Check Out [Boardgame][Simulation]

[blue0o]

Hi, Check Out is now ready for beta testing. I originally posted the game concept in the WIP section on September 17, 2014, but now a working version is ready.

Download the game & post your feedback. Critiques & suggestions on how to make the game better are appreciated. Beta or "Demo" version is the full game. The idea is to play the full game & not a crippled or limited version to get honest feedback. Click on the files below to download. Thank you for support. : )

Rulebook
Windows
Mac
Linux

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Intro

Check Out is a digital board game about a clerk working in a health food store trying to make money & all the interesting characters who enter the store. The tone of the game is lighthearted & silly. The game does NOT have many backgrounds like a VN. In fact, it only has one, (the game board). In the board are spaces for the tokens, cards, & a score sheet. There is still text at the bottom of the screen though like a regular VN.

Check Out is also a simulation game. It depicts events that actually happen in the world of retail. Most of the characters in the game are based on real customers in a real health food store in Santa Clarita, CA.

Goal

Goal of the game is to make as much money as you can with the time you have left. Story-wise, the clerk only has an 8 hour shift, but actual game time is done in rounds & turns like an RPG.

Gameplay is boiled down into 3 steps. It's not hard.

1) Meet a customer in any of the 3 departments in the store.
2) Negotiate or flirt w/ the customer to convert them into a buyer.
3) Check them out at the register to make a cash conversion.

It's not easy either. There are characters & events in the game that will prevent you from getting your goal. The most dangerous one is the health inspector.

Ending

The game ends when you finish your shift, & your cash is still above zero. The health inspector can also shut down the store & end the game if he gives you too many citations. In the end you get a final report, like an income statement. (Again, this game can actually be a simulator for a store, but that would be boring.)

This is my 1st Renpy game. Right now the game is a Renpy hobbyist's dream. Don't know if there is a market for this type of game, not just Check Out but digitized board games in general. Critiques are welcome.

Note: The health inspector card is actually wrong. 2 citations will shut down the store, not 3.

Logo

Intro

Blue hour cards give a short description of the upcoming hour & the characters who will be in the game.

The game board consist of 3 departments in the center, tokens in the upper right, cards on the lower right, & a score sheet in the upper left.

The health inspector is the most dangerous character in the game.

This is the final report plus a purple ending card.

[mollycubed]

First off, I'd like to say how much the bowel issues and losing the bathroom key made me laugh.
Anyone that has worked retail knows how horrendous this is.

Initially I was kind of confused and just started clicking on the different departments. I figured it out quick, but a better explanation of what you're supposed to be doing might be in order.

I thought the bathroom sex was kind of tacky with the moaning. The rest of the game is light hearted, and afterwards she says "that really was a quickie" or something. I think playing on the light heartedness of the game would be better for the bathroom sex route. Instead of moaning, maybe Sad Trombone (http://www.sadtrombone.com/).

I really liked the game board layout. I haven't played many of them, but this one has a great start. I liked the tokens, but I only found two of them. The shitty kid and the bathroom key. I'm gonna replay it to see if I can get more.

Fun game overall!

[sasquatchii]

Hmmmm, I was a little confused (I didn't play through the whole thing so maybe if I did it'd make more sense?

I felt like the text box was big and clunky and frustrating because it got in the way of me being able to see the game board.

Also, I struggled to understand the point of the game, right now it feels like a game where I was just clicking a bunch. I think this has a lot of potential, and would like to see more of a story involved. (But that's just me, I love stories. IN RPG's and other games I always felt frustrated because I wanted to get through the actual gameplay as fast as possible to find out more of the story.).

Lastly, I noticed a grammar mistake - whenever you meet someone, the text on the screen will say "You meet difficult customer" or "You meet no customer." I think it should say "You meet a difficult customer." or "You meet no customers."

[meiri]

I am superbly impressed!

Error-wise, nothing. No errors have popped up for me, but I haven't finished all the way through either. But it's very impressive, with the complexity of the game to not have encountered anything, so kudos to you!
I love the command-line style cutscenes. I'm not sure why, but they appeal to me a lot and I feel they fit in well with game. I'm also very fond of the loading bars during negotiations and flirting, etc.
The gameplay is great. It starts off a little slow, but I finally realized that the further you actually get into the game, the more interesting characters pop out. I really like the digitized board game feel and its very enjoyable to play, and has a very attractive replayability quality!

A visual suggestion I have, is during the loading bar, maybe a little text above it saying something like: "Rolling Digital Dice..." or "Rolling Dice...", just for aesthetics.

I agree with sasquatchii about the textbox-- its pretty distracting, and I want to be able to see the whole game board. I'd suggest maybe putting it at the right with the other text if possible. The sentences are pretty short, so I think it'd fit.

Im quite interested in this and cant wait to see the result, so good luck!

EDIT: I feel like the possibility of getting the grazer or rowdy kid in the beginning is a bit too high. Its very very difficult to get past hour 7. While the difficulty is a charming quality of the game, I feel like the way it occurs is strange, almost as if I could call it a bug? If I choose produce or grocery early on in the game, I get the grazer for the rest of my turns until the game terminates from store damage.

[verysunshine]

I was playing the game on my mac. Aside from the sex and bowel sound effects making me uneasy and the GUI looking a bit bland, I thought it was great. I even got the bonus hour and the easter egg. When I opened the easter egg, I got an error.

Code: Select all

I'm sorry, but an uncaught exception occurred.

While running game code:
  File "game/script.rpy", line 4847, in script
  File "game/script.rpy", line 4847, in script
  File "game/screens.rpy", line 58, in <module>
  File "game/screens.rpy", line 538, in <module>
RuntimeError: maximum recursion depth exceeded while calling a Python object

-- Full Traceback ------------------------------------------------------------

Full traceback:
  File "game/script.rpy", line 4847, in script
  File "My_Computer_Harddrive/Downloads/checkout-1.0-mac/checkout.app/Contents/Resources/autorun/renpy/ast.py", line 558, in execute
    renpy.exports.say(who, what, interact=self.interact)
  File "My_Computer_Harddrive/Downloads/checkout-1.0-mac/checkout.app/Contents/Resources/autorun/renpy/exports.py", line 925, in say
    who(what, interact=interact)
  File "My_Computer_Harddrive/Downloads/checkout-1.0-mac/checkout.app/Contents/Resources/autorun/renpy/character.py", line 817, in __call__
    self.do_display(who, what, cb_args=self.cb_args, **display_args)
  File "My_Computer_Harddrive/Downloads/checkout-1.0-mac/checkout.app/Contents/Resources/autorun/renpy/character.py", line 683, in do_display
    **display_args)
  File "My_Computer_Harddrive/Downloads/checkout-1.0-mac/checkout.app/Contents/Resources/autorun/renpy/character.py", line 486, in display_say
    rv = renpy.ui.interact(mouse='say', type=type, roll_forward=roll_forward)
  File "My_Computer_Harddrive/Downloads/checkout-1.0-mac/checkout.app/Contents/Resources/autorun/renpy/ui.py", line 264, in interact
    rv = renpy.game.interface.interact(roll_forward=roll_forward, **kwargs)
  File "My_Computer_Harddrive/Downloads/checkout-1.0-mac/checkout.app/Contents/Resources/autorun/renpy/display/core.py", line 2065, in interact
    repeat, rv = self.interact_core(preloads=preloads, **kwargs)
  File "My_Computer_Harddrive/Downloads/checkout-1.0-mac/checkout.app/Contents/Resources/autorun/renpy/display/core.py", line 2652, in interact_core
    rv = root_widget.event(ev, x, y, 0)
  File "My_Computer_Harddrive/Downloads/checkout-1.0-mac/checkout.app/Contents/Resources/autorun/renpy/display/layout.py", line 774, in event
    rv = i.event(ev, x - xo, y - yo, cst)
  File "My_Computer_Harddrive/Downloads/checkout-1.0-mac/checkout.app/Contents/Resources/autorun/renpy/display/layout.py", line 774, in event
    rv = i.event(ev, x - xo, y - yo, cst)
  File "My_Computer_Harddrive/Downloads/checkout-1.0-mac/checkout.app/Contents/Resources/autorun/renpy/display/layout.py", line 774, in event
    rv = i.event(ev, x - xo, y - yo, cst)
  File "My_Computer_Harddrive/Downloads/checkout-1.0-mac/checkout.app/Contents/Resources/autorun/renpy/display/behavior.py", line 352, in event
    rv = run(action)
  File "My_Computer_Harddrive/Downloads/checkout-1.0-mac/checkout.app/Contents/Resources/autorun/renpy/display/behavior.py", line 274, in run
    return var(*args, **kwargs)
  File "My_Computer_Harddrive/Downloads/checkout-1.0-mac/checkout.app/Contents/Resources/autorun/renpy/curry.py", line 38, in __call__
    **dict(self.kwargs.items() + kwargs.items()))
  File "My_Computer_Harddrive/Downloads/checkout-1.0-mac/checkout.app/Contents/Resources/autorun/renpy/game.py", line 283, in call_in_new_context
    return renpy.execution.run_context(False)
  File "My_Computer_Harddrive/Downloads/checkout-1.0-mac/checkout.app/Contents/Resources/autorun/renpy/execution.py", line 515, in run_context
    context.run()
  File "game/script.rpy", line 4847, in script
  File "My_Computer_Harddrive/Downloads/checkout-1.0-mac/checkout.app/Contents/Resources/autorun/renpy/ast.py", line 558, in execute
    renpy.exports.say(who, what, interact=self.interact)
  File "My_Computer_Harddrive/Downloads/checkout-1.0-mac/checkout.app/Contents/Resources/autorun/renpy/exports.py", line 925, in say
    who(what, interact=interact)
  File "My_Computer_Harddrive/Downloads/checkout-1.0-mac/checkout.app/Contents/Resources/autorun/renpy/character.py", line 817, in __call__
    self.do_display(who, what, cb_args=self.cb_args, **display_args)
  File "My_Computer_Harddrive/Downloads/checkout-1.0-mac/checkout.app/Contents/Resources/autorun/renpy/character.py", line 683, in do_display
    **display_args)
  File "My_Computer_Harddrive/Downloads/checkout-1.0-mac/checkout.app/Contents/Resources/autorun/renpy/character.py", line 462, in display_say
    what_text = show_function(who, what_string)
  File "My_Computer_Harddrive/Downloads/checkout-1.0-mac/checkout.app/Contents/Resources/autorun/renpy/character.py", line 667, in do_show
    **self.show_args)
  File "My_Computer_Harddrive/Downloads/checkout-1.0-mac/checkout.app/Contents/Resources/autorun/renpy/character.py", line 272, in show_display_say
    return renpy.display.screen.get_widget(screen, "what", layer)
  File "My_Computer_Harddrive/Downloads/checkout-1.0-mac/checkout.app/Contents/Resources/autorun/renpy/display/screen.py", line 646, in get_widget
    screen.update()
  File "My_Computer_Harddrive/Downloads/checkout-1.0-mac/checkout.app/Contents/Resources/autorun/renpy/display/screen.py", line 288, in update
    self.screen.function(**self.scope)
  File "My_Computer_Harddrive/Downloads/checkout-1.0-mac/checkout.app/Contents/Resources/autorun/renpy/screenlang.py", line 1239, in __call__
    renpy.python.py_exec_bytecode(self.code.bytecode, locals=scope)
  File "My_Computer_Harddrive/Downloads/checkout-1.0-mac/checkout.app/Contents/Resources/autorun/renpy/python.py", line 1382, in py_exec_bytecode
    exec bytecode in globals, locals
  File "game/screens.rpy", line 58, in <module>
  File "My_Computer_Harddrive/Downloads/checkout-1.0-mac/checkout.app/Contents/Resources/autorun/renpy/display/screen.py", line 621, in use_screen
    screen.function(**scope)
  File "My_Computer_Harddrive/Downloads/checkout-1.0-mac/checkout.app/Contents/Resources/autorun/renpy/screenlang.py", line 1239, in __call__
    renpy.python.py_exec_bytecode(self.code.bytecode, locals=scope)
  File "My_Computer_Harddrive/Downloads/checkout-1.0-mac/checkout.app/Contents/Resources/autorun/renpy/python.py", line 1382, in py_exec_bytecode
    exec bytecode in globals, locals
  File "game/screens.rpy", line 538, in <module>
  File "My_Computer_Harddrive/Downloads/checkout-1.0-mac/checkout.app/Contents/Resources/autorun/renpy/ui.py", line 918, in textbutton
    return add(_textbutton(label, **kwargs))
  File "My_Computer_Harddrive/Downloads/checkout-1.0-mac/checkout.app/Contents/Resources/autorun/renpy/ui.py", line 913, in _textbutton
    rv = renpy.display.behavior.Button(style=style, clicked=clicked, **button_kwargs)
  File "My_Computer_Harddrive/Downloads/checkout-1.0-mac/checkout.app/Contents/Resources/autorun/renpy/display/behavior.py", line 540, in __init__
    super(Button, self).__init__(child, style=style, **properties)
  File "My_Computer_Harddrive/Downloads/checkout-1.0-mac/checkout.app/Contents/Resources/autorun/renpy/display/layout.py", line 832, in __init__
    super(Window, self).__init__(style=style, **properties)
  File "My_Computer_Harddrive/Downloads/checkout-1.0-mac/checkout.app/Contents/Resources/autorun/renpy/display/layout.py", line 102, in __init__
    super(Container, self).__init__(**properties)
  File "My_Computer_Harddrive/Downloads/checkout-1.0-mac/checkout.app/Contents/Resources/autorun/renpy/display/core.py", line 183, in __init__
    self.style = renpy.style.Style(style, properties) # @UndefinedVariable
RuntimeError: maximum recursion depth exceeded while calling a Python object

Darwin-10.8.0-i386-64bit
Ren'Py 6.17.7.521
checkout 0.0

I hope you can fix this.