July Update

Hello!

Time for a monthly update. We'll start with a progress report. For those following along on Trello, you might have noticed that a couple "done" cards were shifted back to the "doing" category. RPG Maker MV released update 1.6.1 last week, which meant I needed to double check all my 3rd party scripts to verify that they were still working. They was also recommended to start a new project and copy materials over. So, that's why those cards were shifted back and progress seemed severely limited last week. Testing is going well, and I expect that progress to be restored today or tomorrow. At that point, I'll be sending the project to a scripter to finalized a few custom scripts for the "battle" release (version 0.20).

As for the rest of the work, most of the assets have been resized for MV. I need to tweak the shading on 2 CGs, since it looks off at the higher resolution. After that, it'll be time to fix any map issues in MV and setup the pathing restrictions. That should hopefully send a few more cards to the "done" column. It's strangely exciting to move those little digital cards...

Current Aylia's Story plan:

The current plan is to release a beta once the MV conversion is done. This will essentially be a fixed 0.11 with the updated artwork. The purpose will be to a) show off MV and the higher resolution, but even more importantly, b) verify that the scripting foundation we've setup is working. That will NOT be a pledged update.

After that, the plan is to finish up 0.15 and release it. I do plan for that to be a pledged update. That update will represent a lot of work, and will contain at least 6 full scenes with variations and other minor event artwork. I will provide ample warning before the update and provide time for people to manually decline the pledge if they choose to do so. Also, remember that YTGaming also offers a full refund of your last pledge if you are unsatisfied.

Feature Update:

Want to spend a moment talking about how things have changed as well. One of my primary goals when I started this (aside from getting Aylia horizontal), was to create a fun experience without excessive grinding that often frustrates me in other games. In converting the game to MV and testing everything, it gave me to the opportunity to tweak a few things based on what I've learned. The biggest of which is the addition of a "story" mode. This mode will eliminate the battle system and give Aylia an instant "win" if attacked. Essentially, this allows players to avoid RPG Maker combat if they find it tedious. While I AM trying to make combat fun, I completely understand that it is not to everyone's taste. This way, you can still play the game, explore, and quest, but avoid the time spent in turn-based combat. That said, I do hope you give combat a try when the full system is released in 0.20.

Well, it's time to get back to work! You'll be hearing from me again in a patron-only post early next week. In the meantime, don't forget about the Trello page: https://trello.com/b/JUvqGocH/aylias-story-015  You can always just glance at the Menu on the right side to see what's changed, it tracks card changes and movement. I anticipate a decent amount of progress this week.

Thank you!

YT