New Project Announcement. Changes in Team.

Hello everyone! As of a couple weeks ago, I had made my decision on a direction for the next project. In case the image wasn't a give away.... yes. My plan is to make a new SpunkStock.

So... what's different about this SpunkStock? I'll do a break down by section:

WHAT'S DIFFERENT?

ART:

First thing I want to address is that in the newest project, I've wanted to take a new angle at things. I have decided to make an effort to work with new people, and shake things up for myself. This means for future projects, AbsurdRes will no longer be the artist. AbsurdRes has been the artist for RegulusNSFW games since the start. I cannot express my thanks for the work he's done, and his mind for creativity. The separation is not on bad terms, but purely due to me wanting new experiences in game development.

The new artist for this project (and the art seen above) is ChienHoangVN. They have done some of the pin ups in Starbreed previously, and I am looking forward to the things we can create together!

GAMEPLAY:

The new SpunkStock is going to be structured differently, but maintain the heart of the game. The base levels will be in a similar formula to the first game's "Endurance". Meaning normal Hscenes will have 3 or so rounds. The significance of this is explained a bit more in "Animation" and "Music" sections. The actual track/visualizer will be different, and not play off the falling orbs anymore. It will use an entirely different indicator style to make things more centralized. Modifiers will likely still be selected between rounds in a similar fashion to the first game, and build off a very simple click-to-beat system, as I found it to be the heart of what made SpunkStock's Identity. The new layout will likely call for some new/revised modifiers, though.

Another thing that I will likely be changing is the elimination of the exploration aspect of the game. I did think the exploration was fun in SpunkStock, but I feel the resources could be used elsewhere. I wouldn't mind hearing what people think of this though.

I can't go into too many details, as prototyping is still very much in effect, and even the things I just mentioned could be changed... I'll be sure to give a proper vertical slice when the first character/song is reaching completion.

ANIMATION:

Animation is still going to be done by me, but I am hoping to really elevate the dynamics of it. Each round will feature a new position/progression to an overarching Hscene through the song. This is still all in early testing, but the goal is to make it a little less like ".gif loop to a song", and more of... an evolving Hscene to the song.

MUSIC:

As always, a big focus here is going to be that characters sort of represent a unique genre, or style of music. My current mindset is to have the music evolve in between rounds, as the Hscene escalates. A big thing I will be looking into is adding vocals for many of the tracks(though perhaps not all) for when they reach their peak/climax.

CHARACTERS:

This next SpunkStock is going to be taking place in the time of the next generation. This means the cast is largely going to be new to the player. That being said some favourites "mei" still be making a return... tss tss... I might do a poll next week to see what characters people would like to see return (though I sort of already have an idea of who I will be bringing back). It would still be nice to see where people lie. Just keep in mind the amount of returning characters will definitely be less than new characters.

CONTENT:

With plans to make each song/Hscene more dynamic, development time may be increased quite a bit. This means there is a good chance that the new SpunkStock game will feature less characters overall when compared to the 1st game.

That pretty much sums up where I am at with the concept. I will not be starting weekly reports on the new project quite yet, as Starbreed is still priority until launch.

The Patreon/SubStar page will likely be doing an official swap to represent the new SpunkStock on May 1st.

Thanks everyone for your support over the years! Catch you all in the next post!

-Regulus