How New Scenes Get Into the Game

🔊 Many of you keep asking when the next release will be out. Fair enough!! We want to get it out too!

Unfortunately, building content is actually quite complicated and takes longer than we'd like. To give everyone an idea of just how much work goes into putting a scene together, we thought we'd share with all of you the steps we go through to release new content (Some of these I will explain in greater detail in future posts).

1. Character concept designed - Devilish Domina designs the character concept, including personality, kinks, and look.

2. Concept art created - Just Jeff creates initial concept art in 2D for review and approval.

3. Tasks, rewards, and punishments identified -  Domina creates a list of these for the Mistress in consultation with Deviant to make sure we can run them in game.

4. Script outline written - The flow of the scene is assembled by Domina or ACEmat to capture the interactions, but also to insert the base code that runs through the entire game. Domina reviews every script outline to make sure it fits the game.

5. Technical requirements identified - Once Domina has created the outline and confirmed what features to include, Deviant puts them into the list of things to build or advises Domina how to make sure it works in the script.

6.  Coding starts - Much of the coding is done by Unity, but in order to get things to work the way we want, Deviant always has to drop into the C# file and tweak variables, parameters, and other techy things!

7. Script fleshed out - While Deviant is creating new features, Domina or ACEmat start to build out the script with dialogue, animations, scenes, music, characters, and player poses. Ink manages all these functions, so Domina (oops, I mean ACEmat) is really doing all the coding around here. ;P Domina reviews every script and invetitably fixes ACEmat's poor attempts to reflect a FemDomme voice. :D

8. Character model built - In the background, Just Jeff is building the model based on the earlier steps and approval of the 2D art concept. We usually start to get prototype images at this point to see if anything needs to be tweaked.

9. Animations created - We already have a base folder of animations that we can reuse in the game, but each scene introduces additional ones that have to be created. JP, Domina or Deviant tend to mock these up.

10. Player poses built - This is also about the time we start creating the poses you, as the player, have to perform. We have a separate tool for building these, which JP or Deviant create and load into the game.

11. Script review and line tagging - This involves playing through the script in text form to make sure all the commands work, and review and feedback from ACEmat, JP, or Deviant. When all the revisions are done, we run a program to tag the lines for VO.

11. Voice over recorded - Once Domina is happy with the script she goes off to record the VO. This usually involves Deviant having to stop everything he's doing, since our makeshift recording studio is right by his desk!

12. Sound files labeled and exported into game - At this point, Domina sends the sound files off to ACEmat to review and label, which he then sends back for Domina to extract and export into the game.

13. Lip sync run to match VO - Once the audio files are individually labelled to match the Ink script line #s, Domina runs a batch lip sync program that ensures the character mouths move during the scene. There's always some clean up of this during the testing phase, which requires manually manipulating key frames (it's tedious!!).

14. Music selected / composed - We've recently brought on board an amazing composer, Fflewddur Fflam, who is creating custom music for the house and themes for each Mistress. As we grow, we definitely don't want to use anyone's music that we don't have direct permission for!

15. All assets loaded into Unity - Things start to get really fun when we assemble all the parts in Unity and run the scene for the first time!

16. First round playtesting to find bugs - Deviant and Devilish start playtesting first - it's important not to embarass ourselves with fans too quickly! We keep a log of bugs on Trello to help us stay on top of them. Sometimes, at this stage, we also have to downgrade a feature we wanted to include because of the time it takes to write up the code. But it goes onto our list for adding at a later date!

17. Urgent bug fixes completed - We fix the worst bugs first. Our MVP is making sure the scene can be played from beginning to end!

18. User playtesting starts - At this point, we usually invite Patrons who participate in playtesting to go through it and give us additional feedback. This is such a critical step. Players let us know if scenes are too long, positions too hard to hold, the dialogue is wonky, or any other usability issue that would interfere in the immersiveness of the scene.

19. Major bugs fixed and minor fixed logged - We continue bug fixing through the play testing cycle and prioritize any that fans find especially problematic.

20. Build and release the game - Once we feel the scene is stable enough to release, we create a Unity build and send out the link to Patreon, Discord, Steam, and Itch.io. In our eagerness to get content out to fans, we often have to release with niggly bugs and just keep working on those as we build future scenes.

Cheers!