We're streaming in just under an hour from now, at 2 pm PDT Saturday, Oct. 23. We also plan to do a marathon stream next week, Saturday, Oct. 30 starting at 6 pm PDT and running past midnight.
New Tilly's Tale build 0.0.12 with More Voice!
over 4 years ago
– Tue, Sep 28, 2021 at 02:06:18 AM
The epic beta build 0.0.12 of Summer Daze at Hero-U: Tilly's Tale is now up on Steam for backers with Alpha or Beta test privileges. The bug fix changes are small, but the voices...
Gerhard sprite pivot adjusted for neutral pose so he lines up vertically/horizontally with other poses
Selecting Quit from sidebar menu appropriately focuses on Quit menu, rather than appearing behind other menus and remaining persistent while you play 'around' the Quit menu
Added 2800 voice lines. 2800!
Philip has been working on voice clips for months, but they weren't in the game yet. We came up with an optimization that let him automate the process, so suddenly Tilly's voice is almost all there! And Zehra Fazal's acting on Tilly is amazing!
I'm especially interested in feedback on how the background music works with the voice lines. Getting the soundscape "right" is hard. Currently, the music plays continuously throughout the game. We're looking at a few options, including:
1. Leave it the way it is. You can adjust music and voice volume from the Options menu.
2. Have the music keep playing, but have the volume automatically drop after a few seconds to let players focus on the dialogue.
3. Have each music sequence fade out after, say, ten seconds, with silence until another sequence starts.
4. Default to lower music volume, letting players increase it if they choose.
5. Eliminate looping, so each musical sequence plays to its end, then stops.
If we go with option 2, I expect we'll have a switch to let players who want more music to disable the fadeout.
Our stream this Saturday subverts the idea of "Fall" with "Fall From Grace." We'll be talking about the villains you love to hate (or hate to love), as well as flawed heroes. This Saturday, Sept. 25, 2021 at 2 pm PDT until about 4 pm on Twitch: https://www.twitch.tv/transolargames
Tilly's Tale build 0.0.11 is on Steam for beta testers
over 4 years ago
– Wed, Sep 15, 2021 at 01:39:28 AM
Summer Daze: Tilly's Tale Test Build 0.0.11
Philip has updated Steam with the latest test build. Here are his release notes:
Old "The End" black image replaced with credits video (and does not appear over it blocking the playing video)
Normal game audio does not play on top of credits video music
At last, journal check in bedroom scenes no longer causes strange dialogue thought bubble on closing it
Back button and tabs work on all journal pages in bedroom scenes
Credits video will not play twice immediately on top of itself if you fast forward to it during the festival
Festival backer vignette can be ended early by clicking/pressing spacebar/pressing enter/pressing escape
Ending festival backer vignette early will now properly reset camera to center right away
Loading a game while festival backer vignette is playing will now properly stop it from continuing in a new scene
Meanwhile, Lori and I have finished going through all of the voice recordings, marking up which "take" to use for each line. Philip literally has his work cut out... cutting out the clips. We'll also look at which lines weren't recorded to decide how much studio time is needed for "callbacks."
I've noticed a couple of minor issues with the build. We hope some of the beta test supporters will try out the new build and report on what you find. I'll be doing that as well.
Stream Time Again
I won't be posting all of the live streams here - Figure every other Saturday. But since I was posting the new build notes already, here we are.
The best place to keep up with immediate news such as the streaming schedule is our Discord. Here's a temporary link. You can also find us by looking for Transolar Games on Discord. Transolar Games Discord link is good for seven days.
The theme is "Erana's Garden," a combination of Lori's gardening obsession, and talk about the various gardens and safe places that Erana created in Quest for Glory lands. Oh, and maybe a bit about Erana herself.
As usual, there will be contests, giveaways, and developer talk. We probably won't stream game play this time; that will have to wait for a special event or longer stream time.
Lion among the succulents in Lori's garden
Meeps Away!
Some of the boxes in my Mom's garage are filled with the remaining Blue Meep toys. As a result, I was finally able to fulfill the remaining Meep orders for Summer Daze at Hero-U backers. That feels good!
Lori is currently going through Tilly's final recording session, after which we need to do final testing and decide whether to do voice recording "callbacks." We think the game is done at that point. I'll hand it off to Silesia to do the Nintendo Switch version, and we'll scramble madly to test the iOS and Android versions. We're aiming at late October to November for the Summer Daze at Hero-U: Tilly's Tale game release! Ifeyo's Adventure should be at a similar date in 2022.
Plush Blue Meep on a fence post in Ahwahnee
Continuing Life Changes
One of the reasons we delayed our Meep-retrieval visit to Oakhurst for almost a year is that Lori didn't think her car was in good enough condition to make the trip safely. We spent a couple thousand on repairs, which got us there and back, but turned out to basically be bandaids.
After returning to Oceanside, we had the car checked out. The estimate gave us sticker shock, so after 19 years of faithful service, it was time to retire her Honda CR-V. I think we wore it out driving up and down our dirt road.
Speaking of which, if you know anyone who wants to retire to a secluded ranch in Ahwahnee, California, just a few miles from where Sierra On-Line and we made our magic, check with Donna Pride at London Properties in Oakhurst. We have a Flying Aardvark Ranch for sale!
Crazy Summer, Alpha build 10, livestream this Saturday
over 4 years ago
– Sat, Aug 07, 2021 at 12:25:17 AM
Lori spent a month helping out with our new grandson
We made it home to Oakhurst for a month...
but our "vacation" turned into completely packing up the house (and throwing away 90% of everything we owned) in preparation for selling it
And we each managed to catch a sinus infection that lasted for weeks.
Farewell to the Flying Aardvark Ranch
So we managed to make some progress on Summer Daze at Hero-U, but nowhere close to what we hoped we'd get done. Lori and I are still working on breaking out Zehra Fazal's voiceovers for Tilly's dialogue, and probably have another month of that to do.
Note: When we make a seemingly crazy estimate, such as "voice acting will add six months to the project," it's at best accurate, and at worst wildly optimistic. In this case, it's somewhere between.
Alpha Build 0.0.10 Now on Steam
Here are Philip's build notes:
-Added credits video to ending
-Applied camera movement to focus on backers during festival vignette sequence
-Fixed issue in later days where choosing a non-journal option would softlock the game
-Fixed certain characters' sprites lining up with on screen props in Dining Hall and Poker Table
-Added fifth choice to the choice window for the new times when you might have 5 options
-Journal layer now appears underneath dialogue in Rogue Class Day 1
-Conversation Canvas no longer blocks choices if you fast forward into a choice block
-Menu button can be accessed at any time
-Fixed issue where opening journal in Rogue Class made the game think it was paused
-Related issue where fast forwarding through Rogue Class in Day 1 would not allow you to enter Workshop or Practice Field
-Changed clickable area on journal tabs to not be in the middle of pages
-Tabs unclickable in Rogue Class Day 1 journal
He also added additional Tilly voice lines, but needs Lori and I to finish our work to do the rest.
Other Summer Daze News
We still plan to support Windows, MacOS, Linux, Android, iOS, and Switch. We just need to make all those builds and find a way to let you (and we) test them.
Thanks to the trip home, I now have the Meeps and boxes. About a dozen backers are still waiting for their Meeps; I intend to mail them next week.
I've just signed a deal to add SmileGate Stove as a distributor for Korean players. Unfortunately, the game will only be in English, as our word count is too high to make translation affordable.
We have two more Summer Daze games in the pipeline. All Kickstarter backers will get Tilly's Tale and the upcoming Ifeyo's Adventure. Figure Fall 2021 for Tilly's Tale, and Fall 2022 for Ifeyo's Adventure (unless we add voice acting, in which case it will stretch into 2023). Sometime in 2023 or 2024, we'll have Sami's Story. Sami is an anthropomorphic Corgi, and we think you'll find his story totally charming.
Principal art assets are complete for Ifeyo's Adventure, but Lori needs to write it, we'll need to get music, and then we'll probably ask Dave Gilbert to go back into the studio to record voice actors, and Lori and I will spend an enormous amount of time editing the session recordings to get them into the game.
Principal art is well along for Sami's Story. Hey, we couldn't leave JP without anything to do!
Sami and Alain in the Rec Room - Summer Daze at Hero-U: Sami's Story
