Progress Update- steady progress is boring sorry >.< (Patreon)

It's actually great progress! But yeah, this week has been all about executing on the display code changes we've been discussing.

I have a coding stream starting in one hour! If you miss the stream, VODS are also available. ('Videos' tab at the top.)

To new patrons: We’re in the middle of an absurdly-long update cycle. Here’s the summary and how to access content.

What's being worked on?

Display code!

The friendly view at the bottom of my screen for the last 30 hours of work:

Sometimes, the coding software breaks under all the errors and stops telling me things. It does not like me uprooting the entirety of the display code and transplanting new stuff in.

The Evolution

Originally, most of the steps in displaying something in-game were manual. Each game mechanic was its own isolated section of code, from the data all the way to the logic. The only connections were random spaghetti strings making everything unstable.

To improve things, I unified the data by making it so you define display stuff in the same place, and same format. The code for every mechanic would use the same pattern, so I'd always know how to build something new. It ended up being a lot of parallel lines of logic. Tons of matching files with small variations. Things were still pretty manual, but they weren't getting tangled with each other anymore.

These past three weeks have been the next big step. See, all the major game mechanics use a fairly narrow set of actual logic. Mostly, it’s just about playing and manipulating animations, displaying/coloring pieces of the rig, or positioning things. Any game tends to boil down to some combination of those.

So I’m transforming the manual, parallel logic into one single, automatic lane. It starts in the same place in the data, and flows through the same single channel, pausing to wait for whatever game mechanic to use it, then lands at a singular endpoint.

This significantly reduces the time it takes to build a new game mechanic. Instead of it being a whole thing to set up the display code for every tiny new idea, I can just build the logic and waste no further time having it show in-game. All the display work is just done in the data.

So uh, yep! That's what I've been up to! I hope to be done with it this week, if all goes well >.>;

The practical side

Tough code means a tough time focusing for me. 

I don't think I was ever adequately prepared for the mental wall that you can hit when doing something complex and self-directed. Sometimes, each problem feels insurmountable and terrible, but as soon as I push through the first step of it, I realize "oh hey, I actually know what to do next." It gets easier as long as I'm willing to confront the initial intimidation. 

Taking care of mental health is a huge factor in resilience to these difficulties. Poor sleep, lingering tough emotions, and other imbalances can make the coding harder. Then, the lack of progress can me feel like crap, creating a negative feedback loop. 

The opposite is true too, though! Sleeping well, taking care of chores, practicing mindfulness, working out, etc, all contribute to a positive feedback loop. Healthy habits make a smut game finish faster :3

... and that's all for now!

I still haven't fully accepted the fact that people actually want to see this through with me to the end. I feel like I would've jumped ship as a patron after a month. 

So... well.. thank you all so much for following along! Thanks to your baffling level of support, I think this game and engine will be able to deliver us long-term, high quality smut <3