[WIP] TSL Same Gender Romances Mod

[Leilukin 286]

UPDATE (2nd January 2016): Handmaiden and Female Exile - Disciple and Male Exile Romances mod has been released!

 

Download link: http://deadlystream.com/forum/files/file/977-handmaiden-and-female-exile-disciple-and-male-exile-romance/

 

 

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As much as I love TSL, I've always been disappointed by the lack of same gender romance options with any of the party members. Granted, TSL never had any fully developed romance arc to begin with, but consider that KotOR1 at least has Juhani as a lesbian romance option even though her romance has less content (and is much easier to miss) compared to Bastila's or Carth's, the lack of same gender romance options with any of the party members in TSL is disappointing, in my opinion.

 

There's also the fact that there's a lack of same gender romance mods for TSL, while there are KotOR1 mods that allow female PCs to romance Bastila (The Romancing of Basitla) and male PCs to romance Carth (Bi Carth). With making same gender romance mods as the main motivation, I had started learning and doing modding for KotOR games. My Visas Marr and Female Exile Romance as well as Atton Rand and Male Exile Romance mods have been released as part of my same gender romance mod project, so now I'm moving to the next part, which is also the most challenging part of my project: a same gender romance mod for the Handmaiden and the Disciple.

 

The most challenging thing about making a same gender romance mod for the Handmaiden and the Disciple, is the fact that in vanilla TSL, the Handmaiden only joins a male Exile's party, while the Disciple only joins a female Exile's party. While there are mods that work around the problem, namely Handmaiden 4 Females and PartySwap, neither are intended to be romance mods. Therefore, to make the Handmaiden's romance accessible for female Exiles and the Disciple's romance for male Exiles, my mod also functions as my own version of "female Exile recruits Handmaiden / male Exile recruits Disciple" mod. As for the possible pronouns mix-up problems, my solution is VO splicing, so the Handmaiden will refer to a female Exile by she/her, and the Disciple will refer to a male Exile by he/him. The spliced VOs are in MP3 format so they will work on the Steam version of TSL. I also test my mod on the Steam version of TSL.

 

TSLRCM will be required for my mod to work, and my mod will have two installation options:

• Default installation option: This option will make the Handmaiden join a female Exile and the Disciple to join a male Exile. Players will not need to do any extra actions for it to happen. What I do for this option is switching the gender check for the Handmaiden and the Disciple to join the Exile's party. However, this option doesn't allow players to recruit both the Handmaiden and the Disciple in a single playthough.
• PartySwap compatible option: Since PartySwap has become a popular mod for allowing players to recruit both the Handmaiden and the Disciple in a single playthrough regardless of the Exile's gender, I want to give people who use PartySwap a chance to enjoy the same gender romance content come from my mod. I've gotten DarthTyren's permission to make my mod compatible with his mod, and I will take full responsibility for any possible bugs or issues with my compatibility patch.

 

I'm getting close to finishing my mod. I've done most of the DLG file editing and figured out how to splice VOs. As for lip syncing, I extract, edit and rename some of the pre-existing .lip files for my spliced VOs. I still need to improve the quality of my spliced VOs, write a ReadMe and do some more testing.

 

Some screenshots for my mod:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Here's a question that I will like suggestions on: One of the occasions where the Handmaiden/Disciple will refer to the Exile by specific pronouns is the Rebuilt Jedi Enclave sequence, which involves the 650jedi.dlg and krehand1.dlg files. In addition to M4-78EP, another popular mod that edits the Rebuilt Jedi Enclave sequence is Extended Enclave, so I want to know if anyone is interested to see my mod being compatible with Extended Enclave? Note that currently PartySwap is not compatible with Extended Enclave, so my edited 650jedi.dlg may not be included in my PartySwap compatibility patch.

Edited January 2, 2017 by Leilukin

[134340Goat 116]

Yes! Just make frigging everyone bi. I look forward to this one

 

As for EE, I say go for it. Personally, I always play with Partyswap, but there are several fans that prefer EE, and it's part of the mod build on Reddit

[superSzym 155]

So, with PartySwap whichever gender you are, you are going to have an at least love rectangle with Atton, Handmaiden and Disciple. If you're a male, additionally Visas and Mira will join the party.

 

And maybe you could make a PartySwap, your mod and Extended Enclave Compatibility Patch. I mean, DLG from Extended Enclave with PartySwap changes applied and reactions dependent on Ignacy you romance some of your party members or not? And is your mod compatible with M4-78EP like PartySwap is?

 

And one more question - do I always have to romance the Disciple and the Handmaiden? Or maybe I can reject their flirting? In fact, I could have a triangle with Disciple and the Handmaiden as a female, but as much as I cannot expect anything from Atton apart from his disgust that I'm running through Peragus in a potato sack as a male, he could finally turn out to be a gay, but his love to me is far more Platonic, but Disciple is just a good boy geek, I don't feel he could be bisexual. He is either hetero or asexual, his perfect love doesn't even involve a story quest for him. As much as I like him in combat or some of his reactions - I like good girls and appreciate good boys, I never speak to him on the Ebon Hawk unless I want to die from boredom. A boring guy is not a good partner for a gay guy Exile.

[Leilukin 286]

So, with PartySwap whichever gender you are, you are going to have an at least love rectangle with Atton, Handmaiden and Disciple. If you're a male, additionally Visas and Mira will join the party.

Well, with PartySwap it's possible to have two love triangles: the Exile/Atton/the Disciple and the Exile/the Handmaiden/Visas, if you can trigger Atton vs. the Disciple and the Handmaiden vs. Visas rivalry/jealousy cutscenes, which require you to have much higher influence with the Disciple than Atton and much higher influence with Visas than the Handmaiden, respectively. Mira isn't a romance option.

 

 

And maybe you could make a PartySwap, your mod and Extended Enclave Compatibility Patch. I mean, DLG from Extended Enclave with PartySwap changes applied and reactions dependent on Ignacy you romance some of your party members or not? And is your mod compatible with M4-78EP like PartySwap is?

My mod will provide a M4-78EP compatibility patch for players who have M4-78EP installed. I will like to make my mod, or at the very least the default installation option, compatible with Extended Enclave. I'm not sure if my Extended Enclave compatibility patch will work well with my PartySwap compatibility patch because PartySwap is currently not compatible with EE.

 

Technically there's no romance in the Rebuilt Jedi Enclave scene itself (unless you want interpret the Handmaiden "do not let them hurt him" line as romantic), but the Handmaiden and the Disciple have dialogue that refer to the Exile by he/him and she/her respectively. I want to edit the Rebuilt Jedi Enclave sequence so the Handmaiden will refer to a female Exile by she/her, and the Disciple will refer to a male Exile by he/him.

 

 

And one more question - do I always have to romance the Disciple and the Handmaiden? Or maybe I can reject their flirting?

Unfortunately, unlike KotOR1, TSL doesn't really have romance flags that checks if the romance with a party member is active or not, so there isn't any reliable way to turn off a party member's romance. On the flip side, TSL doesn't really give you options to return any of the party members' romantic feelings either. The closest you can get to turning down or return a party member's romantic feelings is the Visas romance scene in the post-Rebuilt Jedi Enclave sequence.

[134340Goat 116]

Well, male Exile can still try hitting on Mira, even if she does immediately reject him

 

So even if not a love hexagon, you can be an extreme polygamist

[Leilukin 286]

Update: I'm getting even closer to finishing my mod. Thanks to Sith Holocron for offering assistance in VO splicing. I've tested my installer to make sure there won't be any errors when installing my mod. My Read Me files are almost done as well. I still want to take more screenshots and make a video to showcase my mod, like I did my Visas Marr and Female Exile Romance as well as Atton Rand and Male Exile Romance mods.

 

 

Question: Has anyone managed to contact any of the authors of Extended Enclave lately? I would like to ask for their permission to make an Extended Enclave compatibility patch for my mod. I had tried to PM danil-ch but there's no reply. Also, Darth Hayze doesn't seem to be active on Deadly Stream anymore according to their profile. If there's no way to reach them, I'll likely have to release my mod without any Extended Enclave compatibility patch. It will be a shame, since Extended Enclave is one of my favorite TSL mods.

 

 

UPDATE 2: My Handmaiden and Female Exile - Disciple and Male Exile Romances mod is now released. Since there's still no word from danil-ch or Darth Hayze, I have to officially declare my mod as incompatible with Extended Enclave.

Edited January 2, 2017 by Leilukin