Musing on Extra Uses for Arousal

I wish that Lab Rats #2 was more like #1 with the Pregnancy.

ZinTek

LM above basically spoke my opinion on this stuff. At the end of the day, I am REALLY hoping this game does not become overly complicated. I'm not looking for a business sim with occasional sex... I'm looking for porn with the occasional business sim. However you develop this is however you develop it, Vren, but I really hope that it doesn't take hours of save-scumming to get hot workers that are at least moderately viable, aren't that difficult to keep happy, and are reasonably simple to have sex with. Too much complication gets tedious and boring in my opinion.

Tim R Mercado

Realism? (DISCLAIMER: I’m not an accredited sex therapist, but I have credentials in abnormal psychology) There is one driving force that impacts a heterosexual human male’s desire to mate with a woman or one woman over another woman; Propagation of the male’s genetic code with a woman’s. There are known attributes which are signals to the male that one woman is better than another in terms of propagation. Larger breasts signify better health and milk production – providing the offspring with a better chance to thrive. 77% of men are wired this way. 12% are wired to be attracted to long, lean legs. This gives the woman the ability to ‘keep up’ when trekking and or have superior ability to outrun a threat, with child in womb or in arms. 5% are attracted to hair – which signifies adequate vitamin/nutrition supply (when vitamin deficient, hair is the first feature to suffer, followed quickly by skin). The proof is in front of us all the time, breast implant popularity, long shiny hair, cosmetics and heels to make legs look leaner and longer. The more a woman has these things, the ‘sluttier’ Vren would propose. Less clothing (except heels) just show these attributes off even more. As free estrogen accumulates in a woman, she will begin to subconsciously ‘advertise’ her [ahem] assets. ie: Vren would say her sluttiness goes up. After she either achieves orgasm or conceives, free estrogen drops. Same with men and testosterone. Well, except the pregnancy part 😊 Obedience is somewhat of a misnomer that Vren has opted to adopt. The proper measure is typically submissiveness. How much sex and under what situation will the woman grant the male his ability to share genetic code. Men want to know that they will continue to have the privilege of providing it under as stressful situation as possible. ie: He will get to propagate his genetics under any circumstances. As in, the highest priority! Even food has been shown to have a lower priority than sex in men. Higher estrogen in women (horniness or maybe arousal) will make a (nominal) woman want to comply. So, in *reality* it’s: A woman has great genetic attributes. A man is attracted to them. She has a high degree of free estrogen and also finds that the man has attributes of protection and security (also hard wired) – BAM! It’s probably gonna happen.. Unless the woman is already secure. In which case, her estrogen levels are probably being stabilized anyway 😉 SCIENCE! Understand this mechanism in a bar and your wildest fantasies could come true.

It was very interesting to hear your opinions. Listen now to mine. In porn games, I do not like very simple ways. In life, it does not happen. Yes, I understand that for many it is simple FAP content, but what about the immersive effect? How about realism? People do not appreciate what is easy to get. Therefore, I think that it is necessary to complicate the game.

VitAnyaNaked

I was thinking (especially considering the things that seem to key off arousal) that there should be a serum effect to boost/gain arousal instead of just sluttiness (say a "x amount gain per turn of serum affect"). That way it would only add/adjust to sluttiness if something is done about it (not to mention perhaps triggering a masturbation action if it gets high enough with no other 'release').

William Urquhart

So you're saying the MC's penis is named "Steam"?

Dubsington

I feel that another frustrating barrier is the fact that the MC is charged a Obedience and Sluttiness penalty for having sex in what could be considered pretty typical situations (like missionary, on the bed for example). It should be the other way. If a girl is 'convinced' to face the wall, or window while I 'get off', then I would argue that she should gain Obedience, not lose any. After all, she complied! Why should she comply this time and then lose obedience so that she is less likely to comply next time. -UNLESS, she didn't have a positive experience or enjoy it..

BRAVO! Thank you, you have certainly articulated my thoughts about this far better than I have. Vren, I *want* to continue to be $20 (or higher) contributor. I just am finding the "statistics and bean counting activity in the game" a little overwhelming recently. I'm totally in favor of the "step back" approach :)

This is true, and I've had also been quite annoyed at it, but I wouldn't say the ornery trait is to blame. Really the problem is that currently corrupting employee's is very one dimensional and repetitive, which is why the player gravitates to a one dimensional solution (the aphrodisiac). But having all the employee's be corrupted automatically over time isn't really that interesting.

Bingbong

I do agree that arousal should be a component of seduction success. But... while arousal is one reason people have sex, it's not the only one. Some upwardly mobile individuals have sex with the boss to secure promotions or boost performance evaluations. While you are tinkering with the rules, maybe have some underlings make the first move if they are looking to climb the whoreporate ladder. ;-) You may find it better to break the rules up into four states: Arousal, Sluttiness, Trust, and Stimulation. Arousal is how powerful is the desire of the individual to have sex. Someone who is always aroused is actually a nymphomanic, not a slut. Sluttiness is a measure of how likely the person is to engage in sex for reasons other than arousal. Sluttiness is also a pretty decent measure of what acts they will perform while having sex with someone the don't trust. Trust is the strength of a bond between two partners. Non-sluts will go all the way with a partner, if they are convinced the relationship is meaningful to both parties. Stimulation is the level of physical and mental effects of the current encounter leading to orgasm. Being involved in a prolonged state of arousal can produce stimulation.

I agree with what some of the others have said, and will add my own input. In previous versions, before you added the "ornery" quality to the aphrodisiac, you could use that in a daily serum to increase sluttiness over time. Now if you do that, everyone quits after a few days, unless you take other measures with each person individually - very frustrating. If you're playing the game with the goal in mind of building a harem of employees, it is very difficult to do. I do like the idea of arousal that is influenced outside of an individual encounter, but you've already made it more difficult to seduce women in what is, (I think?) supposed to be a sex-based game.

Lazarus

This arousal mechanic idea is the kind of thing that sounds ok in theory, but which can become a mess in practice. Right now I think there are significant outstanding issues with the implementation of Slutiness: -I don't really feel I have a solid grasp on how permanent/temporary slutiness are supposed to work, exactly how one changes into the other, what each of them should affect about the employee's behavior, etc. I may have a vague idea of how it's supposed to work (from the blog rather than the game itself), but precisely because it is a vague idea, when things work in an unexpected way I can't tell if that was due to a bug or me not understanding the system. And the whole heart counter for the display (which in the current implementation actively hides information) only makes it even harder to infer the rules for the system. -there are plenty of instances where employees will act in a way that doesn't feel congruent with their level of slutiness I feel that expanding the role of arousal will both raise similar issues and compound the already existent issues. And isn't temporary slutiness meant to be similar to what you are proposing for arousal anyway? I really feel like you need to step back here and take a holistic view as to where the current problems are stemming from.

Bingbong

"Dude" - look at Graphteon.com The story is easy to see from there.. LR1 was a beta too at one time. Loved it! I wait patiently and excited for point-release after point-release only to consistently see this project heading the wrong way. Tired of clicking on "Compliment her recent work", "Compliment her Outfit" repeat. I've been a $20 level supporter for quite a while. Sorry to have to "pull back" :(

This is a Beta dude. The shit that irks me most is I gotta build a new company after each update...

blakeness

So let me make sure I understand: I will now have to deal with my own arousal management, the girl's sluttiness, her obedience AND her happiness? I have to find a way to overcome the -10 Obedience and the -10 Sluttiness penalty just because I want to see the image(s) related to the Blowjob position on the floor?!? I've had it! This game has become an accounting and financial modeling geekfest. Count me out! LR1 had none of this stuff - at least none externalized. And people LOVED it. LR2 reminds me of the typical Rock Legend that over complicates his/her second album release.

if (totalEventPoints == 0) return (Arousal points of girl 1) / (Total event points) = chance of sexy with girl 1 There is a fairly easy way of implementing it too.

mazterlith

Arousal could increase the chances you get of "sexy" events with that person rather than the "work" events. You might want to make it a soft chance increase so people aren't overwhelmed with those events: i.e. 90% of the first time visiting a location per time period no events fire and then 10% of the time is split among work vs sexy events.

mazterlith

I think most people have a core tendency to gain core arousal (hormonally) per time unit, and that the effectiveness of the activity engaged in removes either a percentage or down to a certain level of this core arousal. It's similar to the current iteration of the Sluttiness system. Situational modifiers affect a temp score, a core score is accumulated based on the magnitude of the temp score, and the core score is mitigated at a certain rate by satisfying events. The more satisfying the event, by magnitude, the more Sluttiness gained. Sluttiness would then go and modify static features, like clothing choice, certain preferences, etc. And the pharmaceuticals would then monkey with the rates of gain and temp stats. It's the way it really works, like dipping your dick in coke to make your girlfriend like giving you blowjobs more...

blakeness

Perhaps set arousal to normalize each time block (or each day) towards 1/2 the NPC's lust, with work environment and sex actions raising/lowering it? So watching sex would raise arousal, getting off would zero it.

Scott Snelling