NaNoRenO2020 - Week 5 Devlog

Week 1 | Week 2 | Week 3 | Week 4 | Week 5 (You Are Here)

"There's something about looking up at tree branches that allows me to feel that I am really here. Alive, on this intricate Earth. Which is one of my favourite things to feel." -John Green, Let's take a walk.

This month's Current Events have been making me really appreciate the simple pleasures in life. I've been feeling the sun on my face through the south-facing windows. Listening to and admiring the birds outside. Watching the way tree branches create those odd, black, fracture-like images against the blue-pink sky that your eyes can get lost in.

I've been playing DnD with friends on Discord. I've been spending the evenings drinking tea and chatting with other VN devs through the microphone. I'm thankful to have found this community of people.

Anyway.

Here's what I've been up to this week relating to the NaNoRenO game jam:

Art Assets

I've been making are like a monster this week. I've been trying to do a minimum of three art assets per day. All the art assets are now completed, and I'm very excited for you to see them. I'll have more screenshots to post publicly once they're added into Ren'Py.

Music

Paul Robins has Tweeted another clip of Dear Devere's OST.  He said the following in the post, which I adore:

"Another bit of music from Dear Devere. It was a nice challenge writing the music for this game. There was no multitude of instruments to use or clever production techniques to fall back on. It was about the simplicity & finding the right tone in the music."

I'm now in the process of adding the music to the different scenes of the visual novel.

Programming

With all the art assets done, I'm now concentrating on building the game in the engine that Dear Devere will be using: Ren'Py. Making a game build is the process of taking all the parts (text, audio, art, etc) and programming them into the game's engine.  I made a post on Twitter with a screenshot of the script in Editra.

Marketing

I Tweeted a meme this week. And then another.  I have more, which I'll post as I get closer to releasing the visual novel, as well as some time after.

I also plan on making a list of reviewers and YouTubers I'd like to contact about Dear Devere once the visual novel is ready to play.

Voice Acting

Almost all the voice acting had been recorded! I'm in the process of adding it into Ren'Py. I'm really looking forward to showing you what the voice actors have brought to the main characters.

SFX

I've added in the majority of the sound effects. There's a "latch opening" sound effect that I need to edit, but aside from that, they have all been converted into .ogg files and added into the script.

Next Week

My plans for next week are to:

1. Build a version of Dear Devere.
2. Send it to a playtester.
3. Build a version with the feedback and fixes.
4. Release the game.

While I'm doing those steps, I'll also need to:

• Finish converting all the audio into .ogg files.
• I'll also need to finish writing and programming in the Descriptive Text (for the visually-impaired), as well as edit some of it because of changes I made to the art assets.
• I also want to add a new text style (changing the text's font, size, and colour) for some of the text displayables in the VN.
• Program in the game's credits, now that the art assets are ready.
• Program in the game's splashscreen that displays when you open the game.
• Edit the game's Easter Egg, because due to Current Events that happened this month: I wrote the Easter Egg at the beginning of March, and so much had happened since then that the Easter Egg hasn't aged well.

See you next week, hopefully.

-Katy133