October Development Report! (Patreon)

It's time for a development report! ^^ This month brings with it some exciting news! Of course some people will naturally reserve the right to take it with a truck load of salt, not hold their breath, etc. You'll just have to decide for yourself what you believe and when time comes, you'll be stunned.

Starting this post off with what everyone wants to hear the most.

Release Date: Nov 1st!

We're pretty close to having the content fully done, tested and polished, but I know in the past with release dates.. We've missed our mark and so I'd rather set a date that leaves zero room for error vs one that cuts us too thin and short, set for failure. I hope everyone will understand that and technically.. I wanted to set the release date for the end of October, but I don't want to deal with all the release related stuff on Halloween day when it's already going to be busy enough with classes, house chores and the day itself with passing out candy, etc.

I can't say what time it'd be released on Nov 1st, because everyone is from different timezones. Early morning for me might be late night or the 2nd for some people. ^^"

With that announcement out of the way, once again. I know some people will need to wait until they officially see the download links/posts made before they'll believe it. That's totally understandable and fine! Just please refrain from stirring drama.

Moving into our progress chart for the new content, below is where we sit currently give or take.

-Final editing pass. 100% done.
-Engine transfer. 80% done.
-New assets added/functioning correctly. 100% done.
-New feature/systems testing. 75% done.
-General testing pass. 50% done.
-Release.

As mentioned, we're nearly there! To be honest.. We might have the content fully ready earlier than expected and if that does happen, we could possibly put out a 48 hour heads up post, letting everyone know that we're moving the release date to be sooner than Nov 1st. Just keep in mind our official date is Nov 1st, so that's the real expectation.

I'd just like to mention once more that I'm grateful for everyone who has been with us for the past few years during our project's development leading up to this point and the future! We still have plans to do some fun stuff to make it up to many of you for the awkward period in our development.

Moving on, we want to share some screenshots that show off what the game's text ui will look like moving forward. We shared this earlier in September with supporters, but we'd love to hear feedback on the readability. Ideally, the best of all worlds would be to offer config options to let players choose from a few text options, like simple black text or white text. (Both without the outline color) Something to help with less strain on the eyes.

Reminder that the optical way to enjoy the game is in 1920x1080 fullscreen mode, so that should be kept in mind with the readability.

[~Messy Studios Team~]

[~CG art~]

MarxeDP and AjoseMP have been updating quite a bit of stuff! Mainly they're focusing on updating cg scenes into the new style, but we have plans on getting some new art moving along too.

Here's just a glimpse at the finalized cg art style, the main thing to take notice of in these is that we've adjusted the face shapes, eyes and nose to feel closer to their sprite art. We believe it's much better looking than before and I think Nova is a good example to show it off with. ^^

(Left: Previous cg art. Middle: Nova's sprite art. Right: New finalized cg art.)

It isn't exactly a 1:1 to the sprite art of course, but I think this is as close as we'll ever get to it, knowing our sprite artist and cg artists are different people with their own styles. :P

[~Sprite art~]

It was a big month for Lisa during September! A bit of sprite characters needed to be updated in time for the new content were finished up and we shared previews of Nike (oc), Karissa updated with diaper design for her and Nurse Bell, Nathan updated and she also finished Garnet, who we'll be sharing previews of her updated visuals this week!

Our next goal is working on Juliet and Heather's additions this month, along with possibly finishing up the last 3-4 characters left to be updated that aren't oc's. Then we'll begin updating the few oc's that didn't receive the new visual eyes and minor adjustments in that regard. (We'll reach out to you with updated .psd files for your oc.)

Off the top of my head.. I know there's Chelle, Ichigo and Hana and I think bg oc's from long ago earlier in our project development. We want to ensure the same overall vibe is still felt with the oc's, just matching with MA's style. Nothing else is being changed with your oc's <3

{If you missed September's sprite art previews, you can check those out below! $5 support tiers needed to view!}
https://www.patreon.com/posts/sprite-preview-89112965 (Nike oc)
https://www.patreon.com/posts/ma-art-style-89532301 (Karissa)
https://www.patreon.com/posts/ma-sprite-art-89573634 (Nurse Bell)
https://www.patreon.com/posts/ma-art-style-89890123 (Nathan)

[~Music~]

Last month, ComposerJF finished our final track for the base game! Another milestone reached with development on the project!

While it is sad to think we're done working with them for now, we're in touch and I hope to have them provide their skills towards some dlc content in the future of the project. 

One thing I do want to announce and will make a post for it in another day or two once they provide me with the links. They're going to be releasing MA's album on multiple sources like Spotify, Apple music, etc. If you truly enjoy what ComposerJF has done for the project and their other work, do consider purchasing the album from them. ^^

For now, here's their main webpage to check out!
http://julianfung.works/ 

[~GUI~]

ds-sans has finished the config screen! We'll be sharing previews of how that looks and we'd like to get it into the game with the release, but we'll see how it pans out. It might be offered in a mini hotfix update to address any post-release bug issues.

The next step with ui needs is save/load screens being tackled next and we're trying to figure out how the cg gallery screen should look.

[~Ending~]

That's it for now! We hope the announcement today will be exciting for many, but once again.. We understand the need to reserve your excitement or just simply hold your judgement until the time comes. 

In the coming weeks leading up to the release date, we'll provide a bit more posts than our normal 2 posts per week. We hope these will be exciting, as we want to really generate the hype as we count the next 4 weeks down! ^^

If this is your first time joining along and you enjoy the project, please do consider supporting us on Patreon if you aren't already! Plenty of exclusive posts are made, at least 2 new posts every Monday and Friday, per week!

Keep yourself informed and updated on development by following Patreon notifications or bookmarking our brand new >Guide Post< for 2023. You can also continue to keep updated through our Itch.io page or Twitter as well!

Be alert! The only websites that are officially ran by myself and Messy Studios working on development of Messy Academy are the following list below. Any place otherwise is unofficial and they might be impersonating us for their own gain. Avoid payments/donating to other sources as it won't be helping fund further development into our game!

>Patreon<
>Kickstarter<
>Twitter<
>Itch.io<
>Pixiv<

(You can also find our official posts/account on these sites, but due to their nature we won't include links directly.)
>F95zone< (Username: Messy Studios)
>omorashi< (Username: Bridget1999)
>tapatalk< (Username: Messy Studios)

Be alert! The one and only official Discord server for following the Messy Studios team development is this one. >Invite Link< If you've come across any other server impersonating us, be sure to report your findings with me directly and steer other's interested in our video game project away from possibly scam attempts.

~ From all of us at Messy Studios! ~