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Artemis DevLog - CH5

Happy new week!
Another busy week but the list has shrunk significantly. This week I'll be wrapping up renders that need to be cleaned up or corrected that remain as well as finalize some special effects, aka scenes that are through Artemis' POV. Next week will be laying down the tracks and sound effects and testing of the final build before releasing.

Big relief to finally be at this point. The SD cards won't be in the release build because those aren't finished and since they're just bonus content, I figured it's best to just do those during release week. Before I take my 1-2 weeks off, I'll be working on the SD card renders and address any bugs that may have slipped by. Then include the SD card renders with the patch. Again, since those renders are considered bonus content, I figured this would be a good route.
Thanks everyone and I hope the weather has finally cooled in your area. I'm certainly enjoying the change.

- digi.B

Chapter 3 - Dev Log #19
Hello,
So, I started putting the first renders into the game and began testing.
The current numbers are:
Chapter 3: (1650 ->) 1680
Chapter 3x5: ( 505 ->) 560
Most of my time is currently spent on the phone for Summer's Gone.
As mentioned before, WiAB will get the Phone with Chapter 3x5 too.

And as always, there isn't much to say during the release weeks. It's always kind of a drag and mentally exhausting. (Especially with both games releasing less than a month from each other.)

Previews:
Some rare previews this time... (4K attached.)
Regret.


I slowed a little down with the work capacity.
In the past, release weeks really left me mentally exhausted & destroyed, but this time I'll not go crazy and rather focus on a consistent and healthy output.

SG is going to be released before WiAB, but as soon as the inital burst of potential bug fixes for SG is over, I'll release WiAB asap.
I just don't want to be bombarded with major bug fixes for two games at once.

- Ocean

Hi, guys.
I will be ready to start testing sometime next week. There are always things that need fixing and changing, so testing will likely take a couple of weeks after that.

Thanks,
DB

Hello, everyone!

I hope you're all doing well. Things are all good on my side of things.
I apologize I haven't made a post sooner, but I didn't have much to report besides I've been grinding away at the update. Things are taking longer than I expected, and I thought I would be finished with the update by now, but it's never that easy, and things don't always go my way.
But I am making pretty good progress and getting close to the end. Since the last Dev Update, I have started on the last part. It took me over a week to get all assets ported and scenes all set up for posing and rendering. That included four different scene changes in the last part. All focused on Skylar. I have now finished two of the four scenes in her part. And I'm now on the last two scenes, both of which are hot and spicy with a ton of animations. After these two scenes, there will be a tiny outro scene, and the update will be done.

One of the reasons this update is taking longer is that this is the first update to have two sex scenes that go all the way. There is usually only one per update. And those animations take a long time to do. And you know me, I don't just add two animations and call it a day. I like to do the teasing and flirting, then the foreplay, and then hornplay. I don't know what hornplay is, but it's funny to me now, and I'm going to stick with it. There are also a couple of other minor gallery scenes added too.

While I've been working on this last part, I already let my testers and proofreaders get a headstart on the update. So they have a 75% done update to work on. This should save time in the end. And I should add that they have already finished. So with all that said, I'm getting close to the end. I just have a huge boss rush of animations, and the update is finished. I don't know how long it will take to do all these animations, but I don't want to rush them. Hopefully, it's not going to take too long. Currently, I have around 1200 images and 130 animations. Also, I'll post a bunch of previews today.

Thanks for your patience, everyone. We are almost there.
And a few previews for our viewing pleasure:



Cheers!!

Artemis DevLog - CH5​

Happy new week everyone!

Things continue to stay busy. I unfortunately wasn't able to get the next build for testing to the testers like planned over the weekend. The last build didn't have the mini-games implemented and was something I was working on this week. There were two mini-games planned for CH4 that I had tossed to the cutting room floor, mainly because they were pretty gimmicky and served no purpose other than have something to do during the Halloween party. For CH5, all of the planned games revolve around characters. And I plan each game to be set up to be an activity to interact with whoever you're hanging out with. For example Paige and her enjoyment playing basketball. Naomi at the gun range, etc. This time around, I wanted to go a bit further to make it a bit more "lively" as opposed to click this, click that. I wanted visual responses from the character. If you're beating them, they react however they react. Naomi for example will give credit where it is due but will talk shit if you fumble. Paige will support your efforts even if you played poorly. So I had to tweak some things and add additional renders for this play out for the games planned for this chapter. You can still skip all mini-games, I just hope this addition to the games will encourage more to play with them on.

I also invested a large sum of money into a pretty robust sound effects library. One of my bottlenecks is usually the sound effects department. I did buy my own field recorder so I can record those real obscure sounds when needed. However, I still struggled for things like dogs or bear roars (or wolves...hint). Sure, I could go on YouTube and spend hours looking for a good sound to rip, which I had done before. This method though you risk either low quality sound or having to filter out some background noise as best you can. And I just want to pump as much production quality into my projects as much as possible. So I'm really excited about this investment. Once this chapter is out, I also plan to update the old sound effects used in the previous chapters.

To remain transparent, I want everyone to know that as much as I had hoped to have CH5 out by the end of this month, it would be cutting it really close to comfortably say that. I admit I've let the stress of this release nearing a year since the last chapter get the best of me and I just need to accept it and just maintain focus on delivering a solid release for you guys. Once this release is out, I can re-evaluate things better for a more timely release for CH6.

I genuinely appreciate all the support given, the pats on the backs, the atta boys and all that jazz. After this chapter release, I will do another ask me anything if you guys have questions either about me or Artemis, or anything else. If there's enough interest, we could do one live on Discord. But until then, it's back into den I go to get this update wrapped up!
thank you again and I hope everyone has a great week.

- digi.B

CH05 Status Update #44
Hello, everyone!

This week was a nice grind. Lots of extra little tasks got done, including plenty of coding and SFX. The rendering out and creation of new content also went well. There's still some content creation remaining, but we can finally breathe a sigh of relief as this stretch is coming to an end. For you, the player, the updates may be over in hours or even mere minutes, but for us it took hundreds of hours (and copious amounts of caffeine) to reach this point. Such is the creator's life.

But at last, we're proud to finally have the news that you want to hear...

Release dates!

Enthusiast+ tiers: Friday, October 13th
Player tier: Sunday, October 15th

Initially we had our sights on October 10th, but something about the 13th just seemed to better represent our feelings regarding this longer development cycle...

These dates aren't 100% set in stone, but we are quite confident announcing them as the math seems to check out. If anything changes, we'll be sure to announce it well ahead of time since nobody likes delays. Well, maybe someone does... but not us!

Other news

Earlier today we posted a preview of CH05 featuring Bree. There will be one last preview before this update is released, and that one will be of Mia. You can find Bree's preview here.
The monthly special poll is also up as of this weekend, and the current leader is Sophie.

TL;DR Soon.

Cheers and have a great weekend!

Robison & Npx

И пинап - Эмма в большом городе

Chapter 3 - Dev Log #18
Hello,
Chapter 3 Status
So, just as last time, the PC is rendering pretty much 20/7 and the queue is down to around 115 renders.
I'd say postwork is sixty percent finished, and yeah.

I mentioned before that I would reveal something after this update... But let me do it now for transparency's sake.
As much shit as I give the A6000 for its lackluster speed that rivals a crawling SG Victoria... It gave me the possibility to do something amazing.
I can work on two scenes simultaneously.
"Okay... Cool... What does this mean?"
It means I found a way to turn all the crappy loading times/Crashes/freezes into something productive... One scene is being saved/loads an asset ----> I work on the other one in a different Daz instance.
I've been doing that for like 2 months and Chapter 3.5 is already 500 renders in. (30% done).
I, of course, can't show any previews of the update that comes after the still-unfinished update... But yeah, I found a way to increase productivity immensely and can now work on two updates at once while I'd normally wait for Daz to finish number 2.

Of course, now that Chapter 3 was the first one to get this double treatment, it suffered from not having any momentum and taking an initial hit.
But from Chapter 3.5 onwards, updates should be coming out faster for WiAB.
The numbers don't lie.
And from now on I will give numbers for two updates.
Chapter 3 = ~1650 renders (98% done)
Chapter 3.5 = 504 renders (30% done)
And yes, we're counting in half-chapters after this one to keep the numbers lower.
Previews:
I didn't want to preview Ni at first but... I already showed her before... Sooo... 4K is attached.


I will get a workstation in the next couple of months, but this also showed me how important multiple PCs are... With every single PC, I can cut down the queue time a lot...
I guess I'll become a PC collector... with an electricity bill that's going to rival my rent.

I'll see you in two weeks.
- Ocean

V0.14 Progress Update 08/09/23
Hi, guys.
I just wanted to update you on a couple of things, but first I'd like to thank everyone for the messages and comments of support after my previous post about my sister. I appreciate it and am sorry I couldn't reply to them all.
I've been back working all week, but I'm sure there are going to be some ups and downs over the next few weeks, so I'm sorry if there is any further disruption to the schedule. They are preparing to operate on my sister and remove the tumor, but there are complications and no date has been set yet.
And, finally, regarding the rework I have been working on, I still have a lot of work to do on it and don't want to delay the release of v0.14 any further. Therefore, I'm going to get v0.14 done as soon as possible and then finish the rework afterwards.

Thank you for your support.
DB​

Artemis DevLog - CH5
Good M-...Afternoon!
Last week was a helluva week. Processing the renders was a grueling process. Processing means I drag them into Photoshop into a template that automatically downscales them from 4K to 1080 and I color correct any that need to be. As well as correct any quick fixes like clipping. I managed to get a head start not long ago, but it was still a lot. This update is about 4300 renders big and processing roughly 3000 last week was mind numbing. I also found an issue with one scene where the teeth were badly rendered most likely due to the lighting for this scene. The character looked like a methhead and since this is a key character and a fan favorite, I I needed to address it.

After adjusting the settings, I managed to figure out what was causing this and adjusted it. Bottom image I was able to tone down the odd darkening of the teeth and whiten them a bit.

Fortunately, I don't have to open every single save to fix this. I just needed to review which shots were bad then open those files in notepad and tweak the one setting and save it. So I can't emphasize enough how saving your scenes uncompressed can really help you in situations like this. I'm still using these junk renders for the beta version while the fixes render out.



Beta testing did get a slight delay. On top of the render reviews; inserting the renders into the code took me a significant amount of time. The majority of it was done over the weekend and it's all I've been doing today. There are 5 scenes I've still got left to insert into the code and add whatever image sequences are needed. Beta team should be testing tonight/tues morning. Depending on how fast I can wrap up this part of the build.

If you're on Discord, I'll shoot a message in the announcement channel so everyone there knows when the team has received the build. It won't be a ping since that seems excessive. But I do want to keep everyone informed.

See you all next week and be safe and hydrated!

-digi.B

Hi, guys.
If you're on the Discord server, you may have noticed that I have been quiet for the last five days. Unfortunately, I received the bad news that my sister has a tumor, and I have been waiting to hear the test results to determine whether or not it is cancerous. I've just found out that it is.
This news has come as a complete shock, and my emotions have been all over the place. I've found it hard to get much of anything done this week, so I won't be posting the usual progress update tomorrow.
I'm sorry for the delay. Now I know the test results, I will be able to get my head straight and get back to work.
Thanks,
DB

Chapter 3 - Dev Log #17
Hello,
So...
Short and to the point today.
For the past 11 days, I've been documenting a lot of stuff during development... But the sample size is still too small to present some real data.
I'll probably give you some insights in the next Log.

1. Status Chapter 3
Productivity has been off the charts since I started documenting, but the A6000 and the size of the bar environment and all its people are slowing everything down.
Sadly, this is out of my control at the moment.
I started doing postwork while the queue runs through, but just to give an idea of how long it takes...
In 14 hours of rendering, it finishes 7-9 renders.
And keep in mind that it can't render while I set stuff up.
We're creeping to the finish line, but it also gives me more time to test and polish.

2. Previews
First official Ni (Dana) preview.

Some Miru tiddies.


So yeah, what can I say...
I'm waiting for the queue to finish... There are around 350 renders in it, and I need to set up around 70-100 more.
I'm not sure which game will be released first now.
SG is further ahead in renders but needs all the phone coding and testing.
WiAB is only waiting for the queue to run down and won't get the phone until Chapter 3x5 or Chapter 4.
From there I will just copy and paste the phone code from SG into WiAB, but with a different design.
We'll see... In the next log I will reveal some of my documented insights, which should be a new level of transparency when it comes to the daily output and work involved.

Thank you for your support, and have a nice week!
- Ocean

Artemis DevLog - CH5
Good morning!
Posting this one a bit earlier than usual. I mentioned passing on an early alpha/beta last week and after looking at the script. I felt if I just kept focus and pushed, I'd get this last scene finished. Which I am very glad to say that got it done just now. This scene ended up being just over 600 renders by itself. Scenes on average are usually 30-120 renders long. Very few go past that. The server is currently chomping away at these renders.
There are still a very small handful of renders I need to do/re-do. One scene that involves a bit of choreography, so I held off on those so I can better plan them out. I added three more people to the beta team, two whome are devs I'm tight with and one of them being Stew who devs Unbroken. He'll be helping me out with the choreography I mentioned earlier. It's nice to finally be at this point though. This week, I'll be cleaning things up and going through the renders and inserting them into the code for the beta testing for the weekend.
It's 7AM right now and barely heading off to bed. So sorry for any typos/odd phrasing lol. Going to take it easy today and will start the processing tonight and throughout this week so the testers can get testin'!
Also, to answer a few questions asked from last week. Old saves should work. I generally don't do major changes to code/variables for previous chapters. So I don't see any issues with saves. But I'll be sure to report it if the testers encounter this.
Also, the program I used for the clothing simulation is Marvelous Designer.
Have yoursleves a great week and be safe out there!
- digi.B

CH05 Status Update #41
Hello, everyone!
Status update #41 coming up! This week we've been hitting the remaining content hard. Mainly renders, but also a couple of animations. Not much remains when looking at the screenplay, and the biggest task soon is rendering everything out. Including, of course, all the animations. Last weekend we did some playtesting and made some editing decisions. We decided to cut a couple of planned animations as they were not necessary. This saves us some rendering time, which will be reallocated to other, more important animations. The kind people play for.

Looking back on the chapter and its content, it's one big ass update... It will effectively double the size of the game in one release. Speaking of chapters, future updates will no longer be called "chapters". There are many reasons for this and they are all over the place, but you can expect the updates to be called 0.6, 0.7, 0.8 etc. in the future instead. For the time being, we will still be referring to CH05 as CH05 instead of 0.5.

We also did quite a bit of editing and scripting this week, including some Ember and phone content for future cha... updates. Additionally, we are toying with the idea of an Android version. There are some issues regarding Android which is why we haven't released one so far (mainly relating to the in-game phone), but if we could solve those issues it would be a great thing to offer to people without computers. This is not a promise nor a very high priority, but the thought is there.

What else...? Coding, SFX, and plenty of morphs were created as well. We also did a round of fixing on some finished renders and some post-processing.

All in all, it was a good week.


Cheers!

Robison & Npx