04/12/2021 Patreon Devlog (Patreon)

03/12/2021

This Week's Summary:

• 1 Lance CG
• 1 Jack CG
• 1 Caissa CG
• Started a new Caleb CG
• 1 new BG for Quill's route
• Quill's first chapter

The Ramble:

So this week's ramble. . .

This week I finished up three CGs and started a fourth one. I've also been doing a lot of reference hunting and CG planning.

A few people who have been on voice chats with me this week will be familiar with the mental gymnastics I've been doing regarding CGs. With GS I'm trying to be more sensitive about CG arrangement within the routes.

I've been a little worried over the fact that, in many routes, the CGs are clustered toward the latter half of the route. This is largely because of wanting to keep consistency across the routes. All routes have a bad ending CG and a good ending CG. All routes have a CG in the first love scene. And a kiss CG within the route (usually the first kiss.).

This leaves only three CGs to intersperse through the rest of each route, and knowing that people prefer romantic/sweet moments or else fan service somewhat limits where I can put those. Particularly for the slower romances that have few of these kinds of moments early on.

The end result is that most of the CGs are from Ch 6 onward and the early part of each route only has 1 or 2 CGs. So I've been fretting about this some.

In addition, I've been thinking about the number of CGs that automatically unlock as you go through the routes and those that conditionally unlock.

What I mean by this is:

The player will always encounter and unlock some CGs no matter their choices, affection levels, or endings. (Automatically unlocked)

Meanwhile, some CGs require specific choices, certain affection levels, or are within certain endings. (Conditionally unlocked)

I feel like Changeling was around 50/50 for this - though I'd have to actually go back and look at the code to verify this.

But Gilded Shadows has a lot of conditionally unlocked CGs. In fact, most of them (by far) are conditional.

The bad and good ending CGs are both locked behind endings.

The love scene CGs are locked behind both having the scenes toggled on as well as affection levels.

Most of the first kisses are fully or partially locked behind choices or affection levels. Routes have 1.5 - 3 CGs that automatically unlock. And I've been fretting over whether this will annoy people. Though, to be fair, I think it's naturally to have *some* conditional CGs. And some CGs are behind very obvious (in my opinion) choices.

If an LI kisses you and you have an option to push him away or let the kiss continue, I feel like surely people would understand to pick the latter. (And, thus, get the CG). LoL

So I don't know. This is something I've been thinking about.

Particularly as I've embarked on illustrating the kiss CGs and contemplating if their placement within the route is where it needs to be.

Game design is tough. LoL

Apart from working on CGs (which I took a break from when my shoulder started giving me issues) I worked on some writing as well. Namely, Quill's first chapter - which I have completed.

I realised my planning at the start of Quill's route was a little dodgy and ended up having to merge the outline for his first and second chapter into a single chapter. But that is now complete!

Their interactions are pretty funny so far.

(I also had a new idea for Reuben's route that would force me to restructure a lot of his plot and I'm just trying to decide if it's worthwhile to consider in more detail or not.)

Sneak Peeks and Previews:

A new BG for Quill's route. Like many other BGs, it's possible it will get used in other routes as well (Namely, in Reuben's route since it's the only one left! LoL). I'm amused that I still can't escape the future hexagons!

CG teasers are getting a little harder since I don't want to spoil anything for anyone

So here are a couple of teasers. LoL

Upcoming Week:

Did you guess I'm going to be focusing on CGs and writing? If so. . .

You are correct! LoL

I have 31 CGs complete and 21 CGs remaining for the base game. I have...

All the good endings (6 CGs)

"First Kiss" (4 CGs)

First love scene (5 CGs)

. . .

And a smattering of other small scenes throughout the routes.

Currently I'm focused on kiss CGs. I'm not sure if I'll get them all complete in the next week but it would be nice. Kiss CGs are always tough. I'm never quite happy with them either.

Love scenes are also difficult.

Good endings, it depends. I really only have one of these planned out. I imagine most of them will be on the harder side since they will involve character interaction vs being solo CGs.

I don't know. I'll just have to jump in and see how it goes. CGs are at about 60% completion so I'm well past the halfway point anyway. So that's a good thing.