Progress Report - September 29, 2025 (Patreon)

Hello, everyone!

As the preview image for this week's Progress Report implies, the Frozen video is finally done rendering, after 2 solid weeks of the render machine running 24-hours nonstop and the main machine rendering overnight.

In the end, damn near a terabyte worth of raw images were rendered out. I ended up spending a full day just moving files off of my main work drive onto my NAS, just to make room for lifting the render machine's contribution and get it onto my main machine for working on.

The work isn't quite done yet, though. The next task to do is sound design. While I'm not going to add any sound effects to the video, I do still need to properly pan and mix what audio there is - Anna and Elsa themselves, obviously, but also things like the fireplace and the walla audio. It doesn't make sense for the fire to be as loud in a close-up with in view as in a wide-shot of the whole room for example, nor does it make sense for the amount of background chatter to be just as loud with 5 whole people in the scene as when there are 300 people in the scene.

The sound design won't be difficult. Just time consuming, as there is a bloody hour of it to do across several separate audio channels.

Once the sound design is done, the last thing to do is to put together the "Finish me" page for the video, which will contain a download for the entire source-file package sans audio, as well as some documentation on how to properly navigate the project files, for anyone brave enough to tackle finishing the video proper. I don't think anyone will tackle it, but in the event of, I want to make it as easy as possible for them.

Once all of that is done though, then it's just a matter of exporting out and uploading the videos. As always, the video will have two qualities between three resolutions - 720p, 1080p, and 2160p; each compressed and uncompressed. Unlike a traditional video release though, all six of them will be available to the public - the variants are just for convenience. EG, low-quality for people with weak Internet connections, 720p for people watching on mobile devices.

Seeing how this video is unfinished, it doesn't feel fair to properly paywall access to the higher quality versions. And seeing just how unfinished it is, my previous plans of discounting access to it honestly feel dishonest. I didn't really realize just how unfinished the video is when I previously discussed the release plans. But now that I've gotten very intimate with it in recent weeks, I just don't feel comfortable about it.

So I'll choke down the three-thousand-dollar investment that was voicing this project. Consider it subsidized by the various videos that have been released since the streams working on this video finished, back in October 2023.

I don't know when the video will finally be ready for release, but it'll be soon. It really mostly comes down to how much of a chore the mixing ends up being - that is the biggest unknown, and the biggest time-sink, right now.

Beyond the Frozen Video, a brief update on Micros!

So as you all probably know, the Pharmmetra Micros were sent out for voicing a few weeks ago. Both MidnightDatura and BordeauxBlack have sent in their audio a while back, for Symmetra and Pharah respectively; but as of last week, I hadn't heard anything back from Milly Stern and her Mercy audio.

Yesterday, I did finally hear back from Milly. She has aspirations for getting the audio to me by end-of-day tomorrow, though we'll see how that actually pans out. Apparently, her husband was badly injured at work ten or so days back, to the point he needs her assistance for doing most things, including being driven to the various appointments that he needs to jump through to convince his employer to pay workers' compensation for the injuries. Given how Milly and her family live in Texas, you can imagine how much of a fight they have been embroiled in to get the employer to actually pay out. And understandably, that has been Milly's priority for the past two weeks.

It sounds like the worst of the fight is over though, and she's expecting to be able to get her schedule back to normal. Again, we'll see how that actually pans out - I know from experience that these things have a tendency to drag on long after the dust has seemed to settle. Hell, just a few months ago I received an email regarding that six-car pileup I was involved in all the way back in 2022.

Of course, I haven't been idle during the wait. A few days ago, I processed all of the audio I do have, and put together a really quick little teaser of just how fantastic a performance Datura puts on for this project. Unfortunately, Patreon doesn't seem to allow embedding videos in posts, and since the whole point of this preview is the audio, a GIF won't work. So you'll have to click through this link for the preview. It's just a single line of dialogue, and there is no complementary audio yet, but it's a real sizzler in my opinion!

Forward progress has also been made on the Primordium Micro Arc. While strictly speaking, the first episode violates the "one animation and one finisher" ethos of Micros, I think Triss having a one-woman orgy with herself more than justifies the expense of the work. I still find it kinda hard to believe that, for as wild as Triss' episode is, it's probably the tamest of the three. In my opinion, at least.

I haven't gotten around to writing Ciri's episode out yet, though. That is still something I want to do soon. Especially since, with Milly's schedule hopefully returning to normal, I am feeling less reticent about the three Micro projects I have that I want to involve her with. I love her to death, but I won't lie when I say that the weeks without communication were making me nervous about this being a good time to involve her with projects. Obviously she had her reasons, as explained above, but nevertheless.

Similarly, I have made some progress - and some changes - to the Marshpricefield Micro Arc. You may recall last week how I made a point of how each episode had multiple animations assigned to it, and how it may end up being the case that I will atomize the episodes further, depending on how long the individual episodes run.

Well, I started putting together the first episode of the planned arc, and the first animation by itself ended up running nearly a minute. I internally debated what to do about that, and ultimately decided to split the first episode into three episodes. The reasoning is that it's the same amount of animation work either way, resulting in three one-minute-long episodes rather than one three-minute-long episode, but with less of a production burden on me and my sound designer, since the episodes can be produced and released independently. And it allows me more breathing room to explore each animation - a three-minute long Micro is already on the extreme far end of where I want them to be, but as individual episodes they can each be, for example, 90 seconds long - the perfect length for a Micro video.

However, beyond just the decision to split the first episode into three episodes, I also decided to split the thesis of the first episode into an entirely new arc. So, the Marshpricefield Micro Arc has been pushed back, with the new Stuck-Max Micro Arc taking its place.

The title for the arc comes from the thesis of the first episode - that Max is stuck and unable to orgasm. Chloe makes it her mission to make Max cum, and even though she ends up cumming first, she is undeterred and determined to make Caulfield squeal. In the original episode, Chloe cums once, during the second animation; and Max finally cums during the third animation.

However, with this expansion into a new Micro Arc, Chloe cums during each animation, and Max only cums on the last one. And instead of 3 animations, there are now 8. Meaning that the Stuck-Max Micro Arc is 8 episodes long. The animation preview at the top of this section is a draft from Episode 5 - it is a position I wasn't certain I could even physically pull off, and so I ended up putting it together early just to see if I had to change my plans.

You can actually click here to watch the WIP draft that compelled this tactic change. All of the animation and cinematography seen in it will stay in the final version of the Arc shift. The very last shot, with David trying very hard to ignore the sounds of his stepdaughter having sex upstairs, will remain but have its dialogue changed to perpetuate the current animation. And then the animation will continue after the shot with David, and will quickly segue into Chloe cumming, Max apologizing, and Chloe refusing to let Max off so easy (and get off so hard).

I have aspirations to have every episode of this Arc include a little bit of situational humor courtesy David and Joyce. David, as demonstrated in the above WIP draft, is very uncomfortable with the idea of Chloe having sex in general, let alone having sex upstairs while he's in the house. He is very much a patriarchal conservative, with a strong "sex is something we don't think about outside of doing it ourselves" mindset. Joyce, by comparison, is extremely open-minded about it all, and is just happy to see Chloe in love. She's seen Chloe ruminating in darkness for the past five years, alternating between different phases of rebellion and moodiness - seeing Chloe truly happy and loving life is the best thing she could ask for. And the fact that Chloe has gotten together with her childhood best friend, whom Joyce has always loved like a daughter herself, is even better - she knows Max is good for Chloe.

An example I have in mind for David and Joyce hijinks is for Episode 4: Joyce announces aloud to the girls that she's made lunch, and is in the middle of asking if the two of them are hungry when she opens the door to Chloe's room - to find Chloe and Max eagerly 69'ing each other. To which Joyce just notes with a deadpan that the two apparently are already eating, turns around, closes the door, and walks off.

I also have a real shitpost of an ending in mind for the Arc, but I want to keep that one a surprise. I only bring it up to really reinforce the point that I am sprinkling a healthy dose of humor into this particular Micro Arc.

The last major thing I want to mention for this week's Progress Report is that I have started design work for a new game idea!

If you can't tell from the fact this is now like the fourth time I have used this mood poster, I have returned once again to the general scifi idea. This time around though, I'm feeling pretty confident on the idea. I think it has some real legs. And tits.

The current working title for the project is STARSAIL BORDELLO, and the high-level premise is that you assume the role of a prostitute who has stolen a ship from her abusive Headmistress and has set out to make a revolutionary mobile brothel, traveling from place to place across the star system avoiding her mercenaries that are hunting you down to get her property (that's you) back.

At the same time, you are working to build up a reputation as not only a whorehouse that can compete in prestige and services with the Headmistress' premium sex-work empire, but as a Madam who treats her girls with the dignity and respect they deserve. By running the Headmistress' satellite brothels out of business, and convincing her highest-performing prostitutes to abandon their contracts and join your bordello, you will ultimately break the iron grip she has had on the sex industry in this star system.

It is then that the ultimate fate of her Empire is decided: will she offer an armistice, calling off her mercenaries and allowing your traveling brothel to operate in coexistence with her own greatly-diminished brothel network? Will she refuse to back down, resisting your efforts to run her out of business till the very end, requiring you to tackle her brothel in the very capitol of the government and dismantle it, converting one prostitute after another until she has quite literally nothing left? Or will she see the writing on the wall, handing over what remains of her empire to fall under your own control, and herself become a prostitute under your generous employ?

The outcome all depends on how you run your bordello, how you treat your girls, and how you manage dismantling her empire.

That's right, you read all that right. This is quite literally a "war of the whores" story. Brothel versus brothel. A real "Star Whores/Wars", if you will.

At this point, the game is extremely early in the design phase. I have drafted out the high-level setting, the travel mechanisms used to navigate it, and the head-hunter system that serves as the primary driver of gameplay. The game design is taking heavy inspiration from the pilot to 2004's Battlestar Galactica, the episode "33", where the Cylons are chasing the Fleet and they are required to jump to a new location every 33 minutes. Similarly, in STARSAIL BORDELLO, the Headmistress' mercenaries are constantly chasing you down, requiring you to always be on your feet and ready to jump away if they get too close.

All of this is complicated by the fact that traveling isn't as simple as clicking a spot on a fast-travel map: your ship's engines have a prolonged charge-up time, during which time the mercenaries are getting ever-closer. The engines also have a cool-down, which you can play safe and wait out, or cancel for faster jumps at the expense of damaging your ship. Similarly, not all jumps are created equal: the headhunters are able to keep track of how far away you jump. Short jumps in local space only buy you a bit of time; it requires longer jumps across space, which not only require expensive fuel but can only be performed using jump gates, to more thoroughly shake your tail. And the largest purchase of time comes from making jumps into more dangerous space.

Of course, you have to remember that you're not the Battlestar Galactica - you're a spacebound whorehouse (a great alternate title for the project, I have to say). You're regularly entertaining customers, and you can't exactly just kidnap them and jump away several light-weeks with them onboard. So if you're not careful and keeping an eye on the radar, the headhunters might just find you with your pants down - literally!

And all of what I just described is just the cat-and-mouse mechanisms of the game. More broadly, the game is being modeled very much after the base-building aspects of the Firaxis X-Com games: your ship has a certain number of available rooms, each of which you have to expend resources to upgrade for specific purposes. Some of these rooms are for the bordello itself, such as bedrooms for sex, clubs for shows, and studios for films. Others are for maintenance, such as quarters for crew (you don't expect the prostitutes to fix the ship themselves, do you? They're busy ladies!), cafeterias for food, and lounges for recreation. And others yet are for utility, such as scanners for keeping tabs on the headhunters' pursuit, cargo bays for storing the discerning number of condoms kept on board, or accelerators for speeding up how quickly the ship can jump from location to location and stay ahead of the headhunters.

The general design I have in mind for the game is that you will be compelled to constantly build more rooms into your ship. Eventually, you will run out of available slots, necessitating having to purchase a larger ship. This serves as both a progress gate, and a progress milestone: ships are massive investments, so you will need to be running a moderately successful whorehouse to be able to afford it. And larger ships are, by their nature, easier to find - buying a larger ship increases how quickly the headhunters can find you, meaning you will have to expend even more resources to upgrade your ship's mobility, and be more tense and alert as to the mercenaries' whereabouts.

All of which is compounded by the fact that, as you play the game, you will naturally be bringing more prostitutes aboard that you have to manage. The game is (accelerated) real-time-with-pause, meaning that not only will you have to micromanage your resources and the various rooms you have to construct, you will also have to micromanage your girls' time, making sure everyone is getting the proper rest and self-care they need while also not wasting working time sitting on their currently-unfucked asses. The ideal pacing I am aiming for is that the game is a pot of water on low heat, a gradual simmer of complexity and intensity, such that you never fall into complacency, but also never feel overwhelmed.

I want the game to keep you on the edge of your seat, as you edge yourself to the game, at all times.

As I said above, I am still very early in design. Outside of some of the major systems that drive the game, I am currently focusing on writing a "playthrough," where I detail in exhausting detail the entire player experience, from the moment you hit "new game" to when the credits roll. The idea of the playthrough is that it reads like a walkthrough to an existing game, explaining exactly how to play the entire game.

I am currently early into writing the tutorial for the playthrough. Doing so has already shown I will have to build a few systems I didn't previously anticipate, such as a dialogue system (the tutorial involves the ship AI talking with the player character) and a quest system (the tutorial starts with the FTL damaged and unusable, and requires hiring an engineer to fix it).

I don't know how extensively these systems will be used outside of the core game design, though I do know I have vague notions of having interested recruits ask if they can whore for you, as well as having the girls periodically voice their envy for their coworkers' huge tits, so I'm sure I can put the conversation system to good use once it's built.

Similarly, I haven't figured out exactly how the process of convincing the Headmistress's top prostitutes to join you will work yet; I am certain the quest system can be leveraged there in some way. Maybe each lady has some unique requirements you have to fulfill before she can be convinced to break contract and have the Headmistress hunt her down alongside you, that would be a natural fit for tracking in the existing quest system.

The long-term goal here is, once I have the design fleshed out and moderately locked down, I want to start using the Sunday streams to work on it, just like we did with Slut Squad last year. It will be built in Unreal Engine 5, and the intent is for the game--if it ever actually becomes playable--to be entirely free to play, with no monetization at all. This is in equal parts because it is being built using assets from other games (such as the Dead or Alive ladies for characters), and also because I'm not making this game out of any interest in making money; I'm making it because I've wanted to be a game developer since I was 10 years old, and I want to be able to look at 20-years-past me and say we finally did it. I want to make this game because I just want to make a game.

At any rate, that's all for now!

Things are cooking along as always. I apologize to anyone who was looking forward to the Marshpricefield threesome. It is still planned, but it will be sometime after this new Chloe/Max Micro Arc, which it will lean on for implicit context. The whole point of that first episode was to establish that Chloe and Max are together and they fucc; having an entire Arc dedicated to that serves just as well, and provides more content besides, while keeping the Marshpricefield Micro Arc more focused on the Marshpricefield.

Until next week everyone! And the Frozen video may get an official release post earlier than that! We'll see!