Dev Blog 15/07/24
Well here we are again. I'll start with some personal news. (Skip if you don't care.) Things are better. For a long time it really seemed like everything was just crashing down. Life just really took a big chunk out of me. A loved one with a chronic illness that was on his deathbed way too young, and the constant hospital visits that came with that, the saying goodbyes, days of tears... Then it all seemed to turn around! He's home! He's not doing great, but it's a small win for now. Then IRL Luna got hit by a fucking car walking home from work! She broke both of her knees and was in a wheelchair for many weeks. Again, she's ok, it could have been so much worse, but it still sucks so much. She's finally walking again, albeit very slowly. Then my wife injuring her knee! (Old volleyball injury that finally got worse.) We're still not sure how that's going to progress, but we're hopeful with conservative treatments before turning to surgery. She's still walking around on crutches. Then just a shitload of little things, like I broke a tooth, I get sick, I get sick again... all over the course of about 6 weeks. What the actual hell! Thankfully it seems like the universe has fucking relaxed a bit. But still, I am trying my best to take care of everyone around me, but it's just a whole lot of stress right now and very little sleep. Mental health is important, especially when the world feels like it's all falling apart. I'm doing my best, but I'll always feel like it isn't enough.
State of the game: It's coming along nicely. It's slow and we had a lot of setbacks and absolutely zero free time for a long while, but work is progressing. Now I have a couple of weeks at least where I have a lot of free time to just get stuck-in and work. I don't know how long this is going to last, so I'm trying to make the most of it. I'm probably at the halfway point in the chapter, or near enough, and things are moving quick. A lot of the renders that I had planned have been cut, just for the sake of simplicity. Do you really need 3 images of Adam getting dressed in the morning or would 1 do? I look at it like frames in a comic book. The images are just there to let you know what is happening in the world, but I don't need every few lines to be a new scene to show movement and progression. 1 or 2 will do in most cases. Of course I'm not talking about spicy scenes. With those, the more the better!
One thing I've been playing around with is things happening in the background. Things that will play a major part in the story as it progresses, but now it's just something to be a little bit aware of. For example, if Jason is looking at his phone in the background, it's because someone texted him. Who was it? What did they send? Why is he smiling like that now? What did he write back? Hmm... I don't put things like that in by accident, it's all for a reason. It's going to make more sense later what's going on in the background, but for now it's just something to notice and ponder. I'll be doing things like flashbacks from their POV's and switchovers to see what they are doing behind the MMC's and FMC's backs. I think it's going to be a lot of fun. Just like real life (which this is still partially based on), it's going to be subtle hints and clues, and everyone has their own motives and desires.
I've also been brainstorming with friends about another possible game idea to eventually make. Don't worry, I'm not going to take any time away from this game. I do really want to finish it and be done with it, not just milk it forever. It's going to end after their 4th year and they've graduated, that's always been the plan. Right now it feels like it's going day-to-day but that's just to get the story going in the beginning. There will be some time skips coming. Anyway, my 2nd game I've still been working on a bit on a notepad in my free time. Nothing much, just logic planning things like stats and progression. It's not going to be a Visual Novel, so there's going to be actual code and gameplay involved. It's a bit ambitious, but I do love coding and writing. Rendering in Daz, not so much. lol! But this new idea might be a fun in-between idea, so it might become my new 2nd game, and the other would be my 3rd. What can I say, I like to plan ahead. And this is really something I won't actively work on for another few years. Hell, maybe at that point I start working with AI art instead. Of course I've played around with it. I'm not great at it, but it's super fun. I love game design and game theory and I have always had a ton of ideas for games (both normal and porn). So this will make it 4 other games I have planned for the future. Most with the same kinks as College Love Triangles, so if this is the kind of game that tickles your fancy then stick around!
I've been trying a new workflow for this chapter with my renders. Nothing outlandish, I've just been going through and posing the scene, saving it, then going to the next. Then I'm going back and positioning the camera and lights, then I'm rendering it. Just something I'm trying out to see if it makes the whole process go faster. I'm not sure yet how I feel about it.
Oh, and maybe a bit of spoiler for the upcoming chapter... I think I've already mentioned that we'll find out exactly why Luna hates Morgan so much. But we'll only get Luna's side of it. In the following chapter we'll learn a bit of Morgan's side. But who is actually right? Are they even telling the truth? We're also going to get some of Jason coming through with his deal with Morgan as he tries to set her and Adam up. We're going to start to see the conflict that this causes with him - he does care a lot about his best friend and he wants what's best for him. But he also really wants what's best for his dick too. We'll delve a bit deeper into Jason's demons in future chapters, don't worry. No one in my story is going to be flat. Everyone is dynamic. Things are going to happen, people are going to change, some of them for the worse. It's college, everyone tries out new things and tries to find themselves and who they really are. I've got some really wild stuff coming up, lots of things that actually happened in real life to the characters they're based on too. Maybe I'll do some polls to see if people can guess which events actually happened!
My deepest and sincerest thanks to everyone who has stuck around and offered words of support. I'm making this game, well mostly for myself, let's be honest, but I'm also making it for you all. I'm reading and loving all of your ideas for the characters. Most of them are already planned to happen, but a lot of them have inspired new ideas for the story. I honestly never thought my little game would be as well received as it has been. You all are great. I sometimes just go through and read all the comments and messages to inspire me to work harder.
The upcoming chapter we'll see a little bit of her near the end. I hope it's as hot as I think it is.
