). 7 new MoGi have been animated (except for their sex scenes): Cyclops, Alraune, Alraune Hostage scene, Troll, Vampire, Succubus and the new addition, ZombieGirl. To release them we just need new levels to be made and to be programmed of course. Many other seemingly minor things have also been made, like Voms dizzy animation, when he gets attacked by a certain kind of MoGi. Here's a taste of the things to come.

Yes, ZombieGirl is a recoloring of PumpinGirl. Please don't complain about this extra MoGi.

2017 was a hard and tense year. I wish more could have been done. Right now I do feel exhausted. Kind of like Voms in that image. And I'm need to hear some positive words for all this hard work. Titan promised me he will do more this year (I've had glimpses of the new Beta and Succubus is a pretty cool Queen). I don't believe in hopes and wishes, only in good intentions and actual work. We can only move forward. And I want to thank you all for your patience and support on Patreon. I don't know where I would be right now without you guys.

You can view some Making-of videos in my MoGi playlist on YouTube, which show the making of non-released (yet) MoGi and they also play the new music that we made for the game. Enjoy them!