This year, next year (Patreon)

Hi everyone. 2017 is coming to an end, and I would like to sum up what I've been busy with this year, and take stock.

In the beginning of the year I really wanted to get into 3D and I decided to get some skills in the area.  I spent some time learning Zbrush and Maya. It wasn't all in vain, but I understood that modelling+rigging+animation+coding+gamedesign is quite too much for one person. Such projects require a big team, of which at the time I can but dream. 

I experimented with Daz3D. There was time when 2-3 such games would come out a day.  The idea of making art myself appealed to me. But after meddling with it for some time, I realized that games I'd make this way, though possible, I would not like. I still can't understand why people like this rubber-like 3D so much. 

We managed to remake all the old original art. Some of you might not even heard of it, but just look...

The new drawing was way better, but each art took unbearably long to be produced.  Some CGs took up to 2 weeks. I sought to address this problem by hiring an additional illustrator, but people I found after spending huge amounts of time could not tune into our set style.  At last I decided to curb my needs, and today my illustrator works full-time and with substantially increased capacity.  I was looking to further speed up the production of arts by hiring a colorist, but at that time people's interest was at its downfall, which badly reflected on options available to me -_-   

A great step for me was working on Nesh Morgan's project Slaveholder (it is pretty raw at this point, but if we implement all our ideas, it's going to kick ass). It was the moment when I began to really understand Unity.  Unity engine is suitable for games of any genre, one can also make one's own framework with it, and consequently almost forget about coding for the sake of level design. Talking about visual novels and the current project in particular, I've hit its limits. I am able to make decent animations like the ones you could see in Nekopara or somewhere else, but RenPy only allows for frame-based animation (this is why the MLA is so massive), which is also very laggy. 

A couple of words on the WT mod. I took on this project when new arts were produced very slowly, and I was looking for opportunities to give my audience something in the meanwhile. Today the situation is absolutely different: arts come out at a pretty good rate, and it'll be a crime to engage in side projects while the main one is in development. Especially since the only person capable of making the very best sequel to the WT is already making it, although clothing it is some space disguise :) 

Due to aforementioned reasons, no side projects are expected in the upcoming year. All the next year, except for some help to Nesh with his project, I'll give my undivided attention to the MLA. I realize the game's been in development for quite some time. There are many underlying factors. Among them are the lack of experience, the long arts production cycle, hiring a new illustrator. Constant crunches I set myself have also played a significant role. But after all it is a visual novel and it should not be developed for that long, that's why I'll spend the whole 2018 developing and refining the MLA, so that the version 1.0 of it sees the world not later than December 31, 2018 (I  hope even earlier).  

So the bottom line is, we've stepped on a huge number of rakes, but now the problems are left behind, the illustrator is on full-time, the next year we finish the MLA 1.0, and our following project will absolutely kick ass. 

And of course, I thank all my patrons for making this whole thing possible :) Best wishes and happy holidays!