Migration back to Ren’Py & Other Things… – September 28, 2023
(As posted on our Patreon Page)
Hello everyone, I apologize that it has taken me so long to write an update for all of you, a lot has been going on around here and I will do my best to fill all of you in with what has been transpiring.
First of all, the issue with Unity and the Unity Game Engine, many of you may already know what’s been going on, with addition to our previous statements on how the choices made by Unity, left us with a very sour taste in our mouth and had us making a statement, like thousands of other game developers, jumping ship and refusing to use Unity.
Despite Unity coming out and making a public apology for their [intentional] screw up and adjusting their pricing and usage plan to be more palatable, we’ve decided to stick by our original decision of never using Unity Game Engine for any of our games again.
There were more reasons for us to remain with our original decision of leaving them, the biggest is TRUST. Unity’s actions and their recent announcements still does nothing to restore our faith in a company that seems more interested in microtransactions, rewriting and changing their Terms of Service & EULA’s retroactively and whose executives have little regard and respect for the developers who use their product.
Trust lost is never easily earned back and honestly, we don’t have time, energy or finances that allow our product to you be dictated by someone else and have us yo-yoing whenever they make a mistake…which seems in the last 5 years to be par for course with them.
As such, we… by unanimous decision… will never be returning to using the Unity Game Engine.
So, where does things stand with us and the release that you are all waiting for?
As soon as we made our original announcement on September 14th (my wife’s birthday, no less) to all of you, Epadder and I immediately shifted our focus and work from the Unity Game Engine and began the task of redoing all of our work for our game and release in Ren’Py.
Our first step was to take a solid look at our objectives and reasons for initially shifting from Ren’Py and using the Unity Game Engine in the first place and if they couldn’t be replicated in Ren’Py then restructure our entire game away from those original abilities and plans.
Once done, our next task has been to try and mimic the UI that we designed in Unity, to now look and work as similar as possible in Ren’Py… this includes more than just look and design, but also in functionality and ease of use for all of you… which, by the below examples, you’ll see Epadder’s progress in that objective.
Since we know that migrating and redoing all of the work that we spent nearly two years doing in the Unity Game Engine into Ren’Py was going to take time, I have been working to restructure the original Prologue, as well as, Chapter One, Two and Three to be more updated to the skills that I’ve learned in Daz Studio these past [nearly] two years and also make sure that the Prologue matches the format to the rest of the game…
…this means getting rid of ‘comic book panels’ and ‘split screens’ that I had used in our first game and was using in the Prologue we will be release to all of you soon and instead, creating the necessary backgrounds and sprites needed for dialogue scenes and also redoing some of the original renders.
Doing this ensures that our game will be similar in format, artwork, design and layout from beginning to end, which will also help the transition between game releases from looking different and distracting.
So, like “Wicked Choices: Book One”, “Wicked Choices: Bed Chambers” will be completely done in Ren’Py from start to finish and the original goals, plans and bells & whistles we intended to have in it, will instead be adopted in “Wicked Choices: Agents of Karma” which will like be done in the Godot Game Engine and will continue the story arc that you’ve started in the two previous games that were done in Ren’Py, including an import script for your game saves.
Anyhow, in between going to physical therapy and trying to heal back up from the hell I am being put through there, I have already been going through the task of updating the game’s Prologue to match the game’s other chapters that have been done.
Which now brings us to the subject of health status… as those of you who have been following me on Twitter/Twix/X or whatever the hell it is called now and at other places, I am doing much better after my surgery a month ago.
Of course, it still only being 4 weeks since the surgery, I am still restricted from doing something and stuff, but have also been issued Physical Therapy… three times a week for the next 8 weeks… and have been doing that for the last week and a half, up until recently… though, I am thinking about stopping my attendance of it.
The individual that I have as a physical therapist is an @$$hole to be nice about them. You know, one of those really well looking douche bags, who seems to think they are god’s gift to mortal man and knows better than my surgeon or even me about the limits of my own body.
Those who know me well, know that I am an overachiever and the sort of person who pushes himself to the breaking point, this particular individual tries to push me beyond it and never listens to me and tries to guilt me into trying to do more.
I kind of reached my breaking point with the individual and told my wife that I was going to go in on Monday and tell him to ‘back off’ or I was going to ninja kick his ass all over the therapy place the next time he studies himself in the mirror like some damn peacock.
So, I politely (which is a rarity for me, given the fact that I had already reached my ‘breaking point’ with him) told him that I think things weren’t working out between him and I and that I would like a different therapist if I was going to continue there.
With a few “tchs” and sighs, he informed me that they couldn’t just reassign anyone without messing up everyone’s schedule and that he was disappointed in the fact that I wasn’t interested in achieving my potential and would have to inform the doctor and insurance company that I was being ‘non-compliant’ in therapy… and that he would ‘back off’ as I told him.
I went back yesterday and, yeah, he started up his shit again… so, I grabbed my shit and headed for the door. With him shouting behind me and threatening to tell my insurance company and doctor that I was being lazy, unmotivated and ‘non-compliant’ to his instruction (which of course had other people’s attention, trying to embarrass me)… so, I handed my things to the wife, smiled and told her that I would be back, looked at one of the other therapists and told her that it might be a good idea to call an ambulance for the guy… at which point this 20 something year old priss realized that I was very motivated in putting his prissy ass in the hospital.
Apparently, seeing the look on my face and the intensity of anger in my expression as I slowly made my way towards him, with a maniacal grin and twinkle in my eyes, had him running to the offices in the back and the resounding echo of its door slamming shut.
Sighing in frustration that my prey had no desire to witness just how committed, motivated and compliant that I was to my intent in dislocating an elbow or an arm (or two) of his, I politely apologized to the other people in the place for the disruption, wished them a good night and speedy healing and collected my things from my wife and left with her.
So, I will be calling my surgeon’s personal assistant in the morning (it is nearly 4am here) and asking if there is any other place that she could refer me to, or if I can just do the shit at home…
But, yeah, that is how the status of my health currently is right now.
Okay, time for me to finish this up, hit the rack for a couple of hours, get up and call my doctor’s office and then get back to our migration to Ren’Py… I hope that you are all doing well and thank you for your support and putting up with all of the BS that we’ve had to go through.
Take it easy and will talk to you all again soon.
~Jack
