Dev Update! 7/29/24

Hey, folks! Hope your week's off to a great start!

Just for a quick state-of-things update, I recently crossed the 350 render mark for Chapter 10, wrapping up the first of two planned ero scenes for Mason. At present, I'm working to finish up a talky scene that precedes the Viola section of the chapter. I'd hoped to be a little further along at this point, but I'm not making bad progress at the moment.

I'm still aiming for a release in August, but I've got three scenes I need to finish:

• taking Mason shopping/visiting Viola to set up the next phase of her story

• another scene with Mason, more firmly establishing the trajectory of that relationship

• ending scene with Gabby, setting up her next story arc/relationship to the player

The thing is, I feel like I can get these scenes done by the end of August. But, I also feel like I could make them better, if I spent a little more time on them. So.. I'm at a bit of a crossroads. Get them finished by my arbitrary release date, orrrr push the release to September, and add more renders, options, etc? I could always split the difference and push the release out for August, and then go back and build on it later. I've already got a few scenes sprinkled throughout the game that I want to tweak or otherwise add onto, so it'd just add a few more items to the list.

I dunno! Sound off in the comments, and let me know what you think. It's always possible that I make progress quicker than I expect, and I don't need to short-change any scenes. But, I also know how my good intentions are often derailed by the reality of the time available to me.

Besides the planned final release, I'm presently building a new demo version for $15+ subscribers, which should be available any day now. There will be a handful of 'placeholder' renders present, but it'll have a good bit of content, including the aforementioned Mason ero scene. My main dilemma right now is simplifying the flow of the ero scene, and kicking myself for not tagging a few things correctly, in Mason's earlier appearance. Stupid, stupid Neon..

Finally, I recently approached a couple animators to see about having some actual, proper looping animations done for some of the ero scenes in the game. I've never loved how Daz animations look, though. So, I've contacted artists people who specialize in Live2D and Spine animation, seeing if it's possible to take some of my renders, and manipulate them as they would a normal 2D image. The goal being to create a crisp, smooth animation that'll display well in Ren'py. If the artists return some good results, I'll be sure to share them with you folks. >_>

That's it for me today! As always, take care of yourselves, and thank you for your support!