Patreon Devlog update 014: Script progress, Background sketches and Side characters

Hello everyone! It’s been a hot minute since we last uploaded one of these, and there’s been some more progress worth showing, amidst all of the all-too common chaos of our lives, so let’s get down to it!

Script draft is ready

With roughly 11600 words, this update will be containing a whole lot of story for our shark boy Lachlan, and as such, the branching paths are starting to take more shape, hopefully giving you all guys the chance to explore more decisions and such <3

Right now, the next step is proofreading all that text and ironing out some of the quirks we always find in first and second drafts.

Background sketches

As the game progresses, the need for more background art continues. The process we normally follow is deciding a layout for the environment, then plan out the ‘blueprint’ of it, doing a couple of thumbnails to have as options for compositions, then clean those up, ink them, color them, add details and finally export them for its use on the game engine.

Is it a bit overblown and unnecessary? Maybe! Are we having great time while doing it? you bet! We need to always keep a balance between what’s necessary for production, and what is overkill for the sake of the release schedule. We’re not always following the most efficient path, but as always, we’re giving it our all to make it the best possible product we can have!

Lachlan’s Dorm room:

(Layout options)

(Thumbnails to check for composition) 

Gym’s Showers:

(Layout and connection with changing rooms)

(Thumbnails to check for composition)

Side character Design: Devon

After the auction for the side character was finished and the winner was decided, we got in contact with them to work on the details of the design and story integration. So let us introduce you to Devon, the very athletic Rottie/Dobie mix! He's a gearhead and works as a mechanic's apprentice, Is part of the varsity boxing team and is very dedicated to his own workout regimen. 

Can’t wait to start working on the sprite and side portrait for this lovely fella <3

—

All the story and artwork labor is always interspersed with a bunch of coding and problem solving in the back end of things that almost never gets to be mentioned, but as we keep working on new features and improvements, there are issues that complicate development a bit when it comes to keep story flags and other stuff for upcoming features like the CG gallery and the unlock scene replay, etc. I think for the next update there will be compatibility issues with current saves, but hopefully all the future-proofing we’re doing will reduce the chance of incompatible saves later on.

See you soon!