State of Play: April 2023 (Patreon)

Hey there guys and gals, how’s it wilding on your end of things? This here’s a post’em up about what’s up and what’s going on lately, in lieu of an AoH teaser for these times because there’s been another big spanner in the works. Strap in and let’s get to some explaining the current state of play. It’s not all teary-eyed news as there’s some things to be jazzed about, and some space for beWildernauts to chime in on the near future, but yes, the meaty parts of the news involve some short-term hurdles that need a grappling hook to scale, so let’s get too it.

First off, let’s get to where the game is in regards to where we aimed for it to be, then we can go into the whys and if you care to go below the headlines as readers then gladly come on with us, and if not, you’ll have all you need to be informed on where things are at. Sound good? Well then.

Where We Are Now

We kicked off AoH some time ago and got rolling into it to the point that right about now or even earlier we wanted our posts to be releases, but clearly that’s not where we’re at now. Not much has been pushed forwards on the AoH side of things, important if not particularly helpful distinction (see later), since early April as Unshi our artist and half the team has been redirected to dealing with some personal issues that really, well and truly needed dealing with at last, and hopefully will be in the near future. With finality at that.

Currently we have a little over half the content made to render (~55 of expected 110-120 at present), with a smaller portion of that (~15) already batched and made into game ready images (as seen in both our Teasers to date). That still leaves us with half the content, and pretty much all the script to get penned before we’re into Post-Production, Engine Set-up and ultimately a play ready release.

At this point we can be fully assured that April won’t be the month to get this done, which sucks for all involved, we know. However, it simply is the face of reality. It’s going to be May, most likely late May, that we have Natasha release ready as Unshi will still be tarred (closer to literally than you may know) for a couple weeks yet until early May. We’ll touch on how we aim to make up for as much of this as we can lower below, but again, that’s for people to whom it matters. Next up is what we’re going to do about things from here.

Immediate Plans Moving Forward

Time to take the bull by the horns even more so, where one of us is tied up, the other’s got to pick up the slack. While most of the delaying factors are external and therefore hard to bend to our timeline, there are somethings we can do that’ll help along the process.

For those that don’t know it, we approach both our games from opposing ends, as that allows us to leapfrog the production of assets (visuals/environments and written scripts both). That means that NTR versions are supplied with written scripts from the beginning of the version production, while AoH’s scenes are written to the art after the rendering, based on pre-planned scene outlines. So while AoH’s art has been going up and down in productivity, meanwhile Spook the writer has been using the time between batches to continue writing new content for Noemi, plus gameplays, planning etc. In fact, for Noemi this time has been a boon as we’re more than a version up and 2 dozen gameplays too, which is why we said it was “important if not particularly helpful distinction” above that AoH hasn’t been moving as well, because the time will pay off down the line eventually at least that much.

Anyways, what we’re going to do from here in is change up our usual process as it’s clearly not working for us as is, at least it will not be the quickest way through. With Spook on hand to refocus on AoH, he’ll be taking on the pre-emptive production of the script as of today and will forge ahead with what’s doable on that side of the production. At this point, the benefits of the change will outweigh the drawbacks, we feel. With somebody who has the time to dig in and focus leading the way we can get the script complete, use the chance to slimdown and trim fat in some of the scenes and sequences to lessen the art burden (we may see that expected CG count drop some, basically), while keeping as much of the action and sexy in there as is needed. Having a completed script as a guide will also give us one less variable in our calculations so we can be that much more certain in our forecasts. Yes, the final script may end up more like the chunkier per image Noemi scenes, something we usually try avoid by doing them after the art is made, and even some cutting of CGs of lesser need is less eyes on sexy girls overall, it’s the only thing that’ll less the art strain and get us there faster. So that’s the plan.

By the time that’s done and Spook is back to making Italian dishes again, we’ll in a better place with the art department and have a hand-holding guide to get it through to the end too. That’s the best way we can reposition and going in the right direction again from where we stand.

Unshi’s Issues in More Detail (with pictures!)

So then… What’s really going on under the hood? Why all the fussing that’s been getting in our ways the last few weeks (this time, some might say). Simply put, again Unshi’s time has been pulled out from under him do to many of the same issues that’ve been hounding him the last 2 years or so, and this time circumstances have forced a change in arrangements at an ill-wanted time, but may well be the end of said issue at last… so here’s hoping. We’re not talking about the related but different issues that were on his case back in January, which we’re happy to say are relenting to a point they are manageable too. Those are quite personal and Unshi’ll perhaps speak to them someday when ready, but what matters is the current ones at hand.

Y’all may remember that in recent years Unshi lost his home in Catalonia some time ago and so had to up and move to Eastern Spain to make his new home. All this time along, he’s had ups and downs, but has always been in semi-permanent housing, working out of the backrooms of friends/significant other’s relations, etc. Well the good news is he’s at last got his hands on a new home of his own! The bad news, to be affordable what he’s got is a dilapidated more-than-fixer upper. That’s manageable though, with elbow grease and time. In fact, he and his other have been working through getting it all liveable in their spare time for a while. This was the kitchen a few weeks ago:

And now:

The plan here was to keep it low key moving, working on it some nights and over weekends until it was ready to move to and finally settle, but that timeline has been sped up at the cost to AoH since the beginning of April.

The place they are staying at currently decided not to renew the lease for another half-term, and about 2 weeks ago he got a notice to quit (after our Goals and Plans for April were drafted and published, FYI). May 1st, the locks change and he’s out. Off to the new place they go then, ready or not. So that’s what’s eaten his time up. His days are filled with amateur masonry, fumigation, heavy lifting (for a computers guy), painting and dealing with professionals coming and going as needed, relating Natasha to nights and weekends work where can be done after long days of physical labour. Hence, it’s been slow going. As one might suspect, the estimation of the work needed doing was under rather than over, again.

The good news here is that it’s all over May 1st, one way or another. He’s out of the old place and into the new, give or take a few days to unpack and settle as well as get internet set up, he should have a creative space of his own again by the latter part of the first week of May. The bad news is that until then it’ll be a rush of moving things and getting more restoration done, which is why we know that Agents of Heels will take until mid-to-late May to come to fruition. The place is starting to become liveable, so come May it should be the case he’s settled enough once and for all to start creating like his old self again from the days we made good time, making those 6-week cycles we aspired to in our Roadmaps more of a reality… And if not, there’ll be Hell to pay. Hell.

Plans for Intermediate Future/Summer/Catching Up on Plans

We’ve already covered how we plan to make the most of the situation for AoH and aiming to get finished with the current chomp of content above. We’ve also got our minds on what comes after ass we aim to get back on some sort of track forward into ever more tasty.

First and foremost, we’ll obviously be sending back links to Daring/Brave fans as per usual for March and now April, as the games release. That’s the least we can do.

After we do Natasha, next up in Noemi, and after that… We’re thinking Noemi again. It’s not the best practice to do multiples of one game after each other so much, but in this case it may well be the better options, even if we want to keep AoH going and getting close to v1.0 with all out hearts. Doing a double Noemi over the summer will more likely mean better chances of faster releases as the content for both v0.21 and v0.22 are written and ready, all they will need is art, so it’ll be good to test out Unshi’s new circumstances with them. They also will need some but a lot less newly arranged Pre-Production assets given the content they contain, which is a help. We expect that these will come up for release around about Late June/Early July and Mid-to-Late August respectively, giving us the space for 1 more AoH and possibly NTR before the years end if things hold up well. This is what we’re currently thinking on, however we feel like it may be prudent to make a formal ask of the fans what they want in this regard, since it’s you who are the ones we’re trying to make it up to after all this back and forth after all. So what do you all think? Let us know here or on Discord in the short term as a straw poll while we decide if a full polling will be necessary.

Lastly, we considered it as part of our planning, but we’ve decided against a pause in our Patreon charges for May, in part due to the reaction we got the last time we suggested it, and in part because getting behind on bills and payments is another shitstorm we don’t want compounding anything down the line, not when we’re trying so hard to dig out of this ditch as it is. We hope that by being upfront about May being our new targeted deadline that you all have the info you need to decide on support yourself. We’ll leave that side of things to individual discretions.

TL;DR

The quick summary of this whole big post is thus:

- Still working our way out of a hole. We’re not happy about it, but progress is progress.

- AoH hasn’t been progressing as well as we’d like, or much at all, in the last 2 weeks.

- Spook the writer will be taking the lead on development for the next few weeks in an attempt to drive production forward via the script side of things as we get a handle on the situation.

- The new expected release window is Mid-to-Late May.

- Unshi’s long troublesome living arrangement issues have worsened in the short term, but we hope this is the end of them. “Light at the end of the tunnel” he says.

- We’re considering another double helping of Noemi’s Toscana Rebirth to catch up on content come the summer months, but we’ll listen to fans’ input on this before we set into these in June.

Outro

As a footnote, we’d like to remind everyone to take the forecasts made here and elsewhere with a grain of salt. In the last while we’ve shown that getting a handle on expectations vs reality is harder for us than it used to be, and given the chaotic nature of things lately, we’re working off grounded but still mostly aspirational expectations and aims for the future. We’re doing our best to return to old consistent form. We’ll get there too, the only question is when will we have fully paid our dues and gotten back to a smoother time if things and life. Our deepest and sincerest apologies for what they are worth and thank you to those who have stuck by us and made keeping possible at all.

So that’s it, that’s you informed, and us without a further ado but to go get that script scripted and things moved hopefully for the last damn time. Onward we go then, we’ll see y’all again soon enough for something more delicious for that women-fuelled sweet teeth, whatever that may be! So until then…

Be better for all your troubles and beWilder!