Devlog #123

Hi-ho, Wudge here.

So... it's out! If you somehow haven't heard despite my modest-yet-incessant marketing efforts, Herotome's Super Demo is now out on itch.io!

People seem to really enjoy the game. My notifications are blowing up. Everything seems to be going really well - it's all coming up Wudge, one might say!

Which means it's time to talk about 𝓜𝓮𝓷𝓽𝓪𝓵 𝓘𝓵𝓵𝓷𝓮𝓼𝓼.~

Y'all weren't expecting that one, were ya? Boom, baby! Haha!!!

So, let me know if this sounds familiar: I spend most of my waking moments worrying that something bad is going to happen. I'm perpetually waiting for the other shoe to drop. (Thank you to @hummingbird-games for reminding me that idiom exists, and taking it in good humor when I excitedly babbled that "YES! It's like there's this giant centipede with shoes in my ceiling and I'm convinced I hear him walking around and someday, someday he's gonna throw all his shoes at me like that one guy did to George Bush--!"

...I'm worried that someone is going to find a reason to be rightfully angry with me. I'm worried that, through the mortifying ordeal of being known, I will be punished with the harrowing gauntlet of rejection and misery. I worry that, any day now, I'm going to get a random half-thought-out message that obliterates my heart into smithereens and kills me on the spot. I am a sea slug, cautiously edging a tendril into the light and praying not to be noticed by the eldritch fish above that will devour me in a single gulp.

I find myself flinching even when there isn't a blow coming.

Putting out a piece of yourself for the public to consume is really fucking terrifying. I did it anyway, which is cool of me, but I want to make it known that there is not eternal bliss and satisfaction and rose petals on the other side. Is this better than my cave of solitude and darkness I emerged from? I think so. But I'm still perpetually scared, as Toby Fox might once have described it, "like a small dog startled by a thunder storm."

I'm still really tired, too.

I don't write this to complain; I'm conscious that some people are now looking up to me and the way I do things, and I want to be transparent. I don't want anyone to think I'm perfect or have always been perfect and will always be perfect, or that I've ~found happiness~.

I'm not. I have never been. I will never be. I haven't.

But I'm okay, at least. I'm okay and I'll be okay, and I'm grateful to you all. Every single one of you. Thank you for not submitting me to the harrowing gauntlet of rejection and misery…yet.  :^)

Alright what's the takeaway here. Uhm.

Be yourself! Follow your dreams! Never give up!!!

That's sincerely what I'm trying to do. It's a challenge every single day; I have to choose Herotome every single day (something something married to my own game blah blah blah). It is worth it. And I believe in you - assuming you're not a cannibal or a murder or, worst of all, a plagiarist (gasp!) or anything else terrible and bad - I believe in you. (… But honestly, I'd believe in you if you were a bad person too, I'd believe in you to continue to do bad things but I'd hope that you'll stop and turn yourself in to the proper authorities lmao…)

… I went on a weird tangent again…

I don’t know if any of this is making sense. Maybe it will be insightful to someone out there, maybe it won't.

I uh, did some writing for the next part of the game, and I plan on working on some character expressions today in honor of my Ko-Fi donators.

Oh, and there's gonna be a stream on Wednesday 10pm Pacific. I'll be there! Come say hi and please don't squish me!

… Yeah that's all I can think of writing for now. I absolutely wish you all the best with every speck of love I have in my current flesh prison.

Tata for now. Stay safe and keep warm,

Wudge.

Do you bleed? You will.

coughcoughahem-- another beautiful piece by my lovely REMNANTATION <-(website with glorious portfolio and commission info) @remnantation

Fun fact this was actually part of an art trade >:)

Warden can't wait to get a hot nosebleed in

when the Super Demo comes out!!!

Make sure to bookmark the Super Demo!!

Herotome Super Demo comes out Dec 2nd 2023 🎔

Video features a voiced dub by Richard Gabriel Millares; with original music "LOOKING GLASS" by @brightbone and art by @remnantation

Devlog #120

Hi-ho, Wudge here. Early devlog...!

This week I drew a blush just for Warden and nobody else. There are two very specific ways to see it, and only in this office location. So... good luck!

And - we've finally updated Mr Whidden! Wahoo!!!! Remnantation did an amazing job as always!

I thought about putting in some animated smoke coming out of his cannon arm but I had to tell myself No... No Wudge....stop.. ......I did add a lil ember and smoke at the very edge of the gun but THATS IT I restrained myself there and did not animate!!!

So, what else is left?

Thanks I'm glad you asked.

.... So yeah, mostly like - social media promo stuff. That should be it. Fingies crossed. Whew.

By the way?

Super Demo comes out December 2nd. Mark your calendars <3

Stay safe and keep warm,

Wudge.

Incredibly excited to announce that the free Act I demo for Bright Oak will be releasing June 24th on Itch.io, and later on Steam!

You'll want the sound up on this-- I finally, finally get to show off a bit of John Åhlin's absolutely phenomenal work on the original score!! Character art is, as ever, credit to the wonderful @remnantation.

Proper Irregular Monday Update to come later today!

No proper update today, except to say:

Demo incoming at the end of this week!!

Demo will release on itch.io June 24, 2023 at midnight PDT!

What will the demo entail, you ask?

What will be missing from the demo that is planned for the final release?

...and now, back to polishing up those final finishing touches. ✨

Irregular Monday Update, Edition 10

Here we gooooooooo--!

The Demo:

✨The full Act I Demo will release on Itch.io June 24th, 2023, and Steam soon afterwards.✨

That's right! This upcoming June 24th! Twelve days from now! Less than a fortnight hence! A dozen sleeps from tonight! (assuming I sleep between now and then, hahahaha...haa...)

To that effect, if you missed my earlier post, here's the demo release trailer, complete with @remnantation's excellent character art, and one of the absolutely incredible tracks John Åhlin composed for the original score:

What will the demo entail, you ask?

What will be missing from the demo that is planned for the final release?

Beyond all that immediate excitement...

Right Place. Wrong Time.

Seeking aid after a wreck, you stumble upon the quaint, tightly knit community of Bright Oak-- some 45 years outside of your intended travel plans, and struggling with their own troubles in the wake of a mysterious catastrophe. Finding a path back to your own timeline won’t be easy. Abandoning the townspeople to their fate might be even harder.

FEATURES:

Bright Oak is a heavily character-driven visual novel with elements of science fiction. Discover the tragic secrets behind Bright Oak’s preternatural dilemma; find friendship, or possibly love (characters are not gender-locked to pronoun choice, romance and friendship paths given equal weight); save the town and make your way home-- and if at first you don’t succeed, try, try again!

Devlog #8

Hi-ho, Wudgey here!

I guess I was wired towards art this week, but next week’s priority should be: fleshing out my draft and incorporating some of the edited text into code. The latter will be my main focus this coming Wednesday. 

Personal Note:

I turned on my phone today and saw – 

Whoa!!! What a shock for me. Thanks for the likes and follows, everyone, I’ll keep doing my best!

Special thank you to @steamberrystudio​ and @otomesweetheart​ for reblogging so many posts from here, you guys are too kind   😭

I had a bit of a depression spell so I didn’t accomplish much last Thursday; I’ve been trying to ease off obsessive social media checking and keep my mind active, so I should be able to start this next week full of energy.  ❤  

I’ve beaten Pinstripe – I don’t want to spoil anything, so I’ll just say that it was a very worthwhile experience, and not too frustrating for a platformer. It’s only about 3-4 hours long, so if you need some quick and momentary immersion, I highly recommend it!

I’ve also finally finished reading Hogfather, so I can finally start on The Handmaid’s Tale!! I’ve seen a lot of great writing advice from its author Margaret Atwood, so I’m really excited for this one.

I hope you’re all staying safe and keeping warm.

Much love,

Wudgey.

Devlog #4

Hi-ho, Wudgey here! It’s gonna be a special log this week, since we’ve made a lot of art progress! ❤

(I feel like I’ve done more than this, but I’ve forgotten. Might update this post a little later.)

Personal note of the week:

I got onto Dropout and am finally catching up on Tiny Heist, which is delightful. And pretty soon I’m gonna post an overview of @velvet-cupcake-games​‘s delightful title Made Marion, so keep an eye out for that!  ❤

I’m kinda blanking on what else to say… I guess I’m pretty tired right now. ;;; Again, might update this post a little later.

I hope you’re all staying safe and keeping warm.

Much love,

Wudgey.

A pot-in-pot refrigerator, clay pot cooler is an evaporative cooling refrigeration device which does not use electricity. It uses a porous outer earthenware pot, lined with wet sand, contains an inner pot (which can be glazed to prevent penetration by the liquid) within which the food is placed - the evaporation of the outer liquid draws heat from the inner pot. The device can be used to cool any substance. This simple technology requires only a flow of relatively dry air and a source of water.

Source: [x] 

Follow Ultrafacts for more facts!

This is cool.

Important Note!

This DOES NOT work for dairy and meat products

ONLY use this for fruits and vegetables please

My housemate had one of these and any dairy or meat they stored in it went off long before they could finish it or long before the use-by date

Overshoots and Mini Anticipations lecture from my Complete Introduction to 2D animation package.

https://gumroad.com/l/Introto2DComplete or you can buy each chapters, or my other tutorials: https://gumroad.com/stringbing

An artist : Aw man! I saw my arts were reposted on Instagram. I’ve asked them to take my arts down but they ignored me.

Me : Say no more! Click this link, then click ‘fill out this form’. Fill the form and wait for about 1-2 days, the staffs will remove the image you were reporting from the reposter’s account :^)

hope you don’t mind me adding some more info :’D

Many websites have those complaint forms you need to fill out to submit DMCA notice. Here are some of them:

Usually links to those forms can be found on website’s Terms of Service pages. (search for copyright or DMCA)

Any content you’ve created, is copyrighted by you. You have full right to ask staff to delete repost. Your works deserve to be protected. ♥

Yo. This better be my most reblogged post. I want to see all my artists friends reblogging this for their artists friends.

^^^^^ for all the artists with uncredited work on pinterest and insta

Ah the free market at work. (Similar to when I went to CVS to pickup a 90$ prescription and they had their own generic version for 7.99).

This is important! Tell your Friends.

I can’t believe some insurances quit covering them 😐

From Slate:

The generic Adrenaclick will cost $109.99 for two doses, compared with $649.99 for the same amount of drug in an EpiPen. That’s good news, both for financial and safety reasons: STAT reported last year that some parents and institutions had begun filling up syringes with epinephrine as a cost-cutting measure, a DIY solution that could pose great risk to the children who may have eventually needed injections. A more affordable alternative will help ensure safer epinephrine injections.

That’s assuming, though, that the people who need these devices know exactly what to ask for when they’re sitting in their doctors’ offices. Otherwise, they’ll still be stuck with the overpriced product. Here’s why: The mechanism by which Adrenaclick injects the drug is slightly different from EpiPen’s mechanism, so the Food and Drug Administration has ruled that the two are not therapeutically equivalent. That distinction is important because it means a prescription for an EpiPen cannot be filled with Adrenaclick. If you want the cheaper option, you have to have an Adrenaclick prescription.

You must ask your doctor for an Adrenaclick prescription! 

I also found a coupon from Impax on 0.15mg and 0.3mg epinephrine injection, USP auto-injectors, which appear to be the generic version of Adrenaclick; these coupons cover up to $100 per pack for 3 packs of these injectors (6 total injectors).

Some customers may be automatically eligible for $100 off the retail price thus only paying $10 for a pack, but this may be good backup for those who for whatever reason do not meet those requirements.

Pass this information on, potentially save a life.

@infamouslydorky

How to Use an Ellipsis Properly in Fiction

Ever wonder why some ellipses seem to have three dots and others have four? Some have spaces between each dot and some don’t? Why sometimes you capitalize after an ellipsis and other times you lowercase?

To be honest, I don’t think most of us were taught properly how to use an ellipsis.  I know I wasn’t. I see a lot of writers who don’t understand all the rules of ellipses either.

Some of you may be wondering what an “ellipsis” is. It’s a fancy name for the three dots or “periods” you see in writing ( … ). The word “ellipsis” is Greek for “omission,” which is what it does. It shows that something has been omitted or left out.

Now with research papers, this might be obvious. Maybe you are quoting a source and don’t want to quote every single word of it, so you use an ellipsis to show that you left some stuff out. Like this:

Full quote:

Quote with omission:

In fiction, we usually aren’t quoting sources. But the ellipsis works in similar ways, it conveys that something is omitted. This might be something directly omitted. Mamma Mia uses this method well:

The ellipsis is used to imply they got intimate, but that part is “omitted.”

Other times things are omitted because they are incomplete–maybe an incomplete line of dialogue such as when a character trails off.

Or an incomplete thought.

Or maybe something is “omitted” for the sake of something else, like a character trying to censor or tone down his word choice.

In pauses like this, the ellipsis may convey thinking. It’s completely fine to use them that way.

In rare occasions, an ellipsis might be used to indirectly convey the passing of time.

And you may occasionally see them used other ways stylistically, but these are the main situations.

In a sense, though, in all these examples, something is omitted, whether it’s directly, or indirectly, like an incomplete or changing thought, or actions in between.

When used smartly, ellipses can be powerful in fiction because they convey more than what is on the page, and that is vital to good storytelling.

Too often, however, newer writers just throw them in because they like the feel and sound of them or the long pause, or even in some cases … because they are lazy. Make sure if you use them, they have a point.

Now let’s get to the technicalities. Years ago, I used to be confused that sometimes ellipses seemed to be three dots and other times four, and I didn’t know when to use which. Ellipses are three dots. However, if it comes after a complete sentence, you still use a period.

 If it follows an incomplete sentence, you don’t use a period.

If the words after the ellipsis are the start of a new sentence, you capitalize them.

 If not, you don’t.

When it comes to spacing before and after an ellipsis, handle it how you would a regular word.

One exception to this is if there is a question mark following.

According to The Chicago Manual of Style, ellipses should have a space between each dot.

 However, in APA style, there are no dots.

Fiction typically follows The Chicago Manual of Style, but you may still see the ellipsis with no spaces, especially since word processors sometimes reformat ellipses automatically. So while technically they should have spaces between each dot, you probably aren’t going to get reprimanded if you don’t. Even The Chicago Manual of Style notes that some places will be fine with the no-space ellipsis. I use spaces because that’s how I was corrected by a mentor once.

One more thing: Ellipses do not signify an interruption.

WRONG:

 Use em dashes for that.

Correct:

Dashes are another subject.

But hopefully now you know how to handle ellipses!

On Writing Flawed Books

If you’re a writer and you’ve thrown yourself into learning the craft–following writing blogs, reading craft books, attending workshops–there’s this thing that is very likely to happen. 

Armed with newfound knowledge of what makes a piece of writing fantastic, you’ll realize that your writing.. isn’t. 

It may even start to feel like your writing is the worst writing that has ever existed. It may make you scared to put a single new word on the page in front of you. You’ll see exactly what you’ve been doing wrong, and you may very well not know what to do fix it. 

I’m here to let you know that it’s natural to feel that way when you’ve reached a point where your knowledge surpasses your ability. A secret for you? Your knowledge of craft–any craft–will always surpass your ability if you do what you should and continually study said craft. It’s a good thing. 

It’s okay for your writing to be flawed. 

You can write a book, know it has flaws, and still be proud of everything you’ve accomplished. 

Published books are flawed. Best selling, critically acclaimed books are flawed. Readers love books with flaws, because those flaws tend not to matter as long as the story connects with them. 

There are people who complain about all the adverbs Rowling uses for dialog tags in Harry Potter. Features in Harry Potter can be used as examples of “bad craft.” Does it mean the books are poorly crafted? Does it lessen their value to the literary world? To the world at large? OF COURSE NOT. 

No book is perfectly crafted. Not a single one. The book you’re writing will never be perfectly crafted. So what do you do about it? 

Tell your story. 

Do your best. 

Keep Improving. 

But don’t let the fact that your work has flaws stop you from writing–or worse, stop you from being proud of everything you’ve already written. 

It’s also based on a true story! But of course Netflix isn’t promoting it at all 😒😒 Please watch it so we can get another season!

truly

Playing with glitch effects in Photoshop, maybe had a little too much fun.

I’ve never actually uploaded any gifs before, so trying to figure out optimal file sizes was fun….ha…

The Character’s name is Glitch, he belongs to @remnantation