Everstone Daycare - Progress Report (Nov. 25, 2022)

Howdy everyone! And happy Thanksgiving to all my American patrons!

Just a quick update and a notice for next month this time. The Gallery and Replays are finished (and hopefully mostly clear of bugs), though they took a little longer than expected due to having to tinker with the guts of all the old scenes so that they work properly as a replay. Likely not going to be an issue going forward now that I know that this is something I should be setting up when I first make the scenes themselves. At the moment, I’m busy finishing up the art for the title screen, and hopefully programming it in soon.

I’ve also been working on a few minor changes to the title screen. It’s a little bare and crusty at this point, so we’ve decided to spruce it up a little bit as part of this demo. We’re planning on updating the art, logo and the layout itself. I’ve also added a few other conveniences that should have been there from the beginning:

There’s now a Fullscreen toggle and a button to access the Volume/Text Config menu right from the title screen. I’m also planning to add a Changelog, and possibly also a special replay menu just for scenes added in the latest version as well (in case people just want to quickly see what’s new). Another idea I’ve had bouncing around in my head was a Credits page, but I wanted to pass this through everyone first.

I wanted a way to show my thanks to all of you in the demo itself, under something like a Special Thanks to anyone who’s ever been a Patron. I’m not sure how to go about this though, and I didn’t want to just take everyone’s names and paste them into a wall of credits without them knowing (in case anyone didn’t want their name publicly displayed for any reason). Would you all be interested in something like this? Should it be something you have to willingly opt into, or opt out of? I’ll look into what I’ll need to actually set this up when I know this is something everyone actually wants.

~

Regarding next month, it’s going to be a little difficult for me to work at my full capacity (as with every December.) It’s the holiday season, and because of that I’ll be traveling (and therefore be away from my regular computer) for the last third of the month. I can guarantee I’ll be able to deliver a demo next month. I’m not sure if I’ll be able to finish all the work needed before I have to leave, and I’m not sure I’ll be able to export my work into a demo after I leave. I’ll see if I can release a demo early with whatever we have ready by that point.

This shouldn’t prevent me from continuing to work on any writing, so I won’t be idle (Spooky will still be working on art as well), but I just wanted to give everyone a heads-up early in case people want to cancel their Patreon subscription for that month because of it. Just for reference, next month I’ll be working on the scenes involving Nurse Weavile. The CGs for it are already completed (they should be up and viewable by $10 Patrons), so it’s just up to how quickly I’m able to form a cohesive story, put it to paper, and program it in. I hope you all continue to support me regardless, but I understand if you would be worried you wouldn’t get your money’s worth.

Thank you all again, and happy Turkey Day!

TLDR; Gallery and Replay finished, working on Chapter Select next. Work done to Title Screen, including adding an options button, a fullscreen button, and a new logo and art. Curious if people would be interested in being credited directly somewhere in the demo, and how I should go about it.

Next month, a demo release isn’t certain. I’ll try to release something early if possible. Just a heads up so people know what to expect.