Chapter 7 now in development (Patreon)

Hey everyone!

Break was nice and got to unwind and recalibrate myself. This week I'll be gathering my notes and start organizing the events that'll be taking place as we get closer to The Expo. I'll also be working on the new locations such as Kapuletti HQ, the Autumn Festival, MC's permanent home, just to name a few. I was hoping to play around with more Blender stuff while on break, fix some of the animations. For example one of Kindra's scenes, the camera moved too quickly. June's hair was a bit sparkly, Reina's hair was a bit too dark. The farmer's market scene was pretty rough. Some growing pains working with a new program. But like all things, it gets better as you learn. Back to what I was getting at, my render box was in dire need of maintenance. As I was rendering the new main menu that Puggy animated, my waterloop tapped out. Very thankful it got me to the very end of CH6. But with everything that went on last year, I hadn't got a chance to clean the waterloop. It's all clean now, I'm just waiting new parts to come in. I ordered some quick disconnects to make maintenance much easier and faster. I'll be working on coding and the script in the meantime.

Before and after

Below is the Q&A

Will we be seeing the mini games in other paths or parts of the story? For example say we are teaching Artemis how to shoot a gun. Would we have the shooting range mini game?

There will certainly be more and with other characters. I'm just careful to not make them a focus of Artemis and more of a short break from reading kind of thing. I also try and add them where they make sense. But time is also a major factor. For example, in CH5 you were supposed to play scrabble/wordle with Artemis when Aiden brought out the scabble tiles. Time is something I consider, and I had to cut her minigame due to time constraints. So, there will certainly be mini games in other paths and parts of the story.

How do you select your beta testers?

Beta testers are people I have to be very critical with when choosing. It requires a lot of trust, which is why all the people in my beta team are people I chat daily with and have been for a long while.

What are the toughest and easiest challenges, specifically program or machine wise, that you had to face during development of chapter 6.

I would have to say Blender was a challenge. It's a whole other beast compared to DAZ and requires a lot of manual adjustment, whereas with DAZ you can mostly get away with just plopping a character and an HDRI to get pretty decent results. Matching the lighting, skin textures, etc. It was a challenge. Easiest part was firing up DAZ :P Just kidding, easiest is probably my workflow of importing custom assets and clothing. While some still give me problems, I can still work with them fairly easily.

Walkthrough?

I do plan on having one integrated into the game. It's just one of those things that's in the backburner because development always takes precedence. And a walkthrough is considered extra work that can be put aside while I focus on the core parts.

...had another question: theres an in-game app that lets you check your standing among the potential love interests, but as some point (chapter 8 i think you said) we will move into pursing a single someone (with the exception of a throuple) exclusively. does this mean that app will change as well, will it evolve, or will it remain a constant reminder of what could have been *for that playthrough?

The app is an evolving thing. Some trivia, I actually took the scale from Dragon Age: Origins' affinity scale. I plan on cleaning things up with the apps. The wallpapers I'll be adding a number and possibly sort them by chapters for those who like to track that stuff can track it. Once I fix the music app (I hope to get to that this cycle), that'll be back in the phone app. In regard to the "BIOS" for the love interests, that'll also get tweaks. Clean things up, have notes show up regarding that LI, etc. There are other things I plan on adding/changing, but post CH8, it'll remain as a tracker. Listing points, etc.

What made you start working on AVNs? Is Artemis your first and do you have any plans after Artemis?

Yes, Artemis is my first AVN. Those on Discord often see me talking about plans for my next project. Taking what I've learned from Artemis, the biggest change in my next one after Artemis will be at maximum 5 romance options. Working on Artemis, 5 seems like a great number to balance core story and sub-story. The setting is going to be high fantasy. For those concerned; No, I'm not working on it. Artemis already takes a lot of time as it is. I'm just jotting notes, crafting characters, settings, worldbuilding basically.

I'm a big fan of writing stories. When I was younger, I'd staple printer paper together and create comics. When I got to high school, I got into filmmaking and 3D animation. In college I did more of it, writing more scripts. Then I realized my creativity overgrew budget, so I had to put things on ice while I focused on my degree and career. During all that I ran into a site called VDategames and an older AVN called "Getting to know Irene" I think? (it's been years). I thought it was real interesting format and looking at the scripts I wrote, I always felt they'd work better as novels. Working with 3D basically means the only budget you need to concern yourself with was the hardware you render on. And thus Artemis was born. Things were very rusty in the writing department and my eyesight was betraying me, but I pushed through it and glad I did.

I'm wanting to work on an AVN. One of my struggles is keeping motivated and I mean when dealing with negative comments. How do you deal with that and still stay motivated?

Lol, you're not gonna like my answer...

To put it bluntly. Who gives a shit what negative people have to say about your work? That's their goal, to kill your motivation. Humans have been human'ing for a very long time and it's nothing new. Mozart, Leonardo da Vinci, all those guys probably had people heckling them. Even today we live in a world where a lot of people seem to hate everything these days. Can't read about a movie or show or game without the overabundance of "I hate x because it's stupid". Stop caring what you read that kills your motivation and focus on your growth. Remember, it takes a lot of work and effort to create something. It takes little to no effort to destroy it. It's why these people choose to destroy. So, don't let it get to you.

On the flip side. Do pay attention to criticism that's constructive. Something that'll help you grow or make your work better. For example, I got a lot of upset readers because of the firm choices in Chapter 5 when the discernment protocol mechanic was introduced. They felt you were being too mean towards Artemis. So, I took that into consideration and put a lot more focus on planning these choices out for her protocol. Basically, look for things that can help you. Even if you may not agree with it completely. At the same time, make sure you're staying true to your vision. It's confusing, I know lol. But you'll get it in time.

That wraps it up! Next week I'll be going over some pending items (Artemis' cooing sound, etc.). I just didn't want this devlog to be a massive infodump since I did the Q&A.

Have yourselves a great week!

digi