Small talk waiting for the update

Hello everyone,

One of you wanted to hear about the other projects and how I was planning things for them so I thought it could be a good idea to talk about them as I have obviously less and less things to show about the next update since the big part are H scenes and I'd rather keep them hidden for safety reasons :x

Keep something very important in mind: no matter what I say or plan, everything needs to be taken with a grain of salt. You never know what can happen in life so nothing of what I'll say is set to stone. That's just a combination of how I'd like things to work out combined with an analysis of how things are currently progressing at the current time.

So, here's the current situation for the other projects.

Fubuki's Challenge

For the new people, this is the VN I'll be doing as JFC as an artist. The current status is that unfortunately, JFC seems to have been very busy these past months so he couldn't make much progress on it. I originally stated that this would be the next 2D project I work on after SoVR but from the look of things, chances are it won't be the case. Of course, that could change with time but for now, that's a project that is progressing at a very slow pace.

The Secret Project

While there are many parameters to take into account for this project, there is a possibility this project becomes the one I work on after SoVR. Once again, I can't say anything for sure but the art part has started for real and is progressing at a nice pace. Considering SoVR will probably take longer than initially planned, there is a possibility that the majority of art assets for this project are ready when SoVR reaches its conclusion. If that's the case, I'll start working on it and will be able to reveal it.

The Hunter 2

I've always said it, I'll say it again, TH2 will always be my "last project" because of its size. The only question to wonder is "will I come back to it between two other projects?" While the answer should be an obvious "yes" there are a couple of elements linked to the secret project that could lead to a situation where I jump to SoVR to the secret project without working on TH2 in between. Originally, my goal was to do SoVR, then work on TH2 for some time, then working on the scret project. But since I have planned a bit more content for SoVR and we're progressing a bit more slowly than expected, SoVR might take the spot for TH2. And to be totally honest, considering my vision for SoVR I don't feel guilty at all. At some point SoVR needs to be a strong game, and if it means delaying TH2, then be it. Unlike TH2 on which I can work on my own almost virtually endlessly, 2D games need a team and you never know until when you'll be able to work with the people surrounding you. So yes, there's a possibility you don't get TH2 content for a good while.

Slice of School - Extra Lessons

This was always meant to be a gift. It's free. As such, I really don't feel any kind of incentive to make the game development more prioritary than anything else. Of course, I'd like to add more content but JFC probably won't go back to it until he's finished Fubuki's Challenge. So, yeah, this project is easily at the bottom of the list ^^'

Slice of School

I intentionally kept Slice of School for the bottom of the list because it's probably the project on which I've changed my mind the most. Originally, SoS was supposed to be a sort of "sandbox" game in which I'd add content based on Peak's availabilities and all. But both of our situations evolved a lot since then (after all, it was more than 2,5 years ago.) SoVR is the proof of that (with it being a regular project and all.) When I keep telling you that everything needs to be taken with a grain of salt, SoS is the best example. I would have never guessed the situation would be what it is now when I started working on it back then.

I had an idea as to how I wanted the game to finish but that was more of a A --> B --> ?? --> Z plan, where while I knew the ending, I could do whatever shit I wanted in the middle of the game. Now, I feel like making the game "normal" (as in "put aside the sandbox"), so write down all the elements I want until the ending and make it a clearly defined game to have a better idea of the amount of work it would represent. I'll just try to make sure no character is left on the side, but basically, I don't plan on making it a huge-ass game. Overly huge games are often a trap and TH2 is enough for that :p So when I'll go back to Slice of School, my goal will be to properly finish it (I'd say it can be done within 6 or 7 updates ?) As for the "when", that's tricky as well. I can't honestly answer that question.

Side mentions

There are a couple of things I'd like to mention either because I feel like it or because I've been asked about them.

Slice of Venture 3

I guess I should feel honored that people keep asking about it more than 3 years after it was put on hold and 2 years after its cancellation. The answer is always the same, it will never happen. I mean, it can, but the budget I'd need to reach to do that will never happen. I've been around for more than 10 years now, I know I'm a niche creator, I know I can't compete with vanilla projects or random 3D games and I've come to peace with that analysis. Games don't have to be huge to be good. But SoV3 is a project I've been thinking about for so many years that I don't want to make it smaller just to fit the size of my projects. That's why I'm chosing the possibility to write everything. I know barely 2% or 3% of you would actually read it because there's a huge gap with a game (I received enough negative comments when I released Kou & Yasu to know that (and it was a doujin, not a book)), but that's how I want to try to share the story.

For information, I only took a single time to really focus on it and I wrote 30 pages. Knowing that with 30 pages, I didn't even reach the end of the v0.1 of SoV3, you can guess the story isn't going to be a 100 page-long story :x But I also tried some stuff on inDesign because I'd like the pdf to be a bit interactive. You can add audio in PDFs so in an ideal world, I'd like to make things more pleasant to read by adding music and a bit of drawings as well. The amount of money/time needed to draw some black and white illustrations to picture the key parts of the story (like in japanese Light Novels) has nothing to do with what a full game would require. I'm also changing the text color for H parts because I'd like to try and write the whole story with all H content being avoidable (meaning I could release a "for all ages" version in hope to reach a bit more people ^^'). But once again, this is something I can only do on my free time, and it's not with stuff like Shadow of the Erdtree that I'm going to spend several hours in a row to write :x

Slice of Quiz

Did I mention it at some point? Maybe yes, maybe no... I don't remember. It's been ages since I've been planning a rework of Slice of Quiz. I have an excel sheet with questions, divided by difficulty and game. And I also have two images in store that have never been used while they have all the necessary variation to simulate a strip-game like the original Slice of Quiz was. So the new version wouldn't have only Yuki (the same one done in the original game), but also Anaëlle (drawn by JFC), and Eri (drawn by I-have-no-idea-who-because-I-commissioned-this-pic-6-years-ago). Ideally with a 4th character drawn by Peak, it would make a nice amount. I don't know when I'll work on that but it's somewhere in my list. At least now you know it.

Pixel-only stuff

That's REAAAAAAAALLY random because I tried different things these last years (maybe one day I'll make a post to show that), but I would love to make a pixel-only game. But we're talking about something I just "would like to do". I know many among you don't necessarily like pixel stuff (or at least not enough to play a game with ONLY that), but you know I'm an old guy. I grew up with the 8/16 bits consoles and I tend to love pixel-made H games. So, yeah, if I ever have the chance, I'd like to make a pixel-only game...

Well, that sure was one big post. At least you can just read what is interesting you, no need to read everything. If you reached this without closing the post then I'll show you a small thing for the next update.

This was supposed to be this way all along, but the mine part of the game has always been thought to be dark with a flashlight effect. Hime worked on it and now we have this nice effect inside the mine. That's the kind of polishing that I wanted for this update. Sorry if you expected anything sexual :p

I'll see you later o/