The Matriarch
A downloadable game for Windows
Welcome to The Matriarch
The Matriarch puts you in the shoes of a dancer at a club famous for having pregnant staff. The gameplay loop is simple, promote the club and provide dances when someone requests one!
You can use the money you make to buy items from the club store. These items can increase your fertility, extend your pregnancy, and more!
From the dev:
Heya, Oceanaga here!
Thanks for your interest in my game. I hope you enjoy and if you would like to share your feedback, keep up with development, see more of my art, or just hang out then feel free to join my discord.
Also, this is an adult game so don't open it if you're not of age.
Virus warnings: I have published games made in Unity before for game jams and they popped up with virus warnings. I promise there is no malicious intent with this game and have scanned it using Malwarebytes and virus total (you can check the scan below). If you get a warning, it's probably windows being windows. Making it so the game doesn't flag as a virus is one of my top priorities though.
Virus Total scan Updated for 0.05.1 on 08/05/2024
Finally, this game is and always will be free. However, if you would like to support the project then you can donate upon downloading. This means the world to me, and I will put the funds right back into developing the game or related content.
Download
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Development log
- An update on development38 days ago
- Patch 0.5.1Aug 05, 2024
- Matriarch 0.05 UpdateAug 04, 2024
- The Matriarch 0.4 updateMay 10, 2024
- Matriarch 0.03 UpdateFeb 25, 2024
- 0.02b patchFeb 20, 2024
- 0.02a patchFeb 12, 2024
- Version 0.02Feb 12, 2024
Comments
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Is there an update on when can we expect a new version ? The game is so good so hyped
Heya! Sadly I have a lot going on and the holidays are coming up so I don't have a lot of time to work on it at the moment. There's a lot I want to do before the next update so it'll be sometime next year.
how do i get out of the milk introduction screen?
There should be a little next icon/button to the bottom right.
I played the update, and things look promising so far! I read that you are fixing the save mechanism... FUCKING FINALLY!!!!!!!! ITS SOOOOOOOOOOO ANNOYING HAVING TO DUMP NEEDLESS AMOUNT OF CASH INTO YOUR BOOBS JUST TO GET BACK TO WHERE YOU WERE BEFORE YOU TURNED OFF THE GAME!!!!!
Also, are you gonna post all the scenes eventually?
lol, yeah I was putting off fixing the save thing till I felt all the stats related stuff would be finalized so I wouldn't have to go back and tweak it some more. I'm doing a rework of stats and tracking mechanics so this is a good time to fix it. I didn't plan on dumping all the images but I suppose I can do that at some point. I was asked to put in an image viewer so you can view sizes you've reached in game and that is on the list of things to do as well.
I hope you can make it a Android version I would literally pay for that if nessesery
milk production seems to invert for some reason making the character's breast hold negative values
That's a new one... Do you remember about what value you were at before it did that and what interactions you were doing?
Any extra info is helpful.
I can't remember the exact number since it's been awhile but I think it was around 13L and it started after the character's first birth
I did a new run to attempt to see what caused it but I never encountered the issue with the lactation, so I have no idea what happened
lol that's even weirder. I'll try and keep an eye out in testing to see if I can make it happen.
is there anyway to install this without requiring internet explorer?
There is no install, you just unzip it and run the exe.
its only because it downloads as an internet explorer file and wont run is why i am asking?
It sounds like you may not have a program to unzip it? 7zip and winzip are free to pick up and windows 10/11 should have one built in. You may have made IE the default application for zip files so that is why it is opening that way. You could try right clicking the zip and selecting "open with..." then pick your program, or "extract here" if that's an option.
unfortunately i dont have IE as standard it register that there is file but wont open as i do not own it. it tries to open a wiindow but nothing happens
how do i get out of the milk introduction scree
nvm figured it ou
Load and save don't seem to do anything in this patch.
Also, no matter what, you have to go through the intro to the club before you can load.
So basically you have to start from scratch every time.
Thanks for the alt+enter thing, that worked for me.
Glad to hear alt enter worked!
Yeah the save system needs reworking. I did a pretty messy initial implementation of it and the more I add in, the worse it gets. It's on my list of things to fix but I'm waiting to finalize all the core stuff before redoing it or I'll have to redo it again.
You should encapsulate all the game progress and settings into a single [serializable] object. That way you can read/write them easily.
The game has potential, and a very good graphics despite some of its short comings; which I will list below.
(1)The bottom of the screen is cut off, so you can't click everything below a certain point; without having guess where the button is located.
(2)The loading and saving mechanic needs to be reworked, so that it can load up your entire progress; and not your stats. Unless, the player knows what they are doing and knows how to exploit the system itself.
(3) Stats are not viewable in The Lounge area, and the only thing that is viewable is the amount you can charge per dance.
(4) There needs to be a game gallery of your hard work! You have no idea how difficult it was for me to even TRY to dig through the files of the game.
(5) There needs to be a very strong story narrative. I get it, the game is still in the pre- pre- alpha phase; so there might be one in the works!
(6) I am going to recommend that you switch to Ren'Py as a game engine platform, as there is WAY more access to different gaming platforms with it then Unity. Especially, since there are a lot of controversy surrounding the company that owns Unity. You can still keep the game as a PC only game if you switch to Ren'Py, and mobile users can play it ( with the emulator of course ); as that's how I play some of the "PC only" games.
(7) Side quests! There needs to be side quests along with the story!
(8) Being able to talk to the staff during your shift, and or talking to the owner!
(9) Different main character choices! More specifically, four different preset characters you can choose as your " Dancer " for when you first start up Matriarch.
(10) Being able to name your " Dancer " when you first start up the game.
Again, I do STRONGLY recommend that you swap over to Ren'Py. It may be easier for you in the long run. There is a person named Yuliya Kovach, who does something a lot similar and uses Ren'Py.
Heyo! I appreciate the feedback and will reply to each point below:
1) This is probably a scaling issue. If you alt + enter it should fit to your screen so you can see everything. I built the game around a 1280 x 720 resolution, so that aspect ratio is the best to play around. I need to fix the scaling for other resolutions but that's kinda low on the priority list. If you are full screen and still have an issue, please let me know with screenshots/examples so I can look further into it!
2) Yeah, I just dropped in a save system and didn't really expand upon it. I'm going to rework it before 1.0
3) Stats will be coming in the next build.
4) I've been thinking about doing some sort of gallery, I'll add it to the list for sure.
5, 7, & 8) There won't really be a "narrative" aside from you work at a strip club for pregnant women. Adding side interactions with the other girls is on my list so they'll have little story lines with a capstone event but nothing too in depth. I'm not planning on this being some big RPG or anything like that, just an arcadey game where big number gets big belly art lol.
6) I'm not swapping engines, that'd require me to rebuild everything and learn a new language. While more platforms would be neat, I don't want to learn a new engine/language. Renpy is great for VNs and at the moment The Matriarch would fit that category but using Unity allows me to make more interactive systems and minigames in the future. Yeah, that whole financing fiasco was annoying, I toyed with other engines, but I like the way Unity is set up. The controversy was based around monetization though which is something the players will never have to deal with, and we are nowhere near the limit for when I'll have to start paying for licenses so no harm there.
9) Character customization has been brought up a few times and it's just not feasible. The amount of renders I have to do for one size is already like 70 or something, adding customization would make that number skyrocket. This was really due to a lack of planning on my part and I'll 100% take it into account on my next project.
10) The player isn't really referred to yet in any text, but I'll probably add player names in when I get to the interactions part.
Like I mentioned above, Ren'Py is a GREAT engine, just not for me or this project. At the end of the day this is a passion project I'm doing by myself in my free time for free (although I REALLY appreciate all the people who have bought it, your support means the world). I can't really justify the amount of work an entire engine swap or major system reworks would bring.
ok, 1. you can't resize it. the bottom is cut off.
2. "Load" doesn't seem to load the whole game, only settings and some stats like breast capacity.
3. there is no way to tell how much breast capacity you have and how fast your lactation is. You end up just clicking the store items hundreds of times not knowing if they are still doing things.
1) should be fixed with alt + enter maybe? I've tried setting up scaling but it's finicky, so I just went with a flat 1280*720 resolution.
2) I probably need to update the load items. I wanted to rework saving and loading so I haven't been looking too much into load as it is now. I'll see if I can get that knocked out. Thanks for bringing it to my attention.
3) If you go into the lounge there's a menu that'll show your stats.
enjoying it a lot and the massive belly size that ive gotten to so far. but what is set fert and set holding?
The game runs without problems and the images are improving as well. The Matriarch boss kinda scary to look at. The new stages are nice as well but I like the one before the last current stage the most. I hope we will see some costumes, maybe a morror to interact and pose und maybe some growing breasts if you enhance the milk. Also the size of the breasts look a bit different in the same stage dependent on the location. If you are outside the breasts look mostly bigger, for example. Keep up the good work!
Android version?
No plans for that. Just PC, sorry.
Which engine is it made with? Anything that works with JoiPlay so we can emulate on Android?
It's made in Unity. I'm not sure what JoiPlay is.
JoiPlay is an app/launcher kinda like an emulator that allows android users to play games that were developed for pc/mac using certain engines (eg renpy, rpg maker). Unfortunately, it doesn't support Unity🫠
For some reason my game screen is too wide so I cant see the settings and how much money I have is there a way to fix this?
are you running it in windowed mode or did you make it full screen? The game is built around 1920x1080 so if you change it to anything else things may get weird (trying to fix this).
I don't understand why the price for increasing days becomes more expensive if it isn't additive to the due date of the next contract. I think that what you pay for should stay for the next contract, or at least have a price reduce when it goes back down to only 90 days. otherwise liking the game
The price of the extend does reset every pregnancy. If it's not then that's a bug I need to address.
As for why it gets more expensive, I've given a longer explanation in another reply here but essentially it's for gameplay balance and lore reasons.
Sometimes when you start a new contract you start with full pregnancy and it doesn´t change after time. Also what does the hold set and fert.set do in admin settings?
did you adjust your stats at all with the admin settings before getting that glitch?
They set how many kids you're holding and your fertility.
Yes i think i adjusted the number of kids i´m holding before i started a new contract
If you get an error from normal gameplay then that's something worth posting, but if you are messing with admin tools and something breaks then I can't help there. You're essentially forcing yourself into content that isn't there at that point so things will get funky.
So how many Admin Commands are there, and their exact lines? Figuring this stuff is a nightmare. It'd be a bit simpler to just have a Money Admin Command.
it's just a gui that you open to set things. There's a button that adds money.
Well. I have been messing with things, and there's no button that adds money. That's news to me.
It should be the top thing in the admin panel. I'll have to check it when I get home today to make sure.
Playing the new 0.02a patch and seems like the extend drink is no longer resetting in price. Not sure if that's intentional but the speal at the beginning still says it's meant to reset.
Additionally the save function doesn't seem to be working, but admittedly I didn't test it on 0.02 so I can't say if that's a new bug or not.
I'll take a look at those and see if anything is up. You're saving and loading from the club right? That fast forward button on the main screen just skips the prologue. You have to load from the settings menu when in game.
After some testing it seems like it's just the lounge that doesn't let you load the game for some reason.
I have also just realised that if you have the second outfit (the bikini) your boobs shrink for the "Bottle Service" pose. I think the belly stays the right size. Hard to say.
The best size thing is known, i posted about it in the patch notes.
I had a bug where the Energy and Days froze during my second run when I tryed again. I was on day 38 with 1 Energy and klicked throu the bar-job rapidly.
I'll try and replicate that. Thanks for the heads up.
I also used the spacebar to get this bug. Hope this helps
That's weird, the spacebar isn't mapped to anything so it shouldn't have any effect.
Bug reports:
1. I've got the same issue as Askme112, the text box covers the renew/quit buttons after the pregnancy is over.
2. The bottom of the game is cut off by a bit unless I ALT+ENTER it and go into the full fullscreen mode.
The renew screen is an easy fix, I'll have an update out for that once I get home. I'll have to look into the cutoff though.
Thanks for bringing it to my attention.
No virus warnings for 0.02. All good.
Sorry stupid question. I can't press the renew contract button. The message bar is in the way. Any ide how to get to click it?
Dang, I'll get that fixed when I get home today. Sorry about that!
I see great potential in this game!
however I have a couple of questions:
how come the effectiveness of the potions decrease but the price goes up? probably for the game mechanics but it feels a bit off.
what does the TEA do? is that the fertility booster?
is it possible to assign keys to the buttons? (also the shop pops up automatically after the 3rd activity without showing the said activity.)
and is the X top right corner there to stay? it seems out of place since every option is in the left column.
I don't mean any offense just genuinely curious, I really like the game so far. it's a real diamond in the rough ;)
Heya, no offense taken! These questions actually provide great feedback for some design choices so i appreciate it.
The potion effectiveness is a two part thing. First it is to prevent an infinite pregnancy. You make big money when you're preggo so I'm trying to keep the income semi balanced. Next lore wise, your body builds up a tolerance to the medications as you use them so it takes more each time to be effective.
Yes, the tea is a fertility booster. Meant to call it fertilitea, but forgot to change it before I made the build. That has been fixed. I'm now looking for a good way to show item descriptions.
I haven't done any keybinds since the game is designed around just left clicking your mouse. If this is a widely requested thing I'll look into it. As for the shop popping up, I've reworked all the locations and timers so the shop is a place you go to at will instead of being forced there at the end of the day. The exit X is gone now too with this next update. I redid the UI too for it. Still playing with layout and collecting feedback.
haha fertilitea genius.
the drug resistance makes sense in every way though. as for the bar on the left, great choice! with a lot of games the textbar is in the way of the image and I have to press H to see the full image. so this is a great choice! but for the sake of the design keep everything in that box. If you want any tips or advice on visual presentation feel free to shoot me a message and I'll be happy to help if the need arises.
What exactly does the roll button do? one time it made my belly grow, but the rest of the time it did nothing
That actually wasn't supposed to make it into the game. It's a part of my dev tools. It re rolls how many babies you're carrying. I didn't notice it till I had already uploaded the build lol.
Looks good!
Is there a Mobile version?
Thanks! No mobile version so far and it's not on my road map. I'll consider it down the line once i get more content added in.
ok
This is a great idea. Is it possible to save your progress?
Also what does the tea do?
Thanks! I haven't added saving in yet since there's not a whole lot of progression to do in this build. I'm working on that now though and will hopefully have it in with either this next build or the one after.
Oh boy, even 7-zip is throwing a fit about this game, it wont even let me open it because it's calling it a virus, after which it straight-up deleted the file.
I'm a trained computer technician and I've never seen 7-zip do that before. Heck, Windows Defender didn't even have time to respond. Redownloading it made my browser nervous and autodelete it too.
You sure your computer itself is clean? If your projects regularly trip people's AV often enough to mention it in the game's description, my assumption would be that your PC has a legitimate virus and it's bad enough to be infecting your files.
Haha yeah, I promise it's clean (infrastructure engineer here).
This is a common occurrence with Unity (my guess is it has something to do with all the telemetry they collect now for advertising and what not), a quick google will show this. I run Malwarebytes on everything I upload along with virus checker, which I have linked above.
As for the game being flagged, I'm going to see if there's something I can disable so this doesn't happen in future builds.
Edit: I've done some digging and I can go about signing the builds but that requires a LOT of money to set up. I'll tinker with some distribution options and see if maybe it's the file being in a zip that does it. Either way, this is very high on my priority list to fix.
Funny how in all of that description, at the time of writing there isn't really a description of the game itself lol. I infer that it is some sort of pregnancy game, but that's about it!
lol how in the world did I forget that?
I'll get that fixed. Thanks for pointing it out!