Hi folks,
Firstly, I wanted to say thanks a lot to everyone for sticking with me as we near the end. It is much appreciated.
Secondly, just a fun fact: WTHI (in total) now has a word count of aprox. 1.2 million words, so we have overtaken the word count of the entire Harry Potter book series! JK took 17 years to write Harry Potter and she didn't have to do thousands of images and 100s of animations (or coding) to get there. Just saying :)
Episode 25 on it's own accounts for over 200,000 of those words. Length wise: If episode 25 was a novel, it would be considered an "epic" length novel and most publishers wouldn't release it without breaking it into two books. And episode 25 currently has approximately 5,000 images. (and approx 75 animations)
So for anyone who thinks 8 years was too long for me to complete this game… You're probably right! But still, it's a shitload of words. :)
OK, onto the Status of Episode 25:
December 13th is still the estimated release date.
All of the closer/epilogue scenes for episode 25 are now complete, including two "endings". When I say endings…I mean the final few frames/ script of the game. These two possible endings were envisaged ever since I first conceived the game, so it was a great sense of completion to get them done, and that they still fit.
So, what's left to do? Here's the plan: (Note of all the scenes mentioned below are in an advance stage with at least 95-100% of the art complete (most of them 99%+) and fully planned/ mapped out (i.e. the story is done, just need to complete the pathing/dialog). In most cases the pathing / dialog is 75% to 98% done (Group scene 2 being the lowest at 75% and group scene 1 at 98%).
Group scene 2: (3 women) In progress - Will work all weekend on this: 4 days work remaining. All art complete, but might need a few extras as I finish it. Estimate completion: 25th Nov. (including any extra art)
Group scene 1: (6 women). Pretty much finished (just to need to add 1 animation). But the scene pathing is very complex (63 different permutations of girls) . So want to spend 1-2 days testing it, before it's ready for the QC team. 27th Nov.
Weekend of the 27th: Will release another playable version to the QC team for the next round of testing.
Game night: In progress. 4 days left to complete. Will need some extra art as the original plan needs to be extended to make it a little more fun/ sexy. Estimate completion 1st Dec (Including extra art)
Wanda scene In progress. 2 days left to complete. Estimate completion 3rd Dec
Angel scene In progress. 3 days to complete 6th Dec
Weddings. In progress 3-4 days to complete. 9th Dec.
Final testing (3-4 days): 13th Dec.
As previously mentioned, I may end up working across multiple scenes in any given day/week, rather than the specific scene mentioned in the deadline, but I'll keep you all posted.
Need to get back to work, so I'll leave you with some teasers from each of the scenes mentioned above.
As always, let me know of any questions or comments in the comment section below or via a direct message and I'll get back to all of you.
Thanks,
CG