[News] Dev's blog #94

Hey there!

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Brief about September and October

For those who don’t already know, I’m spending these two months working on a remake of the initial part of the story. At the end of October, I’ll be releasing an update that includes all the remade content along with a bunch of fixes, improvements, and new features.

If you’re not interested in sticking around for the remake, I encourage you to reconsider your subscription tier or even cancel it altogether.

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Now, let’s dive into the changes that have been made so far:

1) UOP has moved from Ren'Py version 7.4.4 to 8.3.0

The new version of Ren'Py offers some cool features I’d like to take advantage of.

So far, I haven’t run into any bugs from the upgrade, but I’ll be doing more in-depth testing. The only downside is that Ren'Py 8.3.0 no longer supports 32-bit operating systems. That said, according to Steam, almost all players are using 64-bit systems now, so it shouldn’t be a major issue.

I’d prefer to stick with version 7.8.x since it offers most of the same features as 8.3.0, but unfortunately, I’m unable to run those SDKs. I keep getting some weird error that I can’t find any information on.

Anyway, if you’re a translator or a mod creator and have any concerns about this upgrade, feel free to reach out to me on Discord. I’m open to discussing it.

2) Rewritten code and dialogues up to the middle of the event where the MC meets Natalie and Roxy (about 2100 lines right now but there are much more to come)

I’m rewriting these early dialogues because, after almost 4 years of development, I’m no longer happy with them. Plus, they originally needed proofreading, so I’m killing two birds with one stone.
I’m also trying to better highlight the characters’ personalities and add important details that might give you a deeper understanding of them.

3) 310 new renders and 5 animations are ready

It’s hard to say exactly how many new renders and animations there will be, but I’m guessing we’ll end up with around 1,000 new renders. As for animations, I’m still not sure yet.

4) Music and sound effects have been re-compressed and volume-equalized

The issue with the current audio files is that some are over-compressed, leading to poor quality. There are also inconsistencies in volume levels between tracks. I’ve now updated all the source files, balanced their volume, and applied moderate compression to maintain sound quality.

I’ve also removed some songs I wasn’t happy with, and replaced a few of them with better options. I might swap out more, but I’ll decide if it’s necessary as I go.

5) UI improvements

These changes are focused on enhancing your gameplay experience. Based on your feedback, I’ve added:

• convenient scroll bars for all in-game phone apps

• numbering for PVU lewd pics, making it easier to track which ones you haven’t unlocked yet

• disabled scrolling and skipping dialogues with the mouse wheel and "CTRL" button while using in-game phone apps

• thanks to the new Ren'Py version, all emojis are now in color, and there’s nearly a full set of them available.

That’s not the full list of UI changes, though. I still have more to work on, so stay tuned.

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Coming up:

In the next few days, I’ll be posting two polls about the outfits for Natalie and Roxy during their first meeting with the MC (the first gym scene).

I’ll also be sharing some comparisons between the old and new renders in the “Sneak Peeks” section.

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I’d love to hear your thoughts and suggestions for the remake! Feel free to share them in the comments!

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Best wishes,
Dream Now