Progress Report - Delay Probable (Patreon)

Yeah, I said I probably wouldn't make another progress report before the release. And, honestly, this isn't a post I wanted to make. But it's one I need to make. It wouldn't be fair to all of you not to. Ripping the bandaid off right up front...release of Left Hand Magic Build 7 is extremely likely to be a day or two late, despite my best efforts. 

*TLDR Version: The Explanation is long winded. If you don't want to read it all. The gist is that complications to rendering have resulted in a probable delay. Build 7 is likely to have its release pushed back to either the 1st or 2nd. Everything below is just a proper/full explanation of why.*

There are a number of reasons for this. Surprisingly, the whole 'Novus being sick' thing actually wasn't a major contributor. I'd love to blame things on that...but I'd be lying if I shoved it off on that excuse. While being under the weather for a few days did slow things down a little, the truth is that I'm pretty sure I wouldn't have quite made it even without that factor. I am, in fact, already about 90% better. And I was able to power through pretty well even when I was feeling like crap.

So...what actually caused the delay? 

I...uh...got overly ambitious again.

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Yeah, those of you have that have been around for a while probably just sighed. I feel you. I did the same thing. I know better. But...when I think of a cool thing to add, I can't help but want to actually add it, if I can. And it ultimately does usually make my games better in the long run. So, there's that. Even if it occasionally (like now) also means I bite off more than I can chew. Slightly. 

In this specific case, what happened was that I decided some of the new content would be better if there were variant options. As in, variant animations. So...that figure I gave in the last progress report, saying this build would have have 15 animations? That's kinda a lie. In reality, it will have 17. I just didn't count two of them because they are alternate animations. Same basic scene, technically the same animation files, but with characters in different positions based on choices made earlier in the game. Both of them, in fact, are Dom/Sub related variations. Something that I really want to start working more of into the game.

I honestly believe they are a good addition to the game. Unfortunately, they added additional render time. On their own, it wouldn't have been enough to cause a delay. I'd genuinely accounted for one of them...though the other was a bit of a spontaneous addition. Unfortunately, the additional render time for them collided with THE CURSED ANIMATION OF DOOM. 

No, seriously, I'm very suspicious that one of my animations was freaking cursed. It wasn't even a particularly complex animation! Yet nothing seemed to go right with the bloody thing. I'm pretty sure I legitimately ended up rerendering the same animation six or seven times. And the most aggravating part is that it wasn't even for MAJOR problems. It kept being for minor artifacts. Like the geoshell material for the MC's genitals breaking. And me not noticing during the test render due to it barely actually being visible in the scene (she's being eaten out in the animation in question). Or another time where I apparently loaded a version of Talia where her horn materials were brown instead of black like they are supposed to be >_<. Oh, and the time that I forgot to turn one of the light sources back on when I set it to rerender, having turned it off to get a better view of a trouble spot. Seriously. That animation had me wanting to punt a computer (not mine, they are way too expensive, just a computer in general) off a skyscraper.

The net result is that...I actually haven't finished rendering yet. Rendering was supposed to stop, aside from any 'forgotten renders,' of which there are always one or two, on the 28th. Instead, I'm still running the last set of animations through. And I have a list of five of those 'forgotten renders' to run when the animations are done. On top of that, I failed to account for the additional complexity that the alternate renders would add on the coding side. I just finished up figuring out how to actually do what I needed right before I started typing this monstrously over-long progress report. Coding for a scene that would have taken maybe half an hour, normally, ended up taking an hour and a half. And I still have to do another one like it.

At the end of day. I just don't think I can squeeze everything I still need to do into today and tomorrow. I'm still going to try. But I'm almost certain at this point that I'm going to fall short. I'm pretty sure I'll get the rendering, coding and writing all done by midnight on the 31st. But I'm also almost certain that I won't also be able to squeeze in the editing pass, testing, bugfix, and upload. Depending on just how bad the test/bugfix cycle is this time, there's a good chance I'll only be a single day late, releasing Build 7 on February 1st. If it's as screwy and time consuming as everything else about this build has been...it's possible that it might not get done until the 2nd. I don't expect the delay to stretch any longer than that, unless something goes badly wrong. 

Anyway. I apologize for the possible/probable delay :-(. And also for the super long progress report explaining things. I felt this one deserved a proper explanation, rather than just a notice...