Feb 25, 2024
121
307

A Shot in the Dark: May 17, 2024 Dev Log


Quick update on Prince of Suburbia
We don't currently have enough news about Prince of Suburbia to dedicate a whole dev log to it, but we are still working on finding a new artist and animator for the Pregnancy DLC! We are currently auditioning an artist we really like with a few animators to see how they work together. As soon as we have something we feel comfortable sharing with fans, we'll make a separate dev log about it!
Chapter 5 Development
Last week Josselyn and our coder, Cosmic Mirage, had a productive voice call going over plans for the Murder Mystery Game we'll be integrating into Chapter 5.
We have enough assets made (backgrounds, sprites, GUI) and enough dialogue written to start playing around with implementation. We also hope to get m. (who recently remade the GUI for both of our games) involved with some new GUI elements to give the Murder Mystery Game a unique feel, separate from the main story of the game.
We'll include some previews of how it's all coming together in future dev logs! To get a taste of what it will look like, you can check out our previous dev log for previews of the backgrounds and look for the outfit polls we'll be doing this month and next.
Other than that, Josselyn has been slowly chipping away at the writing and rendering, which is pretty typical for this phase of the development cycle. Currently, the written word count for Chapter 5 is around ~15K words and ~400 renders have been made (including the previously mentioned assets for the Murder Mystery Game).
Translated Builds
Another thing we hope to achieve during this development cycle is translated builds of A Shot in the Dark through Chapter 4, which we know many of our Steam players are eagerly awaiting. Once we have builds they will still have to be tested thoroughly before they are released, but we're getting very close to having builds ready to test!
Voice Acting
Lastly, we are excited to announce we are working with HaruLuna and other voice actresses to add more voice acting to the game (both to previous chapters and future ones)! We tried out voice acting for the first time with the Ashley scene in Chapter 4 (featuring Cinder) and we were super happy with the results, so we've decided to do more. We'll have more information about that as we get further into the process.
Chapter 5 Previews
Here are some previews from the first scene of Chapter 5 which is fully written and rendered. Just in case you were worried we weren't going to resolve the cliffhanger from Chapter 4, let this be proof that we won't leave you hanging. ;)

 

Jericho85

Well-Known Member
Apr 25, 2022
1,374
4,510

A Shot in the Dark: May 17, 2024 Dev Log


Quick update on Prince of Suburbia
We don't currently have enough news about Prince of Suburbia to dedicate a whole dev log to it, but we are still working on finding a new artist and animator for the Pregnancy DLC! We are currently auditioning an artist we really like with a few animators to see how they work together. As soon as we have something we feel comfortable sharing with fans, we'll make a separate dev log about it!
Chapter 5 Development
Last week Josselyn and our coder, Cosmic Mirage, had a productive voice call going over plans for the Murder Mystery Game we'll be integrating into Chapter 5.
We have enough assets made (backgrounds, sprites, GUI) and enough dialogue written to start playing around with implementation. We also hope to get m. (who recently remade the GUI for both of our games) involved with some new GUI elements to give the Murder Mystery Game a unique feel, separate from the main story of the game.
We'll include some previews of how it's all coming together in future dev logs! To get a taste of what it will look like, you can check out our previous dev log for previews of the backgrounds and look for the outfit polls we'll be doing this month and next.
Other than that, Josselyn has been slowly chipping away at the writing and rendering, which is pretty typical for this phase of the development cycle. Currently, the written word count for Chapter 5 is around ~15K words and ~400 renders have been made (including the previously mentioned assets for the Murder Mystery Game).
Translated Builds
Another thing we hope to achieve during this development cycle is translated builds of A Shot in the Dark through Chapter 4, which we know many of our Steam players are eagerly awaiting. Once we have builds they will still have to be tested thoroughly before they are released, but we're getting very close to having builds ready to test!
Voice Acting
Lastly, we are excited to announce we are working with HaruLuna and other voice actresses to add more voice acting to the game (both to previous chapters and future ones)! We tried out voice acting for the first time with the Ashley scene in Chapter 4 (featuring Cinder) and we were super happy with the results, so we've decided to do more. We'll have more information about that as we get further into the process.
Chapter 5 Previews
Here are some previews from the first scene of Chapter 5 which is fully written and rendered. Just in case you were worried we weren't going to resolve the cliffhanger from Chapter 4, let this be proof that we won't leave you hanging. ;)

Voice acting is a terrible waste of time and money for AVNs... but as long as we have the option to mute that shit then I guess it's fine. They're better off not bothering with it at all though.
 

Dark Silence

Conversation Conqueror
Jul 17, 2021
7,817
11,525
Voice acting is a terrible waste of time and money for AVNs... but as long as we have the option to mute that shit then I guess it's fine. They're better off not bothering with it at all though.
I agree. I'm not a fan of VA or music in AVNs. I mute everything and listen to my own music. But if the dev wants/likes it then it's their decision.
 

Jericho85

Well-Known Member
Apr 25, 2022
1,374
4,510
I agree. I'm not a fan of VA or music in AVNs. I mute everything and listen to my own music. But if the dev wants/likes it then it's their decision.
It might be a personal thing for me, but I'm an avid reader and I literally never watch TV or movies. The characters sound a certain way in my head and voice acting fucks with that. I mean do people actually like voice acting in these things? Whenever I see a dev float the idea of voice acting, the reactions are usually pretty negative to the idea. I don't don't why devs even waste the time and money on it. Besides, voice actors willing to take jobs doing erotic VNs are never very good to begin with.
 
  • Thinking Face
Reactions: Dark Silence
Feb 25, 2024
121
307
It might be a personal thing for me, but I'm an avid reader and I literally never watch TV or movies. The characters sound a certain way in my head and voice acting fucks with that. I mean do people actually like voice acting in these things? Whenever I see a dev float the idea of voice acting, the reactions are usually pretty negative to the idea. I don't don't why devs even waste the time and money on it. Besides, voice actors willing to take jobs doing erotic VNs are never very good to begin with.
Since they're not moving images, it doesn't make sense to have dubbing. Whenever I play a visual novel with dubbing, I always switch to the next slide halfway through what's being said. And for those with visual impairments who need voice, Ren'Py itself has a built-in feature.
 
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Dark Silence

Conversation Conqueror
Jul 17, 2021
7,817
11,525
It might be a personal thing for me, but I'm an avid reader and I literally never watch TV or movies. The characters sound a certain way in my head and voice acting fucks with that. I mean do people actually like voice acting in these things? Whenever I see a dev float the idea of voice acting, the reactions are usually pretty negative to the idea. I don't don't why devs even waste the time and money on it. Besides, voice actors willing to take jobs doing erotic VNs are never very good to begin with.
Some people do. I never understood it. But I'm not goin to judge them. We're all different.
 

DovahKing111

Newbie
Dec 5, 2022
56
97
Yep Elly is insane. Not that I mind that much but she's definitely taking advantage of her cousin and his lack of memory. On the other hand Ashley is pretty much straight to the point and wants her nephew's penis in her vagina. I don't know what happened when they were younger apparently our mc has violent outbursts and killed a....rabbit? but this family definitely has issues. I don't mind incest, in fact I love it, but it's a different pace then what you usually get in vn's where everyone is all hesitant and whatnot "no we shouldn't do that it's wrong".....and that's not a bad thing.

When I started I thought Elly just didn't know it was her cousin and they were actually gonna hook up not realizing who they were hooking up with but now I can see Elly is insane. I'm still playing her route and haven't finished all of it so I don't know the extent the issues go maybe she always had a crush on him when they were younger we'll see. At one point I thought maybe their parents caught them when they were younger kissing or something but I don't think that's it.
 
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Reactions: Darkenning
Feb 25, 2022
81
473
A Shot in the Dark: Sophie Special Render Suggestions
Patreon post image.png

Sophie was the winner of our latest special "fan request" render set for 2024! The results of that poll have been added to the original post: A Shot in the Dark: Special Render Character Poll ->

Now we want to hear your suggestions for what that render will be. Let us know your suggestions for themes, costumes, or cosplay characters you'd like to see for Sophie!

Leave your suggestions in the comments, send us a DM, or let us know on Discord! ->

 
4.30 star(s) 57 Votes