18/02 Patreon Devlog (Patreon)

Ramble

Hi everyone! Esh here.

I wanted to announce, first of all, that I'll be moving my weekly update from Saturday to Sunday (Australia time).

I'm finding that my Saturdays are generally just too busy for me to really be able to focus on compiling the update. Sunday/Monday is kind of my "weekend" (assuming I get one) so it makes more sense for me to shift my updates to that time frame so they aren't consistently late.

So yeah, devlogs will now be appearing around this time going forward.

Side note. Ceiling is repaired. It no longer looks close to gaining sentience or caving in. So...yay! Leaky Roof Saga has come to a close.

FOR NOW.

Summary

• Revising Chapter 5
• Revised and proofread chapter 4
• Coded Chapter 4
• New choice screen
• Editing GS lore book (typo correction stuffs)
• David run of Yren's route
• Kav CG

Writing

This week I have been editing chapter 5, after finishing up chapter 4.

Chapter 4 has some of the first big Kav interactions so I was able to smooth those out, which was fun.

One thing I noticed while I was making my spreadsheets and stuff a few weeks ago is that I create a lot of variables where I either cannot remember where they're used or where I'm pretty sure I never refer back to them. It's not a big deal because unused variables neither help nor hurt anything.

They're just there.

I tend to create variables anywhere I think I *might* need one - usually for conversations I feel I might need to recall but often I forget that it even exists. I re-discovered a really cute conversation that Wil and Daaz have that I wanted to call back to but never did and now I have an edit not to see if I can fit it back in during his later chapters because it'll be a nice relationship moment I think. So that's been fun too - rediscovering things I forgot.

Having the spreadsheet where I list out all the variables that exist actually gives me the opportunity to see places where I can use them or refer back to those moments - even in small ways.

Yay spreadsheets!

So yeah, writing wise, I've moved on to chapter 5.

Some of you may have noticed that I still haven't finished drafting the endings for the other four routes and I did actually decide to wait until I get there in the revision. This is mostly because WSC is one of those games (like Changeling, actually) where it starts to get much harder to remember what happens in what paths - because there's a lot of overlap but also some significant differences in what is said to whom.

And I feel like I need to remind myself of some of what's happened in earlier chapters before I can properly write those endings out.

But the endings are much easier to write because that is where the routes split off so I'm not worried about how long that'll take. I just want to try to get the paths straight in my head before I attempt it.

Art

Worked on rendering Kav's CG - it's about 80% done or so except I remembered I forgot a detail and need to go add it. So...bleh. LoL

Often when I give a character a distinctive mark of some kind, it becomes a sticking point. Asher's piercings, Noel's tattoo, Kav's scars - things like that are so easy to forget when doing CG art.

And on top of that, Kav has an annoying coat AND an annoying hairstyle. Fun times.

(I still love him tho).

Other

Okay so I and some friends worked to add a feature that has been on my mind for a while now.

It has to do with how the choice screen is set up. A while ago I revamped the way choices look in the game because with 5 - 6 choices on the screen at a time, I just really did not like how the long, horizontal buttons looked.

So I ended up changing it to this - which I believe I did show off here.

This just makes the choices take up the space better in my opinion. You'll notice the overlay as well, which I mostly added because the characters peering through the choice buttons ended up being distracting and, sometimes, unintentionally funny with how they'd peek over the top of the boxes as if judging you.

But there's something else I've been wanting to do.

And that is to add Wil to the choice screen.

But Wil doesn't just sit there. The expression changes based on the choice you're hovering over.

This is something I've wanted to do for a while because one of the hardest things about integrating choices into a visual novel is signposting how the choice sits within the narrative to the player *before* they make the choice.

Even signposting after the choice can be difficult to do in a diegetic (meaning within the story narrative) fashion because you can't write a solid narrative and also say "Asher seemed to really sympathise with me! I felt like our relationship was getting better" or something after every choice to communicate how the other characters are responding to it.

In the past, even in places where I thought I was being obvious, players didn't always catch on that characters were reacting negatively or positively to the choice.

There are other ways to signpost choices - most of them quite obvious. You can label choices as flirting or joking or whatever. But not all players want something that obvious and having a dozen toggles for that kind of stuff in a visual novel feels a little weird to me.

So I always try to find a way to add a bit of signposting and direction without being too obvious.This was one of the strategies I came up with. You can't figure out everything from Wil's expressions. Sometimes, looking at someone "compassionately" is the expression as just "looking sad" so it still comes down to the player to interpret what that expression means.

But I do think in some cases, having Wil's expression there will make it easier to interpret the tone of the choices. Like in the example above, all of them are actually teasing/joking/light-hearted responses. In this scene, Kaeto is teasing Wil about having increased appetite after waking up from stasis (which is a common side effect). This is Wil's first meal with the crew and the first major interaction with them after the introduction in Chapter 1.

Even with that context, I think some of the choices can be read as serious or genuinely insulted, so it's helpful to see that Wil has a smile on their face or is even laughing when you hover over some of the choices.

So yeah, this is something I've been wanting to set up for a while and see how it goes and if I like it as a feature. Now it is implemented and I'm updating all the menus. So far, I think it's quite a fun way to do the menu screen.

Upcoming

This coming week I want to finish up the GS lorebook (FINALLY OMG) and release it to backers and black tea patrons along with the art book.

And then it'll just be more revising and working on WSC stuff - revising coding, etc, etc.