Saturday Update!

Well, we made it through another week folks! The horrors persist but so do we.

I am astonishingly still sick. My lungs/breathing system just refuse to clear 😂 But on the bright side, I have been well enough this week to work normal hours and exercise again, which has helped my mental health a lot.

I was able to do a normal amount of writing last week:

I know what this looks like but HOLD ON

I'm NOT finished the script. It still needs serious editing and also a bunch of alternate content for gameplay stuff. I'll need another two weeks probably. I promise it's for a good reason, I just can't describe it more without spoilers.

I think this will sort of fall into a good new schedule though. The remaining two weeks-ish of script work will hopefully be enough for me actually get over this stupid endless cold. Then I'll be well enough to drop my new merch [ later than I originally said, I know, but I can't handle a new merch drop while sick at all ]. Then once the merch work dies down enough for me to get back to development, I can start fresh on the placeholder sketches.

For anyone new around here that doesn't know my game development process: The placeholder sketch stage is when I go through the game and sketch/doodle out all of the necessary images. This includes backgrounds, sprites, special effects, everything. It takes many months and will likely result in several hundred images.

^ Here's an example of a placeholder sketch from YKMET:Strade

The reason I fill the game with placeholder sketches instead of just fully drawing everything is so that I can get to a fully testable and functional game without investing maximum time and labour. Then I can do alpha testing and be able to change the game a lot- dropping parts, adding parts, changing things, without wasting fully rendered art. This also gives me time to reset my brain between sketch and render- helping me see more ways to improve and fix a picture before finalizing it. I've used this method since TPOF and I think it results in a much better workflow and better game at the end of the day.

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I haven't given you guys writing crumbs for a few weeks, so here's a couple script snips:

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And here's some pics of the goober:

This is her "respecting my personal space" at the computer desk 😂

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I think that's about all I have this week. I was planning to do my super late Blue Monday art tomorrow but now I have a scheduled repair-guy visit for my stacked washer/dryer [ it came with the apartment and is 23 years old- older than a lot of you! LMAO but it still works. Just needs some new parts to stop making so much noise ]

I might try to do both, but we'll see. I'm not gonna push myself too hard.

Either way, I'll see you all next week! Stay safe, stay warm, and trust that we will find our way through this.