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The information below is for testers, but anyone with bug reports, suggestions, feature requests, etc is of course welcome to post here.


Thanks for offering to help test the game. I hope you enjoy playing it despite it's imperfect state! I'm eager to hear feedback and criticism on pretty much every aspect of the game, but especially the following:

1. Gameplay
I think this is the most important thing, because if the core gameplay isn't fun who will care that the characters can be customized? Testers, please play the game and tell me honestly what you think. What aspects are fun and what aspects could be more fun? How is the difficulty? What things would you do to improve it? Of course please report any bugs you encounter.

2. Customization
Please mess around with the customization features; there's bound to be plenty of bugs and issues I haven't considered. You don't need to create content you would ever share with others. Just play around and see if you can do the things you're supposed to be able to do. Try creating a character or two and writing a little bit of story for her. Again, what you write doesn't have to be anything serious, but see if things really work.

3. Story & writing
Please give me constructive criticism on the story and the writing for the built-in characters. What do you think of the characters? If there are bits that you think should be rewritten for any reason, please don't hesitate to tell me. I realize some of the story (including the premise) may be corny, so maybe you have suggestions on how it could be better? Of course also report any bad spelling or typos or anything else that's off.

4. Documentation
Is the help file which explains how to do all the customization stuff easy to read and easy to understand? Please tell me if any parts aren't clear. I want the customization process to be easy and fun as much as possible.

5. Any other suggestions you have!
Don't hold back. If you have something to say which could help me improve the game I want to hear it.



07-01-2011
Well it seems that nobody yet has gotten a good ending (a non-generic ending). This tells me that it might be too difficult or maybe unfair?

A good ending requires:
1. The character is in a state of Love or Lovesick
2. You have completed her story route

Everyone seems to be doing well with the first requirement.
The second requirement is tricky because you have to make some correct choices along the way AND some of those choices require that you pass an attribute check. Attribute checks are in multiples of 10; either 20, 30, 40, or 50. (So if you get an attribute up to 50, you'll pass any checks involving it in story events)

I suppose the problem is that it's not clear what attribute checks are coming up for a given character. Also, with the longer stories, you might simply be running out of time to complete them.

For the next release I'm going to make it a little easier to pass attribute checks by making it easier to raise attributes. I might also add a means of getting in-game hints for characters.



07-05-2011
I didn't intend to put out a new release so soon, but there really have been a sleugh of bug reports and changes in the last two days. Testers, please grab the new release (v0.4).

I should have mentioned this earlier but if you encounter a serious bug I'd be greatly appreciative if you can send me a save file prior to the bug's occurrence. The game autosaves each day during the status screen where you can spend orbs so you can use that file. There are a few bugs that have been reported now which I've not able to reproduce and seeing the save file could help me out a ton.



08-01-2011
I can see myself tweaking this game and adding new features for awhile to come, or for as long as people are interested in it, but I'll stop calling it a beta when we get to the point where any new releases will not render saves and records incompatible. There are still a few changes I'm considering that could possibly do that.

Here's some of the ideas for new features in consideration:
- "mental notes" about a character can be reviewed
- generic event for walking to school together
- support for BxB (only if there is interest)
- support for dual character endings
- Mouse support
- additional mini-games

The top two of those will likely make it into the game in the near future.



08-21-2011
The new version, among other things, finally fixes the "script is hanging" error which people with slow computer sometimes encounter after the ending before or during the credits roll. Well, I think I fixed it. If anyone still gets that error at the end of the game, please let me know! I don't have any older computers around the house with which to test it on.

Posts

Okay, you'll have to make sure a few things. Do the following and start the game after each step. If you had to delete any file save for Yuu's ones, reinstall the relevant custom packs. Make sure you use the 'Extract Here' command.

1. Delete all of Yuu's files. If I was in charge of custom content when KimotoDragoon released her, the pack would never have been upoaded in the form it is now. It's a buggy mess, and even if you can kick it in, the story doesn't make sense.
2. Now there should be only four directories in the game's main folder: Music, Profiles, Story and Tachie, respectively. If there is any more, delete those.
3. Only Junko's, Aoi's and 21's tachies should lie in the main tachie folder. All other chars have their own subdirectories, none of which is ever 'Tachie'. Delete any file that doesn't fit these reqs.
4. Same goes for every file in the Profiles and Story directories.

If neither of these fix your problem, then it's due to a bug or an anomaly in your system. As Flowerthief is on the go right now, we can't deal with that directly, but I will write and upload a quickfix for each pack if needed.
Marrend
Guardian of the Description Thread
21781
@Enderstar: I downloaded the copy of Masako in my locker just to make sure, but it looks like that tachie is in the ZIP file. Unless the copy that's on the official site is off (Evidently, it works for me now?), then you should have that file, somewhere.

If not, get the version that's in my locker, here, and reinstall. I guess?


*Edit: I swear that there were custom content packages that had it backwards. Like, rather than a "Tachie/<Character Name>" directory (which is a directory structure that the game can read), it would have a "<Character Name>/Taiche" directory. I'm pretty sure 21 Ways is one of these characters, and it's vaguely possible that Yuu is also such a character.


*Edit 2: Wait, how the heck did Enderstar find this page? It's not linked on the main gamepage anymore! Moot point, I suppose.
Alright well I went through all the files on only found the tachie in the tachie area and redownloaded everything several times. No success. And I know how to add them correctly since I got 21's and Junko's to work.

And Marrend I found this place on http://heartache101.3eeweb.com/ comments page it said go to Test Page for problems so I did. I got into the game late only cause I found it by mistake when looking up RPG Maker XV games I saw this one and thought it might be neat to try got hooked around the 20th day xD And I have everyone beat have all the endings including 21's and Junko's. Even the shy girl who left me notes I got her ending as well. I want more girls stories to play lol, and I looked up custom characters ending up here http://rpgmaker.net/games/3229/custom/ and found your characters Marrend but all of them gave me the same answer about tachie errors. Sorry I got into it late but yeaaa that's how I found this page lol.

Edit: Oh and Dozen I deleted the whole game itself cause I have the Heartache.zip so when I make a mistake I delete the whole thing and use Winrar to extract and put the files in the right place but I know I haven't messed up.
author=Marrend
@Enderstar: I downloaded the copy of Masako in my locker just to make sure, but it looks like that tachie is in the ZIP file. Unless the copy that's on the official site is off (Evidently, it works for me now?), then you should have that file, somewhere.

If not, get the version that's in my locker, here, and reinstall. I guess?


*Edit: I swear that there were custom content packages that had it backwards. Like, rather than a "Tachie/<Character Name>" directory (which is a directory structure that the game can read), it would have a "<Character Name>/Taiche" directory. I'm pretty sure 21 Ways is one of these characters, and it's vaguely possible that Yuu is also such a character.


*Edit 2: Wait, how the heck did Enderstar find this page? It's not linked on the main gamepage anymore! Moot point, I suppose.


I downloaded the file you gave me Marrend but got the same message as before with the error unfriendly. And I only add one Girl at a time so that things can't mess up :(
author=Marrend
If not, get the version that's in my locker, here, and reinstall. I guess?

>:O
I'm shocked!
Marrend, you can't do that. If the installation process was corrupted, it'd work, but if it's a manual error, just reinstalling and nothing else multiplies future complications!
BLAH BLAH BLAH I'M A COMPUTER NERD BLAH
>:O
I'm shocked!
Marrend, you can't do that. If the installation process was corrupted, it'd work, but if it's a manual error, just reinstalling and nothing else multiplies future complications!
BLAH BLAH BLAH I'M A COMPUTER NERD BLAH

(Is now very confused and lost) O-o""
O- ohh. Nevermind, nevermind! I'm just clinically insane, that's all!:D

What I meant is, if there's a manual error in the installation(That is, if you messed something up) then just installing a pack again is not going to fix anything. In fact, it would mess things up more, even if you've got it right the second time.

So, are you sure every file is in order? I don't wan't to waste hours with you realizing it was a mistake after all in the end!>:)
I just downloaded the game from here, so whatever order it's in here is what I have. I haven't messed with anything I only added the custom characters where they're files are needed Junko and 21 worked fine but nothing else did. And I deleted the game everytime to add new characters then I'd extract the zip file so it was a normal game again then re add what I wanted but everything from Marrend that I tried to add hasn't worked at all sadly. And Yuu's file didn't work ether
Marrend
Guardian of the Description Thread
21781
I don't understand why my content is not working, or is returning that error message. I'm going to try activating all of my content on my end, and seeing how that works. Or, possibly, fails to work!


*Edit: Wow, I'm getting all manner of error messages, here! First one:

Error: Unable to parse condition phrase '35' in story 34 in file 'Fran/fran_story.txt'.

That's a new-ish character, so I figure I would fix that eventually. Got rid of her content, then got:

'bedroom (night) is not a valid Place. See the documentation for valid Place names.

Technically speaking, I kinda knew this would happen, as I'm running version 2.0 of the game. So, I got rid of Junko's files. No offense, but having a working game has a higher priority than being able to get Joruri's sequences. It came to no surprise, then, that I got a warning about how Joruri needing Junko to work. However, I did manage to get another error when processing Joruri:

Error referencing global story hash. Failed lookup for 'joruri/joruri_story.txt'. Please tell flowerthief!

So, okay, let's get rid of Joruri, then. That should get me running, right? Thankfully, it did! I was down to Emiko, Masako, and Uchioniko, but I got the game to run!

Outside of that odd message with Joruri after removing Junko, my best guess is that version 2.3 is misreading, or misinterpreting, where to look for things. If this guess is correct, this is a bug that flowerthief has to fix at some point, and has nothing to do with what Enderstar has done with the custom content he downloaded.
author=Marrend
I don't understand why my content is not working, or is returning that error message. I'm going to try activating all of my content on my end, and seeing how that works. Or, possibly, fails to work!


Sorry for being a bit of a pain but I looked before how to fix it with no success. But I felt like I was the only one with this issue :(
author=Enderstar
Sorry for being a bit of a pain but I looked before how to fix it with no success. But I felt like I was the only one with this issue :(


Nevermind that, it's our job:) Want me to do it, Marrend? I'd be happy to make use of myself, these days^^
Marrend
Guardian of the Description Thread
21781
No, it's all good. If my theory is correct, I should be able to download version 2.3, put in Masako, and I'd get the same error message you are. I'm downloading it now, we shall see how it goes.

*Edit: Or, if Dozen already has version 2.3, he could check on this theory of mine. I'm still doing it on my end, though. If three people can get the same error message under the same circumstances, well, that, people, is a bug!
author=Marrend
*Edit: Or, if Dozen already has version 2.3, he could check on this theory of mine. I'm still doing it on my end, though. If three people can get the same error message under the same circumstances, well, that, people, is a bug!

Ahead of you. Masako's files only do not produce error messages. I shall continue to see which combination casuses problems exactly, I did get a lot of it with all packs at once!

Edit: I managed to indentify a bug! Looks like there is a invalid init path in the Joruri pack! Here's the fix, for this at least!
Marrend
Guardian of the Description Thread
21781
Woah! Check this out, guys!

Who I've got:
21 Ways
Tsukino Emi
Kuwabara Emiko
Yume Francesca
Umehara Joruri
Watanabe Junko, Watanabe Aoi (Junko)
Mitsuya Masako
Konohana Midori, Hasegawa Kanon, Natsume Rika, Kirihara Kana (Midori)
Katanashi Seira
Momotami Ruri, Nemoto Mayu, Terakado Shoko, Shirazu Izumi (Uchioniko)
Lambaria Yuu


First test - Everybody I've got!

Result:

Unable to parse condition '35' in Story 34 in 'Fran/fran_story.txt'


Second test - Fran removed!

Result:
Unable to parse conditoin phrase '14' in Story 15 in 'Yuu/yuu_story.txt'


Third test - So long, Yuu!

Result:
Script 'Begin' line 225: NoMethodError occured.
undefined method 'chr' for nil:NilClass

Last known process: Uchioniko. I couldn't catch the exact file name.


Fourth test - Good-bye, Uchioniko!

Result:
Script 'Begin' line 225: NoMethodError occured.
undefined method 'chr' for nil:NilClass

Last known process: n_stories. I couldn't catch the exact file name.


Fifth test - Midori, and her firends, float off

Result:
Script 'Begin' line 225: NoMethodError occured.
undefined method 'chr' for nil:NilClass

Last known process: Masako. I couldn't catch the exact file name.


Sixth test - On a hunch, Seira rages off

Result:
Script 'Begin' line 225: NoMethodError occured.
undefined method 'chr' for nil:NilClass

Last known process: Joruri. I couldn't catch the exact file name.


Seventh test - Masako stands a the sole survivor of the custom content purge.

Result:
Script 'Begin' line 225: NoMethodError occured.
undefined method 'chr' for nil:NilClass

Last known process: Built-in/game_stories_9.txt.


Eighth test - There are only the built-ins now.

Result:
Script 'Begin' line 225: NoMethodError occured.
undefined method 'chr' for nil:NilClass

Last known process: Built-in/game_stories_9.txt.


Conclusion: I can't run this version of the game?


*Edit: Ninth test - removed the game, and re-installed it. No custom content added.

Result:
I have a title screen!

*Edit 2: I guess I did accidentally delete the built-in content when I was whittling down to Masako. Yeah, I was able to get them out of the recycle bin, but would there really have been data lost? Well, maybe there was. Even so, I'm not liking that error!
I recommend we approach it from the other way. Let's add each pack gradually until we find the cause(s)!(Don't forget the Joruri fix!)

Edit: Got it. It's definitely Yuu. Leave her out, it should be fine then.
Marrend
Guardian of the Description Thread
21781
This was pretty surreal.


First test - Added Joruri, before getting the Dozen-fix.

Result:
I've got a title screen! But... where was the warning about Junko?


Second test - Added Masako!

Result:
Warning: File 'jun_and_aoi' not found in the 'Profiles' directory or subdirectories as indicated in the file 'Joruri/joruri_story.txt'. Story content in file 'Joruri/joruri_story.txt' will be ignored. In order to see this content in the game, 'jun_and_aoi', assuming this file exists, must be in the 'Proflies' directory

Error referencing the global story hash. Failed lookup for 'joruri/joruri_story.txt. Please tell flowerthief!


I'm getting Dozen's Joruri fix to see what the heck that does!


*Edit: Nope. Still getting the error. I'm wondering what the heck would happen if I tried to run the game with just Joruri, as the game gave me no indication that there was a problem! I think I could use a bit of rest, though.
You're not paying attention to meT-T I'm telling you, remove everything, then add back everything but Yuu. It will work. It definitely does for me.
Marrend
Guardian of the Description Thread
21781
I get it. You wanted to go through each one individually. Sorry I didn't quite get that memo. Still, that I didn't get anything, not even the warning, when it was just Joruri was eye-quirking.

*Edit: And I'm still not getting the memo, evidently. Sure, why not? What have I got to loose?

*Edit 2: Okay, everybody but Yuu and Fran gets me to the title screen, like Dozen suggested. However, this does not explain what happened when it was just Joruri, or when it was Joruri and Masako. I'm too tired to think coherently right now, though.
Because you need Junko for Joruri to work:) Go and have some sleep, we're done for now^^

Enderstar, you may find the above confusing, but long story short, if you don't include Yuu and install the Joruri fix, all content should load as intended. Feel free to a adopt Yuu if you'd like, we've lost contact with her creator a long time ago.
author=Dozen
Because you need Junko for Joruri to work:) Go and have some sleep, we're done for now^^

Enderstar, you may find the above confusing, but long story short, if you don't include Yuu and install the Joruri fix, all content should load as intended. Feel free to a adopt Yuu if you'd like, we've lost contact with her creator a long time ago.


(Is dead from confusion).... (Twitches a couple of time)