Dev Diary 66 (Patreon)

Hello all, TD here. Christmas is approaching, and I'm coming at you with the penultimate dev diary for 2023. Holy shit, does time fly.

As of December 9th, the next update sits at 1,419 static images, 34 animations, and 32,362 words. That spells out 254 statics, 0 animations, and 6,004 words added to the project over the last two weeks.

Felicia's date keeps on keeping on, as things progress decently. There's a lot of goodies behind us and some really delectable ones ahead of us. Beyond that, there is nothing new to report; it's all about keeping the course steady.

As ever, thank you all for the support, and you can be sure I'll hit you with the usual end-of-the-year sappiness for 2023's climatic dev diary. In the meantime, please have a wonderful holiday season and stay safe!

...And that would be it in a regular DD, but let me jump in this time. Howdy everyone, GIL here. 

You know, sometimes I wonder how other devs do it. I have immense respect for lone wolves, because the amount of skills required to make a visual novel is nothing to scoff at. The visual aspect is incredibly time-consuming, and putting on planning, writing, coding and other miscellanea on top of it is truly daunting. You can be sure of one thing: your average AVN developer that puts out consistent content in a reasonable time frame works like a mule. I'm sure of it, because it's two of us here and boy oh boy we got our hands full every single day.

Some people might think TD`s side of things is easier, since he doesn't have to spend 10 hours a day locked in a basement working a poser studio, but believe me when I say, I don't envy his side of things. Over the last months I've come to understand how deep his dedication is to apects of the work I just take for granted. He will literally lose sleep over concepts such as pacing, narrative coherence, quality standards and character logic. He will stare at script drafts for hours, carefully changing little details until he reaches the refined true form of what he seeks. He's not afraid to throw away something he doesn't believe in for the sake of "it works". A perfectionist to a fault, and a man with a vision. He often downplays his work in public circles but believe me when I say he has the makings of a true artist and I'm extremely lucky to be working with him.

The thing I value most about him though is his incredibly humble and cooperative demeanor. I've had some experience in my younger days working with other artists in a different field, and most of the time it was a painful ego-clashing struggle. It blows my mind how TD can operate in a perfect balance of vision integrity while being completely open to suggestions and ideas. His creative touch will transform rambling into solid gold, ready to playfully add my imagination to his. In that way, he's always made me feel more than just the muscle of PC. He might be the brains, but we both make up the spirit. 

Truth be told though, if I'm lucky about something, it's having your attention and your support, dear audience. Every time we even dare to compare ourselves with anyone else, we are careful to stop in our tracks and remember just how fucking blessed we are, being able to dedicate ourselves to the work, thanks to you. You're making this dream happen, we owe it to you. You can be damn sure we'll never let you down, no take backs. This is what we live for, it's as simple as that. Thank you, thank you, thank you. I hope you all have a fantastic holiday season. I Love you all!