Pound Cake Diary : 6

I have some exciting news! I am going to be selling physical copies of Naitemo at a local craft-fair. This way I can earn some money to put towards a computer. I really want a new computer...everything would be so much easier. 

Each copy comes with a keychain of the characters. I hope I can make a few sales ^^

As for Emit Glass, progress is still slow. That's just because I've been working on Naitemo though. I am writing Yukari's route now, the last of the main girls. The route drafts are almost finished and that makes me feel so much better! I keep mixing up Yukari and Yutaka's names in the code because her tag is "y" and his is "yu"...but their names both start with YU.

I also started drawing the CGs for Midori's route. There are some really cute and romantic scenes and I want to make sure the CGs are enough to capture those intense feelings. 

There is still a lot of work to do, but I know I can finish soon if I am determined enough and stop wasting time >_< I want to thank everyone for the small bit of support I've gotten on Instagram and X. All the kind words and interaction means everything to me. I want to continue to make games, and make an impact in this community!! ^^

Status Update : 5

Hello again ^^ I am not very proud of myself...

I finished Yutaka's route, but his route is very short so that didn't take long. There are only two routes left to draft and then I'll finally move on to editing. I am dreading that...

Progress is really slow because my passion for this game has died out a lot. It's because of a lot of things, but mostly because I want to work on other projects. I think that a lot of my issues stem from not engaging with games similar to Emit Glass as much. When I first began development, I was playing Clannad. That really inspired me to write and gave me a direction to go in. 

I'm going to try and finish this as quickly as I can, because I don't want to lose the project all together. I knew going into this that it would take a long time to complete. 

I am participating in NaNoRenO this year with a game called Naitemo. It's a story I've had in mind for a few years and I never got the chance to do anything with it. It's just a cute, short little story about robots. I'm using this as a way to interest myself in VNs as a medium again. Naitemo is NVL style though, which I really like.

Most of my games going forward will probably be NVL, just because I think it's more flexible and cool as a story telling device. The words can be laid out much more creatively (Line breaks, varied paragraph length, etc.) and I think that benefits my style of storytelling.

Anyways!! I will update again when I'm done drafting all the routes :3

Status Update : 4

Progress has been slow, but things are still being worked on. Rika's route is completed which leaves only 3 routes left to draft. There are still a lot of BGs needed, but most of them I cannot get until the summer because they are beaches, parks or seasonal places and it is way too cold & grey outside to get them. 

Rika's route was so hard to write because I personally have no interest in the character. I'm going to improve it in editing, but as a character she is the most bland. I hope the route can be more of a showcase for how Tatsuki deals with relationships with others and hardships, rather than completely focused on the romance. 

I am thinking about participating in NaNoRenO this year, and I might talk about that on Twitter ^^ I have so many ideas. 

Pound Cake Diary : 5

 I have gotten a lot of work done over the past two weeks! The most notable achievement is the completion of the game's GUI. I get bored of writing the script so in between writing sessions I worked on artwork. I think it looks pretty good for what I am currently capable of. I hope to continue improving my skills! I really tried to capture the right mood. The whole game is ocean themed so of course I incorporated as many sea creatures and water motifs as possible. This included fish, bubbles, dolphins, and a lot of blue!
(This version does not have the white uniform spikes or proper lineart color. This was fixed later on.)

I really struggled with the save/load slots! This was probably the hardest GUI feature to change. When I downloaded the art for the slots from my IPad they were not transparent or PNGs like I had selected so I had to fix that. Then the thumbnails weren't centered on the slot backgrounds so I had to go through a whole learning curve to figure out how to move them T_T I was so stressed. Then the text was too high so the slots covered it...everything was a mess. It turned out well in the end so I am very pleased with myself!

I am almost done writing the first draft of Kaori's route (About 90%). She is an interesting character to write because the way other people see her is vastly different from the way Tatsuki sees her, and even the way she sees herself. The drama of her route is definitely less "stressful" than Ayaka's, in the sense that the conflicts are lower stakes (At least towards the beginning). The routes keep getting shorter and shorter...maybe it's my attention span.

I hope that my writing style doesn't seem too shoujo-esc or girly! I am female after all lol. I want emotion to come through in the story but I know that a lot of Bishoujo games/stuff written by men for men don't delve so deep into the feelings or thoughts of the characters. It's just so hard to write romantic things about girls. What do I even say? She has nice eyes, a cute smile...? ^^ I am definitely going to make an Otome game next just to treat myself!! 

I noticed that each CG I draw keeps getting better than the last, and they look WAY better than the sprites. It might create an odd contrast between janky looking sprites and good CGs but I guess that's just how the development of skills goes. It will at least add some more artistic value to the game. I know lots of people won't like how the sprites look, but I am ready to take the criticism for that :3

Happy new year everyone! I am looking forward to all the great things I will make in 2025! <3