Monster Girl Rancher (v0.5.3.0 - Centaurs and Aging Update)

[Ryan-Drakel]

I think I'll wait for the next update to download it.
Question, are there sounds for the monsters when things happen? Like say you feed one, you can hear muffled noises?
[and if so, I'm unsure but will they be willing or non?]

Logically I'd say "willing" because monster-girls are considerably stronger than the average human, trying to stuff one down another's throat while they're struggling will be next to impossible and might end up getting the human hurt, devoured or even killed.

[Hansony]

Logically I'd say "willing" because monster-girls are considerably stronger than the average human, trying to stuff one down another's throat while they're struggling will be next to impossible and might end up getting the human hurt, devoured or even killed.

Kind of a big assumption, don't you think?
I mean WHY should monster-girls necessarily be stronger them humans on average? That seem to be a lot more to do with the fantasy settings you are used to then with any actual reasoning so it could just as well be that in this setting monster-girls are not stronger then the average human or maybe even a little weaker.

[Ryan-Drakel]

Logically I'd say "willing" because monster-girls are considerably stronger than the average human, trying to stuff one down another's throat while they're struggling will be next to impossible and might end up getting the human hurt, devoured or even killed.

Kind of a big assumption, don't you think?
I mean WHY should monster-girls necessarily be stronger them humans on average? That seem to be a lot more to do with the fantasy settings you are used to then with any actual reasoning so it could just as well be that in this setting monster-girls are not stronger then the average human or maybe even a little weaker.

That's for the creator to decide.

[MasterGryph]

The window's too tall for my computer. Also, it cuts off the money, same as the other person.

[Anesthetic]

OK so a few criticisms.

1 This game NEEDS some kind of tutorial. Without one I'm not sure weather or not I'm even playing right. I have no idea how to even interact with the monster girls outside of plaque menue, or if it's even possible to do so.

2 Everythign is too big. Everything is too spaced apart and you move too slow. Your house should be one small room not 3 especially when the only important thing in your house is your bed. When you enter your bed should be right next to you so you can sleep. Walking everywhere feels like a chore because everything is so spaced out. Also transitioning locations takes longer then is necessary. I suggest putting the cowsgirls in a pen thats outside instead of in a barn, that way the player has to transition fewer screens on a consistant basis. It took me over an hour to go just 40 days. That means that per 10 days it was taking me 15 minutes, and thats mostly due to how much walking you have to do to play this game.

3 Your prices aren't right. Harpy feathers are only double the value of Cowgirl Milk, but it takes two days to get them instead of one, and Harpies are more expensive. So there really isn't any value in getting a harpy as opposed to a cow girl, as a cowgirl is just as monatarily usefull, but less expensive. AHH. Just got an egg, that does make up for it, but this just reinforces the need for a tutorial. I have very little understanding of how things work. I also need more feed back on the things I click on. Trying to go into the Horny Harpy should tell me that it's closed for renovations or a when it will be open or something, and everything in the game should kind of be like that.

4 The players walk cycle is wrong. The character always appears to be stepping forward with the same foot, so the walk animation just looks weird.

5 BUG REPORT opening the menue with X opens a duplicate menue every time you try and close it. It only happens once per menu opeing but it is annoying.

6 BUG REPORT randomly the players walk inputs get weird, and pushing any kee will result in them walking a random direction, leting go of all keys may also cause them to walk in a random direction for several minutes.

I'm sure I have more, but I cant keep them straight in my head right now.

[Appo]

Hey Sulac.

I’m really inspired by your game concept so much so that I’ve been collecting days worth of thoughts of what mechanics and atmosphere I’d love to see in this style of game. I have no idea if our visions will align in any way but I offer mine in hopes I can inspire you in turn. I am of the impression that you’re planning a monster rancher game where there is consistent upwards growth of your ranch in line with something like stardew valley. The idea I’ve been mulling over is more rogue-like than stardew and a more punishing.

Please let me know what you think. I've written this for myself so the language won't be as though I'm making suggestions and is more like I'm dictating to myself.

Overview

Spoiler: show

My idea is that the game would be something like ‘Don’t Starve’ not in terms of gameplay but in terms of atmosphere. There are lots of choices to be made and tough decisions to try and stay on top of your finances while hurdles are constantly being thrown in front of you. Additionally like Ericant’s ‘A High Stakes Game,’ there should always be an understanding that defeat is like the sword of Damocles hanging over the player. A few unlucky rolls of the dice could see the player losing a lot of progress or worse.

Another similar game in terms of mechanics I quite enjoyed was Journeyman’s game Ultimate Blackjack. One way of describing the goal of the game is to accrue money by pseudo-random chance until you win. At no point until you’ve actually won is there no possibility of random chance not completely screwing you over until you lose no matter how good you may be at blackjack. This is what I envision for a monster rancher game only without there ever actually being a win state. You accrue money, capital, training etc… for it’s own sake but these things also function like a buffer between you and being eaten though no matter how large the buffer there is still a path to defeat no matter how unlikely.

I’d analogise the atmosphere to building a sandcastle against a rising tide. You build the best ranch you can but like with the Martingale gambling strategy there is always the chance that you lose more times than you can afford to. Maybe some of your sandcastle is washed away but you can rebuild. Maybe so much is damaged that you’ll never be able to get ready for the next wave and you’re resigned to waiting for it to hit.

How miserable.

Dates and Times

Spoiler: show

I recommend that the game be broken up into 7 day weeks and 28 day month/seasons like in stardew valley. The importance of this is that periodic events are more predictable to the player. You could have events occur randomly with no respect for weeks or seasons but incrementing like this promotes the player to consider their actions more than random chance does.

This also allows for cool mechanisms that I’ll suggest like shows and seasonal effects that provide further opportunities and obstacles.

Monster Girls

Spoiler: show

Monsters girls with low health produce less. This is mainly important for cow girls since they are responsible for a lot of passive income.

Sick
Monster girls can become sick occasionally which constantly lowers their health until they are healed. Sick monster girls are worth only 10% of their original value. Healing a monster girl costs roughly 50% of the cost of the monster girl. It’s often the case that sick monster girls should just be fed to another monster girl.
Unique scene for sick monster girls being eaten.

Pregnant
Getting monster girls pregnant can be an effective way of making extra money if you have the money to attempt it. Alternatively it can be a cash pit that drains away your funds if you’re too eager.

You can fuck the monster girls once a day. This makes them quite a lot hungrier and effectively costs 100-200g per fuck in food. There is a 10% chance that the monster girl becomes pregnant as a result but it’s not revealed to the player if a monster girl becomes pregnant for three weeks at which point their model has a swollen belly. This means that making many attempts at getting a monster girl pregnant is probably going to be very costly in addition to being a waste of money. It would be more sensible to fuck a monster girl only once or twice each month if you want to get them pregnant.

Young
Young monster girls just take up food while they’re growing. They require half as much food as an adult while being worth only 25% of their adult value. Young monster girls can’t get sick or have any other status effects until they become adults.

The Landlord and Rent

Spoiler: show

Rent must be paid monthly to a bullyish dragon girl landlord. She will buy monster girls from your ranch and eat them if you can’t pay. If you don’t have enough monster girls to pay her she eats you instead. The rent fee is exorbitant starting at 2,000g for the first month and increasing from there.

Every 90 days in addition to taking rent the dragon girl will evaluate your ranch. This is done by simple summing the value of the entire ranch if all the girls and items were sold for 100% of their worth (unless they have a modifier such as sick) and the player’s current funds. If the ranch doesn’t meet a certain threshold of value the landlord eats the player. If it exceeds a certain threshold the landlord will improve the ranch by adding some new features but also increasing the rent required each month. This essentially advances the game through different acts.

An important not on this mechanism; having a lot of unspent money gives the player safety in flexibility since if some tragedy befalls the ranch they can cover its cost. However unspent money still counts towards the evaluation despite it not being invested into making the player even more money. It’s best to spend your money investing in more monster girls to increase your revenue but then again a rainy day fund is also useful! It should be like balancing on a tightrope.

Shows

Spoiler: show

The primary function of shows is to earn large amounts of money to pay rent. This is almost exclusively the only way to earn enough money to pay rent each month.

Predator girls can be sent to compete in shows every 7th day. They’re put up against 4 other predator girls from other fictional ranches. The performance of a predator girl will be determined by their stats.

Competing in a show drains the health of the predator girl through exhaustion and predator girls perform worse at shows if they have low health. An important aspect of this feature to shows is that health will be drained faster by weekly shows than it can reasonably be replenished through being full. A monster girl will be able to compete roughly once every fortnight in order for their health just to be maintained, every week to drain health and every three weeks to replenish it.

This introduces an element of risk for the monster girl and player. Repeated shows for a monster girl will increase the risk for the monster girl coming last and being devoured. It may be necessary for the player to push their monster girls beyond their limits in this way to make rent especially if they don’t have many predator girls to rotate. If the monster girl does get eaten the same may happen to the player shortly as they’re now down a potentially expensive monster girl and without prise money all while losing a monster girl for more competitions.

Entering into a competition is free and will likely return large rewards depending on how they place in the rankings. Rewards are 2,000g, 800g, 400g, and 100g for first through fourth respectively with additional consequences for first and last place. The worst rated monster girl in the show gets eaten by the best rated monster girl so it’s important to send quality girls. This is a double whammy type effect for winning since the meal boosts the stats of the winner and if the player loses they’re down a potentially very expensive predator.

The stat that is being tested is announced before committing to the show and is decided at random. The player might want to be maximising a stat to perform really well in some shows and neglecting attendance at other shows or they might moderate all their stats to attend many events. This also puts pressure on the player to consider competing in a show they’re not suited for if money is lacking at great risk to them.

Herbivore Girls

Spoiler: show

Cow Girls

Cow girls are a cash cow (pun intended) which produce a mostly reliable low level of income. They produce money each day and require food each day giving a net income of ~20g each day. This roughly correlates to the amount required to feed one additional monster girl per cow girl. They are not a monster girl that is capable of satisfying the landlord’s rent because the money they make per day is low.

Lazy
The function of the lazy modifier is to introduce more management responsibility for the player. Additionally the random chance of having lazy cow girls means that the reliable cash flow from the cow girl could dry up unexpectedly posing a risk to the player making rent though it's generally reliable.

Cow girls have a small random chance to become lazy and stop producing as much milk. During this time they require twice as much food and produce half as much milk making them cost on average ~40g per day. If the player notices they can chide the cow girl who will become considerable less happy and have a 50% chance to become productive again. If this causes the cow girl to drop to 0% happiness she becomes depressed and can’t be returned to normal unless returned to 100% happiness (which takes weeks and would cost more than the cost of the cow girl). While lazy the cow girl is worth only 25% of her normal value (which is a possible way to confirm that the cow girl is lazy) and while depressed she is worth only 5%.

Predator Girls

Spoiler: show

Voracious

Unhappy and hungry predator girls may randomly eat the player. It may be necessary at times to penny pinch and not feed predator girls as much as they need to stay happy. Additionally the player might need to feed the monster girl food that makes them unhappy in order to boost their stats to better compete in shows. There is a balance to taking care of predator girls.

Arrogant

The purpose of the arrogant modifier is to nerf high quality predator girls so that if one becomes amazingly good and consistently wins shows they may become more of a burden than they’re worth. It’s therefore important to manage the quality of your girls and send decently high quality girls to shows without letting them win too often and have that go to their head.
Arrogant girls will only eat high quality foods that cost three times the normal amount and get very unhappy very quickly if not fed. They also do not have to be hungry to decide to eat the player if they’re unhappy.

Lamia girls
While voracious lamia girls may make a comment about how tasty the player looks since they’re so hungry. The player can then either punish them or ignore the comment. If the player punishes the lamia girl she loses about a weeks worth of health regeneration but the player is absolutely sure to avoid being eaten. If the player ignores the comment there is a 10% chance the naga then sneaks up to the player and eats him.

The importance of this mechanism is that food and happiness are linked to health which is linked to show performance. Getting your lamia upset will lead you to punish her which isn’t ideal since it lowers show performance. Alternatively if you’re scraping by on low funds you might find it necessary to skimp on feeding her so much and take some risk on yourself in order to win shows.
Unique scene for hungry lamia girl eating the player

Young Lamia Girl
Young Lamia girls produce while still growing unlike other monster girls. They grow scales every day as they rapidly moult their skin. This is actually worthless to the player and is entirely a trap because there is a flat 20% chance the lamia girl will eat the player each time he collects from her as she is very aggressive and impulsive. The numbers are never worth it to be messing with a young lamia girl.

Harpy girls
While voracious harpy girls may request to go on a hunting trip. If the player refuses the harpy there is a 10% chance it will eat the player in retaliation. If the harpy is allowed to go on a hunt it will be gone for 1-7 days during which it isn’t available before returning. There is also a 20% chance it never returns as the harpy was eaten itself.

Mermaid girls
Mermaid girls produce a bit more than other predator girls and are a bit cheaper than other girls however they won’t compete in shows or produce at all during winter, it’s too cold. This poses a seasonal challenge to the player. If they are too reliant on mermaid girls without saving during the other seasons they will be under a lot of pressure to make the winter rental payment.

Gambling

Spoiler: show

Gambling is the last resort of a desperate player. It has poor odds and is very likely to lead to the player being eaten but it may be all that the player can do to feed their monster girls or pay rent if misfortune befalls them.

The player can only bet 100g at a time. They have a 40% chance of winning double their money and a 60% of losing it. If the player doesn’t have enough money to pay they can choose to go all in and put their own body on the line. In this case the dealer changes the odds and the player only has a 20% chance of winning but if they win they get 1,000g as a reward. This shouldn’t be quite enough to pay rent but it’s close.

Goals

Spoiler: show

The proper thought process for a player trying to survive the game as best they can will be to consistently be maintaining all their monster girls every day while attempting to reach certain milestones.

Short term

The player will want to compete in as many shows as they can so long as they have a reasonably healthy predator girl. These occur every 7 days and the player will be planning towards making sure their intended monster girl is ready each week.

Mid term

The player must make rent every month and so they will be planning their finances around acquiring enough money to do this. This is going to involve buying more monster girls for shows and possibly skimping a bit on feeding them.

Long term

The player’s long term goal is to create a good monster girl ranch. The leap forward on this front happens every 90 days where the player is evaluated for the quality of their ranch. This long term goal should always be in the back of the player’s mind but they will automatically work towards it by achieving their short and mid term goals.

Mathematics

Spoiler: show

If you are interested in anything like the style of game I’m proposing I will be able to do the number crunching to make sure the economy of the game is fair but challenging for the player if you wanted me to. If you this idea of building a sandcastle against the tide then an important note about the fairness and randomness in a game like this is that you don’t actually have to be fair if you give the player a save button! In this case it’s absolutely fine to set the player up for defeat by giving them bad odds.

For example if you send a 5000g lamia to a show with a 500g average reward and a 25% chance of being eaten you’re making on average -750g per show. However given a save function the player can force the timeline to include more wins than the odds would predict. Take ‘A High Stakes Game’ by Erecant. The odds of getting to the newest content in one life might be close to 1% but everyone does it because they can reset the paths that lead to being eaten.

Of course if you’re doing this you want to avoid the temptation of save scumming. For this I recommend allowing saves only the day after a show or at the start of a month so that it would be too bothersome to save scum every chance event however when it becomes necessary for the player to influence their fate they don’t have to restart the game.

I know this is a lot to read. I'll thank you for whatever consideration you give these ideas and I'm looking forward to whatever game you make.

[Bright]

Wow appo you put a lot of thought into that post. Would you be open for giving feedback on other games?

[Appo]

I really got carried away with thinking about this game because it's all mechanics and not story. The story is the history of what you do.

I've been thinking a bit about other game systems and how they manage pseudo-random chance . A monster girl ranch setting is an amazing opportunity to implement enough simple mechanisms with degrees of randomness such that the player can't figure out a best solution, only good solutions. This while choosing to enact plans that takes on risk to the player willingly and having them backfire, or even just the threat of them backfiring, leaves the player in a state of looking for solutions on a sinking ship. I can't imagine something more miserable and I really am trying.

What game would you suggest I have a look at? Has anyone made a vore themed rogue-like?

[Sulac]

OK so a few criticisms. ...

Let me first state that this game is still in a very early state. Some of the issues you've pointed out are due to this reason. Still, thank you for your input. In response to your comment specifically...

Tutorial: There is a brief "How to Play" section in the first post, but I suppose an in-game tutorial wouldn't be unreasonable. I'll see about implementing something.

Too big: This has been noted before. Again, due to the game's early state, I've only implemented a small amount of the content I'm planning. That said, speeding up transitions a bit should be a simple thing.

Prices: Balance is tricky! And yeah, more clarification is definitely needed.

Walk cycle: I'm not entirely happy with it either. Thought it seemed at least decent to me? *shrug*

Bugs: I'm already aware of both of these. The menu bug I know an easy way to fix. The movement issue is a lot more complicated. I'll see what I can do, though.

Hey Sulac. ...

Hoo, that's a lot. First, let me say that I am going to dismiss some of this out of hand due to not fitting what I'm planning with this game. But for the specifics...

Calendar: A proper calendar system like Stardew Valley was the original plan. However, there currently isn't enough content to justify it yet. Once more has been added to the game, I'll implement a full calendar system.

Monster Girls: Sickness is something I intend to eventually add to the game. Pregnancy is actually coming in the next update! Though you'll be hiring someone to come fuck the monster girl, and the actual pregnancy will be a lot shorter and simpler than what you've stated here. The player fucking the monster girls himself is being considered, though. Young monster girls is another idea I've had, but I'm not certain if it should be implemented right away.

Rent: That's... actually something I hadn't considered. I'm not certain if it's something I'll add, but I'll keep it in mind, at least.

Shows: I'm already planning this for after the Breeding Update. I am also planning on more than just a fairly generic "stat competition". But that's for a later time.

Herbivore and Predator Girls: Interesting ideas, though I'm not too keen on them. Especially for the predators. I've stated before in this thread, but I don't like the idea of getting a sudden game over due to poorly interacting with your monster girls. Though various ideas for penalties for being eaten have been suggested, and are being considered.

Gambling: Ehh, not a fan. Maybe very later on? I dunno.

Again, I want to thank both of you for your input and feedback. It helps me keep this project alive!

[J3DGTS]

It's taking WAY too long for my cowgirl to die. I'm intentionally trying to kill her to see what happens, yet it's been well over 50 days and shes still alive. I'm on day 83 now, and her health has now dipped into the red. Regardless, it's still taking a lot longer to die than I originally thought

update:
Day 91, still not dead. However I found a weird bug. http://prntscr.com/j1zdnn

[Sulac]

...I guess I never considered that someone would intentionally try to kill monster girls through neglect. Right now, they don't actually die no matter how low their health goes.

I guess that's something that needs to be added, huh...

Also, the day counter bug has been noted already and will be fixed in the next update.

[J3DGTS]

Ohh okay thanks for the info. Not sure if you mentioned it, but when is the next update likely to happen? (Also I tried killing the cowgirl because I thought in order to feed a girl to a cowgirl, they had to be dead, due to the "[name] won't eat live prey" so I tried killing one)

[Appo]

Sounds like you've got a good idea for what you want the game to be. I think it's going to be really good and I'm looking forward to playing it.

[vorelectric]

I love this concept so far and will always welcome new game content to the forums, but, mostly asking out of curiosity than anything, have you thought of adding in any lore into the game? Or have you thought of a story to put in eventually?

I know the game is in too early a stage to even think about such things, but as a writer (And current editor of another game on here) I can't help but question the reasons for why someone would even be willing to start a farm where they have the potential to be eaten everyday, or why the monster girls themselves would be willing to live on a farm in the first place, unless, of course, Monster girls in this universe aren't nearly as intelligent as full blooded humans are (Food for thought? ) On that note, do regular animals/monsters still exist? If so, then why risk raising monster girls if their regular counterparts are so much tamer and less dangerous to handle?

To be perfectly frank, we, as players, can surmise a lot of the simpler stuff in this world without context (And, again, it's a little too early to be putting in lore anyway I still admit) but keep in mind that a little lore can go a long way in developing a game.

Good luck on the programming mate. I hope you can get the core mechanics of the game working properly in the future.

[Anesthetic]

OK so a few criticisms. ...

Let me first state that this game is still in a very early state. Some of the issues you've pointed out are due to this reason. Still, thank you for your input. In response to your comment specifically...

Tutorial: There is a brief "How to Play" section in the first post, but I suppose an in-game tutorial wouldn't be unreasonable. I'll see about implementing something.

Too big: This has been noted before. Again, due to the game's early state, I've only implemented a small amount of the content I'm planning. That said, speeding up transitions a bit should be a simple thing.

Prices: Balance is tricky! And yeah, more clarification is definitely needed.

Walk cycle: I'm not entirely happy with it either. Thought it seemed at least decent to me? *shrug*

Bugs: I'm already aware of both of these. The menu bug I know an easy way to fix. The movement issue is a lot more complicated. I'll see what I can do, though.

Ok then, let me give you some sugestions but first another Bug Report.

There appears to be no such thing as a Harpy Egg++ it tells you that you recieve one but when you go to sell it it's just a Harpy Egg+

1 To make harpies more monatarially valuable I would say that you need to ensure that when you get an egg it always lands on a day where you would have gotten nothing.

As it is right now if the egg lands on a day where you would have gotten feathers, you lose out on the feathers. So ensuring that when you get an egg the previous, and next days would have feathers drop would make them more valuable then cow girls.

Also the Lamias are worthless as they are. Their scales aren't even as valuable as basic Harpy Eggs, and they grant them less often. So for how expensive they are they really need to have their scales made MASSIVELY more valuable, or granted another drop they can give.

2 Give the monster sales lady dialogue options that tell the player a rundown of what the monster girls do, foods they like, and what they yeild in terms of dropps.

Also since the monster girls you buy are random, I would say that their should be a re-roll button, so we can change the monsters appearance if we want something else.

3 The walk cycle is just very jittery it could use more frames, and the legs need to alternate which one is stepping forward.

4 Lastly your house should be a single room with the bed right next to the door. There is no reason for it to have multiple rooms and be so big when the only important item in it is your bed.

[bloodwolfvamp]

i think ill wait till later to download game but if yuo could mod a stardew on steam id jump on that heck id even get it on steam to have a vore mod

[Anesthetic]

i think ill wait till later to download game but if yuo could mod a stardew on steam id jump on that heck id even get it on steam to have a vore mod

There's a Starbound Vore Mod.

[Turbotowns]

HALLELUJAH! A vore game that's been in the works released! Today is a good day!

[CakePisces]

This game is awesome, have not played it yet but I have read the comments, can't wait to play it. Though I hope someday to have some kind of a "relationship level?" (too much but thats why I said someday XD) and have some variety of interactions like letting them eat you or something like that (someday...XD)

[Turbotowns]

Having now played it... Are sounds coming in a later update? Or am I missing some files. Which I might since I got this bug after buying 2 cowgirls and some food for them, I got a "bug-report-error-type-thing". I'd upload a screenshot, but I didn't think to take one when I got it, and it hasn't happened again yet, it happened the first time when I was trying to feed them, but on my second attempt I was able to feed them just fine.