Hey everyone,

It's time for the traditional yearly roadmap!
 
2025 was a transition year between The Pacifier Project and DreamWalker, and a lot of things happen, but it was mostly under the hood. The greatest thing I did this year was the playtest sessions :  it's just incredible how much they help in improving the game, and everyone playing the demo a bit later will be able to enjoy a far more seamless experience thanks to that. Thanks again to all playtesters !

Now, 2026 is all about growth, so Dreamwalker turn into a proper living game.

Let’s break it down.

Q1: Demo Polish and Release

Final Demo Polish Phase

The first months of the year are fully dedicated to polishing Dreamwalker’s first public demo.  The goal is to make sure the experience feels coherent,readable, and solid from the very first minutes.

Main focus areas include:

- UX clarity 
- First-day pacing and onboarding 
- Balance and friction points  (food balance,continence...)
- Technical stability and performance 

This phase is intentionally not about adding new features right now. 
It’s about making sure the core loop holds up under real player conditions and leaves a strong first impression. I really want to make sure everyone can have a good time.

Pre-Demo Playtest Session

A closed playtest session will be organized in about a month 
This session will focus on:

- Identifying remaining flow issues 
- Catching last-minute usability problems 
- Stress-testing the demo content as a complete experience 


Demo Release Preparation

The current target for the public demo release is around March 1st, with a slight delay possible if needed.  While it's a realistic date, it's also a nice callback to the first build I've released of the Pacifier Project !
The initial goal was to ship by the end of 2025, but natural delays made it clear that pushing a bit further was the healthier choice. I could have released a demo by now, but it's just not up to my standard anymore.

After the playtest :
- I’ll be deep in last-minute bug fixes 
- There will be a short break in mid-February since I have real-life work obligations to take care of.
- Development will then resume for the final stretch and launch preparation 


The Pacifier Project 1.2.0 Free Release

As promised,The Pacifier Project 1.2.0 will be released for free once the Dreamwalker demo is public. 
This closes the chapter properly and ensures everyone can experience the final version of the game.

From this point on, maintenance will be very limited to bug fixes only,maybe on a yearly release.


Early Access Preparation

Alongside the demo release, groundwork will begin for the transition to Early Access.

Once the demo is released, the goal is to move forward with an Early Access phase of the game and onto the "real game". For the demo purpose, I specifically created a game mode, and, of course, some game events and structure are tied to the demo so you can enjoy content. But the real story mode might be sightly different in term of pacing.

Q2: Early Access

Early Access Release

This first Early Access release will likely not be yet about story progression past the first few days, but instead widening the scope a big on the game introduction, properly moving out of "demo mode" and improving the experience following the demo feedback. Don't get me wrong, there will be content, but it will likely extant what already exist. The goal is to validate the demo and ensure our feets are rock solid for the next one.

Subscribers will get access first, with the demo version getting available publicly as an entry point.

Regular Playtest Rhythm

Playtest sessions will now happen a few weeks before each major update, to ensure that feedbacks and bugs are adressed.


Q3: Expansion and Depth

First Major content Update

This update will focus on expanding Dreamwalker’s world and systems.Of course we're still a bit far and things can move, but the general direction will be: 

As usual, subscribers will access this update first, with the previous version later becoming available for free.


Summer Pace Adjustment

As every year, development will slow down slightly during summer,especially August. 

Q4: Consolidation and Direction Setting

Early Access Update

By the end of the year, the goal is to ship a second major content Early Access update.  Since most systems backbones are solids, I expect I will be able to create contents at a good pace, while most of the new features will come from existing systems improvements instead of starting from scratch.


Once again, thank you all for sticking around, for testing unstable builds, for giving feedback, and for supporting this project over the long term.  
2026 will be a great year ! 

Heya everyone,

As we step into 2024, I wanted to share a bit about what I've got planned for the whole year. This is going to be pretty packed, and I'm sure it's going to be very exciting! Here's all you can expect from me this year:

Finalizing Release 0.9.9

My immediate focus is, of course, wrapping up Release 0.9.9.
This update is not just another milestone; it’s the tying of ends and the conclusion of the main storyline, hence why I’m taking the time to make it really polished. This should hopefully come before the end of January.

Patreon discontinuation

As planned since the great Patreon banwave, and even though my page didn't get banned, I'll delete my page on 31st, January. I still have a few useful posts to save and put back here, like the debug command list.

Polishing for Perfection: The 1.0.0 Update

Following 0.9.9, my efforts will shift towards Release 1.0.0. This is a pretty important milestone, as this is where I’ll consider the game "finished." This doesn’t mean "completed," but more like a state when I can look at it and see it's playable from start to end, without temporary mechanisms and with a main story that can be finished.

So, what does this imply? This means that for this release, I’ll make a giant pass across all the pesky little bugs, polish the world, add more interactables in the world (something that I find very lacking), extend some features I implemented but never really expanded upon (NPC accidents for example), add more little events playing in and out, use more some places that are currently used only for a side quest...I think you can see the goal here: Not adding a ton of new content, but polishing and expanding what already exists.
The projected date for that update is the end of Q1, so late March- early April.

Community Insights: Survey Results
Somewhere around the 1.0.0 release, I'll be sharing the insights from last year's survey. Your feedback has been invaluable, and the first dive into the results has been really interesting. It will be extremely useful going forward. Some of you might be wondering, why taking so much time? It's only results right? 
The answer is that I only have the raw results for now, and I've just began analysing it . Going for a serious survey analysis take a little bit of time, and I really want to be serious here to respect everyone that took the time to reply.

There's also a tons of verbatim from the survey that are more difficult to analyse, and some asked interesting questions, so I'll be sure to answert his in a separate FAQ or something like that. 

Balancing Act: Post-Release and New Horizons

Post-1.0.0, I'll be juggling two roles: continuing to support The Pacifier Project with additional content, and kickstarting development for our next project. This is where your voices matter. I'll be reaching out to you to gather insights and preferences for the direction of our new venture, using the survey results to better orient the direction of the future game.
The goal here is to continue to provide content for The Pacifier Project, because there’s still a ton of things that can be added to the game, and also because, very likely, it will be some time before something "playable" comes out for the next project.

New Game, New Goals

The ultimate goal for the new project this year is to develop a Minimum Viable Product (MVP) – a prototype that will serve as the foundation for further development. It's a big step, and one that marks the beginning of another journey. On that road, I may release small prototypes so you can test out features to see what works and what doesn’t. I really want to build something on a much stronger basis than The Pacifier Project, and I want to be very careful going forward with all the very basic features, ensuring that it’s tested and feels "fun" right from the start.

A Change in Pace: Quality Over Quantity

Here comes a very important yet controversial point. During the last two years, I did my best to release a monthly update of the game. I think this is very important, both for consistency, the ability to gather feedback, and to give people something to expect.
However, I feel like it comes with some drawbacks that are slowly compounding over time, namely stress over deadlines, rushed updates, lack of QA, and bugs creeping out. To be fair, most of these drawbacks come from bad planning in the first place by wanting to cram too much into a one-month period. So, for the best interest of everyone, I’ve decided to step back a bit. This is especially important since this year, there’s going to be a small overlap between the ending project (The Pacifier Project) and the next game, meaning I won’t be able to dedicate myself 100% to releasing something for the current month.
A monthly release will not be set in stone this year. Instead, here’s the general outline:

As for the public release:

I know this can be disappointing to some of you as Patreon previously and SubscribeStar now have a monthly support model, and you can rightfully expect to get something every month. If you really feel this is unfair, don’t hesitate to voice it up. But, from my side, I think this change in approach will help with general game quality and polish.

In closing, 2024 is a year of both endings and beginnings! I’m very excited for all this year has to offer, and I hope you’ll continue to enjoy my work. I would like to thank you all for your constant support during this year. This was a pretty packed year, with a lot of hardships, especially at the end where Patreon decided to kick us out. I'm glad we managed to sort things out. Thank you again, and wish you all the best for this  year!