Monthly Update - September 2020 (Patreon)

 Hi everyone! 

It's been a very busy month over here - as you've probably seen, we released the extended demo last month on the 15th, along with a brand new beta build that goes up to the end of the common route. If you haven't checked them out, please do!

The Divine Speaker

Art

This month, we've been focussed on completing additional sprites we need for the full game. We still have a handful to go, but we've knocked out quite a few of them!  If you're on the $7+ tiers, you would have seen them, but for thos that aren't... here's a little teaser of the one we're working on next:

Wow... who is this handsome man...? Leos, what a glow up.

All four of the main characters are getting new winter sprites as they venture into the cold capital, Sid Caeham. You can view the completed Cyne and Raen sprites on the $7+ tier, as well as other brand new characters.

Writing

As you know, writing and editing on both Fawn's route and Cyne's route has been completed. We also reported last month that Leos' outline had been completed, with the last of the plot points decided on.

We've been hard at work with Leos since then, and his route is around half way completed (~37,000 words). Some routes events are common between all three, so we hope to have his route completed in the next month easily.

Here's a little preview from his route. He seems to have encountered a suspicious individual.

And a second little preview... it seems the two of them are finally getting closer...?

Programming

We're still awaiting the last two winter sprites before we begin programming in the character routes. Once we can start that, it shouldn't take us long to have 2/3 routes in game and ready for testing.

While we've been waiting, we've been working on adding additional journal entries to the rest of the common route.

It actually takes a lot of time to work out where each should go, when it should update, when a journal entry has become out of date, when Raen's opinion on a character has changed... you get the idea. It's a lot more work that it seems to be. Luckily, we've had some great comments about how useful it's been, so it's worth the extra work.

The other thing we're doing is adding some additional effects to some scenes. Snow, rain, etc.

Voice Acting

In super exciting news, voice acting for the rest of the common route is well underway, and the voice files are currently sitting with our audio editor waiting to be edited before they can go in game.

Here's a little look at our schedule:

As you can see, lots of new Illran and Veras content (so we hope you liked them!).

For context, we've so far completed scripts 1-2 and 8-9. The VA for Nox had a mic issue but luckily it has now been resolved, so we'll jump back to 3-4 tomorrow.

Once this is complete, we'll need to jump straight into one of the routes. At the moment, we're thinking of voicing Cyne's first.

Steam Release

As you may have already seen - we're officially live on Steam! You can download the extended demo there, and any updates will download by themselves. No need to download the whole thing again on itch.io! 

If you like the game, we'd really appreciate it if you would wishlist the game on Steam. It really helps! As always, you have to be signed in to view the page.

You can check it out here! 

Patreon, Beta Builds and Merch

We can't thank you all enough for supporting us as we create The Divine Speaker. We hope you've all enjoyed being on this ride with us!

We have a couple of updates to our Patreon. Firstly, our brand new beta build. It goes up until the end of the common route  (around an additional 40-45,000 words). We hope to update it soon with the new winter sprites, as well as the voice acting. 

Also, we've also signed up to something new to thank all of our Patrons - Merch for Membership. This new offering from Patreon lets you be rewarded for staying on certain tiers for three months with physical merch at NO extra cost to you, not even shipping. Everything is covered! 

It costs us some money, but it's something we really wanted to do to thank you all.

Here's a little look at the first lot of merch. We'll be updating the designs periodically, so make sure to get in if there's something you like:

Art Contest

We recently hit 3,000 followers on Twitter, so we decided to run an Art Contest! It's running across Twitter, Tumblr and Instagram, so you can pick your platform of choice.

 To win, create an artwork of any characters from the game and hashtag it with #TDSartcontest. SFW and NSFW is allowed, and you have until the 3rd of October (12pm AEST) to submit! 

The reward this time is a custom, physical artbook from us, especially made for you, as well as access to the newest beta build at the time. We also have a second prize that includes just the beta build.

We're really excited for this, so we hope you'll participate! Any skill level is encouraged to participate.

If you want, go chuck us a follow on Twitter to keep up to date with news like this.

Beyond the Abyss

We don't have any huge updates for the game - as you may know, we're waiting to complete the writing after Leos' route is complete. It still sits at about halfway done, with a full outline ready to go, so the rest of the writing won't take long.

Programming wise, we're been working on adding in additional sprites as we get them, to speed up the process of adding the story later.

Speaking of new sprites... take a look at this one! 

And a little preview in game:

(They won't actually both be naked in this scene... just for... "testing")

Next, Juni is working on another character's sprite. Here's what he looks like, for those that have forgotten:

On top of this, she's also working on some additional arm variants to the original sprites.

That's all for this month! We hope you enjoyed these updates, and we're looking forward to next months update. We'll work on completing the end of Leos' route, as well as (hopefully!) starting programming on the character routes.