Bimonthly Update, May 7, 2022

Hello My Friends

I had a little more trouble getting my head on straight on this project during this time. There were a lot of factors that took my stress levels way too high. Too many distractions that was drawing my focus.

I always knew that I just needed to work through things, and give myself a chance to get back into the flow. And I have made some progress, and things are slowly getting back on track.

Got a job

This is the biggest change, and the one that is the most annoying. It’s good news for our finances, bad news for the visual novel… at least until I adjust.

The real problem is it completely throws off my workflow. (Which was already suffering due to needing to get that job.) But that should only be a short-term problem. As I get used to a new workflow, and learn how to work around my job.

At the same time, there are plenty of people who produce visual novels with full time jobs, so I really can’t complain about having a part time job.

But on to what I did get done.

Tweaked Characters
I tweaked Mrs. Howell’s looks. I am happier with the way she looks, but would like to tweak her even more. I just don’t think that’s possible with the tools I currently have available, and I really can’t say that any more improvement would be worth the effort. I am fighting against my perfectionism.

Writing

I sat down to write, and what I produced seemed subpar. I decided to take a little more of a break to let the ideas percolate in my brain and work on something else. (This happened before the job.)

Then I got to work writing, and the flow kicked in letting me write a couple sections, (as I am defining them,) and rewrote a prewritten section. This was done in a day. This puts me about 5/6 of the way to the number of sections from the last update, but the story is a little shorter. It might be about 2/3 as long as the last update. I will decide if I need to write more or not as I progress.

New organizational system

I am revamping how I am organizing my self-made assets, poses, and characters on my computer. My old way had me searching my computer for the files. This slowed me down, especially when trying to find everything. Now it is in my content library in a way that I can just click a butting and place an asset.

To tell the truth it was kind of stupid that I didn’t do this earlier. Going on a hunt to find things was taking way too long.

New Huts

I revamped how I created the huts. I have all the pieces I need to build a basic hut, both internal and external.

I then built a new generic hut that uses instances. (Saves resources.) I haven’t rebuilt the Boy’s or Girl’s huts yet, but I did build the Howell’s hut. Any new hut, or revamp of the old ones will be much quicker.

Final Thoughts

Things might be a little wonky right now as I adjust, but I will adjust. I got some work done, and I am preparing for the next steps.

I have a little more complex scene coming up, and it’s going to take some time to figure out how I will set everything up, and actually building that scene.

Next Update: May 21st

As always, enjoy life.

Bimonthly Update, April 16, 2022

Hello my friends

The idea of burnout was brought up in one of the comments by a supporter, which wasn’t too far from the truth.

I sat down to write, and just wasn’t feeling it. Admittedly I had a lot going on, but if I feel like this, it is a sign of potential burnout. So, I shifted focus. Being burned out one thing doesn’t mean you are burned out on all things, just that you might need a change of pace.

Instead, I focused on learning. I had 2 tools I wanted to learn in DAZ Studio, (3D posing software) but ended up learning 3.

I also spent time learning Blender (3D modeling software). This is the next logical step for me. (Unless I could afford Maya.) I don’t plan on using it real soon, but would like to in the future, and this prepares me for that.

Also slowing me down, and adding to my stress levels, is the fact that it is tax season and I was woefully behind. (I mentioned this before.) One of the problems is that I keep making it more complex, and keep putting it off. So, I have been scrambling to get the documents together, and put together notes that I need. Tuns out I owe a LOT more than expected.

Also applied for a job. Yes, just one, but I have a good reason to believe I’ll get it.

I’m done whining…Any Progress?

No.

Stressful 2 weeks, and nothing moving forward with the game during that time, at least in creating the actual game.

I did create a few expressions for the characters based on the expressions they had on the show. I try to use those scenes as a reference so I can get them to look as close to the show as possible. But I always modify based on the scene.

Honestly, I have probably been overdoing it with the number of images for the characters I have for the last update. I like to give them a little more personality, and really wanted even more but I held myself back.

Getting back to writing

Don’t be worried about me getting back to writing. As you can see from this post, I don’t seem to have much of a problem putting words to paper. (I even rewrote it, and still had to edit it down.)

I have much of the story planned out, and a bunch of ideas brainstormed that I can draw from. I have plans. I have plans within plans. Yes, I am the Kwisatz Haderach.

Wait, a Dune reference for a Gilligan’s Island Parody? (Great, now I’m thinking what happens if we merge the show and novels?)

Goal for the next game update – 25th of June

There needs to be more consistency with the updates, so I decided that I would put out a schedule of about every 3 months. Hopefully I can get that down further.

In the past I would keep going until I had whatever sections I created done, but now if the time is coming up, I will release the parts I have done.

Next update – 25th of June (Earliest release for my supporters.)

Public Release – 2nd of July

Final Thoughts… TLDR:

This is definitely a long update. Hopefully not too boring.

To sum up, nothing done on the game, other than creating expressions.

Focused on learning to improve my skills. I am happy with my progress.

Tax season sucks, and I need to be more organized.

Since I update of the first and third Saturday of the month, the next update will be posted on May 7th.

As always, enjoy life.

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