This week was the first serious dip into the animations for episode 5, and it was a nice change of pace from doing story renders.
Current numbers are 619 story renders and 1,095 frames of animations completed.
As mentioned earlier, I'm also past the more 'serious' intro for the episode, and I can finally tune into a bit of humor as the MC decides enough is enough. I knew I wanted the intro to be dark, but it was actually exhausting to create, even as the developer, I care for these characters and want them to have fun rather than go through bad stuff. But it acts as an excellent setup for wholesomeness later on in the episode.
I'm also getting closer to the part where you finally get some explanation for what the heck is going on, and to make it interesting, I've decided to do two completely separate scenes of how that plays out (like going to the club with Sam and Cel, or Tuesday in episode 4). That way, if you're particularly interested in that part of the story, you can do two playthroughs to get as much information as possible - but it's not required.
Anyway, for the Celesties, here's a render that I thought came out good. Enjoy (4k version attached).
Have a nice weekend, and stay safe out there.
// Drifty