March News post #2 (Vacation & update 0.09)

Seems fitting to do our 2nd news post by now. :P There's not too much difference in news compared to the one earlier this month, some added things going on in case you've missed it.

(1) Read this post about my vacation coming up. In short, I'm going away on vacation from March 20th to March 31st. Which means that update 0.09 will release on the 20th before I'm away. (there still still be light posts on patreon, but please understand once I come back. I will be going right back into the normal work process on updates still.)

(2) Update 0.09 content. We'll see 3 new days added (wrapping up week 2 of the game), 1 new cg scene, 2 new bg's (day/sunset/night versions) and the Nurse sprite added, along with some new outfits. (more details about all changes and new content will come before release with the change logs)

(3) Updates on kickstarter. We're looking to get the promotional art, such as; headers, character profiles, pie charts, icons, etc. All done in April so that it's ready for our launch sometime in May if things stick to that plan. The kickstarter and any promotional advertising like this will be big for us, as it'll give us an idea for how to proceed with cg scenes moving forward. In short, it's a very rough guess but we're looking at cg scenes costing us close to 8000usd if we continue doing what we're trying to do. Of course this won't ever get finished with our current patreon funding split between 4-5 of us on a team and that's just a fact sadly. We're prepared for the worse case, which would be that we'll only be able to focus on major priority cg scenes and cut/scrap anything else or be very wise on what we choose.

This isn't something we personally want and this isn't to scare anyone, blame any of you at fault, etc. It's simply just a funding vs supply issue, our cg scenes cost us roughly 75-120usd for each new one we add. Based on how many characters are seen in the scene. The hard part about this is that even if we found another artist who does cg scenes for less and what not. Many of these artists don't have experience drawing diapers or say they're willing to draw them and know how, but of course there's a difference between I can draw them and actually drawing them to target what people expect with diaper art. (even our cg artist was new to drawing them and the choices unless you're the artist for the project is pretty slim to none.) (This isn't to say we're looking to replace anyone on the team either, just an example to help explain why the costs.)

(4) Character sprites. So not to alarm anyone, but there is some behind the scenes stuff going on as we come to a end with finishing up the last major sprite work for characters. (aside from new outfits, effects, expressions.) This most likely won't begin until April at the earliest.. But we're looking at the main six girls for possible adjustments or changes to better fit the vision for the game. We're doing a strawpoll to help us understand how you all feel about certain things too, without fully going against anyone. Below goes over my out look on the main girl sprites and what I personally feel so far, these are subject to change and are in no way confirmed to go through with these plans yet. (before any of these fully go through, we'll have concept designs for you all to vote on and compare)

-Miki-

Let's keep it simple, she was our first sprite finished and while I'm sure there could be some nitpicking of small adjustments to make her look a little nicer, while still keeping her exact same look, pose, etc. I really feel like it isn't required or needed, in other words she's perfectly fine for how I've envisioned her.

-Nova-

There is two possible concept ideas with her. (1) small changes for her chin/jawline area to make her face less round and possibly tone her tan down a little. (2) Trying to go back towards her original concept with a little twist. Imagine her hairstyle changed to become more like a ponytail (similar to Rachel currently), except longer and her bangs would be different. Her hair color would go back to a light/medium brown. Eye color would possibly become more golden/brown. Her physical build would maybe be toned down a little in areas, but more or less about the same. Her tan would be toned down a little possibly.

-Erika-

Nothing major changing with her, except her hairstyle. Her general shape and style will be more or less the same, but her bangs will be a bit longer and lay on her face in a different way to look more natural. Her hair in the back will be longer to about her mid/lower back. That's it! Nothing else, except possibly her hat not being around anymore if it doesn't look right with or without it on for the new hairstyle.

-Heather-

Starting to get into the big stuff. She's had 2 sprites now, which we want to make use of both of them as they both offer great things about her, but it would be jarring to see her new sprite for most of the game and then suddenly after X day the sprite is changed to the older one. So with her, it's not more about actual character design changes but rather we want to look at doing a new sprite that balances how her two sprites look currently. Because her new current sprite used is very good for angry/pissed off expressions, but falls flat for calm/general expressions. Her old sprite is very good for general expressions but angry ones aren't as impactful. So nothing would change for her outside of just striking a balance with making her sprite work for her expressions over all.

-Rachel-

We have two concept designs planned in the thought process for her. (1) We keep her current design but tone her down on body build type, height, etc. Leaving her to look fairly the same except more in line with how Erika looks body type wise, not exactly but similar. (2) We go back to her original concept design, which is similar to the above in terms of her height, body type changing to be closer to Erika's height/body type. Her hairstyle would change to a new look that's still fitting for her character, hair color roughly the same still and eye color would stay the same.

-Bridget-

This is our biggest one I believe... We have two ideas in mind to really think about with her. First off is that she would become a completely new character from the ground up, her visual looks and written personality would change. Instead of being a famous streamer and her odd habits seen so far in the game for her tone. She would become more like a shut in, loner who wishes to stay in her room playing games or posting on the internet as a form of escapism. Without trying to spoil the ideas for her, she would have a different tone and outlook on things that we're used to with the current version of Bridget. Visually she would look much different but there would be many different concepts to see for her.

Added with this... There is another idea in mind if it feels more fitting even after these changes above. That would be to retire Bridget as a main character and bring Juliet into the spotlight, pushing Bridget into side character area along with Zoey & Lola. This idea is in mind only because of how Bridget currently feels right now and Juliet I think has a lot more going on compared to Bridget in terms of being more interesting. Regardless, there's a lot of stuff to consider mostly with Bridget and all of this here. We're not looking to rush and jump into these changes.


-Conclusion-

I don't want to scare anyone who likes X or Y character currently with these mentioned ideas in mind. But now is the time to share your thoughts on these things, as we aren't purely going off of what people want. But we're not also going to turn a blind eye to things, Miki is a good example of this. Many of you show huge interest in not touching her design and there wasn't anything really that struck out to me about her. But regardless, it still shows me that even if I had very light plans for Miki. It really isn't needed and don't touch her.

In the end we'll do what is needed based on the vision for the game, but please do understand we're not doing this to upset anyone. The point of this information here is to let you all know now, rather than just up and do things without anyone knowing about it.

Moving on from sprites, even with my vacation going on. I told myself before March began "I'm going to still give everyone 3 new days of content even within under 20 days to quickly make it happen." I would like to say I'm ahead of schedule... Which I am kind of, but I still need to write up all of day 12 (section 1 at least today) with the rest on Monday, Tuesday. Then give myself Wednesday, Thursday to hopefully have enough time to do the engine work for that. It will be a very tight release before I go on vacation, but my thoughts is that I didn't want any of you to lose out on much because of my time away.

This does mean that because update 0.09 is coming out earlier than expected, with update 0.10 it'll be targeted to release at the end of April. I'm sorry for this ahead of time, but I can't come back from vacation and be expected to adjust to having 20 days to pump out 3-4 new days of content. >.< So the wait time between 0.09 and 0.10 will be a little over 1 month but on the plus side, you'll be able to enjoy 0.09 earlier than normal.

With that all said, I'm sorry for the looooong news post. I will remind everyone about my vacation on the update release post on the 20th. I'm sorry if I don't reply back as much during this time, as it'll be a much needed vacation before I jump back into normal work on top of managing the game project. Hope you all understand! ^^