Update 0.49 (Patreon)

Not a lot of new content, but a lot of reorganisation here! I've moved the "bonus" or "supernatural" storylines into a kind of shop. At present, the goal is primarily to just provide a convenient location for them to be accessed. But as the game develops expect prices on things to change, as well as more stuff in general for the shop, including a full on storyline that will run parallel to the "main" storyline of the game. With this implemented, it will make adding new storylines much easier, my previous framework wasn't really built to allow for additional storylines to be added easily, so a lot of time was wasted just getting them functional.

Massive, massive thanks to an incredibly helpful volunteer for setting this up for me, I could not have managed to do this system on my own, and this one bit of extra help has already improved things a huge amount for the project.

https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1FkZ9jvmWXvmFSadiv5yB2qkHCPMTC3q2?usp=drive_link

For the next update, I'll be aiming for two main things:

1. A clean up of the general hub, so moving around and discovering new locations is less of a hassle.

2. Expansion of the dating part of the "dating" sim. I'm planning on putting new dates in for characters and expanding date locations a little bit (ideally I'd like for the player to be able to explore places on their own, without needing to be on a date, and maybe meet some new characters there.)

In addition to these to most major focuses, I'll also be trying to implement some other improvements:

A) Adding more skill based dialogue options, so that the player can feel like their skills are actually used for something.

B) Expansion of the skill mechanic in general, so that the player can find various "skill trainers" around town who will improve a particular skill for them (including a few of the dateable characters!)

C) Addition of more supernatural storylines, with the new format, it is much easier to see which characters need more content!

D) Expansion/rewriting of previous storylines. A lot of these are very rushed, and all of them have had cut content for one reason or another. I'm hoping to touch them all up here and there.

E) Full integration of storylines into the shop system. I'm going to be moving storylines away from the previous way they were implemented and make them solely available from the shop. This will mean the player will have the option of enjoying the story immediately, or having it "activate" and giving them the chance to stumble upon it organically, depending on which you prefer.

F) EDIT: I will also be trying to shrink the filesize if I can. It isn't too big yet, but it will keep getting bigger, so keeping it small is a good idea. It will never be tiny, because of the sheer number of image files in the game, but I should be able to get things a little smaller.

These are all side improvements and will not be the main focus for this month, but I will attempt to get to them when I can, they are more of an ongoing idea for the game anyway.

In about 3-6 months my current housing situation will change for the better, making it much easier for me to focus on the game and get more done per month, till then. I'll just be trying to get whatever I can done each month.

As always, you can reach me in the discord:

https://discord.gg/zEzS7wc6

I sometimes share progress updates and concept art there.