Heart of the Woods December 2018 Update

Meowdy nyall,

Feels kinda weird that this will be the last HotW update I write for 2018, and quite possibly the last one I ever write, since there will (hopefully!) only be one or two more before release. It's only been two years or so since this project began, but it feels like a whole lot longer.

Anyway, things are going well. Technically, the most recent update was only a little over a week ago, when I mentioned that we're in the final stretches of putting stuff together. Unsurprisingly, this is still the case.

The very last art asset will be started on tomorrowish, once I write up the write-up and send it to Rosuuri. It's for one of the CG's in Chapter 4 - I've been putting off the write-up for this one because I wasn't quite sure what I wanted. Since she turned in the [REDACTED] sprites this morning, there's really not a whole lot left to be drawn. That's also kind of a weird feeling. Getting to the final stretch of projects always is.

As we get closer to the end, we've finally settled on a tentative release date for the game. That needs to be verified with everyone still, to make sure that we all think it's achievable. If we do, you can probably expect that announcement later this month. We're still targeting Q1 2019. So, somewhere between the start of January and the end of March. We're all really excited for y'all to play the game, and also to get started in earnest on our next couple projects.

Let's see, in terms of other stuff... The ending theme for the game is pretty much done now, and Minute is working with the musician to do the cover art for the song. Sarah's also composing a new track for the game's trailer, which will be done by Adi (same as the TWA:P trailer), and it's sounding amazing so far. Astartus sent in some demos for the retake tracks, and they're also sounding pretty excellent. This game is gonna have a damn good soundtrack, if I do say so myself. Hopefully it'll have a damn good everything.

In a lot of ways, the development period for Heart of the Woods has been a learning experience for many of us. For over half the team, this will be the first commercial project they've worked on (and in some cases, their first project at all). Game development is a continuous cycle of learning from your past, and I feel like we've all gotten a lot better at our respective crafts over the time this game has taken to make. I know I'm not the only one looking forward to putting those lessons into practice. Even now, as I've been editing scene-by-scene, I feel like I've gotten a lot better at finding places to improve stuff, as well as providing useful feedback on drafts of the script. Hopefully that'll show in the final product, too.