The patch this week is short, in terms of playable content, because most of it was spent doing 3 things:
- Trying to fix a single bug that took 2 days
- Adding new, hand-made tomes to the cove that detail every weapon skill and every spell in the game, right down to their damage formulae. No more puzzling over what things do or spending essence blind.
- Tweaking/Rebalancing a lot of moves and equipment
Also added a couple of DEEP SECRETS this time around. Hope you enjoy.
Fifty versions! JEEZ. Since I took 1 week off for Christmas last year and 1 week off in June this year, this means I've officially been releasing weekly builds for a full year.
I know I say this a lot, but it's unbelievable to see how far we've come at times. Looking back at our launch version, 0.01, it was just the opening sequence at Shiveworth, hanging around the town, visiting your aunt at the abbey, and climbing aboard the ship.
It seems particularly ironic that exactly 1 year later, we return to Shiveworth again. This time... not as Mercy?
Anyway, I'll have some more news about new patrons rewards coming soon, probably early next week. The long and short of it is that I want to do something special for the folks who've been around a long time as a gesture of my sincere appreciation.
Started new Beatrix segment: Added Beatrix sprite, portrait and battler: added skillset for Beatrix; Shiveworth is explorable again, this time as Beatrix
Added a new consumable/crafting item: wool cloth
Reduced all status-healing item costs by 5 gold
Fixed an AI glitch with the Marlan/Finder encounter
Fixed a bug where Mercy would be slowed after the shapeshifter scene
Fixed an issue with background sound effects in the molten cave
Hey folks, we're very happy to bring you the latest weekly build and alpha builds this week, featuring art as a result of the latest art poll for our patrons!
The second place result, "Mercy & the Idol," has also been commissioned, so you'll have even more nice-looking scenes coming in the near future.
Drawing took up almost my entire week, but there's still a nice little bit to play in the weekly build, so we hope you enjoy.
Added the poll-winning scene illustration: Mercy & Shapeshifter!
Added new encounters and progress to the Beatrix segment
Added a new skill to Beatrix
Updated and fixed an issue with Overgrowth, Orus’s level 16 Moonlight skill (now heals for slightly less and costs a little more MP, but affects both Mercy and Orus)
Updated some of Orus’s resistances to more accurately reflect his moon elemental nature
Fixed an issue with Brute Force, Orus’s level 16 Moonguard skill, and rebalanced it slightly
Ironhide now heals equal to Orus’s Def + Res stats, instead of the average of the 2
Good evening! Here is the latest & greatest, version 0.52--a respectable number by any metric, but especially a gambler's.
This has been a week of system-implementation and bug-wrangling, but there's also a pretty juicy sequence of brand new story content that I hope everyone enjoys.
One thing that is important to note is that there are a few variations to this week's story content--five, to be precise--which is the first major crossroads we come to with regards to the player's choice re. yielding or resisting the essence all this time.
NEXT week, patrons can expect some spicy new written scenes, at the very least.
In her hubris, Mercy returned to Shiveworth and was captured by Oldlight. She has been blinded, shackled and subject to the Church's "conditioning" rituals, whereby they strip their finders of everything that makes them who they are.
But Mercy cannot forget. Not even if she wanted to. She is the Daughter of Essence.
***
If you haven't been keeping up, the latest chapter takes a pretty sharp turn. The latest build is, by far, the most complex yet, stacking choices on top of choices for what amounts to three separate paths and dozens of slight variations between them. As you can imagine, this is time-consuming, and it's in a stage of only half-completion right now, so I do NOT recommend saving over your old file until it's completed and all the kinks are smoothed out.
That said, the game also adds a couple of radical new NSFW scenes to the game, so PEEP EM if you want.
Hey everyone! Continuing from last week's theme, we have another intricate, multi-path release, and the end of the chapter is finally starting to take shape.
This is another rough WIP build, but there's a lot to tinker around and experiment with, so my advice is to make multiple new save slots and don't overwrite your old one.
That said, if you're more of a "wait and see" kind of guy or gal, I think next week will be the build that finally finishes tying all these threads together and cleans up some of the loose ends. Plus, if my memory serves, there's also an alpha release next week, so bonus points to me for timing it perfectly.
VERY excited to announce that the last 3 weeks of development hell on this portion of the chapter are finally finished.
This section has been tested extensively, and it's in a pretty good place, but if you do encounter any issues, please let me know. Once you play it, I think you'll understand how much can go wrong with all the different variations.
Somewhat surprisingly, this also marks a denouement of sorts in this particular chapter, which means it's not too far away from wrapping up and going public. We might see that in a few weeks, depending on how hard or easy the next portions are to make.
Got a fresh new build right outta the oven with a lot of little tweaks and updates, many of which have to do with the fact that Mercy needed new sprites for fishing, riding Orus, combat, etc. on account of her change in appearance.
Remind me to never change Mercy's appearance again!
Other than that, making a little more progress on the story and managed to squeeze in a spicy new NSFW scene in the process. Hope everyone enjoys.
The latest weekly build for patrons is now live! See the patch notes below. Want to try the public build or become a patron? You can find us at https://www.patreon.com/indoorminotaur.
Version 0.57 - 11/2/2018
Added new dialogue to nearly everyone in Carvannah
Added new bathhouse scene
Finished Sleeping Frog quest
Added some new characters to Carvannah
Added lots of new weapons and equipment to Carvannah’s castle plaza vendors
Added new bathhouse portraits
Added a timed attack tutorial to the Marlan Fight
Tweaked some gear slightly for balance
Added missing fishing trophy sprites
Fixed some typos
Fixed an error where the quest journal would not correctly flag the Esterholt quest if you didn’t have Silas recruited
Redesigned some of the lighting effects in the cove, aqueducts, Shiveworth, Witchdale and Mar’Liore to cut down on lag
I CANNOT believe another week has blown past us already. They're going so fast! 58 of the things so far?
Anyway, have some cool new features for the game this week, like a fancy new map of the different factions in DoE, based on player recommendation. Hopefully having something like this early on will help visualize who's who and what's what in the world.
Made a ton of bug fixes this week and implemented a secret new NSFW scene. It's time-sensitive, so find it if you can!
I know I keep saying this, but we are extremely close to being finished with chapter six as of now. In fact, chapter six might already be finished, and we might be in chapter seven. I'm not sure yet. Everything's a little fuzzy in my mind right now, so I'll get back to you. That's exciting, because it means a new public build is nigh, and I'm going to be uploading it through the browser in a couple of places to see how that works.
We'll also be doing a bit of cross-promotion soon with another project worth checking out, so keep your eyeballs peeled for that.
Anyway, that's enough rambling. Hope our gunners and swashbucklers alike enjoy the build. Big thanks to Akira-Raikou for the Mercy art you see in the banner this week!
By Jove, we've reached our 60th release, which is a nice, tidy number to make public by my reckoning.
Next week, a polished up version of this build goes live, featuring all of chapter 6. MAYBE it's an omen that chapter 6 releases on version 60--I don't know. I'm just here to deliver the goods.
What this means, in full, is that version 0.61 will go live for weekly AND alpha patrons next week to ensure all patron builds are still ahead of the game.
With that out of the way, feast your eyeballs upon the patch notes, and enjoy the latest build.
Best,
Nym
Version 0.60 - 11/23/2018
Added Dalkon & Brandis scene art
Added new NSFW Scene (F/F, S&M)
Added new Witchdale departure and cove arrival scenes
Updated some of the cove residents to reflect the progression (WIP)
Updated scene library
Updated Witchdale fishing/mining spots to reflect sprite/portrait changes
Updated Witchdale and the cove to automatically detect whether mounted or not and adjust speed accordingly
Added new dialogue to Witchdale citizens
Fixed some issues where Mercy could revert to an old costume when transfering maps on Orus
Fixed an issue where the Carvannah gate map didn’t properly darken at night
Fixed a mapping inconsistency between the Carvannah gate and docks
Added a new WIP system for visible party members. This system is designed with the intention of Orus being visible, but may behave strangely with old save files.
Version v0.60.1 is officially live and available to the public on both Windows and Mac, adding the latest chapter and all the bug fixes and general improvements that come with it. You can download it here: https://www.patreon.com/indoorminotaur.
So, what exactly is new? You can see the entire change log here, but for the (very) abbreviated list:
Extended the main story line by several hours
You can ride Orus around outside for increased speed
You can now mine silver & gold around the world and use it to craft jewelry if your forge is upgraded
Added eight new written NSFW scenes
Added and revised new portraits and illustrations
Added new skill and spellbooks to the game
Performance optimizations
Balance adjustments
Lots and lots of bug fixes
Q. Will my old save version work?
- A. Yes, but you may experience some bugs--especially visual. Save often and proceed at your own risk!
Q. I found a bug! Where do I report it?
- A. You can reply to this post or post in our public Discord's designated bug report channel.
Q. How do I know when the build ends? (Spoilers)
- A. Chapter VI ends once Mercy returns to the cove from Witchdale.
Thanks for playing, and if you enjoy the game, spread the word & consider becoming a patron!
New Weekly (& Alpha) Build: v0.61!
Alpha patrons are getting their build early to stay ahead of the public release.
Version 0.61 - 11/30/2018
Replaced Claire scene illustration (WIP)
Added Orus backpacks
Fixed some text runoff
Fixed an issue where encounters beneath Carvannah palace didn’t correctly display a background
Added more dialogue to the cove
Added a bedroll beneath Carvannah palace
Fixed an issue with the “strangers” boss fight ending before the final attack
Fixed a tile passability issue in the Carvannah dungeon
Fixed an issue where Mydrede and Borris overlap during a Witchdale cutscene
Fixed an issue where Beatrix speaks with an NPC in Shiveworth at the beginning of the game
All maps in the game now check whether Mercy is riding Orus and adjusts speed accordingly
Implemented more lag reduction on all maps with multiple light effects
Fixed a number of lighting issues
Fixed an issue with map effects not loading in correctly on game start
Mercy is no longer slowed in the prologue dream sequence
Added new possible loot outcomes to the excavation chest (only available if you choose to upgrade the cove early, rather than let it upgrade through the plot)
Added leather hide as a possible monster loot drop
Fixed a number of bugs where Mercy would revert to her original sprite on screen transition
Dietrich is no longer in the cove when Mercy returns after Ch. 6 (if he ever was)
Fixed & modified some of the restocking loot spots in the cove, & added sparkle to know when it’s restocked
Fixed an issue with cooking monster flanks
Fixed a couple of tile passability issues in the cove throne room
The skill and spellbooks now sparkle in the cove for ease of identification
Hi folks, we're back with another build this week--the last one before all the holiday madness! Builds WILL resume over the holidays, so you'll have plenty to do through the new year.
Chapter 7 is well under way, and we're beginning work on an entirely new continent: Grey Clarion, home of the nomadic and isolated harps.
This week's build gets a lot of new things started, but it also goes back and adds some nice touches to the debug room (accessible to Old Salt patrons and above), something we've been neglecting for a little while. Now you'll be able to unlock every scene in the game, even if you didn't choose a certain path or don't have certain characters unlocked, etc.
This weekly build packs a hefty little chunk of new content pertaining to Grey Clarion, homeland to the elusive and mysterious harps. Next week we will launch a new alpha build!
Bug report (and non-bug feedback) for public version 0.60.5.
General bugs
When you set Mercy's class in the Nunnery, all unused SP is lost.
If you enter the code to open the gate in "Fireside Tales", the game crashes when it can't load the relevant map file. (I assume this is Patreon-only content, which is fine -- but it still shouldn't crash.)
The Shadow Oil is not actually removed from the inventory when it's stolen; once it's returned, you have two of them.
The box in Witchdale Caves East doesn't move when you pull it -- unless you're riding Orus.
Peacekeeper Camille doesn't switch to her short speech after you talk to her once.
On the Witchdale "Confront" track:
You can defeat Van Ritter, then reenter Witchdale via the tunnel. Van Ritter and his crew will still be standing at the gate.
If you're riding Orus when you board the ship to leave, you'll still be riding him when you wake up in bed in the hold.
When you talk to Hallie in the Cove, you mention she was "a big help with those pirates", despite the pirates having been vanquished hundreds of miles away.
On the Witchdale "Peacekeeper" track:
When you fight Van Ritter's crew in the cove, Dalkon is still damaged/depleted (HP/MP) from the deepfolk fight post-Carvannah.
If you buy a Sparkling Rabbit from Dietrich, Wulfhilde's shop doesn't register it: it shows "Possession: 0" when hovered over.
Easy fix. See the "Proxies" section of the "More Currencies" plugin documentation.
If you're not riding Orus as you initiate the post-Witchdale timeskip, when Holden "goes to the inn", he instead just turns right to face the crate and vanishes.
If you are riding Orus as you initiate the post-Witchdale timeskip, you'll resume control within the Inn while riding Orus.
After the post-Witchdale timeskip, if you've a) shown Hallie the Bruiseweed Vial and b) picked up the messenger-bird, Hallie can't be located anywhere in the cove.
This happens regardless of the order of events, and also regardless of whether or not you've seen the Mercy/Hallie Bruiseweed scene. If you get the bird before seeing the scene, you're presumably locked out of it.
If you have the Sun stand (Gertrude's forge) upgraded once, you can buy a Sun Glass, but it disappears from your possession when you exit the shop menu. Going back into the shop shows "Possession: 0" when it had previously said "Possession: 1". You also can't use that Sun Glass to buy a Sun's Wrath before you exit the menu.
Since I ended up writing a partial bytecode decompiler for the fishing minigame, I know exactly what and why: it's because the purchased Sun Glass goes directly into your inventory, but on exit, the inventory trade item quantities are "restored" from (read: clobbered by) the currency-placeholder variables.
Some possible fixes:
Option 0: Use "<Item x Buy Price: y>" directly, instead of proxying through a "<Variable ...>". See the "Notetags" section of the "More Currencies" plugin documentation.
Option 1: Use the YEP Item Synthesis plugin. (You can hide the "Collected Recipes" (etc.) part.)
Option 2: Subclass the shop yourself in a plugin, the way Yanfly did. Do all sorts of custom things there.
Option 3: Alter all currency-items' value fields to be accessors of the relevant currency-variables, or vice versa. You can use parts of YEP_SelfSwVar.js as a pattern for how to do the "vice versa" version.
Option Bleh: put the Sun's Wrath (et al.) under another shop menu, as is done with Moon's calcinator and potions.
That last option is "Bleh" because it's the only option listed that won't let you ditch all the save-and-restore-currency-items code everywhere in the game.
Note that the relevant variables will still have junk in them, so if you care about maintaining savefile compatibility across versions, you can't immediately reuse them for other purposes. (You can get around that by reserving a currently-zero variable for "savefile version number" and doing any updates at savefile load time. Although you may already be doing that; I haven't checked.)
Seekers (Esterholt) can still Submerge while Moon Poisoned.
When selling to the brewer in Esterholt, the preview shows the sale price being removed from your Gold, not added to it.
In the first wolf cutscene, in the blizzard, if you speed through the dialogue with PgDn, Lord Balgruuf may be mispositioned (one square too far down) once the wolf strikes.
After you beat the Night Mother, you're in the manor with Orus following you. You can take him up to East Bedroom 2 and see another Orus there.
In Lord Balgruuf's bedroom, the Key Fragment location has the "carrots and apples" line attached to it after you collect it.
Immediately after you replace(?) the idol, if you talk to Orus in the bedroom, Mercy's bust has a coat, despite her sprite not having one. (If you talk to Hallie in the same scene, the coatless bust is used.)
Immediately after Volda comes to the manor with accusations, trying Agatha's door still yields "Aunt Agatha will be asleep at this hour" despite the fact that she's clearly awake and downstairs.
If you talk with Joseph on the way out of town after Lord Balgruuf's death, the conversation reads like he's still alive.
Map bugs
In Carvannah, in the noble district, if you go south immediately on entering, you can get up on top of the wall and walk to the fake stairways. (I'd actually suggest keeping this one, just so sidequest-thirsty players (hi!) can tell that the stairways are fake.)
In Witchdale proper, south of the main entrance, you can walk behind and around a 3x3 tree and through a cliff. From just north of Claus, walk NNNEESE.
In Witchdale proper, southeast of Saul's house, you can stand on a square of water. From just south of Mathieu, walk SEESE.
In Witchdale, in Saul's basement, you can step onto the shelf square on the back wall that has the pitchfork. On entering, walk SEEEN.
In the cove, in the Bath House, there's an untraversable empty square at (9,3). On entering, walk NNWWWWNNW(N).
In the Northern Wasteland, in the SE part just above the stairs, there are two places where you can walk on the foot of the cliff face. From just south of the cave entrance, walk 6E,8S,3W,N. From there, also walk 3S,W,S,3W.
In Esterholt Manor, Eastern Wing Bedroom 3, the bookshelf by the entrance is walkable. On entering, walk EN. (This will require first collecting the Cheese.)
In Esterholt Manor, Lord Balgruuf's Chambers, a tile is walkable that doesn't look like it should be. From in front of the monument, walk SSWS.
Fishing
If you purchase the Fishing Rod Upgrade from Gorps the first time you meet him, you can't fish anymore: the fishing spots in the early Cove only check for the ordinary Fishing Rod.
If you fish while riding Orus, when you're done fishing, you're still effectively riding -- but your sprite is on foot.
If you check a fishing spot while not holding a Fishing Rod, or if you have one but simply decline to fish, it can still disappear.
Appearance nits
In the savegame menu, the unhelpful variables "Lighting Opacity", "Gold Luck", and "Mercy Luck" are displayed.
In the keyboard configuration menu, the text which presumably means "Ride Orus" (default: C key) is illegible.
Also, it's unrebindable, and there's no corresponding gamepad key.
In the Equip menu, when an equipment change would modify Spirit and Resistance, they're called "M. Attack" and "M. Defense" in the change description table.
In the Equip menu, when preparing to equip the Gold Bell, the "MP Cost Rate" effect is shown in red in the change description table, despite being beneficial.
When cooking, four-ingredient recipes (and some three-ingredient recipes) overlap the recipe name unreadably. The "price" window is also partly unusable for four-ingredient recipes.
If you feel comfortable subclassing Yanfly code, I'd suggest truncating these to icons, and placing the full item names to the window that currently only has "Possession". If not, maybe try out the Item Synthesis plugin?
The dragon bones at Carvannah's entrance look weirdly unnatural, due to the lack of a wing-elbow. (Usually, when dragon anatomy is depicted in detail, the wing structure is like bat wings. Don't ask me how the wing joints are supposed to connect to the thorax, though.)
This can reasonably be handwaved as diegetic; Carvannah wouldn't be the first city to have a fake tourist attraction.
Several groups of identically-shaped icons are not identically aligned:
The Silver Ingot is off-center to the left by one pixel, while the Gold Ingot is centered.
The Moon Vial is one pixel lower than the other vials; the Giantslayer Vial is one pixel to the left.
The Blue and Red Gorpflorp icons are one pixel off to the left and right, respectively -- although the Red Gorpflorp seems to be best centered.
The text in the Skillbook and Essence Journal is too curved to read comfortably. (YMMV, obviously, but a little goes a long way.)
The helm of your ship (Map 107, "Ship Deck") is, strangely, located on the forecastle. Helms of vessels like these were invariably located to the rear, because the wheel directly controls the rudder, and for multiple reasons one wouldn't want to have a control mechanism running the whole length of the ship.
Scrolling in Esterholt very noticeably shudders: certain elements seem to be drawn in their proper place only a frame too late, so there are distracting one-pixel-wide horizontal black lines all over the place. This is immediately visible between the dock and the ground.
The font you're using doesn't actually have glyphs for 'ğ', 'ı', or 'ǫ', and the substitutes from the default font (Arial?) look weird in context.
Typos
I didn't start tracking these seriously until Witchdale; I'm pretty sure there were more.
the Cove
Eva, in her intro, says "with our without" (should be "with or without").
Carvannah
The text for the Carvannah quest "O Sister, Where Art Thou" has an improperly-closed color tag.
Joceline, in the Carvannah infirmary, says "daughter" where "doctor" is probably meant.
Witchdale
When departing the ship at Witchdale: "Return to the Witchdale?"
All the Latin is completely wrong. Google Translate is not your friend.
I think what you want is "Vox Silvae" and "Cor Silvae", these being "Voice of the Forest" and "Heart of the Forest" respectively. If you wanted "voicewood" and "heartwood" you're out of luck; Latin doesn't do noun-noun compounds like that any more than Spanish or French do.
Likewise "Ferrum Silvae", which I haven't actually seen yet, although you might consider "Chalybs Silvae".
The grammar on the monument is too fucked for me to make heads or tails of; as it is, it reads something like
Bones beneath feet sleep thousand
to be awake, may you (pl.) make and destruction by our enemies
which is of course nonsense, despite fragments of meaning seeping in through the cracks.
(Esterholt) Canute's gravestone reads "Your god my rest", in exactly the sense of "This sentence no verb". Again, I'm not sure what was intended here.
At the close of the Witchdale arc, on the "Peacekeeper" route, when Mercy has just disembarked: "irrelevent" should be "irrelevant".
Hallie says "crafstman" instead of "craftsman" when you speak to her post-Witchdale.
Esterholt
In the description of the Runesword, "pummel" should be "pommel".
In Esterholt, when Joseph is asking about Perfect Shells, he says at one point "a couple of of things".
In the Esterholt Manor basement, the middle journal has "safe" instead of "same".
"Thieves Gloves" (armor #101) should be "Thieves' Gloves".
In Lord Balgruuf's intro speech: "but thou shall" should be "but thou wilt" (or "but thou shalt", but given the lack of volition/hortation, probably the former (not that there was really a strong distinction in any historical dialect of English)).
In the second wolf cutscene, after the battle, "the others comes" should be "the others come".
In the cutscene following that in East Bedroom 2, Agatha says "surpressing" rather than "suppressing".
In Lord Balgruuf's speech outside the manor: "thou has" should be "thou hast"; "thou will vanish" should be "thou wilt vanish"; "when thou will" should be "when thou willst" (or perhaps "whenever thou willst" or "as thou willst").
Yes, the latter is "willst" and not "wilt"! They're two different verbs. The former is Modern English's "she will vanish"; the latter is "when she wills".
Post-Esterholt, Gorps' "WhatchaMcCallIt" should probably be "Whatchamacallit". (It's a contraction of "what you may call it"; no Mc involved.)
Post-Esterholt, Ohma's "has giving giving" should be "has been giving".
Other feedback
A prebuilt Linux version would be nice. It's possible for users to get it running natively, but it would probably be much easier for you to do it. (Although you might have to double-check filename capitalization. I sidestepped that issue via ciopfs, so I have no concrete feedback there.)
When selecting the next project for the cove, there's no way to back out of the project selection dialog.
Worse, post-Witchdale, if you hit Cancel it's interpreted as "Nothing for Now", which is almost certainly not what anyone would want the Cancel button to do.
Keeping Ohma locked up for fifteen days when she can't escape, yet letting Brandis out and about to peel potatoes, seems cruelly inconsistent.
The choices for project selection are somewhat opaque:
"Upgrade Essence Station" might better read "Upgrade an Essence Station" or "Upgrade a Crafting Station", to make it clear it's not upgrading the calcinator.
"Remodel Throne Room" might better read "Repurpose Throne Room", to make it clear that it's not just an option to indulge Mercy's nascent megalomania.
Fishing is entirely opaque. Trying to figure out what the hell was going on with it actually drove me to write a bytecode parser; I was expecting the Luck stat to influence anything and everything except what it actually influenced.
Even before reading the code, I'd figured out that the optimal fishing strategy is to repeatedly a) save, b) try to fish, and c) if you didn't catch anything or only caught a Gorpflorp/Seaweed, reload. This isn't fun, but it's less not-fun than spending precious gold on lures and lines.
It would be neat if you could craft fishing lures out of gorpflorps somehow, since as far as I can tell they're currently just very-low-quality vendor trash.
I've very possibly fished more before Esterholt than any five random players would in a full playthrough (even if two of them picked Expand Docks), and I've still never seen a Golden Gorpflorp or a Great White Seabear. FAKE EDIT: I finally ran into a Golden Gorpflorp in Esterholt.
Stealing is also opaque; I was expecting Agility to have some effect. Well, more effect than it does.
... on that note, the Thieves' Gloves should probably have a bonus to Steal. (The Steal plugin's documentation describes how to do this. I'd recommend a bonus of 50% or greater, although a better option is probably to increase the effect of Agility on Steal, and then have a smaller (~15-20%) bonus. But that's all untested hot air.)
In the Esterholt Manor basement, you should possibly not be able to read the journals until you light the nearby lantern.
After you've talked with Judith about the monument, but before you've checked Lord Balgruuf's chambers, the replica monument still has its previous interaction message (which no longer makes sense, in context).
Perhaps examining Hallie in Eastern Wing Bedroom 2 (after the Agatha/Hallie idol discussion cutscene) should have Mercy put her in the bed? Or at least comment that she doesn't have the energy to.
As you leave Esterholt, when everyone else is packed up and on board, Hallie remains in bed, snoozing away.
It doesn't fit with the rest of the feedback here, but I thought I should mention that the entire Esterholt storyline was great. Not just "good", and certainly not just "unusually good for a porn/RPG Maker/... game"; it was a solid storyline (well-written characters and a consistent, coherent plot) which was also well-executed as a game driver.
Hello! I'm happy to present the latest build for weekly & alpha patrons alike. This has been an extremely busy week in Daughter of Essence Land, and partially for reasons not yet revealed.
To that end, I'll say this: there is more news to come later this week. In the meantime, enjoy this mountain of patch notes!
The patch notes for the latest weekly build are below, and we're happy to say that they are cool and good, but we have an even more important announcement to make.
We have decided to bring an artist onto our team, so for the last two weeks, we've been in long and sometimes excruciating talks with dozens of qualified people, trying to find someone who is the right combination of available, talented, affordable and invested in the project, which is a sort of modern holy grail of attributes.
That said, we have made some progress. Not so much progress that we can announce a name and a time, but enough that we feel confident in announcing that our search is fully under way and that we've narrowed it down to a few potentials.
That said, nothing is set in stone, and if you know someone who you feel is right for the job, now is a very good time to pass that information along.
Version 0.66 - 1-11-2019
Added a new cove event in Ch. 7
Added a new toy to Wulfhilde’s tier 3 workshop: The Cathedral
Added a new NSFW scene (solo F, toy)
Added new lines of dialogue to everyone in the cove
Added a new illustration to the Sparkling Plug scene
Added rooms to the second floor of the cove dormitories
There is now a new, duplicate cove area that players switch to after Ch. 7
(This was necessary because events have a 20 page cap, and this cap had been exceeded on a growing number of NPCs. Now I can start fresh and help keep organized.)
There is also a new duplicate cove tavern
The first cove upgrade now correctly costs funds from Mercy’s stash
Upgrading the throne room now correctly costs funds
Updated the scene library with all recent scenes
Fixed an issue where cove images could overlay during cutscenes
Fixed an issue where combat read “she could not escape” even when controlling Marlan
Another week, another update to Daughter of Essence for our patrons!
This one packs in a lot of new content in the cove, including tons of new character dialogue and a lot of that big, juicy story progression we've been building up to for a couple of updates.
It's been fun fleshing out the characters at home, so to speak, and there's plenty more where that came from in the future.
On the artist front, we've tentatively narrowed our focus down to one very promising candidate, and we'll update you as soon as everything's official. Let me just say... Audrey and I are very excited and optimistic about the future.
That's it for me tonight--see you soon!
- Nym
Version 0.67 - 1-18-2019
Added new story content and dialogue to the cove
Added a new boss fight (WIP)
Added a new tile for door frames to indicate doors enterable from above
Updated the quest journal
Finished all rooms in the cove dormitory
Fixed a portrait issue with Douglas from the Mar’Liore farm
Fixed an issue where you could buy a duplicate fishing rod from Ginny
Essence Bolt changed to Essence Flare, no longer requires a crossbow to fire
Fixed some typos
Fixed an issue where Cattie is incorrectly called “Ginny” in the cove
Hey folks, just wrapped up the latest weekly build, which takes the big leap of expanding the world east, in preparation for the next big adventure.
As I might have mentioned already, we've also settled on a long-term artist (whose work is featured above), and we'll get around to making introductions once everything is finalized.
It's going to be good. At least, I'm pretty sure it's going to be good. I'm like 94% positive that it's going to be good, and those are the kinds of odds I like to bet on. Daughter of Essence has come a long way since we launched this Patreon, and the game has nowhere to go but up from here. And that's damn well where we plan on taking it.
At long last, after many hard months, we have arrived at version 0.69. To commemorate this occasion, naturally, we had to implement a new, thematically-appropriate NSFW scene.
But beyond the number of the build, this week marks another major occasion! After a few weeks of teasing and insinuation, we're finally pleased to OFFICIALLY welcome our new artist to the project long-term!
Her name is Numinox, or Numi for short, and she will be helping us with our art assets for the foreseeable future, so I hope you'll welcome her aboard and look forward to seeing what she contributes to the game! She's very talented and brings a cool style of art that Audrey and I think will fit in really nicely.
Here's the latest weekly build, in all its Frankenstein glory.
I worked on a lot of different bits and pieces this week, some of which weren't finished in time for version 0.70, so there are a few placeholders in there for now. Thus is the life of a dev who puts out a build every week, though, so y'all are used to that by now.
Even considering the works in progress, it's still a nice little build with some very oft-requested "features" snuck in there. It's a bit of a secret scene for now, so I won't spoil the fun.
Hello everyone, hope you had a great Valentine's Day this year, and if you didn't, don't panic: there's still time for a little date with Mercy this weekend in the latest release.
A lot of time and effort went into the game's first real "dungeon" of sorts this week, so that's just one more thing to plunge into.
Hi everyone, hope you're well and excited for the weekend. As is our custom, we have some CHOICE entertainment options you might consider integrating into your weekend activity list.
The art in our header is courtesy of Indoor Minotaur's newly contracted artist-in-resident, Numinox. We hope you like it, because there'll be plenty more where that came from going forward.
Next week, I'll be taking a little break from advancing the primary narrative to start tackling more SIDE-QUESTS and optional or secret content. This kind of stuff really gets me going, so I'm excited about it and hope you are as well.
We're pleased to present the latest weekly & alpha build, version 0.73!
In fact, in much the same way that a Robert Frost poem might, this build diverges along two paths: one with additional features that is NOT compatible with old save files, and one without those additional features that IS compatible with old save files.
These builds will be very explicitly notated, so you don't have to worry about getting the wrong one. However, if you're not far along with your save, haven't tried the game yet or are even considering starting over from scratch with new decisions and a new build, you'll definitely want to pick up version 0.73.1.
The final consideration is that at some point down the line, the old save compatible versions will stop. It's simply too much work preparing two very different builds every week, but I didn't want to cut everyone off cold turkey. That just seemed rude. My current approximate deadline for that is with the public launch of chapter 7, which is still many weeks away.
I hope you understand! And without further ado, the patch notes (for both releases):
Version 0.73.1 - 3-1-2019 (New Game Required)
Mercy and Orus can both equip two accessories
Equipment types Orus can’t equip no longer appear
Added new categories for better inventory organization
Version 0.73 (Old Save Compatible)
Added a new NSFW scene! (Beatrix, Toy, Futa)
Added a hunter’s campsite to the overworld
Added new treasure to the overworld
Added all new Ch. VII Esterholt content
Added more progression clues to the siblings portion of Ch. VII
Added new cooking recipes
Fixed a sink tile error
Fixed an issue where you can leave Fort Wilkes without your crew
Fixed some typos
Fixed an issue where Beatrix’s direction was incorrectly locked
You can now cook in the Esterholt manor oven
You can no longer hear the sea from inside the cove dormitories
Happy release day, everyone! Same as last week, it's split between two builds (to continue for a little while longer): one that is compatible with ALL old saves, and one that requires a v0.73 save or newer.
The old save compatible versions will be phased out eventually--probably once I wrap chapter 7 up and make it public. I wish there was a way around this, but alas. I'll make sure to ease the pain somehow.
Also, if you haven't yet, check out our brand new trailer here:
Hi, everyone! This week's build, version 0.76, is the patron release of what will eventually become the next public build, which means it's not far off!
This ALSO means the save compatible grace period is approaching its gruesome end. I expect support for old save files will end around after version 0.78, so apologies in advance for that.
I'd like to take a little time this week to advertise some of our other outlets as well, especially since many people have an (understandable) aversion to Patreon's increasingly problematic business model.
And soon, we'll also be expanding our subscription service beyond Patreon to other comparable sites, as requested by a number of fans and patrons alike.
Until then, we're continuing to make our game bigger and better, and we hope you enjoy.
- Nym
Version 0.76 - 3-22-2019
Revised and added to a number of scene illustrations!
Added new Oldlight Palace scene
Added new strangers scene
Added return to cove and new cove dialogue
Added new cove scene
Changed Hallie’s dialogue in the cove before departing for Fort Wilkes
Marlan now exists in the cove after returning from Southgate
Fixed an issue where Orus couldn’t equip backpacks in the new save versions of the game
Removed automatic “Trance” generation, making Mercy’s Trance state slower to earn
Fixed several typos
Statue beneath the Eastern Spire now reports the correct combination
