Hey all,
Just wanted to check in today. I've actually wanted to do this DevLog a couple of times but I recently took a couple days off to recharge before the final update push and then here in the US, we had a holiday yesterday so that was more traveling. In the past, I've worried about dropping Patreon posts on holidays because I don't want someone's phone to go off while their sitting next to grandma. Sooooo, here we are the day after and hopefully I don't get anybody in trouble.
Anyway, let's jump in to where things are. Lot to go over today and I want to bring everyone up to speed on where things are at and what the plans are moving forward.
Writing
I'm at the tail end of this update and looking back, I expected to have quite a bit to correct on the writing. For some reason, I really expected this section of the story to be better written than it was and there's just a lot of things that stood out. I know there's still sections that I skipped because they just felt really messy to me so the plan right now is that the editing portion of the update, once everything is together, is still gonna need a lot of work. The last update was the same way and I was really happy how it turned out-- it was just waaaay more writing/editing work than I anticipated. I think that also shows how much I've grown with this entire process so hopefully that will reflect once things are finished up. But I'm officially through the first run of it. The writing is good enough to get pictures done and that's usually my first goal.
CGs (Pics)
So CGs this time have gotten pretty complicated. We'll be seeing two new environments in this update, and both were very involved with multiple characters on screen. If you haven't seen those posts, they can be found here and here. After those scenes, I had a pretty complicated scene at the end of the update that slowed me down. Right now I'm sitting at 597 pics for the update. I believe the hardest scenes are behind me and I'm currently on the last scene now and the remaining shots should be fairly basic and faster to crank out. So I'm almost done. I do anticipate some image corrections this time but I'm not going to know how that looks until the damn thing boots so I need to finish up my remaining pictures, then code everything in and start the process of running through it. For those of you that played the original, you may remember that Chapter 8 has a TON of events in it and some pretty complicated setup and I want to make sure that hits visually.
I'll also say that while making scenes more complicated and trying to attempt more complicated shots can slow down the production, it's also one of the keys that's helped me stay motivated and not abandon this project like the majority of developers do. It keeps things fresh and challenging and just interesting. When you look at the same environments for thousands and thousands of hours, you gotta do things to keep yourself engaged and this works for me.
Animations
So there's plans for two animations in this update. One is completely built but just needs to render. That's something I can do overnight for a few days and knock it out without impacting production at all. Also, hoping that it turns out first try so that's still on my list to do. This update will also feature an animation from the original game but the problem is that the original animation was 30fps and the current ones are 60. The models used in it, also look outdated compared to what we're now seeing in the Revamp. However, it's important to me to include this original animation because the person that made it is no longer with the project but I want to keep his stuff in game. That being said, I will have to have part of the animation cut, I think, to try and figure out a way to try and make the differences in quality blend better. Odds are, Jordyn will be taking the lead on that while I give confusing descriptions of what i want.
What's Left?
Ok, so in summary, I'm on the last scene now and need to finish up the CGs. Animations can be rendered overnight and then code and start building this thing to get it booting. After that, it's just editing and music-- which can take me a significant time depending on how rough it is. Right now, I think it's really rough so I'm anticipating a lot of work there.
Discord
Also, if you're not on the Discord, you should come check it out. I've been recently doing some impromptu streaming on there while I work on CGs. Right now it's just practice because I'm kinda shy but it's something that a lot of you asked about. So far, I've only been streaming SFW stuff but the holiday traveling has kinda messed with that and the majority of pics lately have been very NSFW but I plan to keep working on that in the future. It's a live stream, unedited, and I dont really plan much of anything but it can be a fun way to see how things are built, get a few laughs at how things don't work out, or just pop in and voice chat.
https://discord.com/invite/qAG3qek
Release Date
My goal is to get this out in December at some point. I'll know more once i get it booting which I'm hoping can happen this week.