Looking at some numbers.

It's been a while since we did one of these, so let's look at some numbers and see if we can figure out what that tells us about the state of chapter 7.

As usual, I'll be using number of images added for this chapter as an indicator. I'm curious to see where we stand. Warning, it's a bit off a dense read, sorry about that.

So how much content was added to the game as of now?

Right now, there's 17.3K images in the game. That's 17.300 images.

4,7K of those images were added since the start of development on chapter 7, which means a growth of about 37%. Wow, that number took me by surprise, tbh. Even more so because there's a still a few hundred more images currently in the pipeline at various stages of production (which is not usually the case I must admit).

Right, so how does that stack up against the previous chapter? I forgot to jot down the end total for last chapter, but taking the current total and substracting the end total of chapter 5 (6.9K) and the number added so far for chapter 7, we come to 5.7K added in chapter 6. First of all, wow pt. 2, I'd forgotten how much images were added in chapter 6. It also that means we're currently just over 80% of what was added in chapter 6.

But how accurate is it to compare those numbers? As it happens, with chapter 7 I started to cut images into less parts when they go into the game. So for the same content, there'll be less images in chapter 7.

The reason for this is a bit technical (skip at will):

The high compression rates on images needed on android builds to keep the APK install file within the 2 GB limit results in noticeable seams in composed images. So composed images can be compressed less for Android.
Less cutting up means there's more redundant image data in images that are (nearly) losslessly compressed, so less space is saved for PC and Mac where that is used.
But it also means less seams, so those images can be compressed further on android than images with more seams, and that actually ends up saving space on that platform, where there's a hard limit.
So, at this point, I'm not cutting images in post work to optimize for lowest file size when lossless, I'm cutting to optimize for less seams.

However, comparing the number of source renders instead of the processed images currently added into the game (I'll spare you the numbers), shows that while that might have some effect, we're still not quite on par with chapter 6, for whatever that comparison is worth.

So what about progress?

That's pretty easy, since we got the progress infographic that updates weekly. Just counting filled in heads vs open ones seems indicate we're just under 80% finished on that count. So it's pretty much in line with the amount of content added.

Conclusions.

What conclusions can be drawn from that?

For one, chapter 7 is close to completion, but not quite there yet. There's a good deal left to go.

Secondly, it seems we'll end up with about the same amount of content as on chapter 6.

So, what are the chances of a release by New Year then, as last time?

As I've said before, I don't really like to speculate about any release date until I am actually sure I can make it. But looking at the amount of work left to do, it doesn't seem likely that I'll wrap up all that work and get it ready for release by then. Keep watching this space though.

Wait, how'd did that happen? If there's about the same amount of content as the last chapter, shouldn't it take as long as the last chapter?

It's a good question. Looking at the time spent to date, it's roughly equal to the that was spent on chapter 6 this time last year, so the only conclusion is that content takes longer to make than in the last chapter.

I made a a post before about why it is that, the further you get into development, the longer things start to take.

I think what we're seeing is the effect of scenes getting ever more complicated to produce, to do better than the last.

There's a very real need to do one better than last for scenes at each new step in the relationship with a character, because if a scene underwhelms, it would invoke a feeling not unlike post-orgasm clarity, and unintentionally make the player feel they're done with the character, which would be a great gimmick to pull off, but also a shame.

So, that's it for now. Make sure to check out the progress report on the pinned post, which updates weekly, and hopefully before too long I'll actually have something a little more concrete to share with you.

Links to some posts mentioned above:

Three questions (going into why Light of my Life updates take so long to produce).

Getting closer (going into why chapter development time has gone up progressively).

Latest info (pinned at the top of the page, this updates weekly with the latest progress status and an indication of time spent on development).