Alpha Preview Update (February)

Play the alpha here

Password: itisleapyearmydudes ⬅ ❗️

Report bugs here

View bug reports here

Incomplete routes guide ⬅ ❗️please check if you suspect your game ended early :)

What's New:

• 14,000 words of new content to Chapter 9!
• The Sun Court drama continues... How will Rhienne and Romar's affair resolve? What other allies can you gain at the court? How do your past decisions--including what happened with the Western Hierophant--aid or hinder you as you try to navigate the Serpents' Feast? 

Developer's Notes:

Some important things to note for this update:

• A few things underwent necessary name changes. Notably, Talquist (the Western Hierophant/sponsor of the gladiator arena) is now referred to as Zythos. There were just too many "T" names: Thumma, Thurl, Tovrik, Tallys, etc...
• The Jalis Sultanate is now the Jalis Lugalate. 
• There are now a few new toggles in the quickstart option, as well as the lifting of certain numerical restrictions when you input certain stats (since we're now further along in the game than when that feature was implemented). At a user's helpful suggestion, I made picking up the dark tome toggleable so you don't have to go all the way back to Chapter 2 to see what happens if you pick that. 
• A new variable was added to the game, so your game will likely crash if you don't start from fresh and use the quickbuild option to skip ahead (or just play through from the beginning). If you want to avoid this bug for now for whatever reason, do not talk to the Jalis diplomat standing in ambassador's robes. 

And with that, I present to you this update! As I mentioned in my last post, the shortened month of February + the surprise engagement and elongated trip afterward kind of slaughtered me in terms of trying to get stuff on the game done lol, but here it is! It feels like we're about halfway done with this mission, so I'm excited to see progress on it happening at a nice and tidy clip. I also just wrapped on editing Chapter 5 of the Twine port, which was extremely complicated to re-code with all of the branching and gladiator fights... anyway, that means we're also creeping steadily along on that! Ivan is at work on Volume 2 of the Shepherds OST, I've got lots of goodies loaded up for the coming months (including Riel's cane, which you all voted on recently), some exciting things are happening in my author life, and... oh yeah, I'm engaged! 😃 It's taken some time to sink in, but we're so thrilled, and I wanted to thank you all for your incredibly lovely and kind messages and well wishes: they truly meant the world! 

Jeremy and I will probably have an engagement of a few years, as we're in no particular rush to get married at the moment and I need time to figure out this wedding planning stuff LOL, I am extremely knowledgeable about certain things--like writing interactive fiction, or trivia about, like, English history during the Crusades or the Tokugawa period--and woefully uneducated about things in that *gestures vaguely* overall area of life. But you bet I've already created a multi-page spreadsheet with detailed notes and a plethora of links and references... 🥹 It'll take us some time, but we'll get there! In the meantime, we're making shifts in our lives to coincide with this new chapter: he's started a new job, we've found workspace options that will help boost our productivity while we work rather than sharing our small home office, and we're just overall making healthy adjustments to our lifestyle, like going on more walks, packing bento lunches, etc. I'm even starting a cycling class!!! I guess this is what it's like to be a true adult now... 😔

Anyway, that's all I've got for now! I hope you enjoy this update, and again, I want to thank you all for supporting Shepherds, and for your celebratory messages and gestures of friendship as we shared this happy news! Onward into March!

Total wordcount: 1,086,648 words without code

What's Next

More Chapter 9: let's see if we can finish this section of the mission off next time!