DONE WITH EXAMS!

IT FINALLY HAPPENED! With great joy (more like relief) I can finally say that the biggest hurdle to developing the game is now, starting today, out of the way. As many know, I am a student and this was my last year of studies on university. I don’t live in the same city as the uni is that I am attending, so besides purely studying, working on projects and attending lectures, I also had to travel 4 hours per day if I had a lecture, exam, or anything else. I was “supposed” to finish uni related activities a month ago, I submitted all I could but… Everyone on uni ignored me. I sent reminders and alike, and I either got silence or “please change this xxx” thing as it’s extremely complicated and tedious paperwork😑. Just last week I went to uni FOUR TIMES TO BRING PAPERS BECAUSE THAT'S THE RULES. 

SO AS OF RIGHT NOW, I HAVE NO MORE EXAMS NOR LECTURES IN MY LIFE. WOOOOOOOOOOOO!

But important note, I didn't graduate yet. As it’s normal, at least on many European universities, I still have one big thesis to make and present. And some might wonder “but why are you so excited then?”, and it’s simple. I can do the thesis whenever, and in whichever slow tempo I want. Roughly a year ago, I already decided I won’t push for early graduation. Not only is it an annoying process, which again invovles a lot of frustration sending emails, it's also luck if you will graduate early. If you don't get the lucky slot, you have to wait months. There was a huge chance that I worked my ass of for 2-3 more months, full Summer passed with ever more slow Fates progress, just to be told in late September “Sorry, you have to wait a few months”. I’d feel devastated and I’d feel I betrayed my players, so paying a very small “fine” to carry on the thesis part for next year is for me much, much more acceptable outcome.

So yeah, I won’t do anything thesis related for months, I won’t even decide on topic or anything yet. I’ll take my time doing it, so it impacts the game development the least.

Does that mean I can now develop the game super duper speedy like best devs?

I’ll speed up now, but I won’t be like Cari nor Niichan, not yet. Not only are they amazing and super efficient, I still live with my parents, which brings me to my next short point. I am actively looking to move out, but with the crazy and mostly unjustified inflation, that’s hard to do, especially as with my current earnings I’ll be in a slight loss. Of course, I am now again going to target 4-5 months per releases, and I’ll let you all know when I move out. As little as there is currently lewd scenes, working on this game while both parents are at home and during summer, with open doors for AC isn’t optimal haha 🤣🤣

PC upgrade
I will be buying new components for my Pc. As some know, I am on a very weak GPU (gtx 1660), and while it’s sufficient to work on, it’s not optimal. Honey Select is terrible optimized, but even in that state having anything better than my current gpu would help, and I asked some devs if they upgrades helped, to which they all said yes (to a varying degree). I was hesitant to upgrade due to financial situation, but as I am already “overstaying” at home and saving, might as well now. It's a good investment too.

Fates collide talk

Now lets transition further into the game, as there is lots to talk about here too. The progress last 2-3 weeks was slow with all Uni stress, but I did work a bit more on the code side of things. Thanks Gary for the help. Unsure if I said in public post yet, so I’ll mention it all here. 

Episode 4 will feature quite a big improvement to the gallery, and players will have “hints” which can help them realize where they might have missed an item. This is already fully made and functional (or so I hope haha), and feel free to give me feedback on release about the hints. I made them very short and not too “giving” into what to exactly do, just a hint and guidance. Moreover, there is one more feature coming (that still needs to be coded). After you reach the end of Episode 4, you will have a screen, similarish to when you browse the girls in gallery in Episode 3, with a girl image preview and information on how many relationship points you have with the selected girl. It should also tell you if you are still on their route or not. I only know two games that showcase it like that on the end, and I am sure I can tweak it a bit for future updates, so feedback is appreciated. For now it’s going to be only for Episode 4, so it won't appear retroactively for Ep1/2/3 parts. And for future updates, again, let me know, maybe it’s best for each update to have? Maybe after each act (so only after multiple episodes)?

Save-files and Walkthrough

I am really excited about those 2 features, which brings me to the next point. Saves and walkthroughs. Besides the Ep4’s first half of the dialogue already being proofread, I also sent the first half with renders and all as a “functional game” to a few players to just test if anything ground breaking issues arise. THANKFULLY normal saves worked (that’s a first in like 3 releases right?), but only the normal ones. As some know, I don’t really “promote” the walkthrough file because it broke the saves for vanilla Ep3, so if you wanted the walkthrough mod you had to start from the beginning, which kinda sucks. While that could be fixable, the point stands that it takes a lot of time to make a WT, and to be fully honest, I am not a fan of making it. Not hard for direct “xx character +/-1 point” stuff, but what if there is a choice that is with positive outcome in future? Do I tell everyone that? What if something may or may not have an impact? Some things I get an idea for later in future, I don’t have everything planned even to the smallest of details. In that case, I’d have to retrack back each time to edit older WT parts…

Meaning, I won’t make “wt mod” anymore. (rip 2022-2023?)

It’s very time consuming, causes bugs and causes me just more stress to think about what I should or shouldn’t reveal and how. And with the 2 features Ep4 and forward will have (gallery and end screen) I think it’s justified to remove the WT mod. I was debating of maybe having a character screen like some games have, where you can see in real time after choices the changes to points, but with how many choices we have, and some only really mattering later… Not to mention, in some of those games after talking with few players (and my own opinion), you often check that tool to see if you selected the best outcome. So some players become overly reliant to constantly use it, which makes the game a bit tedious.

That also means players who used the wt mod in Ep3 will most likely have to start again, or just load some saves where they didn’t use it. Apologies for that, but as I said above, I think it’s a much better solution in the long run.

I’ll still make a simple WT pdf for gallery unlocks for those that are stuck even with hints. Well, that’s all for now, I’ve been typing this for 2 hours already. My longest post yet. I just want to say a big sincere, thank you, to everyone who waited for me to deal with my annoying university, and even more to the patrons who kept supporting me through all of it. A year ago I had to gamble, either pause university and work on the game, hoping that I'll never need a degree later on, or focus on it first. I am happy I did it this way, because if I lost the momentum with my studies, there is no guarantee I'd be able to return to it. Moreover, with focus on it and Fates in the sideline, I managed to pass all exams first attempt, in both years. Maybe that makes me a nerdy Simon, but I am in the top of the class due to it 😎

To everyone who read it all, thank you, and I hope I can be swift with future news. I can't give proper release dates, but I expect the game to be released for beta tiers in roughly 2 months.

See ya in the next post!
Love, Kat <3