Release 66: Mechanization

With this release, we're once again pushing deeper into the gameplay features which will be needed in order to finish campaign mode.  And as the first step on that push, Mechanical Chosen have now been added to the game!  Mechanical Chosen have a pretty diverse set of abilities, and Mechanical Forsaken will introduce several more, so I ended up opting to focus purely on the Chosen side of things for this update.  The Mechanical Clash scenario has been added to single play mode, but facing Mechanical Chosen in campaign mode (and making use of their Forsaken counterparts) will have to wait for next month.

The theme of the Mechanical Chosen is that they represent human ingenuity and proactivity.  As such, they don't need to wait until the final battle before trying to destroy the Demon Lord.  Mechanical Chosen conduct "Operations" which count down, day-by-day, to the destruction of the Demonic hive (which means game over).  Furthermore, each Operation grants powerful bonuses to the Mechanical Chosen or to her team as a whole.  Operations can be disrupted by breaking the Mechanical Chosen's Vulnerabilities, but if you aren't careful, you might end up in a situation where the buff granted by the current Operation prevents you from progressing her corruption in the way you had planned.  More than any other species up to this point, Mechanical Chosen require you to plan ahead, so you should read up on what their Operations do and decide which ones you want to trigger!

Because so many of the Mechanical Chosen species were explicitly designed to be indistinguishable from humans at a casual glance, the number of new faces added to the default portrait pack is a bit smaller than usual.  (That said, the "inhuman"ness of the remaining ones is pretty striking - I got a lot of questions about what Mechanical Chosen would look like in the leadup to this update, and I hope those who were interested in this sort of thing will be happy with the result.)  In any case, this freed me up to go back and add more portraits to Animalistic Chosen.  The "songbird" Animalistic subspecies no longer just uses regular human portraits, so this should help people imagine how they're meant to look different despite their lack of animal ears.

This release also has a decent chunk of content commissioned by Kalloi!  The orgasm denial fetish vignette now has a continuation, and that continuation unlocks a new Forsaken tool, the Maid's Cage, which the subject can use to subject other Chosen to more of the same.  Furthermore, the orgasm denial fetish itself has also gotten a bit of new functionality, so that Chosen who have it maxed out will take extra PLEA from related actions in custom sex scenes, and the edged orgasm can end up so intense that it actually knocks them out.

In the coming month, I'm going to be working on the "minigame" that Mechanical Chosen will introduce when converted to Forsaken in campaign mode.  It'll be possible to start doing some pretty crazy things once you have Mechanical Chosen improving your hive.  Once this has been fully implemented, players who are interested in playing beyond the end of campaign mode should have some options that let them do so.

Click here to download.  Mirror.

• Content: Added the Mechanical Clash scenario to single play mode.
• Content: Added 12 new faces to the default portrait pack (10 for Mechanical Chosen, 2 for Animalistic Chosen).
• Content: Added one new vignette.
• Content: Added one new Forsaken tool, the Maid's Cage, unlocked by that vignette.
• Content: Added the orgasm denial vulnerability effect to Chosen with a maxed-out edging fetish for custom sex scenes.
• Interface: Clarified the trait transfer display when using the Velvet Key.
• Bugfix: Spared Forsaken will now correctly have their deployment in battle immediately cancelled.
• Bugfix: The item selection for Loop 15 will no longer break the random seeding in campaign mode.
• Bugfix: Resolved some cases where swapping Forsaken positions around wouldn't immediately take effect.
• Bugfix: Species-determined outfits (previously just mummies always wearing the cloth strips outfit, but now also armor pilot and robot maid Chosen) are now consistently applied.
• Bugfix: Resolved some crashes that could be caused by missing Favorite Forsaken smalltalk.

Release 65: Favoritism

This month's release has a single focus: expanding the "Favorite" Forsaken position so that the one in that position can actually talk about more than just her assessment of whether the currently-selected Commander is strong enough.  Whenever you don't have a Commander selected, your Favorite Forsaken will now instead speak on one of many new potential subjects.

The number of topics is quite high, including subjects like how her Vulnerabilities were broken (or, if they were left intact, her opinions regarding breaking them on other Chosen), her feelings about other Forsaken, her thoughts about the other Chosen species, about the boss Chosen, her thoughts on her former partners, and more.  For each of those subjects, the number of variants depending on her personality, her corruption, and her experiences is also quite high.  My hope is that this will help each Forsaken feel more unique, since even two Forsaken with the same initial personality can turn out quite differently depending on how you corrupt them and how you treat them after they become Forsaken.  Forsaken who have any traits relevant to the attitude system (currently just futanari Forsaken and Forsaken who have developed a stance toward orgasm denial training) also have some unique lines appropriate to their attitude.

I normally don't like to focus an update on just one feature like this, but the number of variants that needed to be written was very high, and this is the kind of feature that needs to be implemented all at once, rather than across multiple updates.  I was still able to fit in a couple of bugfixes and minor improvements, and a decent chunk of the month also went into preparing for the introduction of the next species: Mechanical Chosen.

Mechanical Chosen are one of the two endgame Chosen species, encompassing everything from Chosen who wear power armor all the way to outright robotic Chosen.  Their powers will test the player's ability to respond to a wide variety of challenges, and their difficulty is (of course) yet another step above Devil and Angel Chosen.  Next month's update is going to be a big one, so I hope you all look forward to it!

Click here to download.  Mirror.

• Content: Implemented "smalltalk" system which allows Forsaken to talk about subjects depending on their personality, corruption, and history (currently only used by the Forsaken in the Favorite position between battles).
• Interface: The natural (most efficient) reputation strength for Rampant Forsaken will now be automatically calculated and displayed in the Forsaken summary screen.
• Bugfix: Fixed a case where loading a campaign save file would put the player directly into battle instead of the shop screen.
• Bugfix: Resolved a crash that could happen when using the Hot Tag with an Aversion Forsaken's unique Defiler ability.
• Bugfix: Resolved some other improper behavior when using the Velvet Key to put the Aversion Defiler on non-Aversion Forsaken.

Release 64: Ecstasy

The main focus of this month's update was to finish the commented replay system.  It should now be fully functional, allowing players to share the exact sequence of moves for their runs in all scenarios and campaign mode!  I also fixed some minor bugs with the system while doing my usual playtest.  For an example of how this system can be used, it might be illuminating to check out SuperSkippy's walkthrough, which has been linked in the resources.txt file.  Even experienced players might be able to learn a thing or two by following along and seeing how a Chosen team can be quickly dismantled.

Although sexual content wasn't the focus of this release, there are still a few new additions to custom sex scenes which might be fun to play around with.  The orgasm system has been completely overhauled so that rather than just being something that happens during the 'damage' phase of the subject's turn, it now has duration and persistent effects.  Characters will usually use alternative dialogue when cumming, and they'll also comment when experiencing a particularly intense continuous orgasm.  Likelihood of continuous orgasm depends on the subject's Deviancy, her PLEA level, and the number of orgasms already experienced in the current scene.  Ruined orgasms get their own dialogue too.

A minor but very entertaining component of this system is that custom sex scene participants will have their speech distorted depending on whether they're continuously orgasming and on the intensity of that orgasm.  Characters using a "speech" type action (like dirty talk) will still say what they meant to say instead of using the orgasm dialogue, but their speech will be a bit messed up by the pleasure.  At very high PLEA levels, they can get pretty incoherent.

Much of the month was spent working on the "smalltalk" system which is meant to let your Favorite Forsaken comment on her history and (depending on Obedience level) provide helpful advice or taunting provocations related to the other species, the bosses, and the general state of the world in your campaign run.  But trying to finish this up alongside all the other stuff this month ended up being a bit over-ambitious.  This feature should be the last one I want to tackle before moving forward to the introduction of Mechanical Chosen, so I'll be continuing to work on it in the coming month!

Click here to download.  Mirror.

• Content: Overhauled custom sex scene orgasm mechanics to allow for continuous climax.
• Content: Participants of custom sex scenes will react appropriately when orgasming.
• Content: The commented replay system will now function in all modes of play, including campaign mode!
• Bugfix: Resolved some cases where Chosen captured by humanoid Demon Commanders would use the wrong dialogue lines.
• Bugfix: Performing other actions in between buying a Commander and refunding it will no longer break commented playthroughs.
• Bugfix: There are no longer some sequences of actions for which a commented playthrough will expect a specific action but will not read the current instruction in order to inform the player what that is.
• Other: Improved some of the auto-generated commentary for commented playthroughs to be more clear.
• Other: Bosses who have appeared in story scenes may now be previewed in the Info menu.
• Other: Updated the resources.txt file to point to SuperSkippy's commented tutorial.

Release 64b

• Bugfix: Resolved an error which prevented the player from changing Commanders on a save file which isn't set to write commentary.

Release 63: Denial

This update includes advancements and additions to various subsystems, which were generally too large to fit into an update alongside a major feature, but too small to be the sole focus of an update.  I think that most players will find something to enjoy in this one.

First up, continuing from last month's work, the commented replay system has been expanded to account for item interactions, which means that scenarios involving items can now also be reliably replayed!  On top of that, exporting a .par file will also create a .txt file containing the entire set of instructions for easy review.  A bug which was causing instructions to be overwritten when rewatching the replay has also been fixed.

This release also includes some balance reworks which have been a long time coming.  Angel Chosen have had two of their T3 Adaptation moves completely reworked.  Ego Murder, rather than preventing the player from issuing new orders to Thralls, now ends all Surrounds early, sort of like a Surround-based team-wide Detonate.  And Twisted Reward, rather than providing a huge one-time trauma resolution, now provides very strong damage mitigation to Defiler+ and Orgy actions involving the user.  Lastly, the Aversion Distortion has been buffed so that Aversion Chosen fleeing the battle now enable Orgies (but not Defiler+ actions) as though they were Surrounded and being affected by the same Defiler as their partners.  This means that when two Chosen are suffering from Aversion and fleeing from the battle, the third can actually be put in an Orgy all by herself.

A significant new custom sex scene action commissioned by Kalloi has been added, the Demonic padlock, which deepens the existing orgasm denial content.  Only subjects wearing chastity belts can be targeted by the Demonic padlock, which means that it currently can only affect Forsaken (who can be given chastity in the Customize menu) as well as Chosen who naturally wear chastity belts (currently possible only for custom Chosen whose outfits have specifically been given "persistent" chastity belts, but more ways of applying chastity to the Chosen are coming soon).  When subjects are affected by the Demonic padlock, they lose the ability to orgasm entirely, and this persists even after the end of the custom sex scene.  The padlock will temporarily unlock for Chosen who are trying to commit lustful sins, but it will lock itself up again immediately afterward.  Subjects who have been denied orgasm for a long time will gradually grow more desperate and more submissive in custom sex scenes, as they hope for the Demon Lord to show mercy and allow them release.  A new type of custom sex scene action, "Response," has been added to let the player specifically decide how to handle it when a Demonic padlock subject asks to be let free.

Players who have made a wrong move before starting a battle only to realize that their last save was a few days back should be happy to hear that the game now also allows you to rewind to the start of the day, before doing any purchases or other pre-battle actions!  For save file size reasons, this feature is somewhat limited - it only allows you to return to the start of the day during the current play session, and loading a save will not allow you to revert any actions taken immediately before that save.  But even so, I hope this will be a nice quality of life improvement for players taking on the game's harder challenges.

This update also includes a new feature in the form of a code contribution by one Hoshikawa Emi: the "size limits" feature.  The options menu now includes a setting for applying a maximum and minimum for each body asset size, so that Chosen will never be randomly generated with a size outside the specified range.

Finally, there's also a new vignette commissioned by SuperSkippy, featuring a Core Morality Chosen experimenting with ways to cope with the stresses of battle.  This one was pretty fun to write, so I hope everyone enjoys it.  The details may be found in the vignette checklist.txt file.

As always, there are also a few miscellaneous bugfixes.  Next month, I hope to completely finish the commented replay system, allowing it to account for Forsaken training and the other campaign-specific mechanics.  There are a lot more player actions to account for, and the problem of how exactly to deal with indirect effects on the gameplay from content toggles hasn't yet been solved, so this is going to be a challenge.  We'll see how much side content can be fit in alongside it.

Click here to download.  Mirror.

• Content: Added the Demonic padlock effect to custom sex scenes (requires subject to be wearing a chastity belt).
• Content: Added one new vignette.
• Balance: Completely reworked the effects of Angels' Ego Murder and Twisted Reward actions.
• Balance: Aversion Chosen fleeing from battle now count toward Orgy (but not Defiler+) requirements.
• Bugfix: Love's free deployment from "Pillar of Mercy" will now properly be expended when used.
• Bugfix: Resolved a crash which could happen during clothing customization.
• Other: Added an option to rewind to the start of the day.
• Other: Added "Size limits" feature coded by Hoshikawa Emi.
• Other: The commented replay system is now functional in all scenarios which don't involve Forsaken.

Release 63b

• Bugfix: Angel Chosen trying to use the new version of Ego Murder will now correctly account for the surround durations of Chosen who would be surrounded later on the same turn.
• Bugfix: Resolved some possible crashes due to save compatibility code failing to execute on Day 1 saves which skip the shop screen and go directly into battle.

Release 62: Repetition

This update represents a very significant step forward, though it might take some time before the benefits reach the playerbase as a whole.  After being unusable for a long time, the commented replay system is finally back and better than ever!  With this, experienced players will be able to use in-game tools to save every step of their run, both to compete against each other and to share tips and strategies with newer players.  Now that the game is nearing maturity, it's high time to get polishing features like these worked out.

In repairing the commentary system, I've also worked out a couple of bugs which had been making it more difficult for players to share Chosen teams with each other as well.  The "Export" feature in the Data menu is used to take the current Chosen team (in its Day 1 uncorrupted state) and store it as a .par file which may be easily sent to another player so that they can keep their .sav file without needing to lose all their other progress.  If the playthrough contains commentary (via the Commentary: Write option in the Options menu), then this will also be stored with the .par file.  Presently, this only works for Classic and Challenge mode, but players will soon be able to share entire Campaign mode seeds with each other using this same system.

On the content front, this update contains another system with a lot of future potential in the form of more humanoid Demon Commander customization content commissioned by Kalloi.  When sending a Punisher-type humanoid Commander against the Chosen, the player can now choose to use a "Seductive" approach or a "Humiliating" approach.  Against Chosen suffering from Total Vulnerability Break, this will give you some much more flavorful descriptions than the current default battle text.  Going forward from here, it will be possible to add more approaches and more situations where those approaches give you some more interesting variant flavor.

In the coming month, I'll be continuing to expand the commentary system, as well as take care of some much-needed system reworks and adjustments based on player feedback about the midgame of campaign mode.  And once all of those are finished, it will be time to start looking ahead to the final species and final bosses of Reign's route.

Click here to download.  Mirror.

• Content: Added "Seductive" and "Humiliating" Approaches for humanoid Punisher-equipped Demon Commanders.
• Balance: Love's "Pillar of Mercy" trait now gives her the "Stamina regeneration is based on lower between Hostility and Obedience" effect.
• Bugfix: The Punisher progress from the "Propaganda" item is now correctly reduced by Reign's traits.
• Bugfix: The game will no longer crash when Splendor tries to flip two negative traits but only has one left to flip.
• Bugfix: Boss Forsaken who remain deployable under the Despair Distortion will now correctly display their unique Defiler ability on the Forsaken summary.
• Other: During custom sex scenes, more Deviant Chosen will prefer to use their mouths for things other than kissing.
• Other: The commented replay system is now functional in Classic and Challenge single play modes.

Release 61: Incitement

After last month's brief hiatus, Corrupted Saviors will now be returning to its regular monthly updates!  Now that we're done with the latest wave of bosses, the next phase of development will be all about polishing the game and getting it as stable as possible for the final push which will complete campaign mode.  Much of that polish will come in the form of adding content that takes advantage of the systems implemented during the previous phase of development.

Predictably, a decent chunk of this update is devoted to fixing and tweaking issues that cropped up following Reign's implementation in R60.  This update also includes a significant rework of the Despair Distortion.

Forsaken defeated by Despair will still work the same as they always have, and the basic premise of "fulfill a condition in order to instantly defeat Chosen with Accuse in the final battle" remains the same as well.  However, rather than requiring the player to tediously accumulate a much larger stack of Evil Energy than is ever required anywhere else in the game, the new Despair condition is to blitz toward midgame-levels of Evil Energy generation as quickly as possible.  The base requirement is to hit 30 Evil Energy generated from a single day's downtime actions with at least 30 days remaining before the final battle (thus, the deadline for triggering Despair is Day 20 in a regular single mode game).  The Evil Energy requirement goes up with the number of Morality and Innocence Breaks suffered by the Chosen team, and the deadline gradually relaxes in campaign mode with more levels of the associated achievement.

The other especially notable addition in this update is the unique Chosen dialogue for facing humanoid Demon Lord bodies.  On top of improving the experience for players who like to deal with the Chosen personally, this is also the last requirement before tackling a big chunk of commissioned content planned for next month's update.  That commissioned content should hopefully come alongside some long-needed fixes to the in-game commented replay system.

Click here to download.  Mirror.

• Content: Added Chosen responses when fighting humanoid Demon Lord bodies.
• Content: Added new option to retroactively convert a single play run into a campaign mode run.
• Balance: Reworked Despair Distortion.
• Balance: Reworked Reign's "Fisher King (Superheated Resentment)" trait.
• Balance: Bonus ANGST granted by the Propaganda item increased (1G -> 100G)
• Balance: Devil Chosen's Candle of Snuffed Out Life effect now expires immediately after the final battle.
• Balance: Added a new replacement trait for Negotiation Love when Megalomaniac Victory has been replaced as Second-in-Command.
• Balance: Reign's later appearances will now decrease the amount of difficulty modifiers encountered in the same loop.
• Bugfix: Boss Chosen defeated with Despair will now correctly progress Splendor's corruption.
• Bugfix: Rampant Forsaken deployed using the Hot Tag item will now show their proper reputation strength depending on the Demon Commander used.
• Bugfix: Resolved a possible crash related to the Hot Tag item.
• Bugfix: Victory's profile will now correctly reflect how her Resolve can be damaged in the final battle.
• Bugfix: Reign will no longer be able to fall to Despair while already under the effects of another Distortion.
• Bugfix: The Maneuver bonus to capture duration will no longer fail to be reset after releasing one of the Chosen mid-capture.
• Bugfix: Resolved a softlock that could occur when trying to display a Forsaken vignette when Chosen vignettes were disabled (e.g. because the current loop is a boss fight).
• Bugfix: The extra requirement before triggering Despair when facing Reign will no longer be printed when not applicable.
• Bugfix: Reign's thresholds for using T3 moves will no longer be improperly reset when appearing in later loops.
• Bugfix: Angel Chosen will now correctly display any custom subspecies set by the player.
• Bugfix: Corrected the displayed circumstance damage requirement before Reign begins using her T3 moves.
• Bugfix: Resolved some buggy behavior when Chosen suffer a Core Vulnerability Distortion before all three Chosen have made their first appearance.
• Interface: It is now possible to delete your save file's archive of scene variants.
• Other: Campaign mode random seeds now result in more consistent item choices.
• Other: Chosen meeting each other in private will now be less unfriendly.
• Other: Chosen will now update their mental image of the Demon Lord (relevant for vignettes and some spoken lines) when facing a humanoid Demon Lord body in battle.

Release 61b

• Bugfix: Group downtime actions will no longer sometimes trigger Despair without meeting the Evil Energy requirement.
• Other: Updated the description for the Propaganda item to take into account the recent balance adjustment.

Release 60: Reign

With this release, the game finally includes the recurring boss enemy which appears throughout campaign mode: Sovereign Decider Reign.  Unlike the other bosses up to this point, Reign appears to be nothing more than a regular human.  But her persistence and drive for survival are strong enough to make her a formidable foe.  And although it's unlikely that you'll be able to defeat her the first couple of times she appears, you can still exploit her mysterious connection to the Chosen as a whole in order to reach even greater levels of power.

Reign will show up to face you in every 7th loop.  It's possible to defeat her outright by either burning through her large reserve of Resolve or using an instant-defeat Distortion, but it can actually be better to corrupt her more slowly, because every Vulnerability Break against Reign gives you a buff to your damage for the entire playthrough, even in future cities.  Furthermore, while Reign is under a Distortion, a powerful and unique effect related to that Distortion will take effect, which also continues even in future cities.

Because Reign's mechanics are tied to facing her multiple times across multiple cities, she doesn't have a single play scenario like the other bosses.  This might be a good time for players who haven't tried campaign mode recently to give it a shot!

This release marks 60 consecutive monthly releases.  The next month will be the first where I don't plan on releasing a new version of Corrupted Saviors, because I'll be polishing and preparing a side project for its public release.  This side project will not be receiving monthly updates, so after that, Corrupted Saviors will return to its regular monthly schedule in January.

Click here to download.  Mirror.

• Content: Added the recurring Reign boss fight to campaign mode on every 7th loop
• Content: Added Reign's portraits to the default portrait pack, updated Basis's portrait with a full expression set
• Bugfix: Corrected a logic error which could result in Spared Forsaken ending up in the wrong contingent
• Bugfix: Boss Chosen who escape the final battle will no longer reappear in later loops in a buggy state
• Bugfix: Loops with only Angel and regular human Chosen will no longer display as containing only regular humans
• Other: The Loop 7 warp route now has a different condition, described in the campaign map.txt file

Release 60b

• Bugfix: Resolved a crash that would happen when customizing the appearance of a single play custom Chosen.
• Bugfix: The game will no longer fail to print the updated body description when giving a Demon Lord body an ovipostor.
• Bugfix: Resolved some buggy behavior surrounding Demon Lord orgasms during custom sex scenes.
• Other: Corrected some misleading text for Reign's Negotiation Distortion trait.

Release 60c

• Bugfix: Resolved some buggy behavior when Reign is defeated.
• Bugfix: Resolved a crash that could happen when Reign or Love would escape the final battle.
• Bugfix: Corrected an error in the save compatibility function which would strip boss Forsaken of their boss abilities.

Release 60d

• Bugfix: Resolved a custom sex scene crash.
• Bugfix: Animalistic Chosen using Surrender to Instincts will no longer cause a crash when targeted.

Release 60e

• Bugfix: Resolved a crash when the game was unable to determine who's responsible for a pregnancy at the end of the loop.
• Bugfix: The game will no longer sometimes stop printing text in the middle of battle.

Release 60f

• Bugfix: Resolved some possible crashes while attempting to generate a new city in campaign mode.
• Bugfix: Attempting to recruit a Second-in-Command during the final battle while having a Demon Commander due to the Hot Tag will no longer crash the game.
• Bugfix: Resolved a couple of custom sex scene crashes.