itch.io

Inspired by taking boyfriend through the story for the first time:

That worked, thanks!

Roger, trying from the "Telling Jean to recruit Khenbish/Themba/Wolf" point.

Oh wow, if I click ignore to push past it it send me to the Colonel's Mansion event.

After it offers you the navigation tutorial, nothing appears on the maps for a moment, then it throws the following exception. Happens whether you ask for the tutorial or skip. This was on loading a previous save (Arts, Kota has the lounge, recruited Khenbish.)

[code]

I'm sorry, but an uncaught exception occurred.

While running game code:

  File "game/script_hinterlands.rpy", line 1142, in script

    call screen HinterlandsNavigation()

  File "renpy/common/000statements.rpy", line 569, in execute_call_screen

    store._return = renpy.call_screen(name, *args, **kwargs)

  File "game/custom_screens.rpy", line 783, in execute

    screen HinterlandsNavigation():

  File "game/custom_screens.rpy", line 783, in execute

    screen HinterlandsNavigation():

  File "game/custom_screens.rpy", line 785, in execute

    for location in hinterlands_locations:

  File "game/custom_screens.rpy", line 785, in <module>

    for location in hinterlands_locations:

NameError: name 'hinterlands_locations' is not defined

-- Full Traceback ------------------------------------------------------------

Full traceback:

  File "game/script_hinterlands.rpy", line 1142, in script

    call screen HinterlandsNavigation()

  File "renpy/ast.py", line 2009, in execute

    self.call("execute")

  File "renpy/ast.py", line 1997, in call

    return renpy.statements.call(method, parsed, *args, **kwargs)

  File "renpy/statements.py", line 278, in call

    return method(parsed, *args, **kwargs)

  File "renpy/common/000statements.rpy", line 569, in execute_call_screen

    store._return = renpy.call_screen(name, *args, **kwargs)

  File "renpy/exports.py", line 3057, in call_screen

    rv = renpy.ui.interact(mouse="screen", type="screen", roll_forward=roll_forward)

  File "renpy/ui.py", line 298, in interact

    rv = renpy.game.interface.interact(roll_forward=roll_forward, **kwargs)

  File "renpy/display/core.py", line 3276, in interact

    repeat, rv = self.interact_core(preloads=preloads, trans_pause=trans_pause, pause=pause, pause_start=pause_start, **kwargs)

  File "renpy/display/core.py", line 3693, in interact_core

    root_widget.visit_all(lambda i : i.per_interact())

  File "renpy/display/core.py", line 567, in visit_all

    d.visit_all(callback, seen)

  File "renpy/display/core.py", line 567, in visit_all

    d.visit_all(callback, seen)

  File "renpy/display/core.py", line 567, in visit_all

    d.visit_all(callback, seen)

  File "renpy/display/screen.py", line 432, in visit_all

    callback(self)

  File "renpy/display/core.py", line 3693, in <lambda>

    root_widget.visit_all(lambda i : i.per_interact())

  File "renpy/display/screen.py", line 443, in per_interact

    self.update()

  File "renpy/display/screen.py", line 631, in update

    self.screen.function(**self.scope)

  File "game/custom_screens.rpy", line 783, in execute

    screen HinterlandsNavigation():

  File "game/custom_screens.rpy", line 783, in execute

    screen HinterlandsNavigation():

  File "game/custom_screens.rpy", line 785, in execute

    for location in hinterlands_locations:

  File "game/custom_screens.rpy", line 785, in <module>

    for location in hinterlands_locations:

NameError: name 'hinterlands_locations' is not defined

Windows-10-10.0.19041

Ren'Py 7.4.6.1693

Minotaur Hotel 0.6.2

Fri Oct 14 14:38:33 2022

[/code]

Am I understanding correctly that this just expands the Hinterlands, it does not proceed onward beyond the current To Be Continued in the main story?

Secondly, will this be compatible with old Hinterlands saves? If you've had something count as "done" for the P's notebook skip scene previously, will it still count as "done?"

That makes a lot of sense to me, yeah

I think you've correctly identified the source of the problem, too, in that the characterization that MC has been given is too easy to miss. I don't think it's because it's too subtle, it's because it's camouflaged. Things that you've cited as character choices are phrased and presented in a way where they could be plausibly interpreted as excuses for the self-insert blank slate: we see the MC is thoughtful and methodical, we know a character would need to be that to always let the player explore as much as they want, and therefore we assume this is a gameplay decision that the narrative is rationalizing and not an actual trait the character has.  He's inquisitive, and because a character would have to be inquisitive to dig into Kota's past, or ask for all the explanations of how the research and exploration systems work, we therefore assume that's why he's inquisitive. Because of the genre of the story, and the form it's told in, it doesn't occur to us to think of these traits as more than a storytelling convenience.

I do think the best solution is to just be less ambiguous about the characterization that's already there. Subtlety is good, I'm a fan of it, but because this subtly is being masked behind what looks like game structure, and the expectations thereof, we don't even notice it's there at all.

1. I think some soft slave play might work really well. Have Asterion really want to pamper the MC, play up how he's always been trying to put himself in a subordinate role, let him really go wild with that. Maybe make Asterion have to talk MC into letting him do so, especially if they've made lots of "stop calling me master" choices. There's ways to eroticize the MC's ability to give "orders" and (on top of being HOT) it's a not uncommonly reported method of taking agency over past abuse, to turn it into kinky scenarios (though it should be emphasized that this isn't an approach that automatically works for everyone.)
2. You could use the "control over Asterion's body" to some interesting effect, I think. Maybe as simple as a "...so what happens if I just ORDER you to become horny? Does that work?"
3. I can see Asterion spouting extremely elegant and extravagant, to the point of being a little self consciously silly, poetic praises of whatever part of MC's body his lips happen to on right now.
4. 'Sauna' is definitely good. But I'd also consider having horny possible extensions to already existing R&D projects, if they are completed AFTER the relationship becomes sexual. The Gym and the Pool come to immediate mind as good possibilities.
5. I think Asterion might conceivably be uncomfortable with a sling/sex swing, or anything which might remind him of the cow Daedalus built Pasiphae. 
6. The scene where the MC examines the nose ring, and handling it put Asterion almost into a trance, seems me to be foreshadowing horny applications. Like, gentle pressure down on it to get him on his knees, for example.
7. Asterion's got far too much chest and torso in general to not be able to use it to good effect. Like just bury MC's face between his pecs.
8. I think Asterion's the kind of person who falls in love with someone over a shared task (like, well, running a hotel) But like, the kind of "collaborators to friends to lovers" path. So i think he'd like some activity that then turns into passionately making out. I could see him getting the kind of performance anxiety that comes from having to initiate sex from like a cold start, as it were. I could see him much preferring sort of semi-spontaneous "oh you're brushing my back, oh, something about this feels good..." kind of scenario. Similarly, I could see him liking scenarios where he doesn't have to think about things, doesn't have to make decisions, where he can just be told "use your physical strength and sexy man-body in such and such a way." He'd be submissive because he's got the kind of personality that feels the guilty and therefore more uncomfortable with the sex the more responsible for it they are, so he'd like someone else to call the shots.

Probably because it's not "manly," ie, it's sweet and fruit flavored. I don't know about the rest of the world, but in America the stereotype is that tops are masculine and bottoms are feminine, and that sweet drinks are feminine.

While I could imagine there being some kind of "drink code," meant for clandestine flirting and hookups, in which different drinks mean specific things similar to hanky code, I could find no evidence of this being the case.

Recursion.

I feel like that tone deaf "diversity ranking" chart that was going around yesterday had memetic potential:

I got the impression that Altan's "I have a... friend... who has a gay son, and he's really hardworking and (list of qualities that could describe Khenbish) and he's worried about what his father will think if he finds out" speech to the  MC was a "yes, I know, but I can't openly know until he decides to tell me."

I'm not sure how spoiler-out we can get in this thread, so I'll just say: I wonder what was in that package he got in the last hangout, I never found out? Would I have if I'd had other, non-Khenbish details, arranged differently?

Khenbish's subroute was really good. I'd say it 100% confirms the "players care about the characters that have a lot of content explaining them" proposition.

...and that was the most insightful, most tender, and most evocative description of a blowjob I've ever read.

Never have I been proven so immediately incorrect.

Thanks very much to all who attended! For those who missed it, you can watch the "I Make My Boyfriend Rank MinoHotel Characters Based Only On What He Can Glean From Memes" VoD here: https://www.twitch.tv/videos/1469500666

As if this was the only one of those! Or as if it worked!

Because the three characters are similarly instigators of chaotic, unexpected, wacky schemes, but for wildly different purposes and intentions.

It's Mr Bean, yeah.

And the lady is Amelie, from "Amelie," starring Amelie as Amelie.

I feel this image is entirely self explanatory.

Quick Update: Last minute scheduling conflicts came up, so we'll be doing this NEXT Thursday. April 28th, 12 noon pacific time.

Superb, thank you!

So, last week my boyfriend asked me to set up a casual stream game, where he had to rank echo project characters--none of whose VN's he's played--based only on what he can guess about them from a collection of memes the fan discord had produced. We had a lot of fun and I think it went well.

And then someone requested we do another one for Mino Hotel.

So, I'm asking for your help collecting the material. I've already raided the Meme thread here, but if you've got anything else, please post it or send it to me. I won't be including spoilers (for example, anything that gives away who Jean is) and I might slap a censor box on things to avoid violating Twitch TOS, but anything you've got will be considered!

The stream is this Thursday, so I guess the deadline is midnight Wed April 20th.

First one makes me feel unsettlingly visible...

Not necessarily: he has to to kill the person playing "Argos" because, in the story, "Hermes" kills "Argos." Which is what sets "Io" free. So, presumably, his reasoning is that Asterion is in captivity, making him count as "Io" and then freeing "Io" will undo that. If that is his plan, and if it works, then presumably nobody else has to die.

So I guess in this case, the role of "Hera" would be Athena? As the architect of "Io"'s captivity whom Hermes is thwarting.

I seem to be alone in this, but I feel like Luke and Themba would fit really well. Luke's a bratty loudmouth bottom, Themba's a straight-laced kinky top, they both seem like they'd be comfortable having a purely sexual dom/sub thing with no romantic attachments.

That was the EXACT picture I was thinking of when this occurred to me!

This just now hit me, but I now feel sure I know what's going on with "Jean."

The key was in how hard he tries to talk you into a relationship with Asterion.

We know he voted against Athena's plan. We know he wants to free Asterion completely. And we know he's behind the Argoi, and therefore chose the pseudonym 'Argos' for them, deliberately. And in his attempt at killing Nikos and then Pedro, he doesn't lose control and slip into recursion until AFTER you interrupt his attempt to kill Nikos. The killing of Nikos, of Argos, then, is intentional, and part of the plan. Which must mean that his use of recursion is intentional: presumably, by bringing to bear enough recursion on the labyrinth, he hoped he could override the story with a different one, one in which he wins, and one in which the person in the Io role is released from captivity.

To do that he has to cast as many roles as possible. Io is easy, Asterion's already a cow in captivity. Hermes disguised as a mortal is easy, too, that's his role already. Argos needed time and an opportunity, but when he saw one with the establishment of the hotel, he took it, and put his own agents into the system. Their actual instructions are irrelevant. It didn't matter, to Hermes, whether any individual Argos succeeded or failed, he just needed them to be "a captor" and "called Argos."

So why act NOW? Why during your tenure and not Clement's or Jean Marie's? Why, when Nikos returns to the hotel, does he say that Hermes has suddenly decided to take action? What does that have to do with his nosiness about your and Asterion's relationship?

Because he thinks the final role is finally cast. A Master, a Supreme Lord according to the laws of the Olympians, who is IN LOVE with the Io.

Hermes needed to a wait for an MC who could play Zeus's role.

Allow me to present my findings:

Ishmael and Greta were the only ones who ever took me out of the narrative.

I guess Luke's trucker always kinda looked like he was wearing a fake moustache? But not enough that I didn't want to rewatch the scene.

I'm actually going to argue against updating Jean, there's a real subtle 'painted on the side of an urn' quality to him, and I feel like that'd be really easy to lose.

It's hard to not favor Khembish, he's the only one we KNOW has actually competed at this. That might put him at a disadvantage, if he falls into the "reads signals that aren't there because his opponent is too new at this to even be aware of the meta" thing? I think he'd still be very much able to hold his own though.

Themba, well, Themba is very large. Just an enormous heap of a man. Can easily picture him just standing there, arms akimbo, not even reacting as Luke or P shoves on his chest in vain like he's a stuck door.

P's principle advantage is that it's impossible to sneak up on him. Dunno what police/merc training he might have had, but in terms of sheer mass he's probably the smallest.

Luke isn't going to be able to resist the chance to feel his opponents up, and will be disqualified. To which he will respond "worth it!"

I don't know if Kota knows any Sumo or not. He might be grumpy about people assuming "just because I'm from Japan, therefore I must know Sumo? You are from America, Luke, do you know all of Dolly Parton's songs by heart?!" and that backfires because it turns out that yes, Luke very much does.

Robert's had so many "surprise! hidden depths!" moments that I think the swerve here is that he does not, in fact, have this one. He's never wrestled before. He has a desk job. The closest he came, I think, was debate club at Hell Law School.

Nikos is difficult. The rules say any body part other than the feet, and he doesn't have those. If he can compete, then the ability to wind up around someone, like he does to Asterion in the first encounter, has some real strategic possibilities. If not, well, MC can always summon him a referee shirt.

I could see Storm going in a bit cocky. He's young and well-built, and he might assume that'll be enough to carry him. I'd put him as the most likely to get fully owned by Khembish. On the other hand, he's lived on the streets for a while, he may know just out of necessity a thing or two about handling himself in a physical confrontation. I'd want him to wind up facing P, and then an attempt at a tackle puts them both on the floor in a compromising position, like within inches of kissing, and it's cute.

The Cobalts have their own separate division, and indeed get bored and begin wrestling with eachother DURING Khembish's attempt to explain the rules.

Wolf has no idea what's going on, but is more than content to play tug of war with an old sock he found if anyone wants to?

Asterion is probably the second most likely to have actual training, something akin to Pankraton. The difficulty might be convincing him to actually use what he knows and not just roll over. I could see using 'whether he's willing to actually compete' as a barometer of how much the MC has built up his self confidence to this point. What might be neat is if, instead of wrestling, he winds up with a version of that Cretan "grab the bull's horns and do a flip over his back" sport, from the murals?

MC I could see interacting with the event with prompts similar to the ones from the scene in the Deep Hotel. Maybe there's some background specific ones in there? Like, "Leadership" lets you play on your opponent's psychology to distract them, or "Arts" gives you the option to do a mock pro-wrestling promo, where you point at the sign on the front of the hotel (they love it when you point at the sign!) Nobody but Luke gets it. Luke thinks it's hilarious.

I like the idea that "as the hotel becomes more complete, and as the staff grows, you find yourself with more time to get the things done you want to do." That's a good touch of ludonarrative convergence.

Ok, this seems relevant. Who told you to put it like that, Argos?

...could this, if necessary, be used to create a kind of... Emergency Exit, to Hades? If for some reason the Hotel had to be evacuated but returning to the ordinary mortal world wasn't an option?

Flawed, certainly, but Athena isn't that kind of... impulsive is maybe the word I'd use? I think if a story had her doing something like this, something that requires this level of planning, logistics, negotiation, and strategy--all things she's admittedly good at--for no more reason than "just because," I'd say that story wasn't being fair to Athena

Even in stories with an antagonistic Athena, such as Arachne, or an outright evil Athena-equivalent, such as the Wicked and the Divine, I don't think a story gets to call an Athena "Athena" unless there's a reason for what she does and plans. That reason might be misguided, harmful, imperialistic, even insane, but she'd have to be the only Olympian who I just plain wouldn't ever buy that she's acting on pure whimsy.

This is a question that's growing on me, the last few playthroughs.

What vote records are currently discoverable make it clear that Athena, specifically, wanted the labyrinth. This was her idea, she moved heaven and earth (literally in the persons of Zeus and Demeter) to make it happen, to the point that she didn't care who could tell she was rigging the trial, and then even demanded a recount which she then adulterated. Why? Why does it matter to her that Asterion have his own private hell dimension forever?

One possibility is the way that a lot of the current scholarship seems to accuse Athens, Athenian historians and poets and playwrights, of skewing the mythological body of Ancient Greece to give Athens a more important place within the lore: Athens, as an inhabited site, is not as old as places like Mycenae, Sparta, Corinth, Arcadia, or especially Crete, but because they were the ones writing the history and doing the theatre contests and establish the academies, the version of ancient Greek history and myth that gets passed to us is THEIR version. The Narrator says as much themselves, cites the Orestia as an example, which ends with Athena talking the furies into "legal justice" rather than "revenge" and inventing Due Process, in Athens, which is ridiculous. So maybe this was an attempt at something like that? Maybe Athena thought, oh, I need the fact that Athens won and Crete lost to be something that everyone gets always reminded of forever, I can't let it be forgotten in the underworld.

Another possibility is that Athena's fallen into Recursion, the same way Hermes does at the (current) end. Setting up a labyrinth with a human master who torments Asterion might be recursive, with the succession of Masters standing in for Theseus. But it's also possible that it's a recursion of the older rivalry against Poseidon: hell, Theseus himself might be a recursion of that. Asterion being of Poseidonic lineage, and part of an actual sacred Bull-Themed lineage, as his underworld trial explains, might be reason enough. The question, though, is if it is recursion, is it DELIBERATE? The recursion Hermes fell into seems to have been partially intentional on his part, he set up the Argoi, which means the first step of his plan to free Asterion was "make the situation more like one of his myths," presumably in the hope that recursion makes it more likely to succeed. So, was Athena trying to accomplish something to which she meant to connect Asterion's punishment? Have him re-enact the labyrinth as a power source? Or, is it possible it's not HER recursion, it's Asterion's? According to Robert he's maybe much more powerful than he knows, so perhaps his recursion, like, gravity well is powerful enough to pull Athena into orbit?

A third possibility has to do with what Robert tells you about Asterion's soul, that it's been "drained" in some way. Now, it's possible this happened at the initial actual killing, something to do with why the Labrys is the way that it is, but it's also possible that draining him and keeping him drained is what the labyrinth is supposed to do? I don't think there's enough material yet to speculate as to why.

The final possibility I can see is that it's something to do with the way mythicals are marginalized in this world. We seem to be dealing with a somewhat... right-wing Athena, let's say, one who emphasizes Law and Order and The March of Progress and Civilization. Humans, then, could be aligned with Athena (every background you can pick, except "speedrunner," is something that falls under her patronage,) and non-humans with Poseidon (since Hermes' vote mentions her grudge against Poseidon's "lineage.")  I could see this leading thematically into a mandate that people who are clearly not human are required to remain invisible with the charm and passport system. Whether that means she instituted the first one, just divinely inspired them, or just happens to like them, they do seem to be thematically congruent.

I love how dumb this format is.