Wednesday, June 27, 2018

Seventh progress report






As I wrote in the last report, we decided to push out roughly 2 reports til release (this being one of them).

Since this question came up a bunch of times, let me get this out of the way first:
"Wasn't this intended to be a game to be done within 2 weeks?"

Answer:
Yes, indeed.
But before the second week ended we had pretty much all our "must have" goals fulfilled already.
Because of this we decided to tackle ALL our "optional goals" as well because things were going really smoothly.
Cres finished all of her work (must have + optional) 2 days over the initial "2 week deadline" and returned to working on Deathblight RPG ever since.
Thus no damage is done since we're financing the extra work on this project purely with our own private money.
(as a random note: we've been financing this project largely with our private money, only Cres not working on Deathblight RPG for roughly 2 weeks is the sole reason why we hand this game out to all 5$ upwards Patrons, but everyone else was payed using our own money)

Also none of the team members currently working on the Francesca Mini Game have any work to do with Deathblight RPG.
Ultimately this means that Patrons will get an even bigger, better game in the end, at no extra cost.
So I don't think this should be a problem at all.

As for the optional goals:
Almost everyone on the team is done reaching all their must have + optional goals.
(in some cases they are 90% done, in other cases they are done already)
The bulk of the work is finished and we've been putting everything together in the game, so after that is done, what's left is testing and balancing stuff out.
We basically expect to have a demo for selected Patrons in the next couple days.
(high tier Patrons get the demo first, and then we make it available for more and more Patrons from there)
Since the game is more refined and has more content than we originally planned, we thought about selling the game on multiple platforms once it's done.
So you don't have to support us on Patreon to get your hands on the game.
(yes, as I mentioned above, we plan to hand it out to 5$ Patrons upwards)
There will also be a public demo going along with the game release, so you can try the game out first.


With that question out of the way, on to the actual progress report!

Boxman finished the tileset and finished work on almost all the enemies in the game.
(I think only one is missing, as well as some polishing here and there)
Zhuan finished the writing and is currently in the middle of implementing it into the game.
Blade is currently implementing all the graphics into the game, as well as doing some testing and polishing wereever possible.
Illustrious was too busy with his real life job, so we had to hire another composer to get music done in a short time frame for this Francesca Mini Game.

Basically, we hired OverCoat to get the music done, you can listen to some of his previous works here:
https://overcoat.bandcamp.com/

Depending on how things are going, we might release another progress report before the release happens.
After all we're intending to deliver a polished product, so please be patient.
We hope you're looking forward to it!

Thursday, June 14, 2018

Sixth progress report




Crescentia finished another base CG, so all that's left to do on the CG scenes is finishing the last CG scene on Saturday's live stream.
After that there might be some polishing left to do on the CG scenes, but the major amount of the work has been taken care off.
Boxman also made some great progress on the tileset, as you can see in the picture above.
While Blade and Zhuan made some progress in their respective fields (programming and writing).

Technically, today the 2 week mark is reached, but we figured to include all the optional goals from our optional goal list.
(the "must have" content as well as some of the optional goals had been fulfilled already, so we figured we'd just push it all the way)

As I mentioned in previous posts, it's only mandatory for Cres to return to her work on Deathblight RPG, since noone else has work to do with that one.
(Blade already finished the mini game implementation for Ferania's Job, so only the graphical work is left to do for the next release)
And since that works out as planned, it's no problem to let the rest of the team work on the "2 week game project" for a couple more days.
(also please note, that polishing it up might take a bit time too, but we'll let Patrons play some earlier builds of the game)

To give you a better understanding so you know what we had on our optional list for the Francesca game:
- a sewer area with tentacle monsters (also CGs for them)
- some powerups and talismans for magic
- simple building interiors, so you can enter some of the buildings (not all of them)
- some more enemy types (mostly humans, aside from the tentacle monsters)


Since the brunt of the work is done, I won't be writing progress reports every two days from now on.
(especially because Cres and I will be getting back to working on the webcomic as well as Deathblight RPG)
But you'll certainly see at least 2 progress reports before we release the game.

I hope you're looking forward to those!
See ya!

P.S:
Yeah, no daily live streams anymore.
Next live stream is on Saturday 21:00 GMT+2 like usual.

Tuesday, June 12, 2018

Fifth progress report



After the weekend we're back in action.
But keeping the current pace up is really straining, so we're happy to slowly get closer to the end of the project.

Cres finished the variations for the first CG scene which will have text accompanying it.
In the meantime, Boxman worked on the sewer area of the game.
While Zhuan fleshed out more of the writing.
Blade is still working on the hentai system.
Still all going pretty much according to plan, so well in fact, that we decided to add the optional goals from our list and improve the game during a third development week.
Cres will most likely return to DB RPG after 2-3 additional workdays past the original 2 week limit.
(by that time Cres will have all the optional goals on the CGs done)
The rest of the team will stick a couple days longer to this project, but this is not holding up DB RPG since they are not working on it anyways.


I realized I haven't written much about the heroine of the game yet.
So let's briefly talk about our heroine, Francesca the dark elf.

Francesca is a pretty self confident and sex loving girl in general.
She's quite energetic, cheerful, and loves to live out her desires without any restraints.
For this reason it's not surprising that she'd choose sex to earn money in order to win her bet.
To her this is fun plus she get's payed for it, which is like killing two birds with one stone.
Of course her goal is to get payed for having sex, but since she loves it too much it might happen that she drowns in the pleasure and loses sight of her goal.
(which then leads to one of the game overs)

Our dark elf heroine in this game is a "toned down" and more "modern day" version of her original medieval version.
In which she's a dark spellcaster, capable of summoning demons and placing hexes on others, who slays her enemies by using a huge maul.
Since we toned her down in this game, she just uses a metal pipe to get rid of "customers" who are not willing to pay.
Francesca looks quite cute in general, so even when she's angry, she still looks cute.
Because of this her medieval version usually wears a dark mask which makes her seem more intimidating, though she's still so small.
So she's small but dangerous!
Her modern version we see in this game however, is not as dark as the medieval version.
So we see none of her "dark side" in this game.

In this game she's just a regular dark elf girl who wants to win the bet she has with her rival by doing what she loves most (sex) to earn money to win the bet.
We're thinking about giving her some measure of spellcasting via Talismans in this game.
But it won't be anything super powerful, and certainly no demon summoning.
(even though her medieval version would be capable of that)

We hope you all look forward to playing the game with her!
See ya!

Saturday, June 9, 2018

Fourth progress report





Cres finished the facial expression variations for Annabelle and Lesath so we can use them in the dialogues.
Also the base CG for the first CG scene has been finished as well.
Cres finished so far:
Character dialogue graphics 3 out of 3
Combat CGs 3 out of 3
CG scenes 1 (base done, variations still need work) out of 4

Boxman also finished the graphics for Francesca, as well as did some good progress on the tileset.
(as you can see in the posted picture above)
Zhuan drafted the writing for 3 of the CG scenes and will continue to polish it up the next couple days.
While Blade is in the middle of programming the hentai system and will get to building the level/stage after that.


Today I'll drop some information on the level/stage of the game:

As you can see, the tileset is a pretty simple city style tileset.
The game will be about Francesca running up and down the same street every day, collecting money from various customers via hentai scenes.
(there's a mini game system for that in the "hentai system", I'll probably talk about it in one of the upcoming blogposts when we have some visuals for it)
As the days in the game progress, some new parts of the stage "unlock" and become accessible.

We plan to not only have the street though, but also building interiors of some buildings (not all), which will be quite simplistic.
But it helps to have some variety, and not only have the streets to "play" on.
Other than that, we also plan to make the sewer accessible as well.
Tentacle monsters are lurking down there, but despite the dangers it might pay off to visit such a dangerous place.

Please note that building interiors and sewers are both optional goals on our list.
But since we decided on selling the game, we figured we should include these optional goals, even if it means working on the game a few days longer than the planned 2 weeks.
(no worries, as the progress currently stands we're pretty fast and Cres will return to Deathblight RPG in no time, most of the team has nothing to work on Deathblight RPG (no pixel art, no writing from Zhuan etc.) so we're pretty fine with adding more stuff to polish this game properly)

And yes, even if we sell the game, Patrons (5 $ upwards) still get it for free as bonus for supporting us.

At any rate, I hope you're looking forward to the next progress report!
Same as last time, we're going to have our "weekend" tomorrow and on monday as well.
(at least Cres and I do)
So we are not going to work on those days, and we'll be back on tuesday with a live stream again.

See ya!

Thursday, June 7, 2018

Third progress report

The first week is basically over, and we made great progress during this week.
Cres finished a graphic of Lesath today, who is a supporting NPC for Francesca.
On tomorrows live stream Cres will work on Annabelle's dialogue graphic, she is the rival Francesca makes a bet with.

Blade wrapped up work on the text parser, combat system, and is going to work on the hentai system next. While Box finished most of the pixel graphics for Francesca and will work on the tileset in the upcoming days. Meanwhile, Zhuan writes the scenes for the victory and game over hentai scenes.


This time I'll fill you in on the story of the game:

As I mentioned on the last blogpost, Francesca is running up and down a street to collect money from customers so she can win a bet she made with her rival.

But how did this happen in the first place?
Without spoiling too much of the story, here's the rough idea:
Annabelle and Francesca are "old friends" but somehow they are still rivals.
They have a pretty competitive relationship, and one day Annabelle laments about not having enough money to buy [Redacted].
(no spoilers, sorry haha)

Francesca criticizes her for spending so much money on "useless" things, and this angers Annabelle. Both women, eager to prove the other that they are in the wrong, decide to do a very risky bet. The winner being able to command the loser to do whatever they wish them to do.
(this applies to both of them)

The content of the bet is: Who makes the most money in 15 days.
Annabelle, who is rich by default (rich Ojou-sama type girl) probably has less troubles winning the bet. But Francesca has a plan, which basically leads her to do all sorts of lewd things she loves to do, in order to earn money. This leads to the situation our heroine, Francesca, is in, and why she's doing what she's doing.
(she would probably still do it without the bet, but the bet puts some "pressure" on her to perform extra well, so that's that)

Basically, no matter how this bet will end, you will all get to see some good lewdness!
(hentai scenes appear during gameplay, game over, and on victory as well)

The dialogues, as well as the CG scenes leading up to all this are written by Zhuan.

Tuesday, June 5, 2018

Second progress report

After our weekend we dived back into work successfully.
Cres finished another graphic (the third one), while Boxman finished some pixel art and Zhuan drafted some dialogue texts.
You can see some of the art above.
So far everything progresses quite well.

But instead of just listing the progress and showing some graphics, I figured I'd go into some details about the game in upcoming posts, starting with this one.

As we stated in the past, this "Mini Game" will be an action game/brawler/platformer/sidescroller whatever you want to call it.
We try to experiment with a few new mechanics and stuff, while also using our strengths and providing a solid, quality game.

Basically, in this game, Francesca (the dark elf) will run a street up and down, looking for "customers" to milk for money, while at the same time holding "freeloaders" off.
When Francesca initiates hentai (or when some NPC initiates it) a screen wide CG, like the one shown above, will be blended in.
This is kinda similar to how Tifatan X did it (very old hentai game).
But instead of just blending in a static image, we plan to have the CG adjust to what's actually going on. Meaning the CG will change according to stuff happening to the heroine.
This is... difficult to explain in words alone, and we don't want to spoil the fun by posting all the graphics before the game release.
Summed up you can say that the CGs have variations and will change during gameplay.

As usual, our game contains narrative with game over hentai which explains what happens to the heroine if she fails. But we also included a lot of ingame hentai and some special hentai that happens when winning the game. So we hope that we cover as much hentai themes with this game as possible!
(this time there is no BDSM in there though, sorry about that)

If you have any questions, make sure to join our live streams the next couple days.
See ya!

Saturday, June 2, 2018

First progress report

Here goes our first progress report!
The first two days on the project went very well, we've been making good progress.
Crescentia finished Francesca's dialogue graphic with all facial expressions.
As well as finished the first CG.
The second CG has already been sketched as well.
Since the graphics are made in "simple cel-shading" they are quite fast to make.
(also no "naked version" underneath, so less work than the Deathblight RPG "soft-shading" graphics)

We plan to include 3 CGs for "ingame" interaction.
As well as 3 CG scenes for different endings of the game.
So yup, this is some good progress.

In the meantime Boxman worked on pixeling the first sprites for Francesca.
Zhuan wrote the first drafts for the prologue.
Blade made some good progress on the text parser which is needed to load the text Zhuan writes into the game.
While Illustrious worked on some prototype track.

As we progress there will be more to show, so the next couple updates should have more details and information.
We hope you're looking forward to them!

Also we hired VoiceLikeCandy to do some voice acting for Francesca!
You can check her stuff out over here:
https://www.patreon.com/VoiceLikeCandy

Cres and I (Wolf) will be taking tomorrow (Sunday) and Monday off, as those days are our "weekend" basically.
But starting Tuesday we'll be back in action and doing more live streams!

See ya and take care!

Friday, June 1, 2018

2 week game challenge start

As we announced on Patreon we're currently doing a "game jam" like: 2 week game challenge.
[https://www.patreon.com/posts/2-week-game-19161085]

During the next two weeks (possibly 3 if we need a bit more time) we will work on a Mini Game with the entire team.
(we recently expanded the team by several new teammembers, Boxman for Pixelart, Zhuan for Writing, and Regris for Marketing)
Once that one is done, we'll return to our usual game project.
This Mini Game is mainly intended to test our teamwork with our new teammembers, gather some data on work speed and stuff, and to kinda say "hey, were back in doing platformers/brawlers/sidescrollers".
So please share the news!

We plan to do daily Live Streams on Picarto:
[https://picarto.tv/CrescentiaFortuna]

(except for Sundays and Mondays when we take our weekend break)

The first Live Stream is running currently.
We'll be there for about 5-6 hours.
So feel free to join us!
You can ask us questions in the chat or simply watch our progress.

We also plan to post progress updates every 2 days at least.
(except on our "weekend" of course)
So stay tuned and check out what we're up to!



The Mini Game will be about our dark elf "Francesca".
In the game she goes on a bet with her rival to earn more money than her within 2 weeks.
Francesca decides to accomplish this by using sex as a means to "milk" her customers for money.
More information on upcoming posts and of course in our Live Stream chat and Deathblight Discord Server.
See ya around!