Midweek ramblings...

Hey Folks,

Just wanted to share some thoughts....

Nothing particularly insightful, just some midweek ramblings, so you won't miss anything if you don't read it :)

Firstly thanks for everyone who participated in the recent polls.   Looks like we have finalized what  Elaine will look like  (Thanks to Aeilion's imagination and your votes) and she will obviously make her entrance in the next episode.  And speaking of next episode, I don't have a release date yet other than sometime next month.   

I also got some good insight into what people's preference's are with regard to the favorite episode poll, so that was interesting with a few mild surprises in there.  The main thing it confirmed for me is that when I'm planning out my episodes, I should go with my gut, rather than trying to write to suit what I "think" people want.

The episodes where I tweaked some plans to give people what I thought they wanted were some of the least popular, whereas the episodes where I just wrote as if I was writing for myself, seemed to be the most popular.  Which suits me, because the latter option is always easier for me to write (rather than second guessing myself).

I'm surprised that the most recent episode was as popular as it was because although I liked a lot of the individual scenes, I had a niggling feeling when I released it that something was missing.  To be honest, I usually get that with every release, but it felt particularly apparent for Ep 11.  But, thankfully, it went down relatively well (like a good woman).  I won't add in any spoilers (because not everyone has played it yet), but it was mainly the last scene that I had some doubts about.  But that was one of those items where I felt it wasn't necessarily what people wanted, but it did feel like how it could /should naturally play out (based on my version of the character and situation).  so, I went with my afore-mentioned gut!

As always, I would like to thank all of you for your support and patronage.  It really is much appreciated and without it, I would have abandoned (or at the very least slowed to a snail's pace) the progress months ago and actually started living a real life again.  Every week is a balancing act between the game, my real job, my personal life and sleep.  And usually one or two of these lose out each week.  But I am still really enjoying it, so absolutely no complaints, no shadow of burn-out and no loss of interest on the horizon at all!   

I have started the process of getting a third member of the team (to help with the writing).      I got a lot of interest, which is great, but this is new to me, so still trying to figure out how to identify the "one" as it will be tricky to get someone who brings their own toolkit to the story but who also needs to match the current style.  I really don't want it to be apparent which scene I wrote versus which scene they wrote as that would just end up feeling like two different narratives per episode.  Similar to the way when Aeilion came on board, I hope it isn't too obvious which images per episode are mine versus which one's are Aeilion's  (Hint:  Aeilion's are the better ones.).  But overall, the quality jump when he came on-board was noticeable, compared to the art before he joined.  Same with the new writer:  I don't want noticeable differences within the episode, but hopefully they can bring the same noticeable jump in quality to the writing that Aeilion did to the artwork.   And free up some of my time to help improve quantity and/or quality of my own work,

So I expect it will take a week or two to finalize the third (or potentially 3rd & 4th) members of the team.  Also looking to get some help on-board for some of the other items that take up my time (writing the walkthrough, coding, error checking).  But with my attachment to the game, I don't think I'll ever completely give up on any piece.  Even if I concentrate primarily on writing, I don't think I could go through a whole episode without delivering some artwork / rendering a scene or coding, etc.  It would just feel too strange to hand over any piece 100%.  

I'll try to get Ep10 walktrough out this weekend and as it's running late, I might just keep going with the walkthroughs and do Ep11 WT as well, so hopefully that will help catch-up and get both walkthroughs out within the week.

Thanks,

CG