Dev log 21 - Mia's "training" session

Hi Everyone and sorry for the Dev Log’s delay!

Please find our current progress report:

• Current number of renders: EP2 - 773  EP3 - 50

• Current number of animations: EP2 - 6 

• Current percentage of text completed: EP2 - 100%

  

So below are some of our thoughts about Episode 2 release, and all we learned from that situation so far. 

We made two big mistakes, in a sea of mistakes for other things, regarding the release of Episode 2.

The first one is that we made the mistake of announcing the release date, even though all older and more experienced developers said not to do it.

The reasons we did that are simple. First, we were excited, we can’t wait for it to be out. There was no bigger joy for us than when we released the first episode. It was a mix of panic and excitement, which was then overwhelmed with joy due to a (mostly) positive reception. After working three months on the game, you tend to get lost in your creation and your world. Until you have more eyes on your game, you really don’t know if it is good or not. That is probably one of the reasons we see so many abandoned games after the first update. Developers think it is the best thing since BAD, but then they see the reception and get completely devastated and demotivated.

Another reason we said it is that we wanted the community to have a timeline to know what to expect, but now we know that was a mistake. Due to our inability to fulfill those timelines, we just created bad will towards us.

The second mistake is due to our inexperience. It is that simple. To explain it in detail, we had a story planned for episode 2. It was separated into scenes on our whiteboard. There are a total of 11 scenes in episode 2, although we should have separated one of them into at least two scenes because it is the biggest one. So we knew exactly what we had to do, but we just missed the mark on the number of renders it would take to tell the whole of episode 2.

Another mistake, now that I think about it, is the render creation order. Due to the weekend voting and my own motivation, I was jumping from scene to scene in rendering. When it is a long scene, after a week of working on it, I just need to mix things up a little.

The latest compounding problem we have is that Vice's real-life job has its own product release. We knew about this, and if I had managed to complete all renders before it, she would have had the time to compile everything and make the translations by now. Unfortunately, I did not make all the renders by then, and now she is swamped with work. Most days she works a 12-hour shift. The rest of the time she is beat, so I am not troubling her with this because I know she is already stressed enough with her real-life job.

So, here is how we plan to improve.

First, there will be no more release date announcements until the build is ready for testing.

Second, we will speed up the render preparation to increase the number of daily renders we output. This will be the hardest part because up until now it has been a mixed bag. Some days I make 20 renders and some days only 5. I hope that with practice and communication with other fellow developers who have more experience, the speed will improve without sacrificing quality.

Third, we will reduce the jumping from scene to scene in the render queue. This will be a little more nuanced because we still want to do weekend votes. We think they are fun, they include anyone who likes to participate, and there has been a great response from you guys  so far!

As you can see, we post regularly two times per week. We post once for the weekend vote, and once for the results of that vote. For the weekend vote post, we share the number of renders completed, and as you can see now, we are at more than 770. In retrospect, Episode 1 was released with 600 renders.

Another thing that is really taking so much of our time is the social aspect of game development. When we made plans for the game's timeline, we had no idea how much time would go on making posts like this (which are important), our dual weekly post schedule on Patreon, and all other obligations connected to maintaining our social media as well as marketing and distribution platforms. This is all getting easier and faster as we learn and incorporate things into our daily schedules, but it is still a huge time sink and is keeping us from direct game dev. Keep in mind we both have day jobs on top of all of this.

For us the moral is still very high. Episode 2 looks great, there is something for everybody and I wake up with new ideas for renders and am often rushing to work unshaven due to preparing the scene until it's the last minute to go. I can not count how many nights were spent in front of the screen without any sleep, and even though I should feel beat, I never felt better. We love this story and we can't wait to complete it.

To summarise, we made mistakes. This was and is expected, and I am sure there will be many more in the future. But we are also doing our best to recognise them, to improve and to make the best game that we can.

Hopefully the wait will be worth it and you will love Episode 2 😍👍

Option 1 - Pink Venom

Option 2 - Black Fury

Now with all this out of the way, this weekend vote is for scene - Mia’s “training” session. We made a little more renders for this one as the outfit is multilayered. Outer outfit (image 1 and 2) will be removed very quickly in the scene, while inner will stay on for a while and based on your in-game decisions with Mia, it will be thrown out of the ring together with sparing equipment. 

After certain events in Episode 2, Mia wanted some "coaching" from MC. He just doesn’t know yet what she exactly had in mind when she asked for "training". 

Looks like he will find out soon.  

Like always, some images are on the verge of NSFW, so we will censor them to be sure to avoid any problems, and you can find all of them on our socials that allow this kind of images as well as on our Discord.

Vote will be extended until Tuesday at 10:00 UTC. You can vote here in the poll (next post) or on our Discord, or in the comments on any of our social platforms 🤗

Thank you all for your patience!

Have a great weekend and we will see you on Tuesday with some very hot images of Mia!

Vows and Vices

Read the full update HERE.