5 years ago, I released a prototype for a game called Petit Monstrous. As of today, I've removed access to it, so I'd like to share some thoughts on how it went.
SUMMARY
Essentially, the game was a cute monster-collecting battler where you had your team of three monsters and battled teams of between one and five opponents. In the prototype, you wandered around a handful of small zones, faced random encounters, battled a few 'bosses', and ultimately built up a roster that you could use to battle a character from the start of the game. It's something like Pokémon but team based and much, much smaller in scale.
The hook is that, in this world, the monsters are super hardy and don't actually get hurt when fighting (to them, it's just play-fighting). Damage is instead represented by destroying their clothing, at which point the monsters simply shy away from the fight. It's cheeky, a little bit lewd, but not outright sexual. That was pretty much the idea - take an exploitative H-game mechanic and put it into a more playful setting.
So, what was the point of the prototype? I wanted to make a bigger game like this, but I didn't know if it was even something people would be interested in. Importantly, I was running out of money and was hopeful that something like this could find people willing to support development. Unfortunately, there wasn't much of a response at all to the prototype, which meant I didn't have any feedback to factor into a full game, and I couldn't count on it as a safe path forward.
WHAT WENT WRONG
The prototype had problems. It was far from perfect, but if I kept rebuilding it to chase 'perfect,' I'd never have anything to release. What I needed was actual feedback.
The sprites and art got the idea across, but were unrefined. Crude and messy. There are a few I still like, but most were just passable.
The Overworld is really where things didn't hold up. I made the battle mechanics first and then struggled to figure out what to do between them. I tried something like a fighting game ladder format, I tried linking nodes of different difficulty encounters, I even tried a side-scrolling navigation system where you trigger fights to move between rooms. A top-down RPG approach (like Pokémon) made the most sense, but the presentation of it never sat right with me. I stuck with it anyway and committed to keeping the whole game playable with just the mouse (inspired by Diablo). In the end, it's still the ugliest part of the whole project.
There was also very little story, if you couldn't tell. Just a brief introduction and then a few challenges before a boss fight and abrupt end. It was definitely clear that the 'story' was just an excuse to give you a path to follow. This was just a proof of concept. It's weak, but it's fine for what it is.
As for the lewdity: I still don't know what to make of it. Did people need it to be more sexual? Did the stripping element just put people off? The muted response left me directionless on that point. As it stands, it's awkward for me keep up and it never found an audience to justify itself.
WHAT WENT RIGHT
Despite all that, I think some things held up. The combat system where you pick who to use and how to juggle the cooldowns actually worked pretty well. Status effects were impactful, clearly portrayed, and there seemed to be a good amount of strategy in what abilities to prioritise in a fight. That was the core of the gameplay, and I think it worked well. It's a solid foundation that I could still build upon.
Actually, the battles in general are the best part. Some are easy, some are hard. Your party composition matters without being so rigid that you don't have options. Leveling up and learning new abilities is neat. Unlocking new characters is neat. The most important side of the game was perfectly fine, even if the presentation was still unrefined. I just wish I found a better out-of-combat solution to complement it.
THE FUTURE
After I released the prototype, I did get started on Petit Monstrous proper. Again, I got caught up on how to handle the out-of-combat portions. I REALLY was not satisfied with how the prototype went. That aside, I had solid plans. A few monsters were designed and drawn up in a more aliased style, I had a loose plot sorted out, and I'd expanded some systems to be more layered. For example, status effects would build up rather than being chance-based, and you would unlock monsters by meeting conditions in a fight, rather than just for beating them.
You would play as a little android assistant to a monster researcher. The game starts with you being given important research data to bring all the way from your remote lab to the capital. You, being much weaker than monsters, quickly find yourself vulnerable out in the wild. Luckily, you're able to win some monsters over and bring them into your party by appealing to them through various means.
The plan was to structure the game into acts based around one environment at a time, charting your journey to the capital, complete with boss fights and side routes for extra content. If the prototype got a big response, I'd throw up a Patreon or something similar and be able to release the game in little chunks as it was done. With that not being the case, I had to shelf it and look for some other way to make ends meet.
Now, years later, I don't see the project being picked up again any time soon. In part because I want to get away from Unity, which would mean a long process of starting over. I would love the chance to tell the story I set out for, I still believe there's a lot of potential in the gameplay, and maybe there is an audience out there for something like this that I just failed to tap into it, but it didn't work then, so now I have to focus on other ideas first.
Thank you to anyone who played the prototype while it was available. I hope you found some good in it!
