VN Ren'Py Secrets in Focus [Chapter 3 - Day 5] [Studio BMK]

[StudioBMK]

Hey everyone!
I’m back from a much-needed sunny vacation ☀

The break did wonders, and my energy (and sunburn) have fully recharged. Now it’s time to get back into the world of Secrets in Focus.

Over the next weeks I’ll be focusing on Day 6 which is also the end of Chapter 3. A large part will be around the skate-punk concert of Lagwagoon (a reference to my all-time favorite band Lagwagon) that MC, Ember and Blair will visit together. And of course not everything will go as planned!

I’m still not the best at planning exact release schedules, the writing and graphics seem to take a bit more time recently due to the higher quality (at least I hope so). But my goal is to have the next update ready by the end of January. I’ll keep you all posted as progress builds.

 

[eromaster]

Could have at least written the summary yourself. AI writing is extremely easy to detect and quite annoying, because it tends to be very predictable.

 

[StudioBMK]

Could have at least written the summary yourself. AI writing is extremely easy to detect and quite annoying, because it tends to be very predictable.

Lol, guess it's extremely easy for some people to detect. Maybe you not so much?

Maybe I'm part AI myself

 

[FrozenPie1]

Maybe I'm part AI myself

Well, according to current research people are adapting the style of writing of AIs and so the line is blurring (even the "kissing ass" attitude towards the user is adapted in some cases lol). That's why the reddit mods now have the problem, that they can't reliably recognize text as "written by AI" too anymore. So if you're writing with chatbots regularly you most likely adapted the writing style of them, hence the "looks like written by an AI"

 

[StudioBMK]

 

[eromaster]

Lol, guess it's extremely easy for some people to detect. Maybe you not so much?

Maybe I'm part AI myself

View attachment 5516809

Huhh? I meant the OP post, this fucking bullshit:
" Secrets in Focus is a visual novel that blends sharp humor, romance, and a creeping mystery into one cinematic story.
You live with Ember—whose teasing warmth hides deeper scars. Returning from a break, you start a new job as a systems engineer at a model agency, where IT jargon collides hilariously with photo-shoot chaos."

It's so obviously chatGPT. I haven't played your game. It's one thing to lazily use AI, it's anothe to be so blase about it.

 

[Bobjock]

I think the dev is also an AI.... oh shit maybe I am an AI too.... what have I been jacking to

 

[StudioBMK]

Huhh? I meant the OP post, this fucking bullshit:
" Secrets in Focus is a visual novel that blends sharp humor, romance, and a creeping mystery into one cinematic story.
You live with Ember—whose teasing warmth hides deeper scars. Returning from a break, you start a new job as a systems engineer at a model agency, where IT jargon collides hilariously with photo-shoot chaos."

It's so obviously chatGPT. I haven't played your game. It's one thing to lazily use AI, it's anothe to be so blase about it.

eromaster
Aha, that I didn't understand.

I've made a new version from scratch, better? If not, then I've definitely evolved into an AI version of myself

 

[StudioBMK]

I think the dev is also an AI.... oh shit maybe I am an AI too.... what have I been jacking to

You've been jacking off to a bunch of ones and zeros!!

 

[eromaster]

eromaster
Aha, that I didn't understand.

I've made a new version from scratch, better? If not, then I've definitely evolved into an AI version of myself

Yes, thanks, it looks so much better. With the AI intro, it was immediately offputting - who knows if this dev can even write anything themselves, or is just automating out unexamined slop? Now with a self-written on people are much more likely to try the game.

 

[MiltonPowers]

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I've just slowly started writing day 6. I thought I'd share a quick picture of the start of day 6 where a client has asked Ember to do a cosplay photo shoot for gamers and anime lovers. She'll be sending MC some more cosplay pictures during the day, but here's the first one.

She doesn't look too happy



P.S. Someone somewhere said Ember might look cute as a catgirl, no clue who or where it was. But... here's to you! Cheers

 

[StudioBMK]

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The renders these month are of course Christmas themed. All Patreon members get these four completely free 4K Christmas renders, one of each love interest from Secrets in Focus. So you can pick your favorite, or just swap them when you like.

Whether you’ve been here since day one or just wandered in for a quick look, I’m genuinely glad you’re here. Your support keeps my project moving more than you might think.

Grab a drink, take a moment for yourself and enjoy unwrapping these festive renders from me, to you.

In case you've been thinking about becoming a paying supporter, the paid members get 4 other 4K renders, fully NSFW

Have a wonderful Christmas, stay cozy, and enjoy Secrets in Focus ❤

 

[balboa2151]

Redhead and no NTR tag, lets fu*king gooooo

 

[StudioBMK]

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Hi all!

I thought I'd give you an update on the progress of Day 6 and the end of Chapter 3 so far.

I'm happy to report that the writing is still pretty much flying. The story is basically writing itself so far and I have zero trouble of connecting the different events in the story to the overarching mystery. Some events so far may seem fairly random, but a lot of them are actually tied to the larger mystery, or already connected to one of the different endings. And that will only increase.

Talking about the different endings: I took some time to work those out a little more. Without making any guarantees (creative freedom or whatever... ) I'm currently looking at 6 different endings. And they are definitely not all going to have a "happy ending"!

I've even already decided as to what the sequal to Secrets in Focus should be and where that should play out (and with who). Some characters will definitely return there. But that will take quite some time as I'm fully committed to telling this story as I want to. And at this point, I'm not exactly sure how many days Secrets in Focus will be in total. (If I had to guess probably somewhere between 18 and 25 in-game days.)

The story so far has been pretty wholesome. Starting with day 6, that will slowly start to change. There will be some shocking and heavy-hitting events later on in the story that will surely leave their mark.

After a little over one week of writing, I've written about 800 lines of code where I expect Day 6 to finish somewhere between 2500 and 3000 lines. I've decided to try a new strategy, instead of switching between writing and working on the visuals, I'm now trying to first finish writing the complete day first. And then finish all the visuals after that. Not sure yet how I'll like it, but I believe it should also speed up the process a bit more.

Although I'm not sure how long I can keep up this pace, I've written about 7000 lines of code since I started less than 5 months ago. The first chapter released 3 months ago. I'm trying not to compare to other games, but F95 is filled with hugely popular games that have big releases once every 1 to 1,5 years. (yes, yes, Daz vs. AI, etc, etc.)
I will need to make sure I don't burn out, but I also don't want to let down everyone who's paying monthly to see progress. I hate to be seen as a milker.

Chapter 3 will not yet feature animations, so I've set that to 100%. But animated sex scenes are surely to come in Chapter 4, so that might take me some time to learn. I've been postponing until I had a specific scene to start with.

Sorry for this wall of text. Like I said, I have no problem writing a lot of text quickly

Love you all and thanks again!

 

[StudioBMK]

So, good news! I've finished writing all code and dialogue for Day 6 today after a full day of writing. I've ended up with about 3300 lines of code, 24000 words and I'm guessing over 2 hours of playing time. Pffff... now I'm tired and ready for the New Year!

I'm absolutely loving how Day 6 turned out. Of course enough laughter and romance, some nice sexy buildup to day 7, plus a nice shocking ending. I'm curious how all of you will like it!

So what's up next:

• The amazing MiltonPowers is up to beta test all the different paths, variables and other code to make sure everything goes as it should and I didn't make any stupid mistakes. (I promise you, I certainly did).
• Now I can get working on all the visuals. I'm guessing I have somewhere between 75 and 100 images and CG's to do. Especially the CG's are quite tough, so I'll see how that goes.

No reason to assume the release of Day 6 won't be happening in the next few weeks.

Day 6 will have some important scenes storywise. You have a heated discussion with Nigel, Hana runs into her ex-boyfriend and you have a chat with Vanessa about Mara. Of course the concert takes place together with Blair and Ember, but that doesn't end as you would expect. At home, the three of you have fun playing a game together. The shocking ending concludes the day and Chapter 3.

Once I've gotten some visuals ready, I'll share a few visual previews with you all.

Have an great New Year! Thanks again for an amazing year!