Law School Episode 4 - Progress update #6

Hello everyone,

Last week went about as well as it could, all things considered. I spent the first three days fixing libraries, sorting out computer programs, and tightening up my backup system to make sure that any future data loss causes as little trouble as possible.

Because of all that, I only really got started on renders by Thursday. I was a bit surprised yesterday when I saw we’re approaching 1,000 renders already. It somehow feels like not much has happened yet. In terms of pacing, things are going okay. Events are being set up, and the plot is becoming a bit clearer. But the love interests? Not as much development there just yet. Now that branching paths have started, each scene ends up needing more renders, so what used to take 1 to 2 days now takes 2 to 4. That shift is noticeable, and it can lead to a bit of scene fatigue. It's not unexpected though. More time per scene makes sense with branching, even if it changes the rhythm.

Part of the slower start is due to the need to explain what happened during the three-week gap in the story. Plus, breaking the narrative into separate paths adds complexity. There are a lot of variations depending on the choices made in Season 1. It creates a lot of text variety, which is actually fun. Each playthrough feels unique, with different jokes and small changes here and there.

The good news is that things are expected to pick up starting on Day 3. I’m especially excited for some of the upcoming scenes on Days 3 and 4.

Render progress is looking solid overall. My main concern now is animations, especially the lewd ones. I’ll likely need to animate those myself. The animator I’ve been working with is great, but the pace is too slow. That’s one of the challenges of outsourcing: others might not have the same passion or urgency for your project. Totally understandable. On the bright side, I’ll be working on a fairly simple lewd scene in a few days, which will be a good opportunity to refresh my animation skills. It's been a couple of years since I last did one.

Here are the current numbers:

• Static renders: 938

• Animations: 6

• Story content: 15 scenes written (13,812 words)

That’s 121 new renders since last week. I’d call that a light week, but given the issues I had with Windows and the libraries, it could’ve been much worse.

That wraps up this week’s update. I’ll also be posting something on Steam soon about new language support coming to Law School, so keep an eye out for that.

Let’s keep things moving. I hope you all have a great week, and I’ll see you next Monday.

MisterMaya