Okay, I'm going to abbreviate the part about what I've been getting done in order to focus on stuff I'll be working on next. Brief reports:
Tons of things are done, like tweaking the first visit to Stineford and making the player visit Withered Mountain. Won't cover them all; see the next update notes for full accounting.
After consulting with optimizers on Discord, I've made a number of changes that make the investment system more forgiving. The math won't change the optimal route, but for those struggling, it will be easier to catch up.
DLC plans are taking steps forward, now I just need to figure out how to make Steam put new files in your folder. You would think this would be easy, but apparently not. =/ I'm going to start by adding an image to the Yarra's Thanks DLC as a test.
Future Tweaks
That said, I mostly want to talk about the stuff that is still under consideration. Just various things that could potentially add a little more polish before new players start experiencing TLS for the first time. Some are likely, some unlikely, and some could use player input.
1) I went to a lot of work to replace the game's music, for all the good it did, but two musical stings never got changed: the victory fanfare and the inn theme. Anyone think they're worth replacing? In theory it could show more attention to detail, but in practice I suspect no one will notice.
2) Another generic aspect is the battle backgrounds, which are mostly straight from the engine. I'm again inclined to think the change wouldn't have much effect, but I'm willing to put time into these if it makes the game more cohesive in a way that players enjoy (for example any of the maps where the options available to me just weren't a very good match). Some players have already offered little edits to make things more consistent, like removing electric lights.
3) Another element I've long considered changing is the balloon icons, since they're default assets seen in every game. Just replacing the icons wouldn't do much, but I've wondered if it would be possible to break open the current system to play animations that are larger than the base type? I'd need coding help on this, though.
4) I don't want to repeat the fetish talk from two weeks ago, but another thing I'd considered to make the game more comfortable for more people is to give Robin terminology options. Now, the core events wouldn't change, but I could potentially use a variable so that Robin doesn't use the word "father" after their decision. I'm willing to go through and change a bunch of lines... but someone would need to find all the instances. There are many normal/previous uses of "father" so it isn't as simple as just searching all the instances. Right now my feeling is that if someone else doesn't take that step upon themselves, it won't happen.
5) Wait, is that it? There are other things I'm doing, but none of those involve questions. So I guess this is an invitation for if people have been holding back on requests or suggestions. No guarantees, but I have time to listen.
I have some longer posts to do eventually (the time investment one, and another about TLS content after TLS), but I have been focused on work for multiple updates now. Work continues!