News and Progress Report

Hey, friends! Hope all's well with you and yours this week! The big news this week is that I finished a new demo build over the weekend, and made it available to $15+ patrons. It's still missing one ero scene with Risa, and a smattering of renders here and there, but it's quite playable at the moment. That's the good news.

The bad news is that, as time's dragged on, I've had to adjust my expectations for Chapter 9. The render count's already gotten quite large, and the word count is around 55,000. For comparison's sake, Google tells me most novels are between 70k and 110k words.. >_> So, I'm cutting the last two scenes I planned for this update, and doing them as their own, smaller update. That means that Chapter 9 will have content for Risa, Pepper, and Alex, and next update will focus on Mason, Viola, and Gabby.

The other good news is that, as a consequence of this, I'm going to be pushing my planned hiatus back a few months. With a good bit of Mason and Gabby's scenes written, I'm planning to finish the content I still need for Risa, do a chapter ending, and then get right into rendering the Mason and Gabby scenes, for what'll be Chapter 10.

That means Chapter 9 will be out this month, and then I'm going to aim to have Chapter 10 out in late July or early August, followed by my month-long hiatus. So, no big gaps in the schedule, just yet.

Obviously I'm not super happy about having to cut my planned content short, and I don't expect you to be, either. But, it's the only way I can really give everything the attention it requires, while still putting out timely updates. For now, I'm going to keep rendering out the content I need for Chapter 9, while I finish the scripts for Chapter 10. Onward and upward.

I really need a pithier name for this section..

Anyway, as some people may know, the Gumroad platform recently banned all adult work - comics, games, audio files, etc. Which was a pretty big blow to the community of adult-oriented creators that had, in large part, built that place. Like, the first thing I ever bought from Gumroad was the smutty comics anthology, Smut Peddler, by Iron Circus Comics!

So, before the Eropocalypse happened, I raced over to Gumroad to download any adult-focused stuff I'd purchased from there. I'd hate to see that stuff just vanish into the digital ether. As I was doing this, I stumbled across this comic, Ruthless, from artist Norasuko. I'd bought it and just never gotten around to reading it.

Bad, Neon. Financially irresponsible!

The story's.. Well, it gets you where you need to go. A renowned space marine/imperialist genocide machine is captured by her lizard-alien foes, and a bit of a cultural exchange ensues. >_> Like Starship Troopers, with even more nudity. It's fun, a little silly, and pretty sexy. But, it's the art that's the start of the show here, and agh! It's just gorgeous.

Some of you might know that, before Daz Studio took over my life, I was a half-decent digital artist. So, I have a special appreciation for well-drawn comic art.

The coloring that deftly balances flats and more rendered, painterly tones. The artful line breaks and color holds. The depth of field blurs that give everything such depth!

If it seems like your cup of tea, go give it a look!

That's all for me, today! I missed this weekend's Wanton Weekends feature, owing to exhaustion and too few hours in the day, but I'm going to try to get it together for Wednesday. A little Wanton Wednesday action? Why not!

As always, take care of yourselves, and thank you for your support!

Hey hey, friends. Hope everyone's well this week. I've had a pretty productive one! Chapter 9 recently crossed 1000 renders, and I completed some scenes to my satisfaction. Today I kept the party going by adding one more scene, which came out to around 37 renders. It's not exactly the most sexy scene, granted.. Well, unless you like severe old guys in wire-frame glasses, in which case, this one's for you, Boo-Boo!

But, I am finally moving into the last couple scenes of the chapter. Woooo! This one's been a struggle, but I'm excited to finally be approaching the finish line. I don't want to start patting myself on the back too hard, though. Still lots to do. If I had to guess, I'd say this chapter will end up around 1300-1400 renders, which will make it one of the larger ones thus far.

My immediate priority is to get a new, stable demo build out for $15+ supporters, and then move right into doing Mason and Gabby's scenes, to wrap up this chapter. I've been cleaning up code variables, scene jumps, and other boring stuff like that, but still need to place over 400 new images and animations into the script, and then do some playtesting. I wanted to have it ready tomorrow, but my day job hasn't been cooperating. So, I'll get it out sometime within the next few days. 

Hmm, what else.. Oh, I got some Loopable Royalty-Free music from Humble Bundle! I'm going to look into experimenting with that a bit, when I redo Chapter 1. I also got a ton of sound effects from a separate bundle, which might provide me with some cool options to punch up scenes.

I also started a Carrd site, which I'm not doing much with yet. But, it'll eventually house links to some of the various places you can find me.

Besides that, all's quiet here in Neon Land. I'm going to try not to let my foot off the gas until Chapter 9's officially in the can. By the end of May, come Hell or high water, it'll be ready.

As always, take care of yourselves, and thank you for your support!

Hey, hey friends! Hope you're all doing well this week! My part of the midwest apparently decided to skip Spring and go right into Summer. So, today I had to spend three hours hacking away at overgrown foliage, trying to get my yard in order. May have gotten a tiny bit of a sunburn.. Ah well!

Quick status update: Renders stand around 875 at the moment. All of Alex's content for the update is done, after I finished it up today. Risa's content is getting there. I'm currently a bit mired in her ero scenes, but I'm getting through them. The goal is to get all of Risa's scenes finished, and get into Mason's scenes, before month's end.

At present, I'm thinking I'll be putting out another $15 play-tester update in the next couple of weeks, and the actual, finished Chapter 9 update in May. I'm doing all I can to expedite the release, without compromising on quality and substance. I know it's a constant refrain with me, but my initial plans for the release grew a bit, and I wound up in the weeds. Longtime supporters know how I am. :'D I can only apologize, and try to make sure the wait is worth it.

In some general life-as-a-dev news, I had to pay my taxes for 2023 recently, and they came out to a whopping $6,500+ -- ouch! While nobody likes having less money than they did before the taxman came calling, I really just have to thank all of you folks. Because the only reason I have such a big tax bill, is because you've all supported me over the past two years. So, from the bottom of my heart: thank you! I couldn't do it without your support.

(But, in the future just mail me an envelope with cash.. Kidding IRS agent, kidding!)

Besides my obligations to the US government, and general nose-to-the-grindstone news, I don't have much to report! Chapter 9 is getting ever-closer to completion with each scene I finish, and it's feeling more and more real. This'll be a substantial update, touching a lot of characters. So, bear with me as I muddle through it.

Finally, for something a little different.. I think most people know I like comic books. Guy/MC's nerdy proclivities are very much based on my own, and the game is full of little nods to comics and characters I love. Soooo, I thought it'd be fun to give a little recommendation here at the end of the Dev Update, to share something I'm interested in, which you folks may also enjoy. I'm not being paid for this, mind you. I just like this stuff and want to share it. 

So, this week I'm recommending.. Empowered! Empowered is the story of Empowered/Emp, a girl who discovered a regenerating super-suit which gives her amazing powers -- but, it's profoundly thin and fragile. As a result, she often winds up in a state of undress, and forced to outsmart whatever villain she's had the misfortune of running up against.

Fun Fact: Empowered first began as a series of bondage fetish drawings which artist/writer Adam Warren was commissioned to do, showing a stereotypical lady superhero in peril. But, over time he began to envision a story which could be built around this hapless heroine, and Empowered was born!

The first volume or two is pretty much fun cheesecake-y action, but over time the series tackles issues like race, sexism, dysphoria, and PTSD. But, it never forgets what it is, and always finds its way back to the story of a good-hearted heroine who inevitably ends up half-naked.

If you'd like to check it out, you can purchase it at all finer stores, or digitally, via Dark Horse Comics.

Now, my brain's pretty well cooked after the day I've had, so I'm going to go flop into bed. But, as always take care of yourselves -- and thank you for your support!

Hey, friends! Sorry for the late update today. Been a bit under the weather of late, but I'm on the upswing. 

Here's a quick state-of-things update: Chapter 9's currently over 800 renders. This week I've mainly been working on scenes featuring Alex and Risa. Alex's scene is over half-complete, and one of Risa's ero scenes is about 60% complete. Still got a little more work to do there, but I'm hoping to wrap that up in the next couple of days.

All in all, things are rolling along pretty well. I expect to top 1200 renders by the end of the month. Alex's scenes are just about there. Risa's scenes are just about there. That really just leaves some content with Gabby, Madison, and Mason to finish up.

So, I'm just going to keep grinding it out and see where I'm at by the end of the month. After informally polling people, most seemed to agree they'd rather wait for a bigger update, even if it delays the release by a couple weeks. I'm still hoping for a late April release, though. As always, I'll keep you folks abreast of any developments.

By now, most of you should have had the opportunity to play the recent Special Release, so I'd like to chat about it for a bit. First of all, I'm just really glad so many people seemed to enjoy it. It was a big change in format, obviously, and with that comes risk. I kind of expected to be drawn and quartered for dilly dallying about with something that's not really within the main narrative. But, the overriding sentiment was that it was cool to see a bit more of the world, outside of the player's POV.

For me, it was just fun to experiment with a new setting. I got to use some new assets, as well as experiment with some different stuff in Photoshop. I think it's some of the best-looking stuff I've done in the game, honestly.

With this little side-story having been a success, I think it opens the door to doing more. With such a large cast, there's plenty of characters to explore. And since I was able to turn around the update pretty quickly (3-4 days of rendering, plus 1 for writing) that means I could theoretically drop mini-updates between updates, giving you folks a bit more content.

Could be fun! I'm definitely excited by the possibilities. 

My stomach's gurgling and I'm running a slight fever, so I'm going to leave you with that for now. But as always, thank you for being here. It means a lot. As always, take care of yourselves, and thank you for your support!

Hey, folks! Hope you're all doing well this week! In case you missed it, there's a new release available to everyone -- for free! Just my little way of saying I appreciate each and every one of you. Don't expect a full-sized release, though. This is more like a little teaser/experiment. I'll talk more about it next week, once everyone's had the chance to play it.

Development on Chapter 9 is going well, and I cleared 770 images, recently. I made substantial process through Alex's scene, but I'm moving back over to Risa's scenes for now. I completed a bunch of script sections for Risa's storyline, and it's the next bit of content I needed for keeping the story in sequential order. So, it just made sense to slide back over there for a bit. My short-term goal is to finish all of Risa's scenes, and then fine-tune it all. Hoping to be there in the next week or so.

It's increasingly looking like I may end the month without the full update ready, but I'm still chugging along hard trying to make my self-imposed deadline. I have every confidence I can get through Risa's scenes, and Alex's. That still leaves Mason's scenes, one with Viola, and finally one with Gabby.

I may put up a poll and just ask if people think I should end the chapter with Alex's scene, and then put out the Mason, Viola, and Gabby stuff as a separate update (before I go on my hiatus, mind you) or if I should wait and put it all out as one. Hopefully this won't be an issue, and I can get it all done in time. But, if not, I'd happily defer to the crowd's opinion on the matter. I'm here for you folks, so whatever makes you happy, y'know? :D

Besides that, I don't have toooo much to talk about. It's crunch time, so I'm just trying to keep my head down, and work. Speaking of which, I should get back to it.

As always, take care of yourselves, and thank you for your support!

Hey hey, friends! Hope you're all doing well this week. Just for a quick little status update, total renders crept over the 700 mark recently, and I'm just going to keep chugging along. Really hopeful for a late April release. Don't hold me to that, but I'm pushing towards it as hard as I can.

In addition to working on the art, I've been making steady progress on the unfinished parts of the script. Still got a ways to go on that front, but I'm getting there.

Honestly, I don't have a ton to talk about this week.. We're getting into that portion of the dev cycle where all the thinking is done, and now I just have to actually make and organize things.. Maybe go check out the new Wanton Weekends featuring Spicy Sapphire, if you're a paying member? There's twelve all new, all-spicy images available! :D /shill

Oh, I have learned a couple of new little tricks, recently. You folks know that, when I do my erotic scenes, 90% of the time I like to give the option to loop back to the beginning of the scene, and try other options. So, if you get menu options for Missionary, Doggystyle, or Oral, you can usually select to change positions rather than cumplete - at which point you go back to the beginning, and get to choose from the menu again. Usually, there's also a little dialogue or narration like, "You guide Ashe into position.." or "Nicki looks at you hungrily, her eyes wandering over every inch of you.."

But, it always annoyed me that it felt like a very visible seam in the game. Like, I try to avoid things that feel a little too.. gameplay-y, if that makes sense. That's why I don't do a lot of 4th-wall breaking like some games do, i.e. "Are you sure you want to make this choice? Doing so will end your romantic route with Brittani!" I try to keep it a little more fluid and organic, and let the story itself inform people what the consequences of their actions will be.

This is all just to say that those little repetitive lines of dialogue would drive me nuts. So, I looked into it and there's actually a super easy way to randomize dialogue! So, now I can make those scenes feel just a tiiiiiiny bit more organic and natural. Plus, I'm thinking it'd be kind of neat to have some scenes where certain lines could be randomized, so you might get slightly different results on a different playthrough. Things like little quips and jokes, not actual, important story information. >_>

So, yeah! That's all I've been up to. Just work, work, work and occasionally learning some new stuff. As always, I appreciate you folks being here, and learning with me. Or at least watching as I muddle through the learning process.

Until next time, take care of yourselves, and thank you for your support!