Release 17: Escalation

With this release, the ability to manage your team of Forsaken has been fleshed out a bit more.  The Forsaken now have nuanced opinions of each other depending on their personalities, their history as a team, and their experiences together since becoming Forsaken.  Currently, the only ways to influence their relationships are to selectively increase their corruption levels and to provoke them into throwing tantrums at each other, but the options will expand significantly once you can have the Forsaken help train each other. These relationships aren't necessarily the same in both directions, so you can have unrequited love or unwelcome stalkers.  Unfortunately, previous versions didn't end up saving all the information I needed in order to reconstruct the relationships of former partners, so Forsaken from previous versions won't remember who their old teammates are.

Training the Forsaken now drains their stamina, which they restore by relaxing in various ways during their downtime.  You can also deplete their motivation by sending them on (currently fake) missions, and then restore that motivation during training.  Another important new aspect of training is that it influences which combat styles the Forsaken use.  Now all that remains is to actually implement the mechanics of having them fight the Chosen.

On an unrelated note, this release also adds a new difficulty setting.  The requirements to unlock hard mode are the same as the requirements to unlock cheat mode.  There's no content locked behind hard mode, so only players who want to experience an extra challenge should feel any need to turn it on.  When hard mode is activated, the deadlines for events and the final battle are moved up (to Day 10, Day 20, Day 30, and Day 35 respectively).  Damage taken also decreases by 20% per damage level, which means that all damage above Lv 1 is reduced to 80%, all damage above Lv 2 is reduced to 64%, all damage above Lv 3 is reduced to 51.2%, and so on.  Players now only receive scores for hard mode playthroughs, so anyone playing on normal mode shouldn't feel pressured to play optimally.

Click here to download.  Mirror.

• Content: The Forsaken now have opinions of each other which they'll explain with a new dialogue option.
• Content: Added the basics of Forsaken base management.  Forsaken Stamina and Motivation values are now meaningful.
• Content: The Forsaken now have distinct combat styles which may be influenced via training.
• Content: Added a hard mode to the game.
• Interface: The text colors used by Forsaken when they talk can now be changed by the player.  When the Chosen are defeated, their text color will automatically change during the moment of their resolve being broken.  Forsaken from previous versions will retroactively have their text colors changed.
• Bugfix: It should no longer be possible to lock oneself out of being able to cheat by going back in time.

Release 16: Training

This update introduces an entirely new mechanic: training the bodies and minds of defeated Chosen in order to sculpt them into Forsaken warriors that fit your particular needs.  The game's main combat loop went through several iterations before its first public release, and because the training mechanics are completely untested, they might also end up needing significant changes.  I'm especially interested in feedback during this early phase, before anything is finalized.

Each training session involves choosing multiple training actions in turn.  What happens during each training action varies according to the Forsaken's personality, the Forsaken's corruption, and whichever other training actions are already in progress.  If the training gets intense enough, the Forsaken's Hostility, Deviancy, Obedience, and Disgrace scores can be increased.  High Obedience makes the Forsaken more likely to cooperate with the training.  High Deviancy, which represents dissocation from reality, allows the Forsaken to endure more intense training without changing their behavior or worldview.

Corruption from training always goes up, never down.  However, there will be benefits to having some of your Forsaken at low corruption levels.  This (along with the Stamina, Motivation, and Skill mechanics) will eventually add some gameplay depth to the training system.  In the meantime, I'm mainly concerned with ensuring that the training system itself works alright.  It isn't as granular as the one commonly used by eragames, but I hope that it's still satisfying to use.

Only the first tier of training actions is implemented in this update, which consists of the easiest, most mild training types.  Most Forsaken who have been beaten the regular way during the final battle will be completely unfazed by all of them.  In order to make the consent and corruption increase mechanics relevant, I've added the option to generate a new uncorrupted Chosen and then immediately "defeat" her so that she can be trained as one of the Forsaken.  Players with early cheats turned on can access this option from the main menu even if they don't have any Forsaken on their save files.

Click here to download.  Mirror.

• Content: Added a system for subjecting defeated Chosen to various types of training.
• Content: Added the ability to generate a random uncorrupted defeated Chosen who can then be trained.
• Bugfix: Added pages to the Forsaken menu in order to prevent the list from overflowing the screen.
• Bugfix: Chosen attempting to inflict self damage greater than Long.MAX_VALUE will no longer crash the game.

Release 15: Conclusion

 The focus of this update is the fates of defeated Chosen.  This includes not only those who escape from the Demon Lord, but also those "Forsaken" who willingly enter the Demon Lord's service.  It also includes some miscellaneous bug fixes and balance tweaks.

During the final battle, when only two of the Chosen are neutralized, the third will try to flee the battle, and those Chosen fall into two broad categories.  The first category is those who have already experienced a Total Break.  These Chosen are too mentally damaged to fight anymore, so they currently just get a short epilogue.  The second category is those who haven't experienced a Total Break, and their epilogues are more complicated.  These aren't yet finished for all personalities, so they're dummied out for the time being.  Eventually, I want to include many more epilogues for all sorts of endgame situations (e.g. two close friends who are corrupted in the same way and end up having their ending together), but there are enough possible combinations that I'll probably have to just implement them bit-by-bit alongside other content.

As for the Chosen you capture, they'll now be stored permanently, and not attached to the individual playthrough they came from.  You can currently visit them from the main menu, view their profiles, and have them describe how they see their situation.  What they say will vary significantly not only with their personalities, but also with their corruption progress.  The menu is a bit sparse for now, but options for talking about their training and their daily life will also show up once those features are implemented.

The overall goal for the next few releases is to pave the way for a campaign mode where you defeat Chosen, turn them into Forsaken, and then use those Forsaken to defeat more Chosen.  This will involve a "free training" mode, then some interactions between Forsaken (including both having them train each other, and having to deal with rivalries between them), then being able to replace your Commanders with Forsaken, and then finally implementing the campaign mode itself.

I'm hoping to introduce enough gameplay mechanics with each release that none of them feel like "just groundwork."  For this release in particular, I've made a fairly major tweak to how Impregnation, Hypnosis, Drain, and Parasitism progress work.  Each use of a sinful move now increases the progress toward corruption by a small base amount multiplied by the associated circumstance level, similar to how Resolve damage during the final battle works.  I'm interested in hearing whether this makes the lategame feel a bit less grindy, since players should have more ways to make the corruption progress more quickly.

Click here to download.  Mirror.

• Content: Defeated Chosen who escape the final battle after previously suffering a Total Break will now go through a short epilogue explaining why they won't be troubling you again.
• Content: Chosen whose resolve was broken during the final battle will now be stored for later viewing and use.  At present, this only allows you to view their stats and hear them say a little bit about their new lives as your servants, but more is on the way.
• Balance: Impregnation, Hypnosis, Drain, and Parasitism effectiveness will now progress more quickly when the respective circumstance is higher.  The base rate has been decreased, but this should result in overall faster and more controllable corruption.
• Interface: When only one of the Chosen is a valid target for actions, the target choice option on that round will be skipped.
• Bugfix: Ending a battle in the middle of a capture will no longer result in the capture option behaving strangely in the following battle.
• Bugfix: Some more possible softlocks in the final battle have been fixed.
• Bugfix: Use of Slaughter will no longer cause Surround durations to be treated as negative for the purpose of calculating the Evil Energy bonus from retreating with Causal Projection.
• Bugfix: Fixed a case where Chosen who prepare to sacrifice an ally during the final battle would never actually get around to doing so.
• Other: Saves on Day 1 may now have early cheats toggled on and off, regardless of their initial setting.

Release 14: Climax

This release implements the final battle on Day 50, where the Chosen either defeat the Demon Lord and save the city, or else end up defeated themselves and lose their powers or even their lives.  The endings and training mechanics still aren't in yet, which means that both outcomes just move you forward to Day 51 so you can keep messing around with the team, but you can at least get a preview of the various fates in store for defeated Chosen (and even some of the victorious Chosen).

The final battle introduces a couple of new mechanics, so it might be wise to save beforehand in order to give yourself an opportunity to see how they work in practice.  Once you're close to the final battle (meaning either you're past Day 45 or you have at least one of the upgrades that lets you damage Resolve), you can check the Chosen's profiles to see how they'll act and how you can beat them.  There are a few distinct strategies that can be used to win, so I look forward to seeing which ones are most popular.

Click here to download. Mirror.

• Content: The final battle has been implemented, including a couple of unique mechanics.  See the readme for more information.
• Balance: The scoring system has been updated to account for the final battle and fix some old overflow errors.
• Interface: When selecting a Chosen profile to display using the Psychic Reading upgrade, an overview is now shown which contains a full list of which vulnerabilities are broken and which aren't.
• Bugfix: Another crash related to very high damage multipliers has been resolved.
• Bugfix: Using cheats to encounter the third Chosen before the second has had a chance to be introduced will no longer sometimes result in their relationships not initializing properly.

Release 14b:

• Bugfix: The game should no longer sometimes crash when defeating the Chosen in a particular order.

Release 14c:

• Bugfix: The game will no longer freeze up with no usable options when the last Chosen in the final battle is surrounded or captured.
• Bugfix: The final battle will no longer suffer a crash related to the game getting confused about who's defeated and who's not.

Release 13: Preparation

This update comes just after the anniversary of the first public release of Corrupted Saviors.  The past year of development has been focused on setup for the Chosen's fall to the side of the Demons.  The coming year will be focused on the payoff.  The update following this one will implement the final battle.

As for the current update, its most notable feature is the new event on Day 45.  This event isn't as sexual as the last one, but it provides an overview of how the Chosen will be faring as they head into the final battle.  A new cheat will allow even players who have progressed their files beyond Day 45 to see this new content.

Additionally, the final tier of upgrades has been added.  This tier is larger than the others at 8 upgrades, although 2 of the upgrades have no function until the final battle and 4 more have effects which are fairly minor until the final battle.  However, the last 2 upgrades are high-impact Commander abilities, including the ability to combine a Punisher, a Defiler, and a Suppressor on the same body.  There are 64 different Punisher/Defiler/Suppressor combinations, and while I wasn't able to add unique flavor to as many of the combinations as I would have liked, it should still let you break some Vulnerabilities in new scenarios.

I hope you all enjoy this update and look forward to the next one!

Click here to download.  Mirror.

• -Content: A new event has been added to Day 45.
• -Content: The final tier of upgrades has been added (although some of their functions will only become meaningful after the final battle is implemented).  Notably, this includes the ability to combine Punisher-type Commanders with the other types.
• -Balance: Replaced the Augmented Thralls upgrade (which made every surround after the first a bit easier) with a new upgrade which grants extra Evil Energy for withdrawing from battle while the Chosen are surrounded.
• -Interface: Added two new text size options.
• -Bugfix: Commanders will no longer always be described as capable of capturing flying Chosen, even when they aren't.
• -Bugfix: During team customization, the button to return to the main menu will now function properly.
• -Bugfix: During team customization, the button to have one of the Chosen go by her surname will now function properly.
• -Bugfix: Using cheats to encounter the second and third Chosen for the first time on the same day will no longer result in their relationships not initializing properly.
• -Other: Added a content option to disable female->futanari shifting for Chosen who started out as male and then shifted to female.
• -Other: Added a cheat which can be used to change what day it is.
• -Other: Added a cheat to stop the Chosen from using Slaughter, Fantasize, Detonate, and Striptease.

Release 13b:

• -Bugfix: Corrected an error that was causing Punisher+Defiler+Suppressor flavor text to be incorrect or simply not show up.

Release 12: Punishment

 This update adds both the seventh tier of upgrades and the final level of corruption.  Four of the upgrades are new Commander types, each of which is associated with one of the vulnerabilities.  These new "Punisher"-class Commanders are cheap to use and deal extremely focused damage to a circumstance and the associated trauma, which makes them useful for targeting specific trauma thresholds while leaving the others relatively untouched.

However, the new Commanders reach their full potential against Chosen who are already corrupt enough to use sinful tactics in combat.  Every time the Chosen use one of those sinful abilities (Slaughter, Fantasize, Detonate, and Striptease), they become permanently weaker against the associated Commander.  Past a certain point, the Commanders become capable of impregnating, hypnotizing, draining energy, and possessing and altering the clothing of the Chosen.  Each of these corruptions will open up a method to completely defeat the Chosen once the final battle is implemented, and will also affect the options for what to do with them after they've fallen.

Click here to download.  Mirror.

• Content: Added the seventh tier of upgrades, all of which are Commander abilities.  The new Commander types can't yet be combined with the old ones, but they introduce some new types of content that weren't available before.  Another notable upgrade is the ability to capture Chosen who are already flying over the battlefield.
• Content: Added the final tier of corruption.  The new set of core break scenes is less sexually-focused than the previous ones, but it does finally make it so that any team of Chosen can now be made mutual enemies, regardless of which vulnerabilities start broken.
• Content: Added a new set of downtime actions and profile updates for the new corruption tier.
• Balance: The rate of damage falloff for every order of magnitude above 1 trillion has been increased from 50% to 80%.
• Bugfix: Corrected some incorrect Commander descriptions during the scenes where the Chosen escape.

Release 11: Mitigation

 The main feature of this update is the addition of the most powerful defiler action, Orgy, which acts as the last step above the upgraded defiler actions added in the previous update.  When all three Chosen are hit by the same defiler action, they all get caught together in an attack which deals all of the damage types at once, regardless of which action was used to initiate it.  The Orgy action follows the same rules about letting all the targets escape as soon as any of them do, and it doesn't break any vulnerabilities on its own, but it gets a stack of modifiers based on relationships and previously-broken vulnerabilities that makes it very strong even when it's only applied for a few turns.  Orgies also have a larger number of scene and dialog variations than the other defiler actions, so I hope you all enjoy exploring them.

The other major addition is a very soft cap on the amount of trauma of each type that can be acquired in one battle.  This only applies above 1 trillion damage, which means it doesn't kick in until you've already gotten enough trauma to see all the corruption content up to this point.  Part of my reason for implementing this was to make it less easy to break the scoring system, but the main purpose was to test the mechanic for eventual use in the difficulty toggle system somewhere down the line.

With this update, all the basic mechanics that were originally planned for battle have been implemented.  All that remain are the last two tiers of upgrades, which will involve the last tier of corruption and the final battle.  There have also been some good suggestions for content toggles and quality-of-life features that I'll try to put in along the way.

Click here to download.  Mirror.

• Content: Added a new special defiler action triggered by hitting all three Chosen with the same defiler action at once.  See Step 8 of guide.txt for further details.
• Balance: Trauma acquired in each battle will now be cut in half above every order of magnitude past 1 trillion.
• Interface: Tooltips for upgraded defiler actions are now distinct from the tooltips for regular defiler actions.
• Interface: Buttons for upgrades bought before the battle will now display tooltips that summarize their effects.
• Bugfix: Attempted to fix some file path issues reported by Linux users.  If this doesn't work, let me know.

Release 11b

• Bugfix: Damage values in the quadrillions will no longer abruptly jump to Long.MAX_VALUE and then usually crash the game.
• Bugfix: Some of the forced threesome scenes during Orgy will no longer be inappropriately rare to trigger.
• Bugfix: The Chosen will stop using Striptease in unusually inappropriate circumstances.
• Bugfix: The bar that shows projected extermination next turn will no longer sometimes incorrectly take surrounded Chosen into account.
• Bugfix: The total multiplier summary of all other active multipliers should be able to handle much higher multiplier combinations.
• Bugfix: A source of post-battle trauma overflow errors has been plugged.