Progress 30.10.2023

Man, it's been a painful few days, and it continues. As with TRS2, and to a point with Sorcerer, there aren't really ready made sets for what I want. Therefore, there are a lot of set building ahead of me. That and render times are a bit higher than I would want to but, alas, it happens. But that being said, rendering is going decently, slowly but going forward. And almost done with the first half of the initial release, so I am schedule with it.

Writing is going, getting used to writing again instead of just rendering. Granted, the long render times help with it. The changes I wanted to do to the update 6 are completed so now it is just going forward with it.

Portion of this environment was ready-made... but it wasn't suitable like that, so had to expand it, a lot. Well, there are a couple of options that I'll be trying again soon. Assuming the tool decides to work properly. Releases some resources, not that I'm running out of them at the moment.

And what are these? Well, to state the obvious portraits. I listened to the feedback and now there is a small character portrait showing who is talking. Not everyone has a custom portrait as is, namely those people who aren't important enough to know. But that might change in the future for those people if I decide to make them important. It's funny how many things you need to do before you can release anything. Main menus screens, customising the UI, and so many other things. And I still need to do icons... blah. I'm so not good at that. Anyway, no point moaning, onwards!

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Progress report

Progress 21.10.2023

Hello, it is time for some sort of progress post.

Anyway, I feel like I'm behind of my schedule despite I'm basically where I should be. Fairly irritating feeling over all. So rendering is going, around 250 renders in of the first half of the initial release. It's a bit frustrating that I spend 3 hours building a set for three renders (at this stage), but it will be worth it.

Writing is going okayish, I was reading that I had written earlier and decided to change a few things of update 6. This is why I love when I'm ahead in writing. It gives me room to change things if they don't feel right. Although, the time skips because of the travelling is... confusing. Anyway, things are okay in that front.

And then we get to this... there are short dream sequences, literally three renders in this case, that will be expanded going forward. They tell some events that has happened in the past. Some of them can be, disturbing. But then again, most nightmares tend to be. And he is wounded, that tends to happen during war... of some sort.

Progress 23.10.2023

Hello all!

The epilogue is out, and it is full steam ahead to the next one. Well, been doing that already for a few days, but yeah, point. Last night we discovered an issue with the walkthrough mods gallery (thanks MG for reporting it!), unfortunately it does affect the android version as well. I've already uploaded and updated the android links. And Shaddy has updated his mod. So if you are an android user you might want to grab a new copy. I apologise for the inconvenience.

As for the next one. Rendering is going nicely. Posing is slightly annoying, but I have only myself to blame for writing the scene as it is. But, when in doubt, cheat... My protagonist tends to have access to magic (or psionics). And let's not pretend we wouldn't make our lives easier doing those little annoying things if it would be possible. 

And writing is going, getting back to the rhythm that got mixed with the longer rendering hours, assuming that there are no surprises. I should be close to finishing the update six's writing by the end of the week.

Then preview and some tech talk. All the options from TRS2 will be in the new one. Thus, those images that are darker but fine for me have the option for a bit brighter version.

The difference isn't that huge, but the latter might be more clear. So if you need it, the option will still be there. Among other options, but more of those when I get the first half of the initial release done and coded.

Changelog: Update 40

Changelog: Update 40

• Epilogue
• 1714 renders
• Grammar, spelling, and other fixes (Thanks to Adry Lemon, Shaddy, BryonSmothers3DX, To Begin With, Bread_, OBE, cxx, DavidCF)

Yeah, not much to say here. It has been a while for these, but yeah. Stuff got done and things are getting done with something else. Anyway...

Release schedule:

• Patrons: As soon as I've verified the links, again.
• Public: 5th of November or thereabouts.

Progress 20.10.2023

Hello everyone!

The epilogue is done, sorry for it taking this long. And I feel sort of empty, but that's normal between projects. It is slowly uploading and release is once it's done, there is 75ish GB to upload in total... Beyond that, the most important part is at the start of the update, with "short debriefing" section and a few other scenes. Then well, it is Sorcerer style epilogue, info and checking on the LI's. Also, the "finale" slide show. I actually didn't go far out with it. All of them happen pretty much within a year, year and a half from the start of this story, give or take. Why? That is a good question. I tried to make some from the later years, but it just didn't fit like it did in Sorcerer. Still, some awww moments, some that make you facepalm, the usual stuff. Maybe.

And that means that the rendering of the next one has started. Starting was a bit slow, but that is normal when starting a new project, or an update for that matter. Rendering is slightly slower than I anticipated, but that is because of the current environment being demanding. But it's more a matter of a few minutes than anything drastic. Over all, it gets faster once I get used to the different flow that the new one has.

Writing is picking up again now that I don't have that nagging feeling in the back of my head. So it's good.

And all this means... there will be only normal "teaser" renders for a while.

Concerns... At times it is hard to tell what certain renders mean for a scene. And at times without several renders before and after the context might be... different than intented. In this case, it's nothing drastic, yet. And that reminded me that I need to show something once I've compiled the first part of the initial release. Makes more sense with actual images than with concept stuff. But now... have a nice weekend. And hopefully the uploads goes nicely.

Prgoress 16.10.2023

Hello folks...

Good thing that I didn't specify on which Tuesday I start the new one. I have about 10 renders left of what I've planned. Then whatever comes to mind, so far most of the renders have been within a year of the start of the story, have to see how that goes. And 10 renders doesn't sound much, and you are right, it isn't much. Except each new set needs building, that's 1 to 4 hours, and daz is slow "starting a new scene" and loading things. And no SSD or NVME.M2 doesn't change it, unfortunately. In this case HDD isn't the bottleneck it's how Daz is made. Regardless, the epilogue update will be out this month, it's being proofread and I've set the release date for it already, but more of that on Friday. And I'm confident that I will start rendering new stuff if not Tuesday, Wednesday... Why do I have a feeling that it's in the "famous last words"-category? 

Writing is chugging along, nothing much to say about it, I get to write a moment here and there so I'm mostly happy with it.

Not all characters get a full scene, Vati and Ivoin are one of them, they still are part of the finale renders. And yes, she is excited about getting a ride in APC... 

It's funny, this looks like a simple scene, but there are so many minor details to take care of, at least so that there is no obvious clipping on the camera. And this one was one of the easier ones in the finale...

And then this. This is titled as "Agony." Yeah... it has been one of those weekends, everything has gone well but slow.  It's mostly an environment test, but also an indication that there will be some darker themes within the next one. But as always, there are choices that can make things better. Or worse. Anyway, back to rendering the finale renders.

Progress 13.10.2023

Hello everyone.

I'm slightly drained at the moment, but the proofreading/test build is done and uploaded. I hate it when I'm behind. Meh. So the scene render count is 1600+ that's what is in the test build at the moment, after fixing and removing support renders. Tomorrow and Sunday I will render the what I ended up calling "finale" parts. That probably pushes the final render count to 1700+. But, the majority of it is done. And if everything goes well, I'll start the next one Monday or Tuesday. Probably Tuesday, in theory.

As for writing of the update 6, it's still going, I'm not worried about it since it's all in my head, just need to put it on paper so to say. And unfortunately, no preview of the epilogue this time. Been working on something I didn't really want to spoil, maybe something obvious, but still.

This is one draft for the next one's main menu. And it won't be the only one, it will be dynamic with certain choices showing the path you are progressing in. It will be per save, so it can change if you have multiple saves on different paths. At least that is the plan. And that's it for the day. I'm going to take a break for this evening, just to recharge my batteries a bit. See you all on Monday! And have a pleasant weekend.

Progress 09.10.2023

Sleepy... and irriatated. I'm two days behind of the schedule I wanted to be, irritating. But perhaps it was a bit unrealistic for the amount of renders I need. It doesn't take much, two minutes longer for the renders in one scene to throw the schedule that I had in my mind off. But regardless, 1700 items in the render folder, minus fixes and support renders. Yeah, one and half scene, give or take it gets a bit strange to estimate, regardless the rendering will be done soon. About dang time if you ask me ;) Need to start tackling the coding tasks while rendering. Although, there might be stuff I need to add at the start of the update, but I'll wait some feedback on that...

Writing is going forward, still not the pace I would want but there are more important things to focus. Although there something I'm thinking of doing, not entirely sure yet, and I need to start thinking of branching as well. Choices, choices, choices... Well it will come to me. And I need to think how I'll do the epilogues going forward.

Hmmm... what the tell about this scene? It's just short transitioning scene from one place to other, but it allows me to show life out side of the apartments for a bit, kinda? I'll admit, this scene can be missed. Anyway, moving on...

More snow elves. I have a guideline of sorts, until it is rendered in the game it is subject to change. You might regonize the "Banshee Queen" that I posted... a long time ago. Ideas are one thing, but things evolve once you start writing. Something that seemed to be a good idea then might not work when writing. Now the ideas of the snow elves and the banshee queen has merged together because it made sense.

Progress 06.10.2023

 

Three scenes left, well three and 1/3. Oh, hello there! Yeah, slowly getting there, on positives, the more "posing intensive" scenes are done, and it just took a double amount of the renders than the other scenes. So the plan is that I'll do the testing/proofreading build early next week and while that is being done I'll do the "finale renders" since there is no dialogue in them. You know, similar to the Sorcerers "Views of the future" bit at the end (aka the bit with nurses). Also 1500 images in the render library, in case anyone was interested in that.

Writing has slowed a bit, been more focused on finishing the epilogue update than writing, but it is still coming along, not as fast a pace as before. But still, even if I wouldn't write a line before completing the beginning of the next game, I would still have three update buffer, like I did with TRS2. So not that concerned, I still keep writing though.

Nica, and a head pat. And the person on the screen is Suzu, might have seen a render of her while back at the beach with Nica and Zicra. And no, I have to save stuff for the future as well; I think.  Also note, this image is, and isn't in the game. Some changes were made to it for public preview.

Northern diplomacy, that was the title for the image. Things are dropping into places, and I keep finding interesting things in my library. Take, for example, the clothes on Tomas. I forgot I had them; they aren't for genesis 8 so they don't show up in the library as is. And then the other night I stumbled upon them while doing stuff when waiting for render to complete. And I reckon that set fixed the irritation I had with Tomas' clothing. Although, I need to change the belt...

And then there is this. I know I wanted to test some new effects I had, but then I forgot, again, that the VDB's are broken in the Daz's beta build. So it didn't come out as I originally wanted.

Progress 02.10.2023

1300 items in the render folder, in three weeks of rendering. Normally, I do around 210 renders a week. It's a good pace as it allows the mind to relax and it allows things to go wrong. The current pace of 400+ renders a week? It is doable, but it's a killer in the long run. And no, before anyone asks, I'm fine. I sleep enough; I eat enough, and I do... whatever I need to do enough. So what is left? Five and half scenes, I had hoped it would be 5, but one of the more complicated posing scenes was done. So there is that. Although this messed up my plans, but that's nothing new, I'm afraid. Live and learn, I suppose. So...

And then we meet up with Rizei. Yeah, mixing things up here from normal, preview before writing stuff as I'm going to ramble a bit in that section. Anyway, let's continue. There is a lot of "dialogue" about how things are going, some I will show after everything, like the epilogue in Sorcerer. Meeting some people that are talked about, and some who weren't. Showing outside of the "city" as well.

Writing things, it's going alright. I had some concerns about the timing of things. There is, let's say, realistic travelling times. Now that creates a problem with certain story aspect. It is surprising how little people could travel during a day in medieval times. On foot and on horse, it's 30 miles per day on average, give or take, just that the time going from A to B is shorter with on horseback. There is an exception to this, with trained horses who could do 100 miles a day, but they would need two to three days' resting period after that. Thinking that, realistically, going from where I live to the next city, which is a one-hour trip nowadays, would take two to three days back then. Puts things into perspective. And now days there isn't the risk being eaten by wolves or bears.

In this setting, I'm not a fan of Sorcerer style "free for all" teleportation, it just creates problems. Which can be hand waved with more magic. That being said, I was browsing my assets, and I found a way that fit the lore of the setting... in more ways than one, to my surprise. And it limits accessibility to teleportation.