Re:Strain

October (And September) Progress report

Hi again and I hope it has been a Happy halloween! It has been a hectic few months personally for myself, as well as for development of Re: Strain, we got a little bit sidetracked on the direction of Chapter 2, but I can finally give the update for you all for what we have been up to!

As some of you of a certain tier may have noticed we have been making a few adjustments to certain content back in chapter 1 that we are in the process of testing, and polishing, if it works out for us, we will be making these small changes a part of the game going forward which will hopefully make things feel that extra bit immersive!

As for Maps we are finished besides final polishing, events and writing are on their way, and awaiting the touch of yours truly to bring all those quippy conversations that lit up Chapter 1! Assets we're a little behind on, they are getting there as our artists juggle their busy schedules and commitments to their own agreements. I wouldn't count on it, but I also would not rule out this year for a release, we have been working quite hard to get things in order but busy schedules and other things get in the way.

Soon enough we'll be sharing things about Chapter 3, where we truly get into uncharted waters for our team, I am quite excited to be able to talk about things there, but right now we have to keep it under wraps, even more so than the girls~

I also hope you enjoy the image I used for this progress report, courtesy of BrotherToSomeone, a long time friend of mine and a fan of Re:Strain who showed his support in the way he could by setting a Ribbon Golem upon them~

We are invigorated as a team and ready to make that push to get Chapter 2 to you all, I thank you all for your patience and sticking with us here as we make our way to he next chapter, Hero Tier patrons will get access to it first when it drops, more on how we're going to roll out future chapter releases later!

A Few Things To Come

Apologies for the drought of things, I'll save some more elaboration on the last two months for the progress report, but I can show something we're working on as an added touch to traps, as well as a little look into one of the new areas. I hope this can tide you over until the progress report~

August Progress Report

Hello again for another progress report and while I don't (Yet) have a playable demo to show you, but we are getting closer and closer to one!

Azu has returned from Canada and we're back to getting making our enemy sprites and we're hoping for those to be finished in short order to get us ready to push the new boss to you all! I have been looking in particular to writing the dialogue of their fight, you are in for a treat!

We've been experiencing clipping issues a little bit with some of the new (and bigger) assets that we've been going with, they help out in one way, while also causing some problems of their own.

Writing is wrapping up (heh, wrapping) sometimes I wonder if I should charge another with this patreon for you all to make sure that they can give the attention you deserve! I am sorry that this update took a bit longer to come through, and that we're a little scant on the details, but it really is a 90/10 moment with this.

Regardless I hope you have a good day if you're reading this!

July Progress report

Hi again everyone! I am pleased to be presenting a little bit of art that Sugar made of the game in between assets while we're getting things down for Chapter 2! Reinie takes a moment to think about what to use her turn for while Ophi and the Chapter 2 companion character Scylla who you will learn more about in time, question her hesitancy from a very sticky situation~

However that's not what we're here for, progress has been made and I want to break out of the more structured way I had been giving these before and give you my thoughts on where we're at in the progress, I think it will be more satisfying to write and more insightful for you all to read.

Asset-wise we are reaching the two-thirds mark, though we are a little bit halted up on enemy sprites as Azu will be going on holiday to spend time with fellow member of the team Hierarch so please be patient on that end, bound sprites are going well, it was quite a sight to see how much extra work adding another character in was, particularly for space and resolution, trust me a lot of the tweaking has been making sure these gals don't steal too much of the spotlight from one another~

writing has been going along smoothly, and by smoothly I mean plenty of nights getting in only a couple of hours sleep before my job because I have been up all night. I love writing those dialogues that were well-received when we released the demo but they take time.

Coding has also been going well and has been worked closely with the maps this time as we experiment with some funny mechanics on the side (think deliberate game overs for those inclined to play the girls a little more carelessly). As well as getting some of the events for certain setpieces in the story have been tricky, but we're still working along on it, sometimes I wish we had more to show there, but alas we are all working at this in our spare time with jobs on the side.

We are aiming (perhaps ambitiously) for a release of chapter 2 this year, however I will keep you updated if that seems to change if circumstances shift or not, but bit by bit we steadily make progress towards chapter 2, I hope this little sneak peek of the new girl can tide you all over towards our next meeting!

Belated June Progress Update

Hi there all, and sorry for the delay on this, I had been wanting to update you for a couple of days, but I was very recently hit with what will be my fourth round with Covid, so I have been laid out flat for the past few days. June has been a bit of a rough patch for us with some major life events getting in the way of some of the crucial aspects of the development, nonetheless we have been making progress and I am happy to give you our most recent update!

• Part 2's maps have reached their first draft and are in the process of revisions and tweaks as we make changes and add in questlines

• Assets are progressing steadily and have been made to the same Sugar Standard as you have seen throughout the previous build

• A whole host of writing has been made and proofread and that has been especially tiring on my fried brain.

• Programming has also maintained its course well too though I cannot give quiiite full details, lets just say I think it will be a fun sequence~

I look forward to seeing you when I am better and hopefully with even more to tell you, we've got so much planned its crazy.

May Progress Update

Hello there everyone! Little late but May was a month of big decisions for us, particularly on the topic of financial sourcing for this project, so far a vast majority of this project's funding has come out of Empress and I's pockets (or the imperial treasury if you will) with income from you all being able to supplement the strain this puts on us from being able to get fair pay to the talented members of the team involved in bringing our vision to light. During May however we all had to sit down and discuss in very serious terms the sustainability of how we were going about funding it beforehand, and we came to the decision to do two major things for the game and its funding:

• Slow down the development process and take our time with chapters more, this will likely translate to a one chapter a year policy in the short term while we rebalance our books as we move onto different stages of our lives, granted chapter 2 is spoken for in terms of funds so don't worry there!

• Focus on building this Patreon and giving you all more of a reason to support the game and make benefits more tangible for those who want to see Re:Strain be made like all of us.

For that reason we'd like to ask you all what would you like to see more of from this page? Whether it is more content of the kind we're currently showing, or a different sort of nature, we are open to the thoughts of anyone who wants to put in their piece.

Additionally here is what we have done for Chapter 2!

•  Chapter 2's maps are all nearing completion for MVP, with only a few of the maps for say lairs and one-offs to be complete

• A little bit of extra flair on the puzzles and interesting areas is being complete in terms of programming

• The Overworld sprites are being adapted to reflect this

I hope you are as excited as we are for the future and what Chapter 2 holds! Look forward to it all!

Concept Art: Slime Bound Sprites

Another post and another bit of revealed Concept Art! We wanted from the start to have cute little slimes in our game and wanted them to introduce Reinie and Ophelia to their gooey clutches (and we may or may not have plans for more in the future!) But most importantly, we wanted them to be the right balance of friend-shaped blobs and squishy bed in which for a heroine to rest~

Ophelia naturally we wanted to lean into the disgust-angle, she doesn't want those disgusting little beasties to get on her, buuut by the full bound sprite she doesn't have much of a say in the matter (unless she hits that nice percentile chance)

As for Reinie, well... I think you all have been able to infer what she thinks of slimes from gameplay, perhaps we should write some side stories about Reinie going and finding some slimes to play around with, let us know if having some sort of 'side story' feature like that is something you'd be interested in~

More coming on their way!

April Progress Report

We've been hitting a bit of a tough patch mapping wise, compiling assets as we still are working on this game not full time, apologies for the slightly late report but here is what I can share!

• We are working on further developing the Part 2 maps of chapter 2, some of the concepts need a bit of refining

• Some assets are also being polished for both bound sprites and monsters

• Programming has been slow and steady with writing keeping pace

• We are in the process of speaking to some voice talents about potentially getting voiced lines and/or nonvocal sounds for the girls, please let us know what you think!

May seems to be set to be an important month in development, we may be experiencing a change in course, but you will be kept up to date about that as we progress! If you are reading this, thank you so much for your support!

March Progress Report

March has seen a fair few ups and downs and personal circumstances getting in the way of things, but we've gotten to the other side and we're making progress once again!

• Chapter 2's bound sprites are still in production, Sugar has been working hard to make some of the best sprites she has so far

• Maps for Part 2 are taking shape and we have the finalized versions of most of the maps for the first part of chapter 2!

• The mechanics have been worked out for a while and we're quite happy with them going forward!

• We finished up the Hardmode version of the Demo which will be posted up to the Itch.Io page shortly after this post! Make sure to give it a try and drop some feedback to give your thoughts on this potential different way to play the game~

We're making progress slowly but steadily, we're still working on this not full time so sometimes I want to bring more dramatic progress, but we're still making our headwinds! I look forward to showing more with you as we go forward!

February Progress Report

February has been a transformative month for us here at Re:Strain, things flew off the rails for a while, but I can wholeheartedly say we are back on track!

- Chapter 2's Bound Sprites are in production phase and are getting made into a reality as we speak

- All enemies for chapter 2 have their designs laid out and the work on them is half done

- The maps for the first part of chapter 2 are in their rough draft stage or done, with the second part's maps still to be done.

- The groundwork has been laid to make the lairs more interesting in Chapter 2 and add more mechanical depth which we're looking forward to showing~

- The writing is underway for the events that we are able to make for now in Chapter 2, look forward to more fun dialogue going into chapter 2!

I know posts have been a little scarce on this patreon and I am looking to change that, we are starting to get more things to show that we're happy with and I look forward to showing you them!

January 2024 Progress Update!

It's the start of a New Year and a whole new chapter in the development of Re:Strain, we're starting a little slow off this year because of a few birthdays that have taken up some of our artists attention, but I can bring you the good news!

- Chapter 2's Bound Sprites entering concept phase, look out for these in the sneak peek categories!

- Maps are stalled far now, but we're due to get back on track for February

- Demo update has taken a little longer than expected to test, but it will be ready very soon!

A short update, but there will be more coming in the next few months, chapter 2 is funded and we're full steam ahead!

Thank you for all your support!

Chapter 2: The Carriage District

Here's a look at the early designs for the first map that the players who get to enjoy chapter 2 will come across, we don't have a lot of the detailing and none of the events down yet either, but we're progressing things along with a very nice vision going forward.

December 2023 Progress Report!

It has been quite the Holiday Season here for us here at the Re:Strain team, fundamentally we are still working on this in spare time so work and the revelry has gotten in the way of things a bit, but I do have progress to report!

- The first half of Maps for Chapter 2 are entering their first draft phases, we have had a while to wait for maps because of our number of people on maps.

- An update to the Demo is in testing, including the addition of a Hard Mode to it, fine-tuning balance for that has been a bit tricky but I am pleased to say that those who have played Mira Co Rescue will be familiar with it.

- The designs for chapter 2's enemies are in progress, business has been getting in the way of us particularly in this regard, and its a little bit of a bottleneck too.

- Funding is being accrued for Chapter 2 by myself and Empress, we found that we were spending beyond our means to get Chapter 1 over the line, but by February we will be fully funded and Chapter 2 will be progressing along (to put it in perspective, Chapter 1's  dev fund was in the region of $2,000)

Once the holiday pause is finished we will be kicking things back into gear and getting back on that track, additionally posts here will speed up, so look forward to that too!

Q&A 1's Answers!

Hiya! It has been a small while and a hectic holiday season where we've slowed down a little to focus on resting, recuperating and getting to spend time with our families, which did make it a little bit of a tricky time to make posts, but I am going to make sure that I will be more dutiful to you all!

Without further ado though, we begin the first Q&A and we have a couple of questions from you all that I won't waste your time getting into~

"What made you decide to make this game? Did you get inspiration from anywhere else or was it just for fun?"

It's a bit of a long story I suppose there, but, the initial decision to make a game came in December of 2021 between Empress and I, where, after a string of small mini writing projects between the two of us, we decided to make a game. Though I don't necessarily believe that gives the whole story too.

Empress and I have, for a long time seen loads of small projects of games taking place in our communities and we've loved a lot about them, whether it is their characters or the peril they bring forward, but there was a major thing we took issue with. The nature of the perils tended to be one of two things: Lighter bondage that was too softcore for our tastes, or bondage that went waaaay too adult for us. You'll find over development that Empress and I like bondage, but not nudity, which influences our design philosophy a lot from perils to the enemies to the characters, titillating, but not obscene.

As for inspirations, in our sphere I would say the biggest would be Esthe Hunter for the first peril-themed rpg that I personally played, I enjoyed the system of peril draining health though I found it a little punishing that it took percentage chunks off of your health, and it also had a focus on perils I wasn't as keen on. Mira Co Rescue is naturally an inspiration, given Ankh is our programmer, although Mira Co is much more adult in nature than Re:Strain, it has a lot of stuff we love~

But overall I can't mention why we were making a game without mentioning our passion for storytelling, we wanted to make an adorable, lighthearted story with cute girls getting wrapped up and be the change we wanted to see!

"What's the ultimate goal for the game, what would you like to add to it over time, and when would you be satisfied with it?"

That is a fairly easy question to answer, because we have a very clear vision of our scope for the chapters. We intend to make seven more chapters for the game with a minimum of three enemy types per chapter, a boss, and a companion characters in chapters 2-6. I cannot promise additional content on the side, but I cannot rule it out either, especially if funding on this Patreon picks up a great deal, because we are funding this game out of pocket and it certainly isn't cheap to develop even one chapter! 

I'd personally say I would be satisfied with releasing the seven chapters of the game, and perhaps doing a post release polish of things, add in some extra story context if we miss any, add in some sidequests, more enemies, and perhaps a couple of optional bosses, however that is content that is certainly years out from now, and content I cannot promise either.

Ultimately we intend to make a game that I hope you will all enjoy, that, more than anything is our goal~

While there was not loads of questions to answer this time around, I think this Q&A went very well, look forward to more posts in the future!

Concept Art: Webbed Bound Sprites

Something you'll find about Empress and I is that we really like our spiderwebs (affectionately called webu) so naturally when coming up with perils for Re:Strain webu was an easy pick.

For the silkworms we wanted to give a sort of splatter feel that built into a full cocoon, you'll also notice here that Reinie's fully bound sprite is different from the one ingame, we actually realised in this phase that having her FULLY cocooned would make it strange to be playing as her in the lair escape given there would be no reason for her head being uncovered. So we went with leaving that cute face exposed for the final version! Additionally despite Reinie's penchent for... Being a restraint enjoyer, we still wanted her to not outwardly be expressing TOO much enjoyment, after all she is serious about winning (unless you surrender)

Ophelia's spite we knew we wanted to play up her fear of all things insect-like and buggy in nature, its definitely a fun direction to have her go to contrast Reinie, we also wanted her to be standing, although the weirdness that ensues when you still want a kneeling character to be visible next to a standing one in rpgmaker is quite funny. I am particularly happy when I see Ophi in peril and how her clothes interact, they stick out or conform with the bindings and look great!

These were actually the first bound sprites we had Sugar design and there is a substantial time difference between those and the other sprites (They were done in October 2022 alongside the main sprites while the rest ere done around August 2023!) this was due to financial situations, particularly on my own end turning sour, but hey! We're up and running at full sprint!

Keep your eyes peeled for more!

Design Concepts: Ophelia

And rounding up our main girls is Ophelia! Fellow main protagonist and possessor of at least two brain cells, Ophelia's design always went complementary and hand-in-hand with Reinie, from colour standpoints, to gameplay and thematic contrasts to provide that dynamic we wanted to establish. As before, Empress and I created the initial blueprints for both girls' designs and for Empress, that girl was Ophelia!

Our design processes are very different, so while Reinie has one sketch that exists earlier than her concept art, this right here is the first design draft of Ophelia since we got in touch with Sugar quite quickly, and this allowed for a very nice and streamlined process for her. We knew from the outset that we wanted to go for a mage, and Empress decided to go with that striking Witch Hat that we even turned into a silhouette of the title!

Ophelia's design inspirations were a little more abstract than Reinie, drawing from the elements of her magic, leading to the weather-oriented spellcasting that has become a theme you'll see in her spells going forward! But things such as rain, mist and wind in particular led to this cool blue and green colouration. However there was an influential personality in her design, particularly in her green hair, that being Mira Yurizaki from Dimension W who influenced Empress to settle on green! When it got down to writing her, it was a bit tricky to figure out what her 'bit' was going to be, at first I thought of writing her like a straight-laced-tsundere, which I am very glad I decided against because I would rather cut off both hands than lean right into that archetype, though you'll notice that there are speckles of it in her dialogue and mannerisms~

Ophelia became a very fun character for me to write very quickly however, as Reinie's personality being like that of a golden retriever needs a little bit of tempering before it becomes the misadventures of a happy idiot! Ophelia also works VERY well for punchline delivery and in general for continuing the feeling of levity on the game. Be sure to keep an eye out for more concept art as things keep on going!

Keeping an Ear Out

Oh? What's this? Seems like someone's listening in on us

The First RE:Strain Q&A!

Welcome one-and-all and thank you all for supporting the project, in celebration of the release of the demo and the unveiling of the project to the public, we will be hosting the first Q&A event for the project! The intention is to make this post live for a week, so by the following Sunday at Midnight UTC submissions of questions will be closed! So if you have any burning questions be sure to ask them and I will be sure to compile them and give you the answers you seek!

Edit: Because I was stupid the start date and deadline for this will be changed to a week after this page has left its review process.

Please comment below your questions, and I look forward to hearing them! No limits on the number of questions per person or anything, go wild!

Almost Forgot to Add

Hiya there! Patreon is one hell of an experience setting up, but I hope that I am getting there quickly enough to get everything in place, but this is an important announcement for anyone who wants to support the project!

ANYONE WHO'S  LIFETIME PLEDGE REACHES OR EXCEEDS $20 AND IS STILL A MEMBER WILL BE ENTITLED A COPY OF THE FULL GAME VIA DIGITAL DOWNLOAD WHEN IT IS RELEASED.

Thank you for bearing with me there, this is a very new experience for me~

Design Concepts: Reinie

Kicking off some of our Concept art is of course, you know her, you love her, it's Reinie, our playable gal and resident possessor of at least one brain cell, Reinie was an absolute treat of a character to come up with from a writing and design standpoint from her flowing scarf to the scant armour she wears! When Empress and I initially coming up with the initial concept of Re:Strain we knew we wanted two protagonists, one with a magic focused role, and one with a tankier, frontline fighter role, and that was where Reinie came from!

Empress and I, upon deciding on the ideas went our seperate ways for a little it before we came back with each character's designs and realising that neither of us could draw to quite the volume and quality that we needed for the game. So this is where Sugar stepped in and brought Reinie to life in all of her bottom-heavy glory! By the by you're going to have to get a poll result (which will arrive eventually) to get that VERY initial design of Reinie because my face caves in on itself from looking at my own sketching style.

Reinie's design inspirations came from some pretty sinful places that you might notice if you look closely, particularly the use of her 'swimsuit' came as an inspiration off the back of Eula from Genshin Impact as a way to accentuate those hips and add a fun character trait to her given her insistence that a swimsuit magically helps her swim. Another design inspiration was the protagonist of another (hopefully) well-known rpg series among the community; Luka from Monster Girl Quest. While a much, MUCH more nsfw series than Re:Strain will be, I can't help but admit that the character growth and writing of the series really did surprise me with the idea that what is quintessentially a come for the 'plot' story actually made me stay for the plot, from the purple hair (though admittedly the palette selection was to pair well with Ophelia) to the inclusion of a VERY referential move, Reinie can find her roots in his design. 

Reinie's character is one that I enjoy writing and bouncing off Ophelia to the greatest degree, because without each other, those two wouldn't be able to bring as much heart to the game as they can together! Stay tuned for more concept art and little ramblings on things as I get more content online!

We're Going Live!

Welcome! And thank you for taking a look at our little project and considering supporting us! We've been hard at work getting things together for this first release of Re:Strain. I'm AirGuitarSolo, the director and lead writer for our little project, and before I get further into it, let me tell you about the other members of our team:

Co-director - Empress: Without her this project would not exist, the first motivator to push towards producing this game, half the starting finances, and also half of the creative decisions, she's as important to this project as myself!

Programmer - Ankhrono: You might know from other success in MiraCoRescue, Ankh has been dutifully building this game from the shaky foundations of my first attempts at coding, Ankh brings his experience and coding to the field that lets all the magic happen~

Mapper - Vima: A good friend who's enthusiasm for building maps has only been rivaled by the content produced, a lot of the maps in the demo here were constructed by myself, but Vima's work has breathed new life into them, and also going forward the maps will all be done by them.

Enemy Sprite Artist - Azupazu: The ever-brilliant Azu is our creature and boss designer extraordinaire! With her design chops we have been able to get together the enemies that will be the dangers on your paths playing Re:Strain!

Character Sprite Artist - Sugarvoids: And a whole lot more! if you clicked on this page you've already seen an example of her art with the banner for the game, face sprites, bound sprites and battler sprites, game overs, Sugar has done them all and will continue to to do more as we develop the game!

Colouring/Finishing - Sushi: For polishing, colouring and making things adorable, we have Sushi and her fantastic style that you're going to become well acquainted with while playing!

Editor - Hierarch: While I am confident in my writing skills, having a second set of eyes to prevent me from getting ahead of myself, proofreading, and for making sure the creative vision we have in place can be conveyed in the best possible way!

With this team we are going to be working together henceforth to bring the vision of Re:Strain to completion, combining all our skills and specialties as we get to grips with (for all but one of us) our first foray into game development! Seven chapters in total are planned for the game, and what we have for you in the demo equates to the first chapter, as you progress through the game expect to see more characters pop up, both friendly, and not so much as our heroines find their place in the world~

It's been quite a long ride and we've had a couple of hiccups on our way to this starting line, but we've officially taken the first step as a team and I hope that you all can appreciate the work we have put in, and are as excited to see more as we are to make it! I must also preface this that the project is funded out of pocket at the moment so development on future chapters will be slow, however on the Patreon, which, if it is not up at the time of posting, it will be up soon, we will keep you posted about current and future development.

I hope you enjoy the journey with us and the girls, and that you all have fun with our game!