For anyone wondering where the update post is, it is in a separate post. This post is just so everyone can see the changelog.

I want to reiterate:

• The game has restarted from Episode 1 with a whole new opening.

• Full Episodes 1-6 are not implemented.

• Your saves will not transfer from Ren'Py.

We restarted because we felt very limited by our old game engine and that the story needed a redo now that we knew where we wanted it to go. I don't wanna go into too much detail since I've talked about it so much over the past year.

Changelog

New Content

• 2,489 words added. (12,265 total)

• New scene with Dave and Greg.

• Animated Sprites for Dave and Greg.

• 3 New Locations.

  • Newhaven Office Exterior

  • Newhaven Office Interior

  • Player's Newhaven Apartment

• 1 Static Lewd Scene with 8 images.

• Added 2 new animated CGs to The Galli.

• Added a pop-up image for the Charlene scene.

• Player Phone asset implemented (with skin tone changes).

• Use Spacebar to advance dialogue.

• Click anywhere on the screen to advance the dialogue.

• Added an intro splash screen with a disclaimer, and to remind you, we don’t use Generative AI.

Updates and Fixes

• Improved word choice during a Max scene. (Changing Promiscuous choice.)

• Adjusted Max CG in van.

• Fixed a visual glitch with Jeze in the main menu.

• Upgraded from Yarn Spinner 2.5 to 3.1.

• Reworked save system to facilitate Yarn 3’s new data serialization. As a result, old saves will not work! This system may need a rewrite by the next update.

• Changed variables to use enums, which Yarn 3 finally introduced - also a reason why we can’t reuse save files. Old variables have been changed.

• Extensive separation of script file to delegate work to the game objects actually carrying them out (this probably won’t noticeably improve gameplay, but it makes the game much more scalable as we continue development). This is almost a complete rewrite of the old visual novel core script file.

• In-game, Save/Load is now one button in the menu. You can then go between the tabs to save or load.

• Changed how we present spine animation in-game: instead of snapping into view, we use a fade transition, which should look a bit smoother.

• Loading in characters and animated scenes should now be smoother and not cause any tiny lags (though that was probably not noticeable before either).

• Disabled meshes that were attempting to throw shadows. They already weren’t, but they wasted processing trying to.

• Character mesh layer fix. An issue with character placement and movement on screen led to them not updating which render layer they should exist on, potentially causing them to z-fight. This should no longer happen.

• Saves were not correctly storing where characters were standing. As a result of the fix above, when you load the game, they will always appear where they should be.

• Saves no longer store the last voice that was played on loop, which caused an issue in the Max scene where his orgasmic moaning would start playing again on load.

• Reworked the loading system, can now save and load at dialogue choices (so far not noticed any bugs)

• Player name bugfix: if a player (for whatever reason) gives themselves the same name as an existing character, the other character won’t animate, speaking instead of the player. 

• The effect of the above change means we can also have the player’s mouth animate in any scene we want.

Contents of the Build

We announced it previously, but since we are now trying to push out a build a month, not all builds will be created equal. Our goal is to bounce back and forth between big and small builds. The last build was large, but this one is small.

We only have one big-ish scene with a small follow-up scene. Dave and Greg have their new introduction to the story, along with some familiar passages from the Ren'Py days coming back. One in particular is a lewd scene from Episode 3 that a lot of people missed, where Isaac can go to his hotel room and look at porn. Narratively, given what happens in the Galli, it made sense to bring that scene here, revamped.

We added some new animations to the earlier Galli section. A new animation for Max and Charlene each. Max also has a bit of an animation change for one scene (we made his butt a bit bigger when there is a close-up of the player grabbing his ass).

What is Missing

No Gallery, no SFW mode, no Backer Guide mode, no working player cellphone. We wanted to add these things, but the upgrade from Yarn Spinner 2.5 to 3.1 took up most of our coding work this past month.

There is still no "roll back" feature like there was with Ren'Py. It is something that is going to be big to tackle.

We also really wanted to add a skip feature to this build, but ran out of time. I want to try to prioritize this for a hotfix and get it in soon.

During the switch to Yarn Spinner 3.1, we didn't realize we'd lost the "H" key to hide the UI. We just realized it wasn't reimplemented, so it will be skipped in this build and hopefully will work again soon. Praying on a hotfix.

We also want to add more save slots soon!

There is still one special moment we haven't gotten in from the Galli section, but with our animator going through school finals AND moving, we didn't have time.

Known Bugs

• Sometimes the animated sprites will have their arms phase through their bodies to hit the next pose. We had to redo some of our code when we upgraded to the latest dialogue version, so we are working to fix these.

• Animation queueing causes issues when transitioning between animations, though rarely. (Max laughing twice, or dropping his cigarette twice.)

• Changing the Text Speed doesn't actually update it without restarting the game. Trying to resolve this, as it might be a bug on YarnSpinner's side.

• Your Isaac does not currently appear during choices. This was due to the YarnSpinner changes. We will add it back in a hotfix soon.

• Occasionally, when saving, the save won't appear until reloading the game, even though it is still clickable.

• Android users are advised to uninstall the old version before installing the new one. Having both currently causes conflicts.

Release Schedule

$20 - April 7th, 8 AM Pacific

$10 - April 14th, 8 AM Pacific

$5 - April 21st, 8 AM Pacific

$3 - April 28th, 8 AM Pacific

Where do I report bugs and feedback?

Either in the comments of the update post, on our Discord, or in our Google Form linked in the update post.

Wrap Up

This was an absolutely wild month! I was so scared about doing these monthly releases, and while there were moments of fright, we did a pretty good job.

We didn't get everything we wanted done, so I fear that might bite us. We had an unexpected software upgrade, which is great in the long run, but still took longer than we hoped. Our animator and background/UI artists are both finishing up schoolwork AND moving this last month, so we couldn't have them around as much as we'd have liked. Then I had to deal with taxes (which I just wrapped up).

So, a lot happened! Even today, I've spent the whole day prepping for this release with a super upset tummy. But the show must go on!

Next month, we will be going back to Cafe Estro!

I hope you all enjoy the build! Your support keeps this team employed and fed.

Be kind to one another and Stay Rad!