Alpha Preview Update (September) (Patreon)

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Password: doyouremember_the21st ⬅ ❗️

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Incomplete routes guide ⬅ ❗️please check if you suspect your game ended early :)

What's New:

• 15,000 words of new content!

• New Ayla character interlude

• New Trouble character interlude

• Participate in a bizarre contest with Ayla

• Let your chaotic gremlin side take over or act like a mature adult in the face of fierce competition

• Surprise guest appearance by a fan-favorite character (...)

• Take in the sights with Trouble, with plenty of Ashtown (mis)adventures to spice things up

• Juicy progression for both Aylamancers and Troublemancers!

Developer's Notes:

Ciao, bellas! As with the last few updates, here are some more character interludes for you, hot off the press! I think both interludes show significant progression for slow-burners Trouble and Ayla, and I find that very exciting!

I had a big revelation about Ayla while writing her character interlude (which is quite chonky) this month. She really opens up when there's an activity for you both to partake in! Face-to-face and in an intimate, solitary setting, she kind of shies away from vulnerability and puts on more of an aloof facade, like when you're talking to her alone on the rooftop or at the bar. But distracted by some overarching activity to do together, however, she almost becomes like a different person, which is why you'll really see your relationship with her making leaps and bounds (platonically or romantically) this time... that is, if you play your cards right!

On the Trouble side of things, this interlude is also important for his character progression, though the effects here are more subtle. If you're romancing him, though, you can see him slowly starting to put certain pieces together if he got jealous over Cordy last time, lol! It's sort of like watching one of those ravens slowly put a stacking ring puzzle together, tilting their heads and eyeing the pieces calculating like... you can do it, buddy, you're almost there... 

But we are RAPIDLY approaching the point he's at in the swamp in Chapter 7, and it won't be long after that before things hit a breaking point... 🤔

That's about all I have for you this time! I wasn't able to work on my novel this month, for various reasons 🥲: we were visiting family at the beginning of the month and have been dealing with sickness and career stresses on top of that, so I've just been trying to keep my head above water these last few weeks! We're all better now, but it was just one of those months! I don't think I'll be able to keep up doing all 3 things (Twine conversion, novel writing, and Shepherds stuff) at the same time, so I'll either have to resign myself to not being able to push out the full Twine version before the end of the year (which I really randomly decided I should make my goal), or the novel will have to take more of a backseat again until I can get the Twine version done. We'll see which route I end up picking! Or maybe I'll just keep spinning all these plates at the same time and just seeing what happens!! 🤪🥴 I'm at a weird crossroads with the novel where it feels uncomfortable to keep flying by the seat of my pants and just cranking out totally unformed, unedited "zero draft" stuff and just seeing where it leads, but going back and polishing things up from the beginning also feels somewhat scary and unproductive and like I might get lost in the weeds... 🤔 You always have to wonder, which is more important? Building a complete (albeit sloppy) skeleton of a house first, or going back and laying down the foundation much more slowly and neatly, though at the risk of becoming so perfectionistic about it that you may never move past the brick-laying stage because you just keep resetting the bricks over and over again...

(... 🤔...)

Also, this month also marks the 18-month mark before our wedding! That sounds like a lot of time, but I'm honestly TERRIFIED... There's so much to do! 🥹😨 I probably look like a crazy person, emailing photographers and whatnot a whole 18 months out, but it makes me feel in control to check things off of the list lol! 🥹 But I've got to tackle one thing at a time...

Anyway, I very much hope you enjoy!!! 🙏 We broke 1.2 million words this month!

Total wordcount: 1,204,470 words without code

What's Next:

More character interludes! Riel, probably, and perhaps Lavinet or one of the others! We are QUICKLY approaching the point where we'll be ready to tackle the Ascendancy Festival and other holidays, and all that that entails... 👀

Thank you for reading, and I hope you're having a spectacular slide into fall! 🍁🍂