Big build today! How build? 51 bug fixes and 25 miscellaneous improvements and changes. (I also made some optimizations that should improve the framerate a bit; I’m now getting 70 FPS in the most taxing scenarios, and over 100 FPS in the least taxing scenarios. However, results will differ from computer to computer.)
To read a list of everything that was fixed or changed in the latest build, please scroll down past this beautiful artwork by @tho_nqu!
Improvements and Changes
- In the original release of 1980s Mode, it was possible to earn a maximum of $55,000 by selling hostages to the Yakuza. Because it was so easy to make money, I decided to update the game so that the Yakuza’s prices got more expensive with each passing week. In another update, I lowered the total amount of money that the player could obtain from the Yakuza…but I didn’t adjust his prices accordingly. To correct this, I have adjusted the rate of “Yakuza Price Inflation” so that it should now be possible to do a “Yakuza-Only Playthrough” using just the money earned from selling hostages to the Yakuza.
- While developing the Light Music Club’s rhythm minigame, I needed a way to get a game over fast so I could quickly test the Game Over feature, so I added a debug command: Pressing the spacebar would instantly fail the minigame. However, when I released this feature, I forgot to take out the debug command, and it actually remained in the game. I’ve removed that command in this update, since it was never intended to be present after I finished testing the feature.
- A highly-requested feature is now in the game; it is now possible to “One-Button Equip” an item from the bookbag using the same method as retrieving a weapon from the weapon bag. While Yandere Vision is enabled, you can now press one button to instantly conceal or retrieve an item in the bookbag, without having to remove the bookbag first.
- I learned that, when a new player experiences the stalker house stealth mission for the first time, they don’t really understand what to do. To provide some direction, instructions now appear at the top of the screen to remind the player of their current objective and what they should be trying to do.
- From now on, any student who is splashed with liquid at cleaning time – who was planning on going swimming immediately after cleaning time – will just change into their swimsuit instead of their gym clothes, since they were planning to change into a swimsuit, anyway.
- New players usually don’t understand that it’s possible to allocate study points by tapping left/right at the “studying in class” screen, so from now on, a warning window will pop up whenever the player tries to leave that screen without allocating any points.
- A lot of people were complaining about problems with Ryoba’s hair physics in her home, in the street, and in the asylum. I didn’t personally observe these problems, but I’ve made adjustments to her physics settings to potentially fix the problem for others.
- The player must now wait 4 seconds between uses of the “study in library to pass time” feature. It’s necessary, in order to avoid creating bugs in events that depend on a certain amount of time passing.
- The “Speedrun Timer” (that appears when pressing the “Delete” key on your keyboard) will no longer freeze when the game is paused or go super fast when the player is using the speed-up-time feature.
- It should no longer be possible for the corpse of a student to clip through a wall if you perform the running animation into/next to a wall or a corner and then release their corpse.
- Raibaru will now ignore weapons dropped on the ground in situations here she very obviously should be noticing other, more significant things nearby (such as Osana’s corpse).
- Removed exploit that would allow the player to use the Student Info menu in unintended ways by pressing a directional button and the “Confirm” button simultaneously.
- Bully girls now sit on a bench and eat lunch at lunchtime during Mission Mode, so that it’s possible to complete a Mission Mode mission about poisoning the bullies.
- The camera now follows the protagonist during a “Push victim off rooftop” animation, instead of staying far away from the protagonist throughout the animation.
- Chigusa will now sit in a different location at lunchtime, because her previous sitting location could cause her to clip into one of the male students.
- It is now possible to use Yandere Vision during the stalker house stealth mission, and see red outlines of the house’s family members through walls.
- Doubled the speed of the animation that Osana performs when she psyches herself up to give a bento to Senpai, since the old one was way too slow.
- The car battery now has a cyan outline around it in Yandere Vision, since all objects with utility are supposed to be cyan in Yandere Vision.
- It is now possible to lockpick your way into a clubroom after the club has been shut down and the doors have been locked.
- The “Sakyu Basu will take off her ring” event in the Schedule screen has been removed, since that event no longer occurs.
- Restored the missing “closing shower curtain” animation that was supposed to play when a female student took a shower.
- Made adjustments that might improve the framerate when looking towards the school at the beginning of the school day.
- Sumire now wears white socks in the tutorial, since that’s what she’s wearing in her official character artwork.
- The “Entering SNAP Mode” sequence is now 1 second shorter, because it was just too long before.
- SNAP Mode now incorporates depth-of-field effects (it didn’t before.)
Fixes
- Fixed bug that would cause strange behavior from Ritsuko (awake and asleep simultaneously, moving at running speed while performing walking animation, in two events simultaneously) if the player passed time using the “Study in Library” feature after Ritsuko had eaten food poisoned with a sedative.
- Fixed bug in the “lower school atmosphere” code that was causing school atmosphere to drop by larger and larger amounts with each subsequent day that a death occurred, because it was counting deaths that occurred on previous days as “deaths that occurred today.”
- Fixed bug that caused the Light Music Club’s practice music to play simultaneously with the Occult Club’s “summoning ritual” music if the player attended the Occult Club’s club activity while the music club were performing their own club activity.
- Fixed bug that prevented the player from being able to disable the school’s security system in Mission Mode. (The system is disabled by stealing a faculty card from the faculty room and then using it on the console in the Announcement Room.)
- Fixed bug that would cause the game to soft-lock if the player accepted Budo’s task (bring Raibaru to the Martial Arts club) and then spoke to Raibaru during a point in time when the Martial Arts club was not training in their clubroom.
- Fixed bug with the “report Osana for smoking” Scheme that would cause the Scheme’s progress to reset if the player purchased cigarettes from Info-chan after reaching the “report Osana to the guidance counselor” phase of the Scheme.
- Fixed bug that allowed the player to perform interactions with a teacher that were never intended to be possible (give a snack, ask to pull a box cutter out of a box, etc) if the “Report Corpse to Teacher” prompt was active.
- Fixed bug that would cause the game to get stuck in “Telling the suitor what to change about his appearance” mode, if a student council member became alarmed by the player while the change-suitor’s appearance menu was open.
- Fixed bug that would cause the game to incorrectly believe that a bloody weapon was present on the ground at school if a rival was sent to the guidance counselor while a bloody weapon was inside of the player’s inventory.
- Fixed bug that was preventing the game from remembering certain information (task status, items that could be brought from home to school, sanity of kidnapped students) when the player transitioned from week to week.
- Fixed bug that would cause Raibaru to move at running speed while performing her walking animation if she was away from Osana at the same time as her “talk with Osana in the plaza on Monday morning” event began.
- Fixed bug that could result in a weapon hovering midair and rotating (looked kind of cool, honestly) if it was dropped while Ayano was standing at the top of the hill where the confession tree is located.
- Fixed bug that would allow the player to skip past Friday without eliminating their rival by putting their rival into a musical instrument case and then letting the police open the case later that day.
- Fixed bug that would cause the rival’s Yandere Vision outline to turn green instead of red if the player scared her and then apologized to her. (The current rival’s outline should never be green.)
- Fixed bug that would make the “Return to the main menu?” text box display the wrong text if the player summoned it using the Escape key after viewing the “Restart Day” text box.
- Fixed bug that would cause a mind-broken slave to “revive” the protagonist by attacking a delinquent after the delinquent had defeated the protagonist in the combat minigame.
- Fixed bug that caused Raibaru to perform the wrong animations after her “Tell Osana to stop hanging out with her because she’ll become a target for bullying” conversation.
- Fixed bug that would cause clothing and dismembered body parts to float in midair if they were picked up and then dropped very close to the location where they spawned.
- Fixed bug that caused Teacher’s Pets to completely ignore the death of a teacher who died while investigating something that the Teacher’s Pet was trying to show her.
- Fixed bug that would prevent the rival from performing her “search for lost book” animation if the player stole both her borrowed book and her bento on the same day.
- Fixed bug that allowed the player to break the tutorial sequence by washing the murder weapon at a drinking fountain instead of disposing of it at the incinerator.
- Fixed bug that would allow the player to run away while being chased if they had been cauterizing a corpse’s wounds at the point in time when the chase began.
- Fixed bug that would cause the camera to clip into the back of Ryoba’s head when going into first-person mode while Ryoba was using the “Aggressive” Persona.
- Fixed bug that would cause a shower curtain in the female shower building to open/shut every time a male student took a shower in the male shower building.
- Fixed bug that would cause a nurse to completely forget about corpses/calling the cops if a student approached her and complained having about a headache.
- Fixed bug that would cause the game to forget the player’s chosen school uniform if they used the “Reset Week” feature at the Game Over screen.
- Fixed bugs that would result if Osana was hit with a stink bomb while she in any phase of the “Reading Senpai’s book at the fountain” event.
- Fixed bug that prevented the player from being able to dispose of a murder weapon in Mission Mode if the weapon didn’t have any blood on it.
- Attempted to fix bug that would sometimes cause the game to freeze when fading in/fading out of a “boost one of the suitor’s stats” cutscene.
- Attempted to fix bug that would sometimes cause the game to freeze when fading in/fading out of the “leaving school and going home” screen.
- Fixed bug that would cause part of the protagonist’s head to stop rendering during the “Cracks appear onscreen” part of entering SNAP Mode.
- Fixed bug that would cause a button prompt to appear on top of the school newspaper as the player was trying to read a newspaper article.
- Fixed bug in 1980s Mode that prevented the Light Music Club from practicing music when they gathered in their clubroom after 5:00 PM.
- Fixed bug that caused Shiromi’s scarf and the coach’s whistle to float in midair around their heads after they had been decapitated.
- Fixed bug that allowed the player to use debug commands in Mission Mode, the Alphabet Killer Challenge, and the Amai Challenge.
- Fixed bug that would cause the 1980s Mode Photography Club Leader to try entering his club even if his club had been shut down.
- Fixed bug that would cause a character to clip through a wall if they were electrocuted while standing very close to a wall.
- Fixed animation error that prevented the protagonist’s skirt from animating during the “push student off rooftop” animation.
- Fixed bug that prevented 2 female hairstyles from displaying when using Pose Mode to change a female character’s hairstyle.
- Fixed bug in the town shopping street that would cause the camera to flicker if it collided with any props in the area.
- Fixed bug that made two non-functional buttons appear at the bottom of the doors outside of the counselor’s office.
- Fixed bug that prevented students from properly returning to their routine after performing the “Distract” favor.
- Fixed bug that could result in subtitles displaying onscreen during SNAP Mode that weren’t supposed to be there.
- Fixed bug that would cause the highest ceilings in the game (the ceilings of the rooftop entrances) to flicker.
- Fixed bug that caused the low-reputation Game Over screen to display the text “EXPELLED” instead of “EXPOSED.”
- Fixed bug that prevented Shin (the leader of the Occult Club) from sitting down in his chair after 5:00 PM.
- Fixed bug that would allow a student to trigger a tripwire trap while swimming in the school pool.
- Fixed a typo in the subtitles for the Tuesday conversation between the two science club boys.
- Fixed animation errors in the “If I can’t have you…no one can” SNAP Mode death animation.
- Fixed bug that was preventing the “open and close the school gate” feature from working.
- Fixed bug that caused the railing in the town to be invisible.
What’s Next?
The question I receive the most is “What are you working on right now?” so I created a new page on the official website to communicate the answer visually (and hopefully concisely): https://yanderesimulator.org/focus/
I am currently focusing on making the game more presentable for the upcoming crowdfunding campaign. That involves fixing bugs, removing exploits, adjusting difficulty, balancing overpowered mechanics, replacing low-quality art assets, implementing features requested by users, and, in general, just polishing and refining anything that is rough or “janky”. It is a broad category composed of a wide spectrum of different tasks, but each one of those tasks is important for making the game presentable for the next milestone, so even though it is tedious work that isn’t super glamorous, it still needs to get done, and that’s what I’ll be focusing on, until I finish going down my checklist of everything I need to fix or improve.