stonefoxstudios

Chasing Sunsets - Development Update 3

It's been a few weeks, and I thought I'd share a little about how Chapter 5 is shaping up.

In short, we have one major scene left, and the lewd scenes and any animations that go along with them to wrap up.

I added a minor scene yesterday when I did a chronology check and realized there was a dot I had failed to connect in the original script.   This will add about 60 new renders, as well as come full-circle on an iconic scene from the Prologue. 

After that, we begin the "integration" phase, where artwork is paired with the script and we start incorporating things like text chats, and test branches/scoring.

To date, we're sitting at about 900 images rendered, or about 2/3rds of our target art inventory for the chapter.

The crossover scene for Chapter 5 is are largest yet, and includes a popular character from another game many of you will recognize.

From a lewd perspective, this update should be rewarding for those who have been patiently waiting.   We're looking forward to letting the genie out of the bottle!

Steam has been a nice boost for us, and only really cost us a week of development time as I worked to merge the codebases. 

As we get closer to beta, we'll become more comfortable about setting a goal date for release.   We remain grateful to our patrons and Discord family for the constant encouragement and support!

Chasing Sunsets Development Update

Kent and I have been going gangbusters on Chapter 5, and I thought I'd take a few minutes to talk about what to expect.   

As of today, 2/19, it feels like we're approximately 50% of the way through the update.

The first half of the game was really about setting up the dominoes for how they'll begin falling in the second half.  We almost succeeded too!   In the interest of transparency there are two things that will happen in Chapter 5 that were originally planned for Chapter 4.  This is actually a very good sign to us that we gave the story enough runway in the remaining five updates to complete it.

We do not have any new features planned for Chapter 5, with the possible exception of an official Brazilian Portuguese translation, so development time is being spent entirely on producing story content.

If the player is on the Jaye path, she is now wondering if she's set her sights too low with MC given what she discovered at the end of Chapter 4.   It's fair to say that they are now both of keenly aware of how much bigger this might be than either of them expected at the beginning of Chapter 1.

If the player is on the Mallory path, advancing that relationship felt pretty straightforward until the surprise at the end of Chapter 4.   

With both relationships potentially at a crossroads (see what I did there?) Chapter 5 will focus on how MC and the two main girls handle this new information, and how they decide to act on it.   While the Polygene story is still simmering in the background, it does take a half-step back in the coming update while our main characters reflect on everything that's happened so far, and begin to look at who they want to be going forward...And with whom.

While all of this is going on, it's hard not to notice that the island provides a number of other tempting distractions everywhere one looks.

Additionally, we'll see answers begin to materialize for many of the questions we see most often:  Is Mallory a clone, or...Something more exotic?   Why did Christian stick up for Sarah?  What's Amanda's condition?   What did Lisa have to say at the end of Chapter 4?

As always, we thank everyone for their patience while we work on delivering the best story we can.   We're also grateful for the bug reports and other feedback that helps us course-correct and pushes us to do a little better each update!

Chasing Sunsets - 0.5 Android Beta

Just a quick note for those of you who are interested:   CenterWork has been kind enough to create an Android port of Chasing Sunsets and we'd invite any of you who prefer to use that platform for VN play to give it a test drive and provide feedback.

There are some minor UI changes and other accommodations that were necessary for the touch UI and renderer.

If you run into anything that seems buggy or broken, please report it in the #bug-reports channel on our Discord!   Download the .apk here:

Android Beta 

Chasing Sunsets - News Update #2

Just a few quick updates we wanted to share today, even if most of them don't pertain to Chapter 5 development directly.

First of all, we've begun building an official web host and file server that we hope will make us independent of Mega or other third party file hosting services.   This should come as good news to those of you running into file transfer quotas on that platform.  Our webpage will launch soon at https://www.stonefoxstudios.net.  Since we will be able to host our own content, we won't be limited by the TOS agreements of YouTube and other free media hosts.

Secondly, thanks to the efforts of a dedicated patron, we should be offering an official compressed Android port of Chasing Sunsets soon.   We will make an announcement here when the APK is cleared for download, and we hope this will come as welcome news to patrons who prefer to consume their VN content on mobile.

On the Steam front, our Store page and binaries have both been approved by Valve, and we are officially all set to release to Early Access there.   We are targeting Feb 15 or sooner, if our pre-launch metrics indicate any benefit to accelerating our timeline.

Due to limitations with the Steam platform, only 100 of the 111 total achievements in the game so far will show in the Steam Achievement Framework.  After launch, when Valve updates our maximum achievement limit, we'll make sure those get added back in.

Chapter 5 development continues to move ahead, with nearly 400 renders completed so far, putting us a little ahead of schedule for the moment.   We'll continue to keep you updated as the update continues to "flesh out."

Phrasing!   Are we still doing phrasing?

Chasing Sunsets - Chapter 5 Devlog

This is where the rubber meets the road, as we say.   Kentyrr has been churning away at artwork while I construct the details of Chapter 5 in parallel.   It's sort of the meat-and-potatoes point of the development cycle where we don't have a ton of specifics to provide other than to say "We're on it!"

Our new characters have been created and are integrated into our workflow, and rendering is going at a pretty good clip.   If you haven't checked out the preview images we've shared in our Discord, drop by and have a look!

From a feature perspective, this will likely be primarily a story update with relatively few changes under the hood.   We've integrated most of the feature set we always wanted to, and hopefully that will provide a relatively consistent experience for the player as we head into the second half of the story.

Thank you to everyone who showed up at our livestream and asked questions!   It's crazy and super rewarding to see the size of the audience grow each time.

In the meantime, we'll leave you with an image of Mallory who appears to be missing a few accessories.   What's up with that?

As we get closer to beta, we'll begin feeding the hype machine with more teasers and specifics about what to expect from Chapter 5.   In the meantime, I'd like to poll our patrons on animations!

Chasing Sunsets Ch4 Livestream up on YouTube

For those of you who missed the event on Discord, you can listen to the Chapter 4 Post-Release Livestream on our Youtube channel!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_FLOLl0qtT4&t=1274s

Chasing Sunsets Livestream Reminder: January 9 @ 1600 UTC

Just posting a reminder that the Stone Fox post-release livestream is about 13 hours away as of this writing.

Kentyrr and I will talk about the development of Chapter 4, take a look ahead at the second half of the game, and answer questions from the Discord and our online audience.   For those of you who are unable to make it, we typically post the recorded livestream to our Youtube within a week of the event.

Chapter 5 is in active development with the first scenes in rendering out now.   Keep checking Discord for preview images and updates as we work to bring the installment to life!

Without spoiling too much we can say that the MV Sunset was damaged during the storm and will be spending some time in drydock for repairs pending the sale George alluded to in Chapter 1.    

Against the backdrop of our principal characters adjusting to new accommodations, Mallory will be faced with the truth of her identity and uncertainty around her best friend's treatment, while Jaye comes to terms with the direction her relationship with her brother has taken -- For better or worse.

On the story front, we'll get some more context on the forces arrayed against our protagonists and begin to unravel the connections between seemingly unrelated events in the past.   

As announced on our Twitter, Chasing Sunsets will be coming to Steam in February!   We do not anticipate this bringing any changes to the relationship we enjoy with our development patrons.   

We would certainly never ask anyone who supported development to purchase on Steam as well, but it will help us reach a wider audience if anyone who can do so "wishlists" us on Steam to ensure we're positioned as well as we can be on the Steam Store on launch day.   

Thanks, and hope to see you on Discord for the livestream!

Stone Fox Studios Livestream: January 9 @ 16:00 UTC

UPDATE:   We are pushing this back a week to Sunday, January 9th due to illness with Stoya and availability with our emcee.   We apologize for the late notice!

Just a quick reminder:   Stoya and Kentyrr will be participating in our post-release livestream on January 2nd hosted by our friend Xor of Thunderline Studios!   16:00 UTC seems to be a good time as it allows our friends in Europe and Oceania to attend in most cases.

We will discuss the development of Chapter 4, talk a little about what lies ahead in Chapter 5, and do our best to answer non-spoilery questions posed in our Discord's #questions-for-dev-stream channel.

Additionally, we'll update you all on the business side of things as well, and take a look at the year ahead.

We hope to see you there!   Typically when pre-submitted questions are exhausted, we open the floor for walk on questions.

Once again, the Livestream will be hosted on our Discord server.

Merry Christmas and Boxing Day from Stone Fox Studios

It's been a crazy year for many of us, but our supporter community is one constant Kent and I both have come to count on.

We thank each of you who have helped us along this journey from the heart.   We never forget to dance with the ones who "brung" us, and we offer a toast to you and your families as we prepare to dive into a new year with fresh hope for a return to normalcy.

Please enjoy a gift-wrapped Mallory as a gift for those of you who have not received her already over Discord!

We wish a winter of peace and prosperity upon every one of you and your families!

Chasing Sunsets: Of Bugfixes and Livestreams!

A few days have passed, and we've built a pretty solid list of bugs.  Kent and I have been on the case and following threads so we could lock down anything that shook out.

Here was our bug tracker as of this morning:

Bug Tracker 0.5

CRITICAL:

• 0.5 audio player throws python exception on Mac version and will not load.   
• Path breaks splitting lunch with Mallory if player rejected her at the end of Ch3.  
• Players unable to get Ch bad ending in spite of making appropriate choices.
• "chathist 6" exception thrown in Chapter 2 if neither Erica nor Linda are sexed up in Chapter 1 and player chooses NOT to rescue Hank the Wolf.

MAJOR:

• Save menu flashes back to main menu animation when certain actions are taken.
• Named saves feature missing.
• Some achievements are not auto-dismissing after the dropdown. 
• Corner case where Jaye can finish Chapter 4 with more than 23 Trust points. 
• No text under Mallory's Ch1 love score at zero points on the Chapter Summary.

MINOR:

• Sound effects continue on asshole path from storm on yacht and never end.  
• Instagram link on "Support Us!" page had an extra / in it, causing redirect to fail

COSMETIC: 

• Image Mismatch:  Mallory shown in van during Alex dialogue when discussing incoming storm.  (Two swapped renders)
• Typo:  Alex should say "To work together" at overlook near end of Chapter 2
• Typo:  Ch4 Narration:   "You dim the overheard lights before joining her on the bed."
• Typo:  Egg Xian shows up with a name before showing up as ??? in the Ch4 market.
• Typo:  Ch4 sharing lunch with Mallory:   "Is this is where I bargain for the whole lunch?"
• Typo:  Jaye speaks to herself in third person leaving bathroom when player is not on her path.  Should be narrator

We're happy to report that all of these issues were fixed in 0.5a which we have linked below.   None of these changes require a replay unless you managed to get the "impossible" extra trust point for Jaye as the path and branch fixes only affect dialogue and not points.   Additionally, Mac players will be happy to learn they now have the Soundtrack button available to them as well.

Mega PC Folder (Mac and PC)

WeTransfer PC Link 0.5b

WeTransfer Mac Link 0.5b

The good news is that this puts the Mac and PC version back on 100% the same codebase.  The bad news is that since we had to make adjustments to the image inventory as well, we can't simply make a patch that we're confident will cover every fix, so you'll have to re-download the full package. 

I'll make the disclaimer that there is no new content here, this simply corrects issues found in the existing content.

About the existing content, I figured I'd take a moment to talk about what 0.5's scope:

• Nearly 1600 individual new renders (bringing the game total to 7600!)
• 9 new Blender animations (New to CS!)
• More than 20 new songs
• 32 new achievements
• 3 new repeatable lewd scenes
• 2000 lines of dialogue (and 20000 words!)
• Phone chat day dividers so ongoing chats can be separated
• New soundtrack and music room with 35 of our tracks available to listen to
• Animated text
• Animated transitions

Additionally, we have animated our main menus, revamped our UI, and completely streamlined our game framework without breaking saves in most cases.

As always, Kent and I are taking the week after the bugfix off from development work to regroup and recharge for the next chapter.   

It's also time to start talking Livestream!   Kent and I will be hosting Q&A on January 2nd, 2022.   We'll talk about Chapter 4 development, and our plans going forward.

We will be reactivating our "Questions for Livestream" channel on our Discord, so please leave any topics you'd like to see discussed there.   We will make an update between now and then to post the precise time, but it should be reasonably accessible to Oceania, Western Europe, and morning for the Americas.

Looking ahead, Chapter 5 will be titled "Crossroads" and will involve a small time jump.

Thanks everyone for your feedback on our latest chapter, and your ongoing support!   If you aren't in our Discord, you should be!

Chasing Sunsets Chapter 4 - The Storm has arrived!

Merry Christmas from Stone Fox Studios!

I'll make a longer post tomorrow, but here's the update a little early!

I'll post the changelog after I've gotten some sleep, but Kentyrr and I are pleased to announce the release of Chasing Sunsets Chapter 4 to all tiers.

With this release, have introduced a number of improvements, but the codebase has been completely reorganized, so mods are certainly going to be broken.

Without further ado:

**NOTE**   For those of you having issues with the audio player in the Mac version, we have updated the Mac link with a version that removes it.

PC Link  

Mac Link 

Alternate Mirror:   PC Link

Alternate Mirror:   Mac Link

As always, Kent and I deeply appreciate your support, and hope you enjoy playing this chapter as much as we enjoyed making it!

Chasing Sunsets - Chapter 4: The Last Mile

It's official...This will be our last update until we release.   As promised I can project a release date of 12/19 now.   We may be ready sooner, but we're giving ourselves a little wiggle room in case something comes up in the release candidate that's bigger than a breadbox.

Chapter 4 Beta test has been under way while the final art has been rendering in parallel for about a week now, and so far beta feedback has been very positive.

Tonight, I completed sound and music integration, tested all achievements, scene and image gallery items, and text chats.  

Here is what you can expect in Chapter 4:

• Expanded intro primer that more concisely explains the role of choice and points
• 14 new musical tracks
• 1500 unique renders
• Better Discord integration which can be turned off in the preferences menu
• 32 new achievements
• Numerous UI improvements and tweaks
• Several lovely new ladies have entered the game
• Potentially major movement in the relationships with our central LIs

We are posing and rendering the last images as quickly as we can and we'll get those bundled into a release candidate within an hour of the last renders coming out of the oven.  We will not rush release candidate beta as doing so last time forced us to issue our first bugfix.

It's shaping up to be a spicy Christmas for fans of Jaye and Mallory.   We can't wait to get our holiday gift out to all of you who have been waiting patiently (and not so patiently!)

Best Regards,

Stoya & Kentyrr
Stone Fox Studios

Chasing Sunsets Ch4 - Post Production

The storm has nearly arrived!

The Alpha build is complete, pending some art, and achievements, scene galleries, and feature integration is wrapping up.

I use the term "post production" because the update is 100% playable from beginning to end and no new content needs to be added.   The end of chapter summary and points are fully populated and all of the branching is in place.

Proofreading is in progress, and feedback from the proofreaders so far has been extremely positive.

So, what's left?

As I said, Kent has some more art to do, BUT the most challenging art for the chapter is all behind us.   The remaining art takes place in environments that do not have to be built from scratch, and will not require a ton of new techniques and post-processing to bring to life.

Additionally, Kent has five days off this week to really dive into what's left, so we expect to see solid progress on the outstanding art.

I still have sound and music integration ahead of me, and little cleanup tasks like building the achievement thumbnails, etc.

Up in the air at the moment is what version of Ren'Py we will release on.   There does appear to be a bug with the latest versions that causes misbehavior in the stat bars at the end of the chapter, and some weird black boxes to appear around the main menu buttons on the Mac version.   Bug stomping continues.

You can all look forward to some pretty big reveals in this chapter (don't forget to stick around for the post-credits scene) as well as the primary characters having to face some surprises that will shape the second half of our story.

Looking ahead, Chapter 5 will represent a small time skip (days rather than months) so the impact of decisions made up until this point can be viewed in context.

My next update will lock down an estimated release date.  

Production value improvements we're excited about aside, we feel this is our best work to date, and hope you all agree!   You won't have to wait much longer to find out.

Chasing Sunsets: Taking Stock - The Run up to Beta

Last night at about 3:00AM, Chapter 4 hit a major milestone.   The final words of the Chapter were committed to the codebase, the playthrough choices were all tested.  So far I do not see any plot holes or issues which look like they will require major re-work in our largest chapter to date.

As of today, my best guess is that between 500-600 still images remain to be rendered before the chapter is ready to ship.  

This certainly isn't for lack of effort.   Some of the scenery and sets have been extremely challenging to compose or pushed render times through the roof.

Having more than 200 images outstanding this close to an unofficial release target means it seems likely we'll be in beta by the end of November, but the finished product will push into December.  

If your pledge for this month was only made on the assumption you would receive the update in November, and feel unhappy that it will carry over into the following month, please reach out to me directly, and we'll make it right.

As always, we will make every effort to be transparent, and I will continue to make mini updates nearly every day in our patron Discord to keep you abreast of progress.

On a positive note, we've had a few exciting developments on the production values front, with several artists willing to lend their talent to this chapter for both music and other art elements previous unseen in this title.  

In particular two musicians have been either kind enough to grant free use or specially modify tracks for us that are not normally available via bulk licensing sites.

We're as excited to get this update out the door as we hope you are to enjoy it.   Keep checking back for progress updates as our first feedback from the beta team draws near!

Chasing Sunsets Chapter 4 - The Light at the End of the Tunnel

Things are coming together now, along with a few surprises we haven't advertised before.

(See the alternate animated splash screen above, courtesy of our friend Puggy!)

As we pose and render through the final scenes, including the mid-story culmination, Kentyrr and I have been working on music selection and integration work for the art that is already completed.

Once art is finished, there remains the achievement, points, and narrative refinement before we can go to beta.

From where I sit today, I'm feeling pretty good about our progress, and I've hit that milestone where I see everything converging toward release.

After consulting with Kentyrr, we're also making a minor course correction on where we spend our development effort.   I won't go into detail, but we'll talk at some length about it in our post-release livestream.  This mostly means we don't see a lot of benefit in devoting a tremendous amount of time in catering to the most destructive paths.

In any case, thank you once again for your interest, support, feedback, and encouragement.  Our Discord channel just seems to get more and more activity and Kentyrr and I are constantly amazed at the quality of our community.   We look forward to delivering Chapter 4, and hope your all agree it was worth the wait!

Chasing Sunsets Dev Update #3 - Crosswinds

It's that time again, folks!   Kent and I have been very busy, and Chapter 4 has seen some hard-won progress!   While descriptions are good, we think a picture is worth a thousand words, so here is where we are currently from an art perspective:

*Red-shaded means complete

With that in mind, we do seem to be tracking toward hitting our goal of launch in late November.   The remaining scenes do pose something of a challenge, however.   They are both the most demanding from a rendering perspective, and require the highest learning curve for us on the art.

How are we feeling about the chapter so far?   Awesome!   We feel like this chapter will begin rewarding the patience of players who have wondered how slow the slow burn would be.   A lot of things bubbling beneath the surface begin to be acknowledged out in the open for the first time as well!

In the meantime, our Steam effort is moving forward.   After some discussion with other developers and research, we've elected to make NO CHANGES to the Deckhand and Engineer tiers unless Steam forces us to.   This means our hope is that Patreon and Subscribestar remain entirely unaffected by our Steam launch.   For those who have not been following, the concern has been the "Price Parity Clause" that Steam enforces on it's partners, meaning the game can't "be available elsewhere" for less than the Steam price.

In addition, we have elected not to do a Steam Exclusive version, so Chasing Sunsets will be identical no matter where you get it, with one exception:   We will remove the Patreon/Subscribestar links from the main menu on the Steam distribution.   Kentyrr and I did not think it was fair to add content to the Steam version that our supporters don't get.

Our position is that Patreon and Subscribestar are supporting the development of a product and receiving a benefit as a "thank you." - Not selling a product to compete with Steam.   We will be open and transparent if Steam doesn't see it that way.

Our plan is to continue offering updates on Patreon/Subscribestar as "Pre-release" and dropping those updates to Steam some weeks later as the release version.   No matter what, we want to take care of our supporters first!

As we get closer to release day, we'll open up the "Questions for Dev Livestream" channel on our Discord.   Our Livestream will occur two weeks after the release of Chapter 4 in December.   We'll announce the date and time shortly!

All of that aside, Kentyrr and I wanted to take a moment and give a hat tip to the other devs that have either helped us through our startup process, inspired us with their games, or are simply as deserving (if not more so) of your support than we are:

• Clevernamegames - Single Again 
• The Naughty Captain - Summer Scent 
• DriftyGames - Leap of Faith 
• STWADev - The Unbroken 
• Bear in the Night - Lust Academy 
• Secret Summer - SuperWriter 

Transparency About Steam and Patron Tiers

UPDATE:   Following feedback on this post, I took the matter to a dev-only Discord for discussion, and did some research, and I am glad I did.   I couldn't find any documented cases where an indie dev ran afoul of Steam with Patreon or Subscribestar.    I did find conflicts with the Epic Games Store and Itch.io, but to my mind, those are platforms that directly compete with Steam for the sale of a product.   With that in mind, Kentyrr and I have decided to make no changes unless Steam forces us to.   

It is our hope that Steam will respect the distinction between supporting  a developer and purchasing a  product.   As always, we will be forthcoming and open about the process as we navigate it.   Thanks everybody for your comments and votes.   Here's hoping this is the last we hear of it!  

<snip>

This post is only visible to potentially-impacted tiers.

Let my start by explaining the issue, and then we'll lean on you to help us find the best answer.

Steam requires when you sell a game on their platform that you do not "undersell" them anywhere else.   While we have fundamental differences with Steam on the distinction between what supporting an artist on Patreon and purchasing a product means, history has shown Steam does view Patreon as a "sale."

Our plan was to go to market on Steam in November at $8.99, which means Steam would view the Deckhand and Engineer tiers as a violation of their Terms of Service.

That said, the backbone of our support really is at the $1 and $5 Tier.   Kentyrr and I don't think it's fair to allow a platform to force us to move the goalposts on people who have in many cases been supporting us from the beginning.   As such, we have a few proposals to work around this issue.   Please vote for the one you think is most reasonable/fair.

Here are explanations of each option we've considered:

Grandfathering:  This means that anyone who is an Engineer or Deckhand as of Nov 1 will get a special Discord role, and there will be a Discord channel from which you will be able to continue to download each update on release day, same as before.   Deckhands and Engineers onboarded after that would be able to download an "update" patch to the main game, but not the full game.  The downside to this approach is that it means your method of getting the game requires you to join our Discord, or message us directly on Pateon.

Update-Only:  This is a similar approach to Grandfathering, only we would release new content to Deckhands and Engineers as a patch to their current game only, and they would lose access to the full game.   This is the method a lot of other developers choose, but we think Grandfathering is more fair to our longtime $1 and $5 patrons.

Steam Exclusive Version:  We could add a few minor features or expanded scenes to a Steam version so it's technically a different product.   This would allow us to continue the Tier system the way it is.  We have two worries with this approach:  The first is that patrons would feel like they weren't getting "the full game," even if the additional content was cosmetic, and it would force us to maintain two code bases.   But it IS a solution.

Lastly, we have considered that some of you may have ideas we haven't considered, so we invite you to comment below.   In the end, we want to do right by the people who've been along for the ride with us, so please take a moment to cast a vote and/or comment below.   We'll take your feedback onboard and make the best decision we can.

Thanks for reading!

Chasing Sunsets Ch 4 Dev Update 2

Here we are just about a month following the release of Chapter 3, and we've made a lot of headway.

As of today, Chapter 4 is about 45% complete, and Kent is averaging about 25 new images per night.

I've been working on a few items requested by patrons:

• Adjustable font size in the textbox
• General code and structure cleanup
• Minor UI tweaks to make Android ports work properly
• More clarity around relationship status
• Better intro tutorial for new players
• Looking at adding a music player to the main menu

In the meantime, Kentyrr has been backfilling dialogue with new art, and my PC is working around the clock to kick out the renders.

The most challenging artwork of the chapter does lie ahead of us, but we're looking forward to seeing what we can do with some of the most demanding scenes in the game to date.  

That said, you can look forward to more of the lighthearted banter that defined the last two chapters as our MC navigates into new waters with Mallory, Jaye, and some new arrivals to the island.    

As previously announced, there will be some minor changes to the Tier system when/if our project is accepted on Steam.   One of the Steam requirements is that we cannot make the game available elsewhere for less.   We have some ideas in mind to ensure our $1.00 patrons aren't left out in the cold, however.   

The last thing we want is to leave behind the fans who contribute what they can and hang out in our Discord with us every day!

In the meantime, we're both working to bring you the next part of our story as quickly as we can.  Kent starts posing and scene building the moment he gets in the door from work, and not very many days go by that I'm not actually doing game-related work while I'm doing my day job.   

There WILL be a Livestream after the Ch4 launch, so start thinking about any questions you may have for Kentyrr and I.

With that, we'll leave you with this:

May you all find a partner who looks at you the way Mallory looks at Alex's lunch!

Chasing Sunsets Chapter 4 Dev Update 1

It's time to do that thing again!

Most big efforts are really many small ones pulled together, and developing a visual novel is no different.   Reflecting back on the lessons learned in previous chapters, we're doing things a little bit differently this time.

• Writing and rendering in story order
• Integrating art as we go rather than at milestones
• Playtesting as we go, rather than at the end

Additionally, we've had a few administrative and technical victories over the past week.  We were having problems with facial morphs on actors "changing" between the posing phase on Kent's rig and the actual rendering on mine.   We've identified the root cause of that and corrected it.

We've also trimmed down our asset libraries and eliminated bloat, resulting in faster load times and snappier DAZ response.   We figured the update to release version 4.15.0.30 presented a good opportunity to update and iron out any wrinkles in our art workflow, and that has been a big success.

Three scenes are now complete with art and posing is underway for the fourth (and largest) scene of the chapter.   Scene 3 tipped our per-image render time record of nearly 3 hours per image, but that is thankfully behind us.   Looking at the images produced, we certainly feel it was worth it!

Mallory's custom tank top for this chapter is complete (It was "Talk Nerdy To Me" in Ch3) and my experiments with bad weather transforms in Ren'Py have paid off with a little bit of extra immersion due to the visual effects.

At this point, I'll keep setting up the scenes and Kent will keep knocking them down.   We have a lot of work ahead of us, but we're excited about where the story's going.

In the meantime, sit back and relax while we work on what promises to be a hotter-than-usual spring in the South Pacific.

Our Discord is now boosted to Level 3, so feel free to share our server with any friends you think will enjoy our story.

We've also tied Discord activity to new custom roles to encourage theorycrafting, discussion, and feedback.

As always, thanks for bearing with us through the development phase, and know we're as excited to get this out the door as you are to see what we've been up to!

Dev Cycle 5 (Chapter 4) Begins Today!

Following the traditional week off following release, Kent and I are gearing up for the long weekend (Labor Day in the US) to hit the Chapter 4 development cycle like the fist of an angry god.

For those of you who don't know the process, I typically begin with a chapter flowchart built in Scapple, and a scene list.   Before rendering any art, Kent will go searching for the assets he needs to build each scene in the chapter.  This is where we typically identify if we need to send any custom assets to 3D modeling.

I also provide him with a new character list so he can begin crafting the new people who will appear in the story.  These are your security guards, dockworkers, and shady lawyers.

While he's doing that, I begin writing out the chapter, and feed him dialogue one scene at a time so he can craft the art (which I render on my side) that will be included in the story.

While I'm waiting on art, I will likely also put together a final bugfix version of Ch3 that addresses a few minor issues which were not covered by 0.4a.

Check back over the development cycle and in our #previews channel in Discord especially for a sneak peek at what to expect in our next episode.

Tentative Roadmapped Features for 0.4:

• Native Android Version
• Improved Phone App (Can be summoned rather than scripted)
• Improved intro to game with clearer explanation of points
• More clarity on relationship state in End of Chapter Summary

On the business side, it's official.   Kentyrr and I transitioned from an informal partnership into a business (Stone Fox Studios LLC) this week.   No, we're not going all EA on you, we just needed to settle on a consistent tax strategy and have a central way to track expenses for assets, software, licenses, and hardware, and this saves us from losing our houses if some jackwagon says he was inspired to send an unsolicited dick pic by our game.

We did a poll in our Discord about doing an Chapter 3 Release Livestream, and the majority of respondents thought it would be better to wait to the mid-game Chapter 4 release to do a bigger, longer, and uncut one.   

As such, the Youtube channel will have to wait a few more months to hear Kentyrr's dulcet tones again.  That doesn't mean we won't hang out in General Voice Chat on Discord periodically to chat with all comers.

In the meantime, if you enjoy our work, we couldn't recommend our friend Drifty's release of a very personal and heartfelt Leap of Faith: Chapter 6 today more than we do.   His work (as always) is free to the public, but it never hurts to toss a coin to your Witcher, and I know this one always appreciates it.   

Chasing Sunsets - A Teaser for Chapter 4

While Kentyrr and I traditionally take a week off after a release, that doesn't mean we aren't thinking a lot about what happens next in our story.

Chapter 4 will be entitled "The Storm," and as teased in Chapter 3, will reveal Mallory's agenda as well as introduce some new faces on the island against the looming backdrop of Tropical Cyclone Leinani.

We will further flesh out some of the MC and Jaye's childhood history, and take a peek into what's been going on with our favorite body spray connoisseur.  

Depending on the player's path, certain realities cannot continue to go unresolved:  Will confronting years of unresolved attraction create an unbridgeable rift, or unleash a storm of its own?

Chasing Sunsets Chapter 3 Released to all Patrons!

Stone Fox Studios is pleased to announce the all-tier availability of Chasing Sunsets Chapter 3 to Patrons on Patreon and SubscribeStar.  

Chapter 3 is titled Hide and Seek, and is comparatively heavily-branched compared to previous episodes.   Remember, there is no way to max points between all characters going forward.   

We  prefer the player does what feels right in the moment than try to play toward a full red or blue bar on the summary screen.  

Chapter 3 has 29 total possible achievements, and would require multiple playthroughs to unlock them all.  

-Chasing Sunsets incremented to v0.4 (Prologue + Chapters 1, 2, and 3)
-New Feature:  Named Saves.   

This should help keep your paths organized.  

Going forward, we are looking at adding an Android release with our Linux, Mac, and PC builds as we've gotten significant demand for this.   This will require some UI/UX adjustment on our part.

After we determine if Chapter 3 requires a bugfix or not, we'll see about adding an official Android port for it, and releasing subsequent chapters with Android on the same day.  Thank you for bearing with our unexpected delay.  

Chapter 3 was our largest effort to date, and Chapter 4 promises to be our biggest effort yet, as it represents the mid-point of this story.   We can't wait to get started on it!  

PC Mega Link
Mac Mega Link
PC WeTransfer Link
Mac WeTransfer Link 

Update:   There is a game breaking bug in the initial 0.4 release.  I've updated the links to the 0.4a files.   Alternatively, if you do not wish to download the full game again, you can unzip this patch into the Chasing Sunsets/game directory and that should correct the issues.

Chasing Sunsets Ch3 now in Post Production

This is just a short update to let you all know that the last art finished today and has been rolled into the game.   We've cut our initial alpha which is in the hands of the beta crew.

There remains some feature, sound, and minor content tweaks in addition to implementation of feedback from the beta team before we can compile our beta release candidate, but this process typically doesn't take more than a few days.

Fingers crossed QC doesn't identify any major branch or continuity errors that require additional art or story.

As it sits, Chapter 3 is the largest single release we've done, surpassing Chapter 1's art count handily, and the lighting in the final major scene kept all of our GPU's churning around the clock the last five days.

I'll make another post when the release build goes gold!   Thanks against for your support and patience.

** Update 1:   Continuity review is done, and there was an error identified, but it didn't require new art, and it's already corrected in today's build.   First pass at spelling and art errors has been completed.   

Chasing Sunsets - Ch3 Finalization

For those of you waiting patiently, let me get the bad news out first:  Stoya will be spending the next four days on holiday while Kentyrr works to finish up the art for Ch3.

It was our hope that we'd be done before this long-planned trip, and we *almost* made it, but fell just a little short.

As of this morning, there are about 400 lines of code that are pending art.   That may sound like a lot, but it's not.   It's possible the art will even wrap up this weekend while Stoya's out, but that would require ninja-like focus and skipping meals for Kent, so we won't hold him to that.

We're pretty happy with how the points and choices play out and true to our word, it is no longer possible to min/max points with all of the principle characters.   In addition, choices made in this chapter will resonate to the very end.

We hope to have a beta out for testing next week shortly after I return from my trip.  Barring any major issues, this process usually takes a few days.  As with development, testing will take somewhat more effort as the game is becoming increasingly less linear.

Parallel with beta testing, I will be layering in sound and music in preparation for the official launch.   I am confident we will be complete by August 28th...We will make every effort to underpromise and over-deliver here.

We thank you again for rolling with our little delay, and for your continuing interest in the story we're telling.   We're already thinking ahead to the mid-story finale with Chapter 4, and can't wait to show you what this has been leading up to.

Chapter 3 is shaping up to be our biggest chapter so far, and Chapter 4 seems likely to surpass it.

We are also looking at getting our game onto Steam soon after the Chapter launches, so keep an eye on this page for updates to tiers, benefits, and incentives as we conform to Valve's requirements.

Chapter 3 Dev Update

Happy Friday everyone!

I just wanted to take a few moments and give an update on our progress with Chapter 3.

To our frustration, the past two weeks have proven more challenging than hoped.  Kentyrr's move has been complicated by helping the rest of his family move as well, and I gave him a scene that has proven significantly more challenging to create art for than anticipated.

As we move out of more linear gameplay, creating art for multiple branches also adds some overhead.

As such, it appears we are going to miss our target release of August 7, but hopefully not by more than a week or two.   Kentyrr will complete his move this weekend, and should be back in the saddle next week, and then we'll get our beta out to testers as quickly as possible.

Additionally, we apologize to patrons who had difficulties with the download links over the last week or two.  It turns out our downloads mirrors were being directly linked to by pirate sites, and our transfer limit was getting eroded by non-patrons.   We have a strategy to combat this going forward.

Now, on to the good stuff!

The story is complete, and playable to the end.   At this point, there remains one small and one large scene to create art for.

Here's what you can expect in Chapter 3:

• We'll see how Jaye and Mallory adjust to one another.
• We'll get a closer look at what Sarah was working on.
• We'll meet some interesting new ladies.
• We'll see some of what George has in store for the siblings.
• We'll see some unexpected nuance out of someone who has been pretty one-dimensional so far.

In any case, we're excited to share what we have in store for you in the coming weeks.   I'll make another announcement when the beta is in our testers' hands, and finalize the release date then!

Once again, thanks everyone for your support and encouragement.   We love doing this, and it's in no small part because of the fan engagement!

Chapter 3 - The home stretch!

All, it's been a couple of weeks since I've made an update, and I apologize for the comparative radio silence.   

A scene that seemed pretty straightforward on paper has proven to be much more difficult to execute than expected, so our back is against the wall a little on time (much like Alex's is above!)

While just over three scenes (2 small, and 1 large) remain, they occur in environments that were already built in Chapter 2, so they shouldn't require any particular heavy lifting.

With that said, we're confident we'll release the Chapter in August as planned, however we may miss our target date of August 7th by a week or so.   

While we're still trying to hit that, I wanted to be transparent about the schedule risks associated with Kentyrr moving house and getting settled in a new place between now and our release date.

My next update should be able to nail down an exact date for everyone.

One more push to the finish line!

As always, thanks for your patience and support.   We couldn't do this without you!

Chapter 3 Dev Update - Smooth Sailing

It's been a week or two, so I figured I'd let everyone know where Chapter 3 stands as of today.

Art, as always, is the long-pole item for us.   We're learning the hard way that the yacht itself is a poorly-designed asset with wayyyy too high of a polygon count to take for granted.  We're playing with some scene optimizer tools to reduce render times for future content, but some of these scenes were taking nearly two hours each to burn.

Fortunately, we're past that now and into the meat of the chapter.   For those of you who have been waiting patiently, I'll try to give a little preview of what to expect.

• We will see how Jaye and Mallory adjust to each other.
• It will be impossible to get all points for both primary co-protags due to path branching.
• We'll meet new female characters who will recur as the story moves forward.
• We'll uncover a little more of what Sarah was up to before her untimely death.
• We'll get another dose of Hatchet Body Spray.
• Save naming will be coming to 0.4

All primary characters have undergone a bit of a facelift for 0.4 as well, thanks in no small part to Mr. Vargas.   

Right now, Chapter 3 is tracking to be our largest update yet, and by that metric, we're currently running about one week behind schedule.   Our hope is that the remaining scenes require less-complex posing, so we'll be able to make up the time and still hit our target.

Check back for more updates as we get closer to launch day.

Also, we'd like to thank Lewd Gamer's Paradise for featuring us as Dev of the Week for the week of June 6, and LewdPixels for featuring us as "Best New Adult Games of 2021" on their website!

As always, we are grateful to our patrons and everyone who spreads the word, finds bugs, and offers feedback for our little project.   We look forward to keeping the momentum going with Chapter 3!

Pinned - Chasing Sunsets 0.6b

The latest version of Chasing Sunsets is 0.6b (Chapter 5).

• Save compatibility with 0.5 tested
• Minor continuity, spelling, and grammar fixes

Updated 6/3/2022:   

New Patrons:   If you ever try to download the the latest build, and find links are invalid, please send us a message so we can get that fixed for you!   We are our own file host now, so if there's an issue, we should be able to get it fixed quickly!

PC Version 

Mac Version  

06a to 06b Script Patch (Mac/PC)

**Note when Patching**   Unzip the "scripts.rpa" file into Chasing Sunsets/game and overwrite the existing file when prompted.   

You will know it was successful if you launch the game, go to Settings > About and see the version number has been incremented to 0.6b.

The updated PC and Mac links above are already patched to v0.6b.

Chapter 3 Dev Update - 5/15/21 Livestream Posted

Development is moving full speed ahead on Chapter 3.   Kent is cranking out art at his usual prodigious pace.  

The first two scenes of Chapter 3 are playable with art in the process of backfilling scene 3.

There is unlikely to be much in the way of new features in Chapter 3.   What we are looking into is how best to make the phone accessible at any time, so you can review old messages, and an intelligent/custom save module.  We'll continue to provide juicy achievements and follow your progress with the end of chapter summary that debuted in Chapter 2, however.

We'd like to thank everyone who attended our Livestream last weekend, and Xor of Thunderline Studios for emceeing again.   We ran a little long, but...There were lots of questions!   If you missed it, you can find the link to it in this post.

Our next stop is Steam!   Thanks to your support, we've made the decision to apply to Steam with either Chapter 3 or Chapter 4.   We're still in the very early stages of planning here, so we'll keep everyone posted.   As always, Patreon/Subscribestar will remain perfectly acceptable ways to stay in touch with and support our project.   This will simply open our story up to a larger audience.

So far, Chapter 3 has been a lot of fun to develop.  Kentyrr and I always do our best work when having fun, so hopefully that will shine through in this update.

Chapter 3 introduces interesting new characters, and will be more balanced between them, while also beginning to move the main plot forward.  There will also be a similar approach to conversation hubs applied to other choices which should reward thoughtful gameplay.

Looking ahead, Kentyrr will likely have to move homes during this update, and we're coming into the summer with some vacation/holiday time planned, but none of that appears poised to induce delay into our schedule so far.

We nearly hit 500 patrons this update, and we couldn't be more humbled.   Word-of-mouth is our only marketing strategy, and it seems like every day we see new names in our Discord talking about our story.   In the end, that interest and excitement is what drives us, and we are grateful that you're sharing this project with your friends!

Chapter 3 Kickoff and LiveStream Details

Hard to believe, but it's been a week since Chapter 2 launched, and Kentyrr and I would like to welcome our new supporters!   Thank you so much for the encouragement and support. 

Response to Chapter 2 has been mostly positive, and the story is primed to move into the main conflict.   Kent and I are excited after our traditional post-launch week off to get back into the development cycle.

As usual, two weeks after release we host a Q&A LiveStream, so you are cordially invited to attend on Saturday 5/22 at 16:00 UTC on our Discord server in the #dev-livestream channel.   

As usual we will not spoil story beats, but we will answer questions about our development process, philosophy, design choices, and future plans, as well as share insider details on challenges and successes we had while developing Chapter 2!   While the voice channel allows only developers and moderators to speak, drop your questions into the #questions-for-dev-streams or #voice-chat channels in Discord.

One again, our friend Xor from Thunderline Studios has graciously offered to host.   

We will do our best to answer questions posed in advance during the Livestream and post the recording on our YouTube channel, so if you can't attend, you can hopefully still have your questions answered.