Unveiling the Unknown - Dev Blog 22/04: Maids and Manor (Patreon)

Unveiling the Unknown, my next game and collaboration with artist mdf-an, is going even better than I expected!

Progress so far:

New Characters:

Beatrice the Nun:

Beatrice is brought into the manor to help deal with the arousal curse that inflicts the protagonist. She deduces that the best way to reduce the power of the curse is through orgasms. Who could have guessed? Despite being a celibate nun, she'll do her duty and assist you due to the fat stacks of money she'll be getting paid.

Beatrice won't be a party member, so instead of gaining affection and upgrades, she will operate with a unique mechanic where she instead gains corruption. A higher level of corruption will lead her to perform actions less becoming of a nun.

Hazel the Mage:

Hazel is a bubbly girl who becomes fast friends with the protagonist. She's the only maid who seems to actually be open to helping you with the arousal curse at first. She's also the only maid, with the exception of the head maid, who isn't interested in courting the legendary hero.

She's likely to become your best friend and an important ally at the start of your adventure.

Mirabelle the Paladin:

Mirabelle has the unique combination of being shy and a tomboy. She's also ripped. The maids in the manor are powerful warriors that fight off the demon army, and Mirabelle is a melee fighter that acts as a superb tank in the dungeon. She's also the head chef, cooking food so good it provides magical buffs.

At first, she won't even know about your arousal curse, and while she knows she has to cater to your every need, how would she react if she was told it's sexual?

Manor Upgrades:

The upgrades screen has seen a big upgrade since the last update! I decided to take the risk and create a spanning web of upgrades that fills in as you gradually unlock each one. This has been an exciting challenge to design and code, but I'm really happy with how it looks. The only thing left to do now is to actually add some upgrades!

Maids Menu:

So we've upgraded the manor; what about the maids? We'll be getting a menu that allows you to see several aspects of your protagonist and their maids. This information—their bio, likes, dislikes, fetishes, and how they feel about you—will be gradually unlocked as you gain a higher level of affection with them.

You will also be able to see their total stat contributions from their upgrades, which you can level up from this menu. Each maid right now has eight upgrade paths, which will utilize a variety of currencies to upgrade their core stats, their spells, and more. And I want a lot of these upgrades to be more than just +stats, but I have to build these things up gradually, so before I can even think of adding any upgrades, I need to make sure the actual characters and mechanics are in the game.

Upgraded Dungeon:

The previous Dungeon UI was pretty amateurish, with a lot of redundant text, so here's an improvement! You may have noticed there's also a consistent design to a lot of the UIs—regal gold with black! 

Brand new to the dungeon screen is the spell bar, which features dynamically changing tooltips telling you the mana cost and effect of the spell.

I may add an additional panel at the top right explaining the biome parameters in the future, since different biomes giving buffs and debuffs may be a big part of the game.

Emotions:

Here's a small thing, but something I'm quite proud of! It's a dynamic emote system. Character emotes are no longer rigid; they're instead based on a variety of different eyebrows, eyes, and mouths. These are slightly randomized. Oh, and the characters visibly breathe and have two different blinking animations depending on their expression.  

Characters will even blush depending on the clothes you choose for them to wear in the scene. (Yeah, you can also pick their clothing!)