February news post #3 (Patreon)

It's time to wrap up this month as we prepare to get much of the work for ep 4 started! ^^ As many of you are aware by now. Version 0.18 released on Feb 17th finally after a bit of an extra wait than we expected.

Which brought with it Miki's Dream: Side Story and I might've covered it somewhere already, but mainly to cover it briefly. The choice to shift the focus from doing the main episodes to doing that to kick off the new year was to help ease back into the writing after being on our holiday break during December.

Mainly it was supposed to be a nice breath of fresh air and a little different than the normal episodes we'd expect from MA. I'm aware some might've preferred to skip it altogether in favor of just getting ep 4 quicker and moving along, which is fine too. I just wanted to help clear up the decision we took to kick off 2021. The rest of this year will be focused on the main episodes of the story.

Episode 4 is planned for March 30th as of right now.

We're looking at this Summer to finally get into the route episodes, which I'm sure we've brought up in our past posts before, but I'd like to briefly cover it.

With Episode 6-12, you'll get Erika ep 6, Nova ep 6, so forth. These aren't expected to be as lengthy as ep 1-5. When the time comes, we'll be doing a voting poll to see which ep 6 characters to focus on as we're expecting that we could roughly get 3 characters episodes done per month without rushing through it.

Of course all characters will have their stuff tackled, but it'd be mainly to get the 3 most popular characters ep 6 out of the way first.

We have thought about the idea of picking one character and purely focusing on their ep 6-12 stuff and move on, but this wouldn't work well with how MA handles bits of it's main story unfolding along the way. (Main academy story vs character story)

Anyways, to sum this all up. The second half of this year will be very exciting for those waiting to see route focused episodes and without spoiling too much... I'd like to give a brief example of what you might be able to expect, using Erika as our example.

Erika's ep 6 will focus on getting a stronger bond with her and having her introduce you to the literature club that she's in. Which for many of you existing supporters who recall earlier versions of the game, this time time around Brandon will be able to actually join and take part in many of the girl's clubs. (A few won't make sense for him to be allowed.)

That should really offer some sort of insight as to just some of what to expect as route episodes begin. I've mentioned it before, but you may not be dating a character right away in ep 6 either, while some might make more sense to be dating already within ep 6. Each feeling unique in their own relationships and how the tone of things are with that.

~Moving along~

I'll reserve a more in depth explaining of Episode 4 stuff for the start of March in our next news post. We'll have a bit more of an idea on what to share about that by then and behind the scenes for our team, between myself and Uncle Artie (our editor/engine worker). We're trying out a more streamlined way of working together that should help keep our game updates releasing pretty well.

I have to bite my tongue before I let anything slip about ep 4, but the one thing I'll mention is that the episode will feel like it offers some character's closure to a degree that hasn't been fully explained yet.

Episode 4 can be split up into roughly 5 major moments with small moments that are connected along the way that feel fitting. We're going to be seeing a character not introduced yet.

(Okay I really need to stop before I leak something I shouldn't! :P )

We might have one or two little things to share before the end of February, but for the most part we'll have a bunch coming in March.

Thank you all! We hope you've enjoyed Version 0.18 and looking forward to the main episodes with Episode 4 coming in Version 0.19, planned for March 30th! ^^