The Portrait postmortem

Ok, this is The Portrait’s postmortem, sorry for beig a tad(s) late :smiley:

I still haven’t tackled the post-comp release, I having first implemented the “lessons learned” in Isekai, then working on version 2.0 of Adv3Lite.

But the lessons learned are interesting: Aside getting the correct balance between details in the titular portrait and the general economy of Isekai (cfr. the author’s cameo: the code will be reused in pointing to the player that has seen enough details, albeit remain free to indulge in art appreciation…) so, aside the funny uppercased text, Mike Russo’s review show that I have nailed the correct balance, all is needed is ensuring that the player got the right balance of details… whose are not those related to aesthetics !

Noah perhaps never played Final Fantasy, so I’m unsurprised in her case in point about WEAR RIBBON :wink: but she’s true on the spotty quality of some details, and, more important, the disambiguation (a point noted also by JJMcC) but the disambiguation is deeply intertwined with the unusual, I daresay Trinity-grade array of adjectives and synonyms, e.g.

fground: pComponent, CollectiveGroup 'trio of girls; portrait\'s painting\'s 
picture\'s diverse three radiantly saluting young smiling happy inhumane; 
girls women foreground; them'

whose unquestionably put a strain to the disambiguation system… but yes, JJ, “kelly” and “Jill” 's disambiguation foci, as you call them, are nearby the top of the list of the post-comp release TODO…

every reviewer noted, in various degrees, the relevance given to the curves, esp. the fore ones (whose is inescapable, a portrait being “2D”)… but I address here a “failed trope” in the titular genre of the main story, namely, the “sex change”, whose in the economy of the main story is also a (not-so) subtle critique of the homophobia and trans-gender-phobia (exist a word for this ??) as the portrait itself anticipates… aside that the general narration is from an EU perspective on body and intimate actions; specifically, I’m still assessing an option on “toning down” said EU perpsective, but this will add another layer to the already complex adaptive prose (cfr. the ambiguity if the portrait is a picture or a painting: what is is revealed later, and the desc of the portrait changes accordingly)
Side point, I wonder if people have noted that X ME changes after looking into the mirror.

on the coding experience, the major (and still unsolved) issue is the handling of the discovery of the six-finger hands, whose is obviously a thing whose can be noted very early and in multiple spots up to looking in the mirror, and should be also one of the first hint to the PC that he’s not only turned into a she… and I still haven’t figured an acceptable (multiple) narrative solution.

OTOH, I was pleasantly surprised that the excision of The Portrait’s source from Isekai’s source was actually breezly easy, and this is a sign that the source’s layout is actually well-designed. (of course, the source will be released with the post-comp release; of course, this require the excision of many spoilers on Isekai from comments & notes in the source, whose was the main cause in the failure to release the source in the spring thing release.

Last thing, the testing die was kept in The Portrait as a reference to another isekai genre trope: the references to (J)RPGs… aside contribuiting to the “WIP demo” flavor of Portrait, of course :wink:

Of course, if there’s questions, please ask, and I will answer :slight_smile:

Best regards from Italy,
dott. Piergiorgio.

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