Devblog #43

Since the Major update just released for our supporters, I would like to spend some time to talk about our plans for the future.

These last couple of months we really had to reevaluate our current situation and our approach to the development. When we first started, I was planning to try and release all the girls storylines simultaneously without having any "favourites". This idea would work for the simpler events we had before. Damn, at that point in development, the first three Aisling's events combined were shorter than her fifth event. Most other girls were in similar positions, though less drastic. Some of the upcoming events will be even more ambitious, so preparing a major update with 11-12 huge events doesn't seem plausible anymore if we are planning keep even somewhat reasonable update schedule.

We were also planning on working in to directions at the same time: moving the story forward AND trying to fill the gaps in artworks in the earlier parts of the game at the same time. This too proved to be more difficult than it looked initially. With the story moving forward, the "gaps" started to multiply and grow bigger, which left the game extremely inconsistent in its presentation, and put even more stress on Shady Two.

So, with all that in mind, we decided to take a step back after this update and try a different approach. Hopefully this one will work better. Here's how our plan looks for now:

• The next couple of months we are planning on focusing on the major gaps in the earlier parts of the game. Adding artworks, sounds, backgrounds, and adding a bit more variety to the early game sprites.
• Adding much requested feature of the "Journal" to the game, this one was on our "to do" list for a while now, and it is past due for us to finally do it. Also, it will be mostly work for me, so Shady Two can focus on other things while I am busy with it.
• Since I will be mostly free from writing girl-events during this time, I will also start working on the second Trial. It has been in pre-development phase for some time now, and I just couldn't find the time and strength to start working on it proper.
• All the while we will be very slowly working towards the release of our 8th main girl - Mitsuki Ookami. Her introduction will be another change in our approach to the major updates. As her storyline will be introduced without any updates to the other girls' stories. This will allow us to roll out the update sooner, since we won't need to prepare the events for the rest of the girls (and writing and preparing 5 events is much quicker that 12).
• After that, our next major change in approach will show itself. We will move from simultaneous updates for each girl to working on a single girl at a time. Since the culminations of their storylines will be both writing- and art-heavy, this seems like the only way to both keep a steady development schedule. Our supporters will have some weight on our decisions on who's storyline we will work next.

Hopefully, these changes will not only help us move forward in a more focused way, but also make the game more appealing to the players who are not familiar with the game's development history and who are just discovering the game for the first time. This type of work is still very new and unfamiliar to both me and Shady Two. We will to see how it goes.