Weekly Report (Apr. 1st)

Hello there.

Last week was mostly preparation for this week. For the most part, I was dealing with the sprites and texts for the next stage of the tutorial quest, which is the trading tutorial sequence. I decided to overhaul the script, because the original version was a little dragged out. It still is, but now, it's slightly more bearable. Hopefully, I'll be able to implement the whole sequence this week.

The obligatory list of changes:

- Translated the previous week’s encyclopedia entries into Russian;

- Realised that the Pantheon entry had a number of yet unmentioned terms - it was the last entry that I revised, so I didn’t even think about it having the info that is yet to be tackled in the encyclopedia/dialogues, so I decided to postpone adding this entry;

- Made the location name label fade in and out on string change - also, a sound is played every time a new set of strings is loaded, which happens even when the location name stays the same while the description is changed, which can be noticed in the tavern lodgings floor level;

- The background picture for the market introduction dialogue was really, really bad - had to spend more time working on it;

- Revised, translated, and implemented the aforementioned introduction dialogue;

- Refactored all level logic scripts, making them more organised - this is pretty much the final stroke for how the level logic should be implemented; I don’t think there’s much more that can be done to streamline the process and make the scripts easier to follow;

- Prepared body and portrait sprites for the two new characters required for the future trading tutorial sequence;

- Prepared a background sprite that can be used for dialogues in the market square, since the one mentioned above is not suitable for that;

- Revised and translated a good chunk of dialogues for the market sequence - they won’t be implemented this week, however.

And that's it. Like I said, I hope to implement the trading tutorial sequence this week. The progress is very slow. I hoped to finish the whole demo by April, yet here we are, only on the market stage. To put it into perspective, after the trading sequence, there's going to be another fight sequence that is supposed to introduce the escape, reputation change, and companions' loyalty mechanics, then we will return to the tavern to complete a crafting tutorial sequence, followed by the toned-down adult segment, and of course, all these have a lot of dialogue. In other words, my estimations were, like, at least two-three months off. Now I hope to finish the demo by summer.

Anyway, that's all for this week. See y'all later.

Ps. Your laces are untied and your back is white.