♥ Week 5 Devlog ♥

Hi Everyone! 

We're officially into Month 2 of YaoiJam2022! Week 5's been a good week, but a slow one.

- Almost done truckin' -

I managed to get the confession written up in a way I'm satisfied with. I'm proud of myself as this was a problem I was mulling over since the beginning, and I really felt like I solved it through deduction. ("Where could this scene take place in a way that makes sense for both routes?") I've  also have found a way to wrap the game up in a way I'm happy with, and now most of the major holes in the script have been filled.

The TODO list is a whole lot longer, but the tasks individually are tiny:

Not all of these make sense in context, but that's ok, they should be gone by next week.

- Gonn try and be a good righter -

This week I got a some books out of the library to refresh a little before starting the task of editing the script down.  (Stephen King's "On Writing" is incredible, and I've been finding value in "Self-Editing for Fiction Writers" by Renni Brown and Dave King  too.) 

I'm not sure if the devlog is a place for it, but I'm surprised just how much "How to Write" sections on dialogue are dedicated to dialouge tags. It's nice not having to bother with any of that.

I picked up some good tidbits that I'll be using to get the wordcount down:

• - Gutting the  "I think"s and the "or something"s or any other filler phrases I have a bad habit of repeating.
• - Removing passive tense as much as possible.
• - Removing unnessicary Adverbs.
• - Avoid describing something that is aleady apparent in the visuals (Such as a character entering the room), and try and convert any "I thinks" or "It seems" into details within the dialouge if theyre not stated directly. Allow the reader to think for MC instead of them wondering outloud.

And for general script improvement:

• - Watch the overuse of the sentance structures "As ____ pulled off her gloves, she turned to face him." and "Pulling off her gloves, she turned to face him."

Not word count issues, but a problem apparently many writers apparently have, myself included. It's something I was lamenting over privately to John, after noticing all my descriptions felt like they followed the same rythmn/format.

• - Remove the italics. One of the books I read points out (with examples) it's potentially condescending to the reader if you assume they couldn't hear how a sentance is being said otherwise. I don't think it's nessicary. Same potentially for the amount of exclaimations I'm using.

Those are my main takeaways. Some are more subjective than others, but I'll report how helpful these points have been once I've finished applying them to my script.

Currently We're finishing the week with around 19.5k words, and I'd like to see that drop by next week.

- Faces made! -

Started implimenting the expressions into the script- They make a big difference!:

They both feel way more like assholes now, I love it.

Arley's are all mostly finished, barring a few that are sketches but work perfectly as placeholers. He's assembled within renpy and functionally is complete. Nala's had most of her parts made, but she hasn't been coded in just yet. I'll be implimenting her after Hayden and Arley's expressions are added in the script.

Implimenting them'll be something I chip away at day by day, and I think it'll take a week or 2 of work, all in all.  I'll be using this time to also look over the script and make sure it reads well, too.

- Font Changes - 

Speaking of things reading well- I ended up changing the font for better readability- I had to edit the font file itself to include a few extra characters, but everything's working just great now. I like the difference it makes:

A little more shape consistency goes a long way.

- BG Scribbles- 

Progress is also being made on the backgrounds!

Originally there was going to be a 5th background, but I've found it unnessicary and have adjusted the script to remove it . I've also started to make plans for the drawn additions on top of the BGs- Next week I'll render out the lineart and see how making changes goes.

These colors have grown on me, but I don't think they'll make it to the final as saturated as they are right now.

- Planning Ahead -

That's it for Week 5! A good week overall, but one of lots of little increments rather than anything big to showcase.

In Week 6, I'd like to:

• - Make sure Nala's sprite is useable/coded into Ren'py.
• - Impliment expressions for Arley and Hayden into the main script, and hopefully also all of Hayden's exclusives.
• - Render out lineart for the BGs, maybe draw on top , but first focus on general color schemes
• - Patch up script a little more,  aim to get as much of that TODO list removed as possible.
• - Increase the opacity of the textbox and finish that all up.

See you next week!