My fellow Kyosians!
"Kept you waiting, huh?"
Just before this announcement, Steam has very conveniently introduced a feature that allows Early Access titles to display their planned release date ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°) But before we get to that...
Website update
Late last year, we finally relaunched our website, which got a major overhaul. If you have already seen my post on Discord about this, you can safely skip to the next section! Otherwise, I'm very happy to share with you that the new website features:
- Significantly improved UX/UI: there's now a built-in search, the map is fully interactive, the website is fully responsive (including the aforementioned map), etc.
- Reworked design: in addition to a refreshed look, the content is now laid out more efficiently, which allows for easier navigation and lookup
- Fully proofread text, which will hopefully make for a more pleasant reading experience
- Added tie-ins to Minotaur; many sections and entries now have references to the in-game story, events, and so on:
- New content galore, plus I reviewed all original content to make sure there are no contradictions with Minotaur (or, you know, there turned out to be a couple even outside the game)
I have updated almost all previously existing entries to some extent, and added several entirely new pages, like "The Old Language" and "Aria's curiosities"; there's also a fully restored "The Fall of Kyos" page with the Sarin 12 report, expanded character profiles, etc. The Old Language in particular got quite an in-depth treatment, but (just like the website in general) it serves as a convenient reference for me, too!
We've gathered a lot of material over the last 30 years that we've been working on Minotaur, so throughout the website, you can discover new concept art, 3D models and even videos - like this visualization of Mira's transport system that we did for Mentor's route:
In addition to that, there's content that I dug out from the archives and cleaned up; in particular, the character section on the Minotaur page has been almost entirely rewritten, and features new screenshots and high-res concept art with Demi's original comments:
Here's some sexy Arthur for you:
As a matter of fact, the website as a whole has a number of screenshots of the remaining Minotaur content that we've been working on!
All of this (and much more!) is waiting for you at https://www.uof7.com/
We hope you enjoy the updated website! In the meantime, speaking of the remaining content...
Development progress
As I mentioned in earlier updates, in the absence of funds for Thea's route voice over, we continued polishing it, as well as working on two other routes, and I'm happy to say that we've made great progress! To summarize it (setting the voice over aside for now):
- Thea's route has been playable for a while, but there were some things left to do here and there, including a couple of ending scenes (which I personally think are among the most beautiful in the game):
With those tasks out of the way, what's preventing me from saying the route is complete is that we still need to outsource some art for it - primarily a 2D character animation for a key scene (in which it's strongly preferable to cross-fading).
- Unter's route is about 60% done; what's left is, primarily, an overall visual refinement, a boss battle, and a small but cool-looking hi-tech section:
- For Richie's route, we have advanced significantly (about halfway, I'd say) through path C, which is mainly set at a Nova Corps station. That's out of order somewhat, as we originally intended to do path B first, but the latter was planned as the shortest of Richie's paths, so we shouldn't have much trouble catching up on it. The main unfinished portion of the game, then, is path D, which is intended as its most conclusive ending.
That, and we also have yet to fully implement Richie's shooting skill!
All in all, I'd say that the game is 3/4 done, and we're well on our way to the story's grand finale...
That's... a bad ending, right? Right??
Which gives me enough confidence to set the release date for (cue drum roll).....
2027!
Two thousand twenty seven... It was in the name all along!!
I realize that, this fascinating coincidence aside, releasing this year would have been preferable, but I think it's better to try and estimate as realistically as possible rather than delay again.
Alright, but when in 2027, exactly? Well, that's for me to... not really know, actually, as there's a caveat. I'm afraid that we have reached a point where the lack of funds has started impeding our progress. Just to be clear, I'm not only talking about the voice over - as a matter of fact, it mostly only affects the feature scope of intermediate releases - but also art assets, music, SFX, etc. I've been using my own savings to fund the development for a while, but now that they're cleaned out and I'm roleplaying as Nod, pre-release sales alone are unlikely to generate us enough money to avoid stalling.
Well, maybe that's a tad overdramatic, but we do need an influx of funds in order to maintain this 2027 pace. To that end, we have a number of options!
- Yes, #1 - community backing! We are extremely lucky to have been receiving offers of additional support from the community, even despite the significant time that it's been taking us to develop the game. I postponed this option for as long as I could, though, as it seemed to me that a more proper way to go about this would be to use it closer to full release, primarily to allow players who missed the Kickstarter to buy Minotaur merch should they want to. After all, we already ran a campaign, and it's our own fault that we miscalculated the budget. That said, with the amount of work we've completed by now, I feel more confident about doing this, especially as opposed to prolonging development even further because of the lack of funding.
It still doesn't sit right with me to simply accept donations, though, so I'm heavily leaning towards providing our Kickstarter lineup of core rewards in return for support - through something like BackerKit, perhaps. Maybe with an Ollie plushie add-on? We'll see! Right now, I'm working through various options, but I think that, in a few weeks (around the beginning of March), I'll have the whole thing set up. So please stay tuned for an unprecedentedly quick update 😅
- In addition to this (the options aren't mutually exclusive), we can also look for a publisher (outside of China, where we're already represented by indienova) and/or investor. Just like with indienova, signing up won't change our release model or game scope; it does mean sharing future profit, but Minotaur is ultimately a passion project, and our main goal is to finish the game, so that's not a decisive factor.
- We could also transition into a full release earlier (for example, with a fully voiced Thea's route release + 2 out of 4 Richie's paths, and the remaining content coming as free DLCs); this would almost certainly result in lower sales, but would still get more eyes on the game, helping us finish it. So... Not ideal for U7 long-term, but again, with the primary goal being to complete Minotaur, that's something worth considering.
There are also some other options that I've been mulling over - for example, in our "spare" time, Rokari and I have been playing around with the idea of making a small game that would potentially generate additional funds (both on its own and through promoting Minotaur by extension) - but for the moment, the ones I outlined above are our primary focus.
Version control
Before I finish building this wall of text, a quick word about current Minotaur versions: at the moment, the main branch on all platforms lags significantly behind the latest beta (v.0.6.5 vs v.0.7.5). Since we already tested the new features that most needed it, such as the updated save system and controller support, there's no reason to delay updating the main branch anymore, especially since this will make new content and features accessible to more players. So as soon as we enable community funding, our next goal will be to update Minotaur to version 0.8, making it available across all branches on every platform!
And that's that! As always, we're extremely grateful to you for your ongoing patience and support, and hope that you stay tuned for more news coming soon!
Love ♡🐧
Nick & u7committee