Lab Rats Current Public Release (v1.0, 27/11/17)

[KingsRaiden]

Thanks for the updated release.

I went through the text updating the dialogue, fixing some of the spelling you didn't get this time.

Hope it helps.

[keradi01]

A great update to a game that has already been shaping up to be pretty good. If each character has about the same amount of major scenes, then I have likely seen them all or at least most of them (influence at around 110-120 for everyone) and I've seen a fair number of minor scenes as well.

Haven't run into any blatant bugs, however, I did notice something odd. While I was able to get numerous pictures from texting with Steph, I couldn't get any from Alexia or Nora, despite their presence in the images folder and having had over a hundred influence over both of them. I'm not sure if they require a random event that I missed or if they haven't been implemented into the game yet. I also haven't seen any scenes showing off Nora in her lingerie for some reason; chances are I haven't gotten the right event or didn't do the right scene the right way (I've only gone through the game once this update). I did notice a scant few weird lines as well (like one scene with Alexia, I think, that said something about the MC pulling their dick out of his panties) but I forgot to pinpoint which specific scenes I found them in and there didn't seem to be that many.

The only gripes I have is that hunting for random scenes and building up influence for each different major scene is a serious time sink that makes time fly by so fast that I didn't even realize it was almost midnight by the time I was done. Then again, that's probably a good thing for a game. I'm very glad that there are now enough scenes with each character to build influence much more easily. Though the studying scene with Nora could be a bit less obtuse; I eventually gave up texting Nora when nothing happened every time I did it and only got the scenes after seeing it hinted at here in the forum (after which, I kept spamming the text > study options until I got it to work once). It could do with a bit more clues that a scene can come from that option since it seems random and it isn't something a player is likely to do over and over without already knowing about the scene in advance. That or don't make the scene random (if it is) and instead, make the text > study option random (if possible) or make it appear only after specific conditions are met; that way if it does show up, then the player recognizes it as something unusual and will try it out.

[cheddaredgrizzly]

Maybe it's just my game, but I can't get any of Alexia's flirt dialogue to work. I worked once when she was at 30, now I'm at 102 and I can't get her to tell me her site. Any ideas. In fact, looking at the code, it seems to skip all the influence options for some reason.

[dannub]

So, have I found all the major serum scenes?

Spoiler (click to show/hide):

Mom

Evening movie with/without Lily
Night scene
Combo scene with Nora

Lily

Movie scene
Night scene
Evening movie with mom
Mom spikes Lily's drink for money

Alexia

Cafe
Lab
Study scene
Mall scene

Stephanie

Lab scene when she catches you making serum
Spiking her coffee
Spiking the drinks for her and Nora
Tennis

Nora

Lab scene when she catches you making serum
Spiking the drinks for her and Stephanie
Scientist party
Studying in your room
Studying in the dining room with mom

[Darthjake]

Nora also has a small scene when you find something in her desk and play with it.

Also there is a late night concentration scene with Nora.

Did you enter the lab when Stephanie had been given a huge load of work from Nora and offered to help?

[Shardoom]

Game looks very good but sadly I don't think its for me. The inability to repeat a scene is too big of a turn-off.

I mean for instance. I finally figured out how to make a serum (way to go on giving the player zero clue about anything, anywhere) and I got all excited remembering that Alexia burns her mouth and gives me an opportunity. So I drop one of those blue bad boys into her drink but can only get a kiss, "That's fine." I reassured myself, I'll just use a more powerful potions next time and eventually I'll be able to fuck her on that table... Yeah right, except that after you use that blue serum you can no longer use that scene to drug her, even with a more powerful serum. Now I don't mean to be rude but that just feels like a kick in the nuts to be honest. Like I wasted my time solving this big mystery for no reason at all.

Have to say, I came away from this experience with a mixture of frustration and annoyance.

[dannub]

Nora also has a small scene when you find something in her desk and play with it.

Also there is a late night concentration scene with Nora.

Did you enter the lab when Stephanie had been given a huge load of work from Nora and offered to help?

I got all those. I was asking about the serum scenes specifically to see if there was another opportunity to build influence. Those side scenes don't change your relationship with them, they're just a result of how far you've progressed.

[dannub]

Also, I would agree not being able to repeat those scenes is a huge detriment. The only way to see the higher-level perversions of those scenes is to restart the whole game and give the serum to the same character at different events, then rush the red serum as fast as possible.

Considering the side events are repeatable, I don't see any reason why the serum ones aren't. As long as you can only give them the serum once, it'll stay balanced, but you could at least go back and see a more perverted version of the cafe scene, for example, without restarting the whole game.

[Shardoom]

Also getting a hold of the purple serum... HOW?

I read through the pages here and followed them. Got the blue serum, made some, found steph in the labs in the morning, asked her about the drug, she e-mailed me some shit, I read the e-mail but then what? WTF was I meant to do because I it says you need extra ingredients, but there's no shops, and the computer only has three options and none of them are for buying stuff, tried being in the labs at all times of the day alone and with company but nothing fucking happens, could still only make blue...

[Wee]

Currently, you can only manufacture Purple Serum at the lab at night, if the lab is empty, once you've done all the other stuff you've mentioned.

[Darthjake]

Also getting a hold of the purple serum... HOW?

I read through the pages here and followed them. Got the blue serum, made some, found steph in the labs in the morning, asked her about the drug, she e-mailed me some shit, I read the e-mail but then what? WTF was I meant to do because I it says you need extra ingredients, but there's no shops, and the computer only has three options and none of them are for buying stuff, tried being in the labs at all times of the day alone and with company but nothing fucking happens, could still only make blue...

You only need to read Nora and Steph's email once, (unlocks purple serum), having Steph find you out making the blue serum (has happened to me before I had the chance to even make any blue serums in several games, btw), unlocks the ability to make red serum.

And as was said in a previous post potency by the least effective is blue -> purple --> Red.

But, I digress, the purple and the ingredients you need for it and the red, you will have the option to buy on Saturday or Sunday (Sunday if you have enough money).

Basically, you have to have over $100 so $120 or so to buy 1 dose worth of ingredients on Saturday, if you have $220, you can buy a dose on Sat and Sunday.

If you have $300 you can buy 3 doses on Saturday and leave your Sunday free, because going to the store consumes morning and afternoon, and the game will be to night before you can do any other action.

Now if you want to be a greedy bastard (yes, I did this), don't offer mom any money. I have not experimented with giving her money later so if someone knows let us know if you later decide to give mom money does she start to offer you services? I've played through several times now, and saving and reloading to get the right combo of events with the right serum is a bit painful. Mind you, I like the game, I love the story, it's just a bit painful while the game grows.

[killyspec]

So get this, after I get Stephanie up to 50 relationship, whenever I head to the lab early and she's there, she ends up blowing me, meaning I can't make any more red serums.

Is this intentional? If so, looks like you'll have to leave Steph for last or grind shitloads of red serums(at least 2 for each girl, you can use purple after that and still get the last tier option when they're about 50-60 relation) before actually making any moves on with anyone. Which, assuming you manage to make 2 red serums per week(which isn't always the case), means you'll start fugging people after day ~50.

Also, in my first run on 0.3.1 i stumbed on the event when you get to search nora's or stephs desk 3 times but didn't get the password on any of them in like 60 days. I've had no problems with getting the pass on my runs on 0.2.1. I'm just unlucky right? I must be, I mean it took Nora 43 days to catch me making blue serums and I was making them everyday since day 4 or something.

Sorry if this feels a little ranty but my last go at it left me a bit frustrated.

[Wee]

@ killyspec
Looking at the code, the chance of Steph blowing you should only be about 20% (which locks out the 'regular' menu for mornings in the lab if it happens). The other 80% of the time, IF you have serum supplies (option to buy these on Saturday or Sunday morning if you have at least $100), you SHOULD have the option to make red serum. That's about the only thing I can think of that would 'lock out' the event, that is not having supplies in your inventory.

As for the random thing, it's been suggested before to put a slowly increasing chance on some events until they fire before, with a deduction to the chance of the event firing after it fires, for events that don't 'lock out' once you do them. So yeah, the random function gods must have decided to annoy you in the game you described. I've ran into the 'not finding lab code for weeks' thing before too when the random function gods were being fickle.

@ darthjake
Thanks for pointing out the supplies thing. I forgot to mention the 'need to buy serum supplies on Saturday or Sunday morning' thing in my last post. That's kind of important...

[Darthjake]

@ killyspec
Looking at the code, the chance of Steph blowing you should only be about 20% (which locks out the 'regular' menu for mornings in the lab if it happens). The other 80% of the time, IF you have serum supplies (option to buy these on Saturday or Sunday morning if you have at least $100), you SHOULD have the option to make red serum. That's about the only thing I can think of that would 'lock out' the event, that is not having supplies in your inventory.

As for the random thing, it's been suggested before to put a slowly increasing chance on some events until they fire before, with a deduction to the chance of the event firing after it fires, for events that don't 'lock out' once you do them. So yeah, the random function gods must have decided to annoy you in the game you described. I've ran into the 'not finding lab code for weeks' thing before too when the random function gods were being fickle.

@ darthjake
Thanks for pointing out the supplies thing. I forgot to mention the 'need to buy serum supplies on Saturday or Sunday morning' thing in my last post. That's kind of important...

If Steph blows or screws you it locks out the make red serum, likewise if the AC is on the fritz, you can't make blue serum.

@killspec when I *need* to do something I save before going then reload to make it happen, painful but needed while the game is in development.

[Shardoom]

Okay I persevered and eventually got to understand the game a bit better. (mainly due to being enamoured with the artstyle and unwilling to give up)

I couldn't find the store because the option only shows 'if' you have the available funds. I think this is a mistake and can lead to confusion. It would be better if it showed but you can't use it without funds. (like the Pc talks to himself about it being a waste of time etc)

After I got past that it quickly became evident that blue and even purple serums were pointless, since the ability to make red is easily gotten before you even have the materials to make purple.. (I restarted and didn't make a single blue or purple serum after that, except for the two story-based ones.)

I have never quickloaded / quicksaved more in another game than I have for this one. Whether it be to get Steph to be in the right place to make me reds, to get the code or to enable Nora's scenes. (Nora's scenes are by far the worst culprit though, until you figure out she's ALWAYS busy, but less so on weekends. Although the non serum Sunday afternoon scene is nice. Especially after you see her wearing that in one of her flirty txts.)

A little more direction could probably be implemented also, since when I started I literally had no fucking idea what I was doing and it was only through hours upon hours of save/load trial and error that I got anywhere. Trial and error isn't inherently a bad thing, but when you have a known time limit and no clues as to what you can, can't and should be doing it becomes a chore.

I noticed quite a lot of spelling mistakes, but those are minor issues.

Alexia's txt flirting is broken and stops after you pass around 30'ish. I know there is more to be seen since I purposefully looked through the images in the game folder.

The scene where you choose to sleep-in and mom comes to wake you up with a quickie doesn't have any corresponding CG. (only the regular mom art shows)

It's currently possible to do all of the serum scenes with red serums. (obviously except for Nora and Steph's scene where they catch you making blues)
Although it did take me till literally the final day before I had that spare $500 to pay mom for drugging Lilly.

All in all after my initial frustration, and the honestly HORRIBLE rng this is actually a pretty fantastic game. One that I will be keeping an earnest watch on in the future.

This was my final score btw.

[Shardoom]

Little guide I made for myself for the serum events. I won't post the one I made for non serum events as their surprise is pretty cool.

(I marked some of them as weekend only, now the RNG for this game is, well, there is very little in this world I hate more than the Apple company, but, this thing comes close... So maybe they aren't weekend only and the RNG was just trying to make me smash up my keyboard, who knows. (they definitely work at weekends though)

Lab rats event guide.rtf

(1.95 KiB) Downloaded 1397 times

[KingsRaiden]

I noticed quite a lot of spelling mistakes, but those are minor issues.

You can use the attached file I have above, it fixes all the spelling mistakes in 0.3.1

[vrengames]

Well, that was a "fun" weekend. If any of you are thinking of catching the cold I'd have to recommend against it!

Anyway, I'm mostly recovered and back at work on v0.4! All your input is proving to be hugely helpful, and I've got a nice long list of improvements I'm going to start chewing through. It won't solve every problem (And I'm sure it'll introduce a few new ones!), but it should be a solid first step at iterating over the gameplay in Lab Rats.

As a teaser: major scenes will be repeatable, and the serums will differ in more that just strength this go around.

[Darthjake]

Well, that was a "fun" weekend. If any of you are thinking of catching the cold I'd have to recommend against it!

Whatever you do for God's sake do not visit YummyTiger's threads, we don't want him infected (j/k)

Anyway, I'm mostly recovered and back at work on v0.4! All your input is proving to be hugely helpful, and I've got a nice long list of improvements I'm going to start chewing through. It won't solve every problem (And I'm sure it'll introduce a few new ones!), but it should be a solid first step at iterating over the gameplay in Lab Rats.

As a teaser: major scenes will be repeatable, and the serums will differ in more that just strength this go around.

Glad you are recovering, and please don't take my earlier comments about save / reloading against the game, I understand you are still working on it and I love the concept and production of the game, looking at the big picture when it will be complete.

[KingsRaiden]

Well, that was a "fun" weekend. If any of you are thinking of catching the cold I'd have to recommend against it!

Anyway, I'm mostly recovered and back at work on v0.4! All your input is proving to be hugely helpful, and I've got a nice long list of improvements I'm going to start chewing through. It won't solve every problem (And I'm sure it'll introduce a few new ones!), but it should be a solid first step at iterating over the gameplay in Lab Rats.

As a teaser: major scenes will be repeatable, and the serums will differ in more that just strength this go around.

Oh, in case you haven't had it reported. Check the Sleep In routine, you have two If statements there, so both scenes launch.

Good to know about the serums, I did some testing when playing around with the chance factors, to get scenes replayable locally, and found that sometimes they really raise a state quick - even for blue. So you end up missing some content due to the score rising too fast. Its still early though, but either you need to make the serums not as strong, or give a wider range for the levels. Which might not be a bad idea for each character, giving it some extra challenge.