State of the Game - February 2020

 It’s springtime! Almost! Let’s start with the usual platitudes. I am perpetually grateful for all your support. I am amazed and still cannot quite believe that the game became this successful. I sincerely hope that I will be able to keep fulfilling my obligations to you. Thank you!

v0.4.1 will go public on Sunday, and I’ll do the regular CG set. v0.4.3 will be out as soon as it’s done. I would love to get it done next weekend, but unless I cut basically everything from it, it’s probably not going to happen. So I’ll try to aim for “less than two weeks”. More information on v0.4.3 will be in the “short-term plans” section.

And we've hit the next goal. Actually, we’ve hit two goals since the last SotG post, but the other one was so long ago. Well, alright, alright, not that long ago, but still. Anyway, I’m talking about the fifth goal, “The Big Upgrade”. The counter might be lower when you are reading this due to the usual start-of-the-month dropoff, but as I’m writing this, the goal is reached. I’ve added the next, sixth, goal just so we have something to strive for, but honestly, I will probably try to add a full-time collaborator much sooner than the sixth goal is reached. 

The poll on the big upgrade ended a week ago, and I’ve made the post public: https://www.patreon.com/posts/33365252 It’s close, but when we add up the two “writer” options, it wins by a lot. I mean, writer wins as is, but two-in-one writer wins by a whole lot more.

I’ve been expecting that we will only hit the goal sometime in March at best, and I’ve been preparing a test assignment for those who would be interested in writing for the game. Thought that when we hit the goal I’ll be all “hey folks, I’ve already found us a writer!”. But no, we hit the goal much earlier and I haven’t even started interviewing people. Not that I’m complaining, but yeah, I don’t have anyone to introduce to you yet. 

But hopefully, within a month or so, there will be someone. I will try to reach out to professional erotica fiction writer community, would be super happy to hire someone who’s good at writing hot, hot sex. And, of course, I will also publish the test assignment here and on the other public forums for anyone who cares to try.

I still want to explore voice work, have been compiling a list of NSFW voice actresses and SFX producers, but I will keep this on a backburner for now. And I will still try to find someone to help me with the renders. It’s a huge amount of work, and I really could use some help. The complex stuff I will keep doing myself, but there are a lot of scenes that aren’t that demanding. Of course, I won’t work with anyone who won’t be able to reach the level of quality you folks expect, so don’t worry, I’m not going to just outsource renders to the lowest bidder. But I really need some help, and that’s because of...

But yes, I am starting to feel burnt out. I know the feeling well, it got way worse at my last place of work before I quit to start working on AHiTR. My productivity was dropping, I couldn’t really enjoy anything, and the only happy days were the ones when I could just tune out of work completely, and those were hard to come by.

It’s not nearly that bad yet, but when I said in the last Dev Update that I’ve been writing stuff for the most of last week, I was not completely honest with you. I was mostly sitting behind my desk, staring into the screen, and trying to figure out what the hell is supposed to be there. That is to say, I did manage to cobble together the main three events of the update, barely. 

But then when I was reviewing some minor details late on Saturday, the floodgates of inspiration opened, and by the end of Sunday my scripts swelled to nearly twice the size, with some old renders still not done, and a whole batch of new ones added. And then I desperately tried to finish everything as soon as possible, which obviously did not happen as I was only able to release Alpha 1 on Wednesday. This is not a healthy way to work, not gonna lie.

But please don’t think that I stopped loving the game, I didn’t! If anything, I love it more now that I made peace with the fact that it will never be exactly the way I want it to be. There will be really rough spots. I won’t be able to put all of my ideas into the game. Some storylines will be cut short. And it’s fine. Flawed, but completed game is better than an ambitious mess that eventually gets buried under its own hubris, right?

And I do want to complete the game. So after the next two updates are out, I’m going to take a week-long break from working on the game at all. Maybe I will do a CG set, a couple of scene concepts, but nothing substantial. And after that I’ll take another week to clean up some long-standing minor issues that always keep nagging at the back of my mind. So one update in April will be super small, more like a bugfix than a proper update, and then I hope I’ll be in a much better shape.

That said, I haven’t made any reservations yet, so maybe I’ll get another update out before the break. But I will continue working through March at the least.

And one other thing. As of today, the custom CG perks will be removed from all the tiers save for the top one. Those of you who already pledge will keep your custom CGs perks, everything remains the same, but new patrons won’t be getting the option. Those perks proved to be not at all popular, I only get a few requests per month. But at the same time I get this nagging feeling that tomorrow all those people who pledged but didn’t claim their CGs will do just that and I’ll have to do a hundred renders on short notice. And I keep missing my deadlines even with those few CGs that get claimed. I probably should have made custom-CG perks a limited-slot option from the beginning, but oh well.

Next, let’s go over the short-term plans for the next two or so months.

Update v0.4.3 will be mostly about Lyriel again. Her storyline is already tied with other girls’ stories for length, but considering her initial disposition, I think it’s understandable. I want to finish that initial part of her story before moving on. Some more sex stuff, some side activities, but mostly it will be about Lyriel’s place in the House.

Update v0.4.4 will bring the continuation of the Space Dream, namely, the android. The android would be quite versatile. I have a slight twist planned for this scene, you’ll see. Haven’t decided on additional events for that update, maybe another visit to Lady Sirenia. Or maybe another communal dinner, including Lyriel this time. Or maybe even a storyline event for another girl from the main cast, but that’s unlikely, I much prefer to do multiple storyline events in small arcs.

Then it’s time for the big anniversary update. I want to redo the very start of the game, add small scenes with characters we voted on a while ago, add a new mechanic, redo some of the early event renders and animations, tighten the writing, and generally, make the beginning of the game much, much better. I know, it doesn’t sound too exciting for you veterans, but I want the first few minutes of the game to shine. And, there will be new content for you to explore, after all.

The anniversary update may take a bit more time than usual. Yes, even more than the usual “the usual”, but I will try to fit it into the schedule and maybe sneak in an additional small update. After that one is out, I will focus on bringing other girls’ stories up to date and advancing the main story. But I have a few conflicting thoughts on that as well.

I have quite a few unresolved dilemmas about how to proceed with the game. It would certainly be comfy enough for me to keep milking the project for all eternity, but I want to finish the game, and finish it within a reasonable timeframe.

So the main question is, how many characters do I want to include in the main cast? The initial plan was for six or more. And I still don’t know if it should be six or more. If six, which ones do I add? I promised you in the last major character poll that the other two girls won’t be just discarded. So do we just go with those two? I have ideas for others, and maybe they will be popular. Expand the cast more? There are a few hidden rooms in the house, we could find room for another two or three girls.

But then again, with this large of a cast, some girls will be left without new events for five or more updates. That would suck. Keep to the six main girls, and cast all others as side characters? Maybe, but then I won’t be able to tell their stories properly. I just can’t decide.

And even if I do decide on that, what about the main story progression? In retrospect I think that maybe I shouldn’t have done any story at all before introducing all the main characters. The thing is, when the game is a sandbox with independent event chains, some events stop making sense if you progress much further in other stories. Relationships change. I need to make options for all the communal events to include/exclude girls depending on your progress within the game. 

I am stalling the story right now, but honestly, I just don’t know what I should do. Probably race to add all the main cast to the House, and then go about the story properly. But then we’re back to the issue of the size of the cast. If you have thoughts on that matter, please do share, I could do with some fresh ideas.

In any case, I want to add at least one new major character either in late Spring or early Summer. And if all goes well with the additional writer and if I will be able to get some help with renders, maybe, just maybe, most of those dilemmas will resolve themselves.

Well, that is all I have for you today. CG set on Sunday, will be working on v0.4.3 starting from tomorrow. Again, thank you, and see you soon!