September Musings (Patreon)

At present, and unlikely to change, routes are told through a 3 arc/chapter format that each takes place in about 1-year timespan.  A lot can take place in the span of a year and trying to fit all that I want to tell within the three-chapter limit can be a little difficult. It can feel a little weird at times when such large gaps in time take place in-between chapters. I think DJ Roadkill's route is sorta the best example where the first two chapters take place within the first few days of the game and then there's a giant 6-month jump in time to what is essentially the climax of their story.  Course, some of this can be filled in with events that happen in other routes like Mitts and Rosita that overlap into it but it requires players to have seen those prior so the jump in time can feel awkward. 

At times I feel like perhaps if each route had an extra chapter to cover certain beats could hit even harder! Like how cool would it have been if players could go on the mission to secure Charles? Or how much more despair-inducing it would be if between chapters 1 and 2 of Rosita players could live out a day with the job they choose and no matter how well they did they would still be faced with Kalei telling Rosita she's failing her trial? Or another stupid misadventure with Ramon in Hell?

When I was conceiving all the routes I had the idea that each route should be about a movie's length in time to 100% complete by exhausting all options and getting each character's 3 endings. So 1H and 30 minutes at minimum. And I found that at the slowest someone would read at 200 words per minute. So the minimum word count for each route is set at 15K. Most routes exceed this word count limit bc here at team repurpose were suckers for dialogue. A few routes like Rosita and DJ Roadkill are 2x the minimum if you 100% it so you're in for 2 hours of content. But even still I can't help but wish players could spend just a little more time with each of the characters.

This doesn't mean I plan on expanding the routes oh nononono we're well past that point and though I'm musing that all this is. Musing. Plus I'm overworked enough as is haha. Even though I'm working hard to make this good I'm also at a point where good is good enough. And as far as the game's stories go I'd say that they're good, memorable, experiences as is.

And that's all I could ever truly want from my game after a turbulent game development. For it to be enjoyable. 

...I don't know if this non-update was though. I just felt like writing something on a night like this where I'm having trouble sleeping and don't want to do something work related till I feel like passing out. So here this is and I'm not tired enough to maybe get some rest. Nighty night to those that have gotten this far.