Public DevLog Update: v16 Progress and Some Personal Shyt

Hey all,

I wanted to check in and give an update on the v16 progress. I'm doing a public DevLog this time to make sure I get everyone. I know I've been pretty quiet here-- even on the socials and I wanted to apologize for that. First, and foremost, I want everyone to know that the project is still going and things are getting cranked out despite the silence. March was a tough month for me. My first dog has been sick for awhile and I lost him right after I dropped v15. He was 12 and it knocked me down hard. Fucking thing took my spark and it wrapped it tightly in riddles of grief and darkness and it buried it deep below paths I've never walked. I expected to bounce back in a day or two and I just didn't. I was still working on the game stuff but it just felt mechanical. There wasn't much spontaneity or life in the scenes and that's honestly something that I take pride in with this project. I got stuff done but without that spark, it just felt like different eyes evaluating where things were and that made it hard to share things. But it made sense, that dog has been here for every word I typed on this thing. He was here for every moment; either at my feet or on my lap, desperately trying to hang on while my hyperactive leg bounced up and down and the room shook around us.

Like anyone else whose been through this, I did my best to work through it and I think I found that spark again-- it was just something I'd never experienced or been through before. I've had a few things come back and my confidence is climbing. I'm alright. But damned if this one didn't hurt. So I'm deeply sorry if the silence, the delay in answering messages, or if any of my comments felt flat or less engaging lately. My heart was broken and I was struggling to both work on the project and keep up with the community with my usual energy. I'm sure those feelings will eventually play out in the story writing-- they always do. Everything is grist for the mill. But I feel confident that I can make up for any lost time so let's jump into this thing again and start to get fired back up together.

v16 Update:

Writing

So overall, this next update should be much easier than the last one. The shopping trip had all the new sets in it that required new lighting and obviously, I went overboard in the changing room scene with CGs 'cause that one was fun. But this next update returns to a lot of familiar settings. Overall, there's a lot of conversations in this section that were already included in the original version. When looking at the rough draft, the writing isn't terrible here but it does need some polish. Unfortunately, I wasn't doing great with polishing recently so while I've completed 2 scenes already and about halfway through the third scene, I'm probably gonna have to go back through them with a clear head again. Buuuuut overall, I'm not expecting a ton of work here unless my spark tells me otherwise. I think I have around 4 scenes left depending on how you count them-- one of which is very long (I'd say comparable to the poker event) but the others are relatively normal length or short-ish.

CGs

Alright, pic-wise, I was expecting this update to be much easier than the last update. With all the new settings we saw last time, this one should be a breeze. However, while we're returning to familiar settings, both of the guys have different outfits now so every dorm room CG will need to be rerendered even if I'm using an existing picture for a pose. That being said, since my spark is coming back, I -- of course-- started going off script again last night and decided on switching up some poses for dorm room conversation since we've seen the guys sit in the same places over and over. Honestly, that's a good sign. We'll talk more about that when I drop some teasers but I am planning to try and change some of those poses up a bit just to give our eyes something new to look at. That being said, the lengthy scene will be image heavy. I'm not there yet. It's a fun scene but I wasn't even gonna touch that one during this past month because I didn't wanna curse it. But despite the recent setback, I have 178 pics finished right now-- most of which were new poses and very few of the "conversation"-type shots I was talking about that are usually super fast.

Basically, I'm a bit behind where I wanted to be right now but I see opportunities to try and speed that up so long-term, I'm not that worried about it now-- I just wanna get stuff out there so you know I'm working. I just felt bad 'cause I been quiet and y'all deserve to be kept in the loop with the progress. I'll again ask that you ignore that percentage completed thing here on the page. I know some of you love that thing. I haven't touched it and I just wanted to try and focus all my energy on the development so I'll ask some patience there.

So stay tuned, folks. I'll see how the weekend goes. I'm gonna go hard on stuff this weekend. If I'm feeling peppy, I may get some teasers out or get a video recorded.

In the meantime, the world is crazy: tell someone you care about them and if you got a dog, give em a hug for me-- or any other pet (minus fish. don't hug your fish, they probably won't like it). Stay safe y'all. Love ya and I appreciate you being behind this thing as always.

-Aaryn 🤙