Version 0.24 is finally wrapped up and in the hands of play testers. This time around the word count is up to about 66k, meaning about 20 mins of gameplay has been added to the early game since version 0.23. We've also finished the last of the new animations for the festival h-scenes on Raisa and Lucine's paths. Expect overall story improvements and expansions plus the new choice system expanding across more of the prologue, although there's still more to be done. The title screen has also been completed, and we've added some more of the menu decorations to match the revamped GUI. We'll be releasing a new free demo soon with all of the early game expansions and new menus for better Steam Deck support.
We've also added in the placeholder art for the final creek scene, but the writing in that scene still needs to fleshed out. We plan to finish that in our next update, then slowly chip away at the placeholder sketches and remaining menu art in future releases so that we can move forward into the later story.
The next update will be version 0.25 which we intend to be another milestone for the game. The last of the fixed prologue writing and story jank removal will be completed, although EscapeArtist will be spending a good chunk of her time working on assets needed in the second act. That includes a sprite for a new main story character that a lot of the events will revolve around, plus some new locations. The writing likely won't catch up to that point until version 0.26 or possibly 0.27 at the latest.
This last update turned into a game of whack a mole with issues so it took a lot longer than originally planned. There were some bugs and unimplemented features that needed to be addressed sooner than expected to solve other issues. As a result a major bug that some people reported in the story route that was hard to repeat and diagnose has been solved. There were also sections that were effectively blocked off that are now working. Because of that, the next update should be out sooner since that's all out of the way.
Things are really starting to come together and we're really proud of how far the game has come along. The new artwork and writing really adds a ton of polish to everything, and while it has been really annoying to have to go back and fix all of the old stuff it is pretty cool to see how much better both of us have been getting over time. To stay up to date on our progress or watch our drawing livestreams be sure to join our Discord.
