Sooooo, I made some really good progress the last days. In the gaming business you could say "the game is feature complete".

I have now added some features that I really wanted to have. There is now a fertility status and a corresponding cycle. This is determined randomly at the start of the game and is intended to provide variety for multiple playthroughs. At this stage, the player won't notice much of this yet, except that they can see when the protagonist is fertile and when she is not. Later on, this will be about possible pregnancies.

Furthermore, there is now additional information about all characters in the game and – most importantly for me – the characters' thoughts. This means that, depending on the current game scene, you will be able to see the thoughts of the characters involved at any time. In the case of MC in particular, this is intended to show the player how she has perceived acute or past situations and how she thinks about it.

There were also many smaller details, such as clearer thoughts, which can now also be used inline. This means that I can have a character speak and simultaneously display their thoughts on the matter. Very fancy! In addition, the scripts are organised much more clearly and there are tons of helper functions, which will make my future work much easier. Attribute changes, game help, dynamic attribute calculations and much more. I have also removed or relocated some scenes from the current gameplay because some of them came much too early. Something like the groping scene in the car, for example, will now become available dynamically. And don't worry, it's still very easy to get there at the moment. So they haven't disappeared. In future, however, they will become available depending on what you have experienced so far.

Last but not least, I am currently re-rendering the scenes from V3. I have to do this for my own peace of mind. I am completely reluctant to release an unfinished version (even though I am aware that I will probably have no choice if V4 is to be released at some point in the future).

So I'm doing what I can to meet my personal deadline. I now have about 10 days left until the deadline expires. It's doable – albeit very ambitious.

I'll keep you up to date.

Back to work

It's actually continuing. Now that I've successfully completed two months in my new job and my health, while not yet 100% perfect, is at least no longer so limited that it's completely impossible for me to sit at a computer, I finally feel ready to continue working. So this weekend, I sat down and made a plan for how to proceed. This plan is as follows:

1. Rework the 3D models

I made a few mistakes at the beginning of the project. One of them was to focus entirely on Genesis 9 characters, but to use a Genesis 8 character for the protagonist's young family friend. This has created so much work over the course of the last few updates that I don't even want to think about how much content I could have created during that time. Long story short: this has to change. I hope that I can somehow convert the model from Genesis 8 to Genesis 9 without too much of a noticeable difference. If I succeed, everything will be fine and the issue should be quickly resolved. However, if that doesn't work, I'll have to completely recreate all the renders in which the 8 model was used. Fingers crossed that it works.

2. Expansion of functionalities

From the beginning, I focused on attributes such as “angry,” “trust,” etc., but never really used them in a meaningful way. I'm going to change that now. Starting in chapter one, these attributes will undergo a meaningful and, above all, tangible revision for the player. This requires me to properly process these values at the code level. Furthermore, I would like to immediately integrate a help feature for the player, through which they can see how their decisions affect the game. This feature should also be switchable via the options. Thankfully, this work has already been done, as you can see from the screenshots. Only the status screen still needs some fine-tuning.

3. More depth in the story

Until now, the story has relied exclusively on spoken and thought sentences. In some places, this is not enough to create the mood I actually wanted. Therefore, I am introducing a narrative voice at the start of the game. This requires a complete overhaul of the existing content. I have already started this and will complete the revision of version 0.1 this week. I may even manage to finish 0.2.

4. Drafting the overall story

Another mistake I made at the beginning of my work was to simply start with a few hot scenes in mind. This led me to develop the characters incorrectly on more than one occasion. An absolute must for further work is therefore the creation of the entire plot up to the end of development. I won't be writing every dialogue by any means, but at least the sequence of events and a detailed description of the characters and their preferences and behaviors.

5. Recurring game sequences

Visual novel or computer game – which will it be? I always wanted to program computer games. After many other attempts, I have now started with a VN. That's fine for getting started, but it hardly satisfies my urge to program. So, in one way or another, I will integrate recurring game sequences. At least I want to try. I don't know yet whether it will really work, i.e. whether the player will enjoy it, but that's where I want to go, so it's worth a try. You'll have to tell me whether I was successful.

So much for my 5-point plan on how to proceed. I will now post updates more frequently (not regularly) to keep you informed of progress, and of course, my goal is to provide you with content. And as I plan it, this rework will also provide quite a bit of content. So it's quite possible that a new v0.1 will be released soon (officially a 0.4, of course, but with the content of 0.1) in which I will present you with the new game mechanics to get your feedback.

Finally, I would like to thank all backers and followers for your support. You motivate me to keep going.