***mages were too big for itch. They can be viewed in this same post on discord.***

TLDR: Sorry it’s been so long. Lots of changes to existing content and new additions coming. Tentative plan/personal goal for next build is before January. 

Hello There! It has been far too long and I apologize for the long silence. There are several reasons for it, which I will detail here, but it is finally time for an update. I really appreciate your patience in this process. 

Now to get you caught up. Last I posted (on discord), I detailed a small project I had begun working on as an outlet to practice writing, coding, and design. That has since concluded. Initially I had meant to publish the finished project to make up for the time spent on that and not Universe City (UC). However, when I had finished writing/coding the section I intended to publish (all that was left was to make the renders) I realized two things. 1. The ‘practice’ project had blown up in scope to become a potential whole other game in my mind. And 2. I had already gotten the practice I wanted from it and already had more ideas and knowledge I could apply to UC. So I called it there. Maybe sometime in the far future I’ll revisit those ideas. Or eventually incorporate them all into UC. 

So this puts us at around mid to late July. Aaaaaannnnd it’s shortly after this point that  I started playing Final Fantasy XIV…  Suffice to say the rest of the summer into early October pretty much evaporated. I am very sorry, but also very glad I jumped in and got to have that experience. 

So come October I finally got all caught up on the main story of FFXIV and my mind finally returned once more to UC. In this regard I am glad for the unplanned absence as the floodgates really opened up mentally and a lot of progress has been made in the last month or so. There’s so much I’m excited to share. However, there’s still gonna be some time before the next build is available. So about that next build...

First and foremost. The core design of the game is changing. I knew I wanted to divert from the standard Sandbox style, but early on I didn’t quite know how I would approach it so I simply built the foundations for a typical sandbox game. Now, Sandbox style games are my preferred style of VN. I enjoy seeing what creators come up with in terms of navigation, UI, progression, etc. as well as how to tie it all together, but their issues are well documented. Sequence breaks, stat grinding, nothing events to fill time, or simply just clicking through the navigation UI hoping for something to happen among others. After working on Enthralled, going through several existing Sandbox titles, and a lot of thinking, I think I have a solution for UC. It’s a bit of a hybridized system or simply put,  a kinetic VN with more options. Allow me to give you a broad overview of where I’m planning on taking this.

• A sense of time. This includes multiple things. The game will still run on chunks of time throughout the day. Though I am condensing the amount. Morning, Afternoon, and Evening will be the three chunks of time you will have available each day. Events can and will take place at night and in between these chunks automatically as prerequisites are fufilled.So that’s not changing much. In addition to this, there is a larger scale structure to time. As it stands the story is set to occur over the course of 3-4 in universe years. Tentatively 4 but it can definitely be condensed to 3. We’ll see how it goes. These years are broken into 4 ‘seasons’ of the typical variety. And these four seasons are 30 days a pop (Definitely inspired by Love & Sex’s take on month/year progression). So altogether 360-480 in game days. The driving motives for this update are a  combination of things. I want to increase the importance and possibilities of player choice in tandem with the endings I have in mind. Applying a bit of pressure and constraint with a global timer and timing systems allows me to plan, pace, and build out aspects of the game much more easily. You won’t be able to do everything in one run, there are many planned exclusives depending on the choices you make, and this will circumvent both stat grinding and the endless/timeless feeling sandbox games can potentially invoke.
• Next is Navigation. Here is an early mock-up of the main navigation screen (file too big for itch attachments. Can be viewed in discord.) 
• This is meant to be a one stop shop. In between events you will be presented with this menu where you can pick the next event, check stats, etc. Everything you would do in multiple clicks in a standard sandbox title on one page. It’s still missing some elements such as the energy count, character cards, and an inventory and it may change visually over time. Unfortunately I don’t think it will be fully available for the next build as I’d prefer to focus on scenes and content. So default renpy menus will have to make do in the meantime. 
• The final major change is regarding the story and characters. Now, this is a tricky topic to explain without getting spoilery so I’ll keep things broad. The core lore and story is the same. How it's told and how much information is given when is changing. With the initial release, the intent was to have a scenario in which I could get the majority of the setup established efficiently and I think I accomplished that goal alright. However, when thinking long term and with the new design direction, I feel it will be more beneficial overall to allow that process to be drawn out a bit and incorporate more motivation and stakes along the way. That’s very vague, I know, but that’s where I’m taking things and I hope that with the upcoming release that is conveyed properly. I will let you be the judge of that. 

Now that was a fuck ton of words, but what will this new build look like and when can you try it?

Initially, I had planned to just shut my mouth till I could put out the next piece of content, but it had already been so long since I posted it was eating at me. So while I can offer no guarantees, my plan at this time is to have the next version out before January. To be 100% transparent, my time outside of my day job will be juggled between working on it, FFXIV Endwalker, and any potential Holiday occurrences, but I will do my best to make some magic happen. The build itself will mirror how I tentatively plan on doing build releases. One in-game week at a time. So the first will include the prologue (3 days) + the first 7 days. Not a ton of content I know, but it will be significantly more compared to what is available now. On that note, I would like to give you a sneak peak at two new characters that will be introduced in the revamped prologue. 

The first is Moe. A resident of Nebula City who was a young child when the meteor shower made contact. She now spends her days scavenging the ruins, conversing with the remnants of the city she grew up in, and tinkering with new finds. She’s blunt, foul mouthed, cynical, yet deeply caring and loyal. Also not a fan of clothes. I do hope you will enjoy getting to know her. 

Second is Deva. Though I might call her Phoebe. Opinions are welcome in that regard. Uh, the less said about her the better right now. So I’ll just say that she’s a sassy and flirty office lady and leave it at that. .

That’s all I’ve got for now. I will do my utmost to get the next version out in the wild as soon as I can. Thank you very much for your patience and attention.