Quest Failed: Chapter Two - Dev Log #62

Hiya there! How are we all doing? It's been a bit of a bumpy, unexpected ride with Patreon changing its payment processing methods out of the blue and causing mass hysteria all across the site--but I think things are finally normalising!

This dev log is a few days late compared to my usual schedule--and I deeply apologise for falling behind and hope I haven't given any of you cause for concern as to the status of the game's development!

For this particular dev log I wanted to give a general status as to where the game is at--and what I'm currently working on. As admittedly, the more fancy character sprite teasers and CG previews I give you all--the more I run out of to show you without breaking into heavy spoiler territory--and it'd be no fun to give away all of the game's plot points before you get a chance to experience them for yourself!

So future dev logs may begin to expand on things you already know about, as well as go more into detail regarding character designs and show old sketches/concept art for what characters could have looked like. I hope this will prove to be informative and interesting--but if you would rather I focus on other aspects with these development logs, please do let me know what you'd like to see, as providing entertaining posts that you all enjoy is my primary goal here to make the wait for Chapter Two just a little more bearable!

So, rambling aside--let's focus on the primary element of this particular dev log--namely the pretty and updated UI mock-up for the inventory you see attached to the top!

I've been steadily working with a dedicated UI artist to help shape up a lot of the UI elements that have been lacking or serving as placeholders in earlier builds of the game and I'm really happy with the results so far! There's still a few tweaks to this piece I think I'll be making, but this definitely helps give more of an 'RPG' feeling when viewing over your stats and items you may have acquired during your adventure, with some flavour text here and there. The general parchment aesthetic is one I wanted to lean quite heavily on when it comes to menus, and even the title screen art itself as you may have seen, mixing together appropriate fonts and accompanying art assets that have a very 'inked' feeling of being illustrations on parchment.

It's all still very much WIP while I focus on the writing of course, though. So if there's any suggestions/changes you feel might help the UI style I'm aiming for--please don't hesitate to voice your opinion!

And speaking of working on writing--I hope to release a new alpha build this month with 4 new CG scenes among other optional and story related scenes that steadily continue Matt's grand adventure. One of my goals this month is to finally develop Matt's 'free time' segments more and expand upon the exploration, letting you explore areas you've been to previously (like the beach for example) to discover all kinds of new events lying in wait for you! It's through this method that you'll meet characters from previous quests, and even completely brand new characters depending on the time of day you visit and what items you may have in your inventory!

As you can imagine, there's a lot of variables at play now--far more than Chapter One ever had. So keeping track of everything does become a bit of a challenge while also trying to build up the more linear main story, too. I'm sure I've made it far more apparent--but for those of you that felt that Chapter One was too linear, I think you're gonna be pleasantly surprised at the level of choice that lies in wait for you in Chapter Two. Perhaps more choices than you'll ever know what to do with, haha.

But at the same time, I want to make it manageable and not feel overwhelming--which is why I introduced the icon system you saw in the last dev log. That icon system is almost ready to be fully implemented into the future builds of the game, too. Just needs a little more tweaking with the layout and icon sets and I think it'll be good to go, and really help people discover all the events lying in wait for them.

For the next dev log--I was thinking it could be fun to go back to certain mischievous ninja's origins and show off some concept art and sketches of old outfits I had considered for her and hairstyles, along with some other fun trvia. Let me know if this is something you'd like to see, since I've been planning this kind of thing for a while--but was worried it may not be as well received as getting more up-to-date information on the status of the game. Maybe I can alternate between new and old as I go along, looking back at some concept pieces while also showing off how Chapter Two is coming along in a subsequent post? There's a lot of ways I could go about it!

But for now--I think I should put an end to my rambling and let you get on with your day! I hope you enjoy the warm weather we're having, and until the next time, guys~