Chalivon Ch. 4, Announcing Live Dev streams, and Plans going forward!

Hello, everyone! It's time for the first of many biweekly updates~!

I've been looking over the feedback you all have been giving me on Discord about Darkwisp, and it seems that most of you are happy with it! I'm delighted to hear that this whole Patreon-substituting-for-Itch thing has led to some quality work already.

But the single most recurring question I've gotten is if I'll be adding more Haunts beyond the mansion - which is a little tricky. See, my design document for Darkwisp included tons of new locations, but they were all expansions on the mansion, so all that prior work wouldn't be helpful for any new locations added.

In addition, some patrons have voiced very reasonable concerns that making the mansion too large might be a detriment to the game overall, as traversal is not ultra-fast by design, both for atmosphere and for aiding in the player potentially noticing traps before running into them. At the mansion's current size, it's perfectly fine, but increasing the scope could lead to problems.

All this is to say I'm currently contemplating which direction to take Darkwisp in - if I make another Haunt, I'll need a longer period of work to get it up to the mansion's level than the regular updates' work time. To be clear, this isn't strictly what I'm doing at this moment, but I have no intentions to stop development on Darkwisp entirely.

But even if the direction of Darkwisp is currently under consideration, I'm not here empty-handed - for one thing, the next chapter of my fiction series, Chalivon, is up! Get it on the Itch page for free here!

In addition, I was thinking over more potential perks for you wonderful Star Patrons - specifically, some way that you could influence some of the things I make, since I feel that's pretty fair for people who are helping me out on a monthly basis. What I came up with is this - Live Dev streams!

I'm showing Darkwisp assets here as an example, but this would be a new game(s) that I make from scratch live for all of you! I won't have a mic, but I'll be chatting with everybody!

Not only that, but every Star Patron will get one special request per stream! I reserve the right to veto requests that I feel go too far or do not comply with Discord's TOS, but otherwise I'll endeavor to make all special requests a reality! These requests will be made using our Discord bot, Rin, and will be visible only to me. That way, you can either keep your influence a secret, or let it be known - your choice!

But these special requests aren't strictly limited to the game - there are some other ways you can "influence" me during the streams...

I've made a few variations that you can potentially choose from to change me (and, perhaps, my behavior) in realtime, but since these OBS setups require some... well, setup, I can't comply with every such request live. I can always make new ones for future streams on request, however!

As for the livestreamed game itself, the plan is for it to be eventually playable for free for everyone! I have no idea of its size or scope or even genre at this point, but when it feels complete, I'll be posting it on Itch for all of you to enjoy!

I currently do not have a schedule for the streams planned, but ideally I would hold them at least once a week (possibly more), and I'm planning on the first stream being sometime next week!

I'll be posting again (both here and on the Discord) when the time for the first Live Dev stream is set, so stay tuned! Thanks again to all of you for your support!!