Law School Episode 5 - DevLog #16
Hello everyone,
Last week brought a bit of a new challenge for me. A lot of you have probably seen it already, but I decided to give cutscenes a real shot. Voiced cutscenes, too.
It’s something I’ve wanted to add to the game for a long time, and it felt like the natural next step after the transition animations. So I went all in on it and spent basically Monday to Friday working on that cutscene. I’m really happy with how it turned out. Coordinating with voice actors, adding SFX, working with lip sync, all of that was a whole new world for me. It also pushed me to improve as an animator, which is always a nice bonus.
It did slow down my usual render progress quite a bit, since I had to make 12 animations for it, and most of them needed lip sync on top of that. It was definitely slow and pretty tiring work, but honestly, I think the result was worth it. So I don’t regret it at all.
Since this cutscene happens during the first day of the update, it also meant taking a bit of a detour from the main event work. I got back to it yesterday though, and now I’m working on the first part of this second freeroam. And somehow, I ended up deciding to make it a LEWD scene too. The setup was just too good not to.
It’s a smaller LEWD scene, so I’m hoping I can get it wrapped up within the first three days of this week. I’ve already posed all the renders that leads to the LEWD yesterday, so I can get started on it today.
So here are the updated numbers:
Static renders: 2,558
Animations: 100
Story content: 38 scenes written (34,049 words)
Yeah, only 73 extra renders since last week... but 12 extra animations. I’d say that’s still a pretty good trade. Animation weeks always destroy the render count anyway, so at least this time it was for something I’m really happy with.
I’ve also already written the next two LEWD scenes. Usually I kind of improvise those as I go, but this time I wanted to try planning them ahead a bit more, so we’ll see if that helps me move through them faster.
So yeah, next up is finishing this smaller LEWD scene, then moving on with the rest of the freeroam. I'm going to aim for 3k render milestone before the end of this month, it should be doable, though challenging.
That’s it for this week’s update. I’m getting back to work now, and in the meantime, I hope you all have a great week.
MisterMaya
Comments (11)
Not bad, but the voice of the MC is not what I was expecting at all.
cool
GOOD MONDAY MORNING 🌄🌞, M-MAYA AND EVERYONE!!! Another one of our ladies looking grand in her costume 🥰❤️! I thought it was going to end with them F-ing 🤣. It looks/sounds great. I thought the MC's voice sounded like Liam O'Brien for a second 😂 when he said, "Whoa… Fancy." Even though I'm not always the biggest fan of VA in my AVNs (I like internalizing my own stuff, and a VA would break the immersion for me 😅). It was VERY ambitious 😁! Now I'm curious about how the rest of the girls are going to sound 😋. Also… would this be spoilers if I haven't caught up yet 🤣? Eh… not much was given 😅. Just MC and Samara in a bathroom 😍. Hey…. Lewds are always a nice bonus…. I wonder who the lucky ladies are 🥰? The numbers are always nice… Your output always goes ham 😅. As long as you're happy. That's all that matters 👍🏻! Wooo 😋🙌🏻… My guy's work ethic is INSPIRING 😛🔥!!! And please, I'll say you'll crush that 3K milestone EZ 😅. As always, thanks for the DevLog, M-Maya!!! Keep on keeping on 😉!!! ALWAYS EXCITED AND EAGERLY WAITING FOR YOUR GAME AND READING YOUR POSTS 🙌🏻🔥!!! Love and appreciate everything! You ❤️, your ladies 😍, your posts 🥰, and your games ❤️! Always make my days better 🌈! Thank you, everyone, always, for being in my life and being a part of my routine 😉! Stay safe, stay blessed, and stay in PERFECT health, beautiful people! And don't forget to stay hydrated! And you're never alone ❤️🫶🏻🫰🏻!!! OUR AVNS AND OUR DEVS CONNECTS US ALL 🤗!!! Have an amazing and beautiful week! I'll catch you all—ON THE NEXT ONE ✌🏻😁!!!
Thanks for the DevLog! And it’s nice hear that you want improve and add or try new stuff. 😊 The cutscene looks really amazing. I don’t really need voice acting in AVNs… but I go with it and I liked it. Keep up your amazing work MisterMaya! ☺️ Have a great week!
To be honest, I'm not a huge fan of the voice acting. I think it rarely works in AVNs, and this is no different. It just tends to sound too unnatural, and too much like a voice actor trying to nail their lines, rather than an intuitive, human expression. That's the feeling that I get here as well, and it even makes it a bit immersion-ruining. To my ears, both the MC and Samara sound very unlike how I'd actually expect someone of that age to sound, which is quite startling and makes everything feel a bit less real. I undestand that as a developer, you constantly seek for ways to improve, but in my view, voiced cutscenes are very questionable if they're really worth the additional time investment they require. Even cutscenes themselves are dubious in my book, but having them voiced over adds an extra layer which I'm just not sure is justified. Of course, those are just my two cents, and I realize they will hardly matter, but still, I wanted to share some honest feedback and offer up a different perspective than what is seemingly the prevailing one so far.
That's fair, I understand that and I appreciate the honesty The thing is, in my opinion, what leads to the downfall of many avns and games in general is devs staying in their comfort zone not trying to improve. This is me making sure I don't end up like that. I always try to implement new things that I think could be an upgrade. Now I could be wrong, and fail miserably, but I'd rather do so pursuing the vision I have for my game rather than staying content with what I have and become lazy :)
Thanks for the DevLog.👍❤️😊
Can you give my Aurora a voice too… while she’s beating up MC? Joking aside, I really like this new feature—it really brings the game to life!
Thanks MisterMaya. Have a good week.
Oh boy, can't wait to hear the others! The episode is sounding better and better.
Wait a minute - Its Speedy Gonzales