Hello everyone, happy May! 

Another month - another monthly devlog! (Since I learned that you can just make general posts on itch without attaching them to a project...that's what I'm going to do for my monthly devlogs from now on, haha!)

WHAT I DID

This month really seemed to fly by, gosh! Where does the time go...(sob) I was originally going to work on finishing The Deepwater Witch in the lull between NanoRenO and Otome Jam, but at the beginning of the month I realized that I was a bit burnt out...(I suppose releasing a game a month will do that to you!) So this month was a bit of a break month - I took a week break from dev work at the beginning of the month, and I also went on a small vacation to spend time with my family in the middle of the month! 

After that I started to ease into producing assets for my Otome Jam game, which is a complete demo revamp of my big fantasy title, Actala! I completed around 3 backgrounds (out of 20+ *sob*) and finished 5 CGs (also out of 20+ *sob*). 

On the writing side, I continued writing for Hanasu (currently at 25k words, which is longer than Kanau and Karamu combined), and I also finished up the script for my Mythology Jam project! I probably won't announce it until a week or so before the jam actually starts, but I'm excited to work on it! (I also made plans and outlines for my Once Upon a Time VN Jam and Winter VN Jam projects!) 

In addition, I did some other miscellaneous tasks! I'm happy to announce that Kanau and Karamu will be receiving a French translation! I also plan to translate Hanasu when it releases, so the full trilogy will be available in French! (And I also did some business related tasks that I won't bore you with...tl;dr government things...)

PLANS FOR MAY

As you probably saw, I announced my Otome Jam project, which is a complete overhaul of the original demo from my first project, Actala: The Hero's Shadow. It's a fantasy/mystery/romance game with 5 male love interests about the "side character that needs to save the Hero" after the end of the Hero's journey. The original demo had 60k words with scenes for one love interest (Liam), but I'm planning on adding scenes for all of the love interests in the update. The art and GUI will also be completely redone, and the script will receive major edits. 

In case you're not familiar with Actala, here is the synopsis:

Shizuka Mitsumori has spent years trying to protect her childhood friend, the Hero, from the perils that assailed him at every turn. At long last, his quest is over. Even during the celebrations, however, new dangers emerge. Dangers more treacherous than monsters. Dangers that threaten the life of the kingdom’s strongest man.

Can the side character save the Hero?

Can you find the happily ever after?

In terms of features, the game will have 5 love interests, 6 routes, and over 300k words (if I'm being real it's probably going to be 500k at the rate I'm going). There will be romantic/platonic variations for all of the routes, and the true route will have slight variations for each love interest! 

Since the revamp involves redoing ALL of the art, I'll be going full steam ahead into the art for Actala in May! Hopefully I can get a good chunk of it done; I thought it might go quicker since most of the art is being "redone," but considering almost all of the compositions/lighting/faces and such are being changed, it's ending up taking me about as long as doing art from scratch (and longer than it took me originally, since my rendering process is longer). 

I'm not quite sure if I'll be able to release the full revamped demo by the end of June, to be honest! I'm being very optimistic, but I'll reassess at the end of May to see how I'm doing. Since this is my big project, I really don't want to compromise on the quality. If it looks like I can't, I'll release an abbreviated demo and plan to release the full updated demo at some point during the summer. 

For writing, I'm definitely going to finish Hanasu this month! After that, I'll be tackling revisions and additions to Actala's script to get that done for the updated demo release. 

CURRENT PROJECT ROADMAP

My game dev plans have shifted a bit, so here's an updated roadmap! This is all not concrete, but this is my current planned work schedule:

May/June: Actala: The Hero's Shadow

July/August: Mythology Jam Project (TBA), Hanasu, The Deepwater Witch

September/October: Once Upon a Time VN Jam Project (TBA), Winter VN Jam Project (TBA)

November/December: Hanasu if not complete, Actala (Liam route) 

I am very excited to announce the jam projects, but I'll restrain myself! 

Thanks to everyone who's following along, and see you next month! If you want to hear from me more often (and see the deets on the upcoming projects), I post most of my major announcements on Tumblr and Twitter. I also post frequently on my Patreon with sketches, writing snippets, sneak peeks, high resolution art, and weekly devlogs.

Chattercap