Caz

Oh hey, it's me! Sorry I'm very late to reply to these: I think there's a few things there... 1) Writing good characters that sound natural is just trying to think in other peoples shoes really. In the beginning, I wasn't very good at writing characters. Some issues are still present - especially in the early game (such as Ava and the cloud scene which still taxes me). Good character writing came to me later. I think partly it has to do with working in a medical field - so I truly meet all kinds of people from a variety of backgrounds every day. This has made writing new characters that are distinct, realistic, and goal driven, actually pretty straightforward. I love inventing new characters, so I'm sure you guys will be interested in what the future holds. 2) The copyright things are an issue - but I more or less understand. I wrote the entire game. Although I live under the impression that not everything needs to be explained - a few lines here and there could tidy things up, especially surrounding the Darkroot stuff. Otherwise, thanks! I'm glad you enjoyed the game!!! I won't comment on any future content though hahahaha 1) Idk man I leave that stuff to posty and the scripters 2) It's a mix. It's very much what Pokemon would suit which character mixed with what Pokemon do we think would be cool for a mega. I don't really believe there's much of a pattern beyond that. Regardless, we take a great deal of time to pick which Pokemon will get a custom mega as we do not want to oversaturate the game with customs. The goal with these areas is to make a sprawling metropolis that is so intricate it can easily stand alone to tell its own story. The means cranking in lots of detail, and many NPCs. Balancing that with making a city that is reasonably easy to navigate is often difficult, and that process hasn't been perfect by any means (Blackview) but I am definitely improving (Cellia East). I couldn't really tell you how I come up with names specifically. I just try and think of something that seems symbolic for either the story that area is trying to tell, or symbolizes events or themes that are happening at the time. I listen to a lot of video game music when looking for inspiration writing-wise. Really if something clicks super well and I won't get into trouble, I am not above giving it a whirl in game. As for Reeve... ask Ruby. She can't be stopped. Ummm... yeah Posty can answer this once. Something something balance. I only started naming them in E4 I believe, which was called 'Twins'. E5 was called 'Somnium', and E6 'Reflections'. I only started naming them when I realized each episode not only had its own theme, but also sort of representing a bunch of things I was thinking about as I wrote them growing up.

I won't really add anything on to what Yumil said. There will be certain types that aren't represented by the League - and that's fine. It is what it is. I have no plans to invent new characters just to represent typings. Yes, some quests are impossible to finish if they are missed. Most of these quests will not be possible to finish in the future, as characters won't simply teleport back in time. Desolation has quests that are time dependent, and I don't think that is necessarily bad. It makes 100% completion difficult, but I think that having some difficulty in doing that is fine. I take inspiration from soulbourne games a lot, and this mechanic is used frequently there.

The rest of the game is written and separated into a total of four future episodes (7, 8, 9, and 10). That being said, I do rewrites of said content pretty frequently and I tinker a lot with things to make sure I get what I think is the best story I can produce. The direction of the game changed significantly during the hiatus - I completely rewrote everything in fact. There has been a pretty clear vision since E5 came out, but there’s always room for change as improvements come along. Aww thanks mate. Yeah balance is really difficult especially now that I’ve graduated and am working. It’s tiring and oftentimes the last thing I feel like doing is more work. I really enjoy writing and I really enjoy making this story for people to play, but the key is taking breaks, scheduling time, and sharing the workload. Frankly at this point in my career I wouldn’t be able to do all of this without the help of the team (have you guys seen what kind of weight Posty has been pulling) and I’m eternally grateful for them. There are like a million inspirations for the games plot at this point. In the first iteration of the game the main inspiration was the movie Inception, but things have progressed a lot since that storyline lol Nowadays there’s a bunch of things. Final fantasy, bloodborne, a heap of movies, lots of things. I’ve really just taken inspiration from loads of tropes I’ve seen across the years and tried to create my own thing. Sorry that that’s not a very specific answer, but it’s just how it is now! More media = more creativity!

Cover art by @Ruby Red Hey everyone - after two and a half years of development, its finally time to begin the next chapter of Desolation. Development has been a long and difficult process full of laughs and challenges. We rebuilt much of the game from the ground up, and rewrote much of the early game to better capture the world that I wish to create. There are many, many new features in this Episode, many of which have been captured in the game's dev blog. This episode captures many of the themes I have thought about over the last few years of development, and in reflection of the content I've written, and in lieu of how the characters reflect on themselves, I have aptly named this episode "Reflections". I know that for many of you, this has been a long, long wait! I hope that you enjoy the game as much as we enjoyed making it. Without all of your support, we would not be here! I am so grateful to how supportive this community is, and we can't wait to finally deliver this game to you. From myself and the rest of the team, thank you so much. For now, we leave Episode 6: Reflections in your hands! Due to the extreme amount of changes and additions, old save files that have not completed E5 data will no longer work correctly. For E5 saves to work correctly, they must be complete and be saved inside the Cellia Manor main bedroom. When you're ready, swing by our downloads page to start the next step of your journey! Downloads This is not the end for Desolation - it is a new beginning, where we tell the next major chapter of this story. Let’s keep it up guys! Also, please report any bugs you find HERE! Please also note that the dev blog has now shifted, and that a new homepage for the game exists. Please find them below: New Dev Blog New Homepage Finally, if you haven't seen the trailer for E6, I'll just drop it here for you! Thanks guys. We finally made it after two and a half long years. This one is for you x Cheers, Caz

~ A Quick Update ~ Oh, hey. It's me... posting non-Patreon excerpts? What a crazy time we live in. Guess we really are in 2023, huh? Anyway, belated happy holidays everyone! I hope everyone managed to squeeze some much needed time off to catch up with their friends and family. I know I certainly did! Now, I'm sure you're all here ready for me to announce when we're planning on releasing Desolation to the community - I know it's been in high demand, and I know that you guys have been waiting a LONG time for it. So... without further ado, let me get you all up to speed. To be clear, we have completed alpha testing and are currently about half-way through beta testing. After that period, we will need to tidy some things up to get the Episode ready for launch for the rest of you guys. As for timeframes, we're aiming for the next 2-3 weeks. I hesitate to give you guys an exact release date as, of course, things can change, but we're very, very close. Here's some bloopers just to keep you going: Finally, before I go, I just want to give a quick shoutout to Darius' Youtube channel! He will soon be posting his work on the game's soundtrack there for you to check out just before E6's release, so stay tuned! His channel can be found here! We've worked really hard to reach this point, and I am so grateful to everyone that has worked on this episode, including the team themselves, reborn/rejuv devs for helping out, as well as testers themselves. We wouldn't have pulled this off without you guys. Almost there! Cheers, Caz

~ These are excerpts from a post on our Patreon - you can find the full post there ~ ~ Tales from the Testing Trenches ~ Hey everyone! Welcome to the end of November (well mid December now...), and therefore, the start of the last chapter of 2022! This is a very exciting time of year for the Deso team. For us, we are deep into the alpha testing process, and getting the game ready for beta/early access. It's almost there, actually... I myself have just graduated from medical school, and am taking a short break from development during the games early alpha stages, as this will be the one short vacation I probably get in the next few years. I'm basically writing this update from somewhere in rural Italy. Anyway. Don’t worry - this will not delay the release date or anything - Posty has been truly excellent at running things in my stead. Now, we are currently eyeing an early access/beta release date later this month for our Delphinium tier and above supporters, but this will be dependent on us being satisfied that the game is to a level of polish that we are proud of. That means that we need to have resolved most bugs, and will not kick off early access until this is done. While you’re waiting on that, however, I have a few small tidbits to share with you. Firstly, I will discuss Yumil’s amazing new Battle Reactions system in some more detail, and then I will let Posty tell you some tales from the testing trenches. Battle Reactions Yumil actually completed the first iteration of a Battle Reactions system a couple of years ago, when he first joined the team. Since then, the foundations of the game were completely remade from scratch, and things had to change. Despite that, the reactions are back, and they’re here to stay. The system essentially works as follows: “Boss” battles will now “record” your battle against them, and make certain comments based off your actions, or how well certain members of your team did during the battle. Reactions then display as dialogue following the battle. These can include your winning margin, such as varying comments for if you win 6-0, 4-0, or if it is a close battle, as well as comments on which of your team performed the best, or comments on which moves you spammed and many more! There are numerous reactions that trainers have, and almost all major boss fights have this system incorporated to some degree. For E6, these reactions are purely in the form of additional dialogue. However, we have created and tested functions that are a bit more complicated, such as the possibility of items, new 'mons, or even possible manor decorations being given if certain outcomes are met. These will be something that we explore in E7, but for now, just know that these reactions exist. Now then, let's hear from Posty, who is currently leading the charge on the alpha testing process... Tales from the Trenches Howdy Folks! It’s the one and only postman delivering some latest news regarding the state that Desolation is currently in. To start off with some big news… Desolation is now currently in Alpha Testing! Yes that’s right, we have finally gathered the community’s FINEST specimens to be our test subjects and run through the broken shards that is the game to make sure the game is bug-free! This ain’t an easy task, filled with crashes, weird little glitches, Aaron appearing from outta nowhere, alpha testing is a huge task and we appreciate all our testers for wanting to help us out! Some of our testers are testing older E5 saves, while others are starting out fresh, so by the time beta comes around, it should be a far smoother experience than what some of our alpha testers have already faced. Of course some things will slip through the cracks, and since we are now on a newer engine with a whole new codebase (which we share with Reborn and Rejuvenation!), we’ll most likely miss some stuff, so we still need people to report bugs. With that in mind, alpha testing will be lasting a few weeks and then we’ll look to move into the next stage of testing. With Caz away on vacation right now, I have been the one leading the charge with alpha testing, so it has definitely been a new experience for me. But rest assured we haven’t crashed and burned yet, haha… Anyways, to finish off this segment, have a few bloopers from our alpha testing and what we have experienced thus far with absolutely no context whatsoever! And with that, I’m out :] Now, back to Caz! -Posty And that about covers it from us! As I said, the team is deeply rooted in alpha testing trying to iron everything out. We are aiming for a late December early access release/beta for our Delphinium and above supporters over at Patreon, and the community will have it after that portion of testing is complete, but please bear in mind that any timeframes we offer are subject to the number of bugs that continue to appear. Nothing is set in stone, but I’ll keep everyone posted. Finally, for full transparency about early access - it will ONLY be available to those who are subscribed to the Delphinium supporter tier BEFORE early access goes live. Not during, and not after. This is to maintain a level of fairness towards our current supporters, many of which have been around for quite some time. Now, just before I leave... here is a snippet of the alternate cover art for E6! What any of this means, however, well... we'll leave that for you to decide! It's not long until you find out for yourself! If you'd like to see the full cover art, as well as more updates, please check out our Patreon! Cheers, Caz

~ This post is taken from our Patreon ~ ~ A Crown of Brilliant, Blinding Silver ~ Alright - I'm going to keep this update short and to the point since there is not much to say. Things are going extremely well currently, and we're very, very excited for you to see and play the game we have worked so hard on very soon. Unofficial-official concept of an E6 location... Ruby did this as schoolwork, okay. Firstly, let me just be transparent about the plan moving forward before I move on to the rest of the update: 1) We are currently working on internal testing. There are a few things to tidy up in terms of balance and major bugs. 2) Following this, we will slightly expand this internal testing to include a few more people. This will be within the next two weeks. 3) Next, we will expand testing/early access to VIP patrons on the server (Delphinium tier). If you would like to be involved with that, here is the link. 4) We will then release to the community. Time frames for this are not set in stone, but things are moving quite quickly now. Please bear with me as we tidy things up and get ready to release the game. Now, with the big stuff out of the way... What does it mean to be the best? So... we've revealed Reeve, a major new character in Desolation... but as I've said, there are numerous new characters yet to enter the fold. I thought I would take the opportunity today to reveal... wait, what... three of them?! Enter three members of our Elite Four... Atlas, Azura, and Damon! Indeed, despite all the events that have unfolded in the game, the most powerful trainers in the Region have yet to rear their heads? I wonder why that is... "The Elite Four, situated on Hydreilius Island, are the most revered and prestigious group of trainers in the Ayrith Region. Their strength, integrity, kindness, and nobility is unquestioned. As a result, it is not unusual to see their faces scattered across billboards and local advertisements. While only three members exist on the walls of buildings and promotions, a fourth exists purely by word of mouth... the fate of this other member, however, is unclear. Atlas, the Dragon-Fire hero, Azura, the Rock-Ice queen, and Damon, the Ghost-Dark nomad, form the foundation of what it means to be a powerful trainer in Ayrith... yet, their lack of physical presence does not go unnoticed..." We will reveal more about these incredible trainers soon. For now, I just want to show you some concept art of these trainers. Ruby designed Atlas and Azura, and Crim designed Damon. Both have done an absolutely fantastic jobs on bringing these characters to life, and portrayed them perfectly! Atlas, the Dragon-Fire member of the Elite Four, as designed by Ruby Azura, the Rock-Ice member of the Elite Four, as designed by Ruby. Damon, the Ghost-Dark member of the Elite Four Once again, massive kudos needs to be given to Ruby and Crim for their continued excellence in designing characters. As I said, you'll learn more about these mysterious characters soon, but for now, you'll have to be content with seeing their faces around the city... Anyway, that'll conclude this month's update. Apologies for its length, but there is very little to show this month without revealing massive spoilers. The team is working extremely hard on finishing up - and given the first part of this update, it can be assumed that we are very close. Once again, I will be posting more frequent updates on the Patreon server as we start to navigate testing. I can't wait for you all to see what we have created. Caz Unofficial-official concept of an E6 location... Ruby did this as schoolwork, okay.

~ These are excerpts from a post on our Patreon - you can find the full post there ~ ~ The Last Stretch ~ Sheesh, this last month really flew by, huh? It's been another very busy month for the team, but this time round it feels super rewarding since the majority of the work and grind is now out of the way. That's right - all major pre-E6 remasters/changes have been completed and tested, finally giving us the runway to finish things off for E6. In fact, as most of you are aware, E6 is almost entirely finished anyway - meaning that I've been able to test all of that too. _________________________________________________________________ Pokemon Desolation Episode 6 Development Progress Ờ̴̩͐͐l̵̼̥͉̒ͅd̸̡̫̜̼́̀ ̶̡͙̫̒C̶̢̖̩͇̬͇̄̋̏̍ȍ̶̯̭̙̞͆̿͆͘ͅͅñ̴̺̭̩̥̐͑͋̀͘t̵̰̔̃͜é̴̢͖͉̭̙n̶͉͔̝͉͙͊̌̓͘t̶̲͎̟͕̮̼͒͐̎͗ ̸̱͔̹͉͋̒̿̎#̶̧̨̱̗͇̓̈#̷͙͈̣͇̀̊͑̇#̶͙̅̕#̴̧̨͕̳̍̍̒͘#̵̻̑̾͗̐̈́̒#̵̧̅̔̈̆#̷̼̆͋̑͘͝#̶̨̲̲͍̘̩̃̽̅͋̾͂#̴̬̖̀̊̔#̸̲̤̮̿#̵͇̿̌#̵͍͈̈̓͊̕#̴̨̹̣̌͛̋͘#̴͇̭̗̦̯̭̓͗́̒͛#̷̱̤̱̀̋̉#̴̛̤͖́̄#̸̰̜̘̱̤̆̇̃̕#̷͉͔̚#̵̡̯̼̗̳͇̂̄̋̈̈͝#̷̩͌̑͋͛̉ ̷̼̖͓̂̈́͂͊̈|̶̮͛̽͘ ̷͇̤̩͐̈́̃͗M̷̢̼̫̗̂͊̎̀̕ͅa̴̬̣͌ṕ̶̙̜̻̣̜̂́͛͝ ̵̼̩͊͒̈́Ừ̷͈̮̇͛͊͝p̵̗̰̎̎̈́̚͘͜d̴̫̣̤̭̬͒́a̸̲͕͉̝͇̚ţ̸̠͐̍̿͆͝͠é̴̩̯̕s̷͎̤͛̕ ̴̱̟̳̅͑̏̋(̶͚̫́̍̊̂%̷͉̃̃̏̎̑)̸̤͉͍̑͐̆̈́̽́ ̷͍̪̉̆̈́͝#̸̦͎̦̿̈#̴͕̒̚ͅ#̸̤̮͒̒̆̍#̸̲̺̞͂̀̿̊#̴̡̨̮̗̣͎͑͒̚#̸̛̹̏̋͘#̸̩͇̹͕̓#̶̜̗̙̃̈͑͊͊#̶̢̨̛͖̣̜ͅ#̸̨̙̟̱̹̫͂̏̈́̓#̸̮͚̺̙́͝#̸̰̼̗͒#̶̛̝͆́͗̕#̵͓̯͖͖̌ͅ#̴̨̯̋#̴̢̰̯̮̇#̴̧̱̼͈̍̋̈#̸̯͂̇̀͝ͅ#̶͓̹̻͆͐̈̂̀̕#̶̥͖͎͇̿̉͑ ̴̧̒|̷̡̱̲͕̙̉ ̴̧̠̫̝̠̏̏̇S̴̩͇͔̱͌c̵͙̙̍͜r̸̢̭̠̥̼̮̿i̷͓͓͎̿̇͛̍́̊p̶̛̜̟͙̱̩̔́͂̊t̵͔̘̥̔̊̃ ̶̡͈̻̙̽U̸̧̡̐p̷͇͙̟͖̘̃́͂d̷̨̙͉̙̦̈́͌͐͌͝a̶͇̺̼̎́̔̾͌͘t̴̥̐͊͠ḛ̷̡̦̽s̴̹̤̳̝̝͂̏ ̵̞͇̮̩͙̞̇̆%̷̡̡͊̉)̵͈͂͠ ̴̫͈͓̈̂̈́̔͛͝#̸̦͇͕̟͆̋͛̔̆̄#̵̬̠̯͆#̸̛̤̝̩̮̞͗͂̍̀͛͜#̵̖͖̲͔͈̭̅͊̚#̴̨̡̈́́̈́̈́̈́̚#̶̫͍̚#̵͙͈̈́#̶̝͚̣̫͆̓͗̊#̸͓͈̥̘̊̈́#̷̩̹̿̀͜#̴̹̘̥̙̥͊̌̇̂͊͜#̸̧̜͕͎̪̊͜͝#̸̘͍̺̻́#̶̢͔̪̪̟̞͊̾́#̴̡̯̃́̀̃#̴͎̓̿̈́͝͝#̸͉̰́#̵̪̾͂#̷̭͇̯̋͝ͅ#̴̧̬͍͖̗̻̓̔͆̇̕ ̶͖̤͍̞͆̎̃|̷̪̞̈́̈́̾̈́͠ ̷̧͚̱͍͕̜͝Ṗ̷͉̼̠͈͖͂a̸̜̩̪͈̱͐̃͆̄s̶̤͊̈́̃͘t̵̩̗̦̩̥̺͐̂͒ ̶̝̭̻͚͇̊͊ͅË̸͙͓́p̵̭̘̔̀i̷͉̬̙̘͍̓̃ŝ̶͈̓͋ȯ̶̘̜̍̃̑̈́͘ͅd̷̛̰͍̙̆̈ẹ̶̛̉̏͗ ̶̨͎͈͗̂̽R̴̡̞͚̩̦̀̊̍e̵̤̯̟̻̫͛͝ͅm̷̪̗̱̼̂̄͐͑ä̴͎́̅͗͝s̵͎͎͑ť̵̙̮̆̇̓ě̸̺͇͋͐̌́̚r̴̫͙͉̟̱̒͌͆͐̉͘s̷̬͙̻͉̰̦̉ ̶̯̽͋͋̄̀́(̸̛̞̙%̴͖̥̽)̷̘͈͚̟̒̀ ̶̡̛̙̙͎̹́̀̐̏͝#̵̢̺͎͒̀́̂̔#̵̧̭̞̳͕͆#̶̢̟̖̬̒̎͒͌͌͐ͅ#̸̢̪̦͚̻͑̏̈́#̴̲̘͙̒̔̈͐̃̍#̴̟̾#̶͚̥̺̭͒̔̏̔#̵̬͛̑̆̄͜͝#̶͙̂̃̄͑̅#̶̖̝̘̝͇̈̅̋̋#̵͓͈͗̿̌͒#̸͕̰̯͉̪͗#̴̲̞̜̞̙̱̓̏̈́̇͐̀#̸̣͖̍̌̌#̴̹̦̻̖̇̌̈́̿̚#̵̨̯̟͚͉͌̀̆̀̄͘#̵̤̻̪͚͇̖͑̍̏̎̽͘#̸̻̞̺͎̈̅#̵̺̪́#̷̠̭̣̉͐͛̅̈ ̸̯̃̀̏̂̈|̸͙̯͔̃̽́͗̈́ ̸͓̜͔͗̉̕͜M̶̹̆͌̐͗i̵͓̍s̴̨̛̛̤̑̈́̋c̷̘̟̹̗̩͝ ̵̼̘̤͈͙̆̈́̍̓́̍ͅ(̶̗͂͌̂̃%̷͌̅ͅ)̵̨̪̠̣̋̈̿͒̚͜ ̷̺̠̣̪͐̏̒͊͜͝͝-̸̬͒-̷̫̗̅͂-̴̦̞̞̜͎̐̅ͅ-̷̠́̽͝͠-̴̣̗̝̈́̈́͆͋-̶̠̀͜-̶̟̣͗-̵̝̦̫̹̎̀̄̾͝-̷̖͉̲̖̭͍͋̌͘-̵͉̍̀̆̚-̷̘̦̖̹͂͘-̵͈̖̠͈̀-̶̱͇͓̹̘̐͝-̷̮͖̤̙̘̗͋̃̊͌̎-̶̗̜̣̟͊̌͗͊͛͜͜-̸̛̭̈́-̴̪̹͈̘͚̒̈̓̚-̷̡̛̛͖̈́̉̀̃-̸̥̗̘̦̻́͘͘ͅ-̵̝̳̽̓̌-̵̝̗̒̎̒̿͠-̴̟͙͋̚-̴̧̧̭̫̪̬̍̆̐́́͝-̷̳͒-̴̡̻̬͌̀͆̐̂͝-̷̨̡̼̭̂͛̂͌̊̈́-̴̧̛̘͎̺͑͆̽̊-̶͚͙̝̚-̵̧̜̺́̍̓̂́-̴͇̳̜͗-̶̞̳̼̺̬̪͌̏-̶̠̻͈̥̖̀̈̊̆͆-̵̫̟͔̹̆̇-̵͎͍̗̼̟͐-̵͚̝͕̖̣̦̿̉͒-̵́͜-̸͈̥̠͉͇́-̸̱̼̝̫̳̪̐̄̂̿̀-̵̗̃̏̓̕͝-̷̜̱͑̀̄̇͋-̵̰̘̗́͐-̸̮̼̂̉-̷̧̻̝͋̓-̸̞̥̳̀-̸̪̻̦̱͍̑-̶̬̺͈̣̣͝-̸̧̣͕̘͙̰̃͐͒-̵̟͔͎̋̄͊̈́͘͜͝-̵̧̻͚̪̪̋̾̄̿͐͜-̴͔̩̣̒͐͗ ̴̗͉̜̙̐̒Ǹ̷̛͚̯̭̌͑̽͊ë̸̘̞̘͈͊̀̉w̵̡̤͇̙̮̄͋̓͜ ̷̲̟̑̌́͝ͅC̵̨̧̛͖̮̖̯̈́̈̅o̷̺̱͎̒̈́̂̓̒̕n̷̡̯̄t̵̬͔̝̰̿̀̅͛͝ę̶̧̻̳͕͖̀̚n̶̖͂̏̓͝t̴̞͙͚̫̙͋̉̓̈́͌ͅ:̸̒̑͜͝͝ ̷̺̭͙͂ ̶̣̱̣̬̲̇̌̍̑̕͝#̴̖͕̳̭̓̀#̵̛̲͕͔̫̗̫͊̀̑͠#̵̨̼̞̒́̾ͅ#̸̮͈̺͖̘́͊#̷̗̟̠̼̜̿̉͌ͅ#̸͍̭͇͕̃̏̂͗ͅ#̵̬̦̝̓͐̈́̌ͅ#̸̛̗͋̀͗#̵̨̮̩͕̗͓̉̉̈́͝͝͝#̴̪͍͇̝̎̓͘͝#̵̨̯̪̽̾͌#̴̛͔̱͓͈̠̈́̄̈́͠#̸̹̘͔̰̮͑̑͋̾̚̚#̸̡̛̛̑#̸͕̎͒ͅ#̵͖̦͗#̸͎̮̳̯͛́̀̃́#̴̗͙͚̭̺͌͐͊́͂#̸̤̬͈̼̃͛#̸̧̥͔̓̀̾͗ ̸̻͉̪̐̅͂͗̑̉|̴͙̺̼͐͛̏̚ ̶͍̐̽̋̈́S̴̗̼̪̪̣͉͗̀̾͝ț̷̥̦̹̟̰́ǫ̷͉̺̟̂̒r̸̠̮̖̫͚̓͘͜y̶̯͎͎̼̱̾ ̸̢̖͂̒́(̶̙̲̝̘͈͇̑̆̑̄̕%̵͙͚̘̀͝)̶̡̧̧̠̦̑͊ ̴͈̿#̴͍̳͚̳̬͈̓#̶̙̇͒#̶͎̬̘̞͇̪̽̏̌̕#̶̝̺̤̂͛̄͋#̴̯̗͕̺͔͉͑̈#̷̀̊͜#̶̛̻̩͇͉̄̋̂̿͠#̵̧̬̯̰͓̒̆̉͒̈͝#̴͇̩͐#̷̮́̇͛͋̕̚#̵̱̰̽̍̿̕#̵̝̅̏̌̚#̸̱͓͛̅̑̾͠#̸̨̦̻̖̈́̽̒̍͗#̸̰̺̥̞̐̅#̵̯̭̟̆̀̆̽̀͑#̶̡̻̎͆̎̀#̶̟͉̭̙̘͛̍#̴͖̖͇̹͒̇̂͂͊#̷̥̼̿̏́ ̵̨̺̯̍̀͑̕͝|̴͓̦̀̈́̄́̚͠ ̴̢̫͓̬̟͂͐̀͛̏͝M̶̨̪͕̮̋ả̴̜̯͊p̷̰̭̯̘̰̊ͅṗ̶̧̻̼̈́̉̈́̆͝ī̴̡͇̳n̸̝̺̼͊̎̍̓̊̔g̴̢̳̝͉̫̏̚ ̸̨̤͙̘̖̀̐͂̔͘̕(̶̞̝̿̌͌̀̀̋%̴̩̟̦͌̂̋̽)̴͉̣̀̈͜ ̴̥̥̰͚͓̹̈̆̀̀#̵̛̘̣̥̪̿̎̿͑̐#̴̢̫̪͍͈̺̌#̷͕͙̬͈͖̈̿̈̒͒͛#̶̡͔̰̰̜̞̍̉̿̄͝#̸̨̢̫̲͇̲̇͊#̶̟̬́#̶̰̘͊̒#̴̨͉̯̼͒#̵̖̏̔͆́̔͠#̷̲̰́̀̈́#̴̙̪̹͊͒̐͒͒͠ͅ#̸͔̖̰̫͖̣̓̾̓̅̇#̸̢̞̱̖̖̹͋̿̐̆#̷̛̫̪̠̩̓̈̈͒͠#̶̢̨͈̺͈̈́̆#̷̹̜̱̚#̶̼̳͔͝#̵̧̛̟͚͉̞̍̓͑͠#̴̲́#̴̖̮̆̈́̇͌͘ ̵̲̘͔͌̐͊̌̎̅|̷̤̣͆͐ ̶̧̞͖̠̹̖̽Ṡ̷̺̘͊̆͗c̴̟̖̬̐́r̶̡̛͕̗̰̫̈̈́̅̕i̸̗͉̜̫͝p̸͈͙̞͈̔̓͒̈́t̵͙͑̈̏̕i̸̛̱̎̎ṋ̴̢̙͈͊̂̓͘͜ǵ̵͎͚̫̦̣̞̾́͝ ̷̨̺̯̖̾̆̂̒̈́͜(̴͙͓̬͈́%̷̗̱́̀̕̚)̷̨͇͚̺̽̓͂ ̴̧̖̗͍̪̏̈́̃̋ͅ#̷͙̰̠͙͒͜#̴̞̹̪̀#̵̫͕̝̽̓#̸̣͖̗̻͒̃̒͋̎#̷͈́̆̈́͂#̵̡̫͈̒̈#̴̼̟͚̥̇͆̓͜#̴̛̥̯̻̫͙̬#̴͔̜̣̻̌͊̄̿͑̔#̷̨͈̤̤̅̉̀́̓͘#̶̟̞́͛̏̈́#̴̛̟͎̬͖#̴̹̒̈ͅͅ#̷̝͖͔͚̈̏̑ͅ#̸͎̉̚#̶̢̬̼͈̥̿̓̎͆̾̓#̸̨̜̘̘̫̈́͜#̵͎̫͖̎̂̅̾͘#̸̨͉̫̩̜̉̾ͅ#̷̫͂͆̒͐͘ ̵̣̗̘͚͎̽̚|̶̖̩̫̱̋͝ ̴̞̰̖͔̎̿͑Ṣ̶̉̃̎͐i̷̧̛̠̲̱͗d̶̦̮̲͖̻̐́̈́̇͜e̸̼̝̪̤̝̔̈́͊̾̀q̷͍̝̞̻͔̕͝͝u̵͎̒̈̓̐͘e̶̩̮̲͎͒̍ṡ̷̗̎̌̿͊͘t̴̳̙͓͚͌s̸̹͗ ̶͇̠̙̳̻̯̓(̶̳̫͎͌͜%̵̹͔͋̊͛̕)̷̲̆̐͠ ̵̠̞̻͛̀̎-̶̺́́-̷̡͍̖̽-̸̟̺̘̦͗̃-̵͔̭̣͌̾̕-̶̡̥̜̥͒͂͗́̆-̸͈̮͙͑̑͌͒͠-̶̰̗̞̈́́͗-̶̖̯͓͇͓̞̀̚-̸̡̡̨̭̞̭̿͗-̴̲̫̈́-̸̬̭͖̥̓̃-̸̱̒́̊-̸̺̯̃-̶̡̗͔̲͕͓̉̐-̷̨̲̯͎̏͝-̷̮̝̻͠-̴̟̳̼̠̩̃̏̌͝-̵̗̯̅͆̿͊̋̄-̸̬͎̗̗̒-̵͕̥̮̣̺̾͋̒̕͘͜͝-̵̨̜̞̈́͜-̴̛͇̮͔̒̉̈́̑͒-̵̻̺̪̑̅-̶̟́͑̔̅̚-̴̢̜̺̙̩͋̇̐-̷͙̙͔͋-̴̨̠̳͕̟̬̎́̔̉̀-̵͍̳͓́̂̕͝-̴̟͆͗̓͘-̸̢͂́̀̍͆̄ͅ-̵̡̗̞͗̈̈́̈̄͐-̷̨͓̟͈̩͌̌̾́͜-̸̝̻͖̫͈̣̍́̐͐̌̕-̸͚̿͐͊̇̽̊-̵̼͆͗̿̔͘-̷͇̝͇̖͒́ͅ-̵̥͚̒͘-̷̱͒̾̾̅͘-̶̢͇̼̙̹͆́̚-̵̙͓̹͚̫̪̇̍-̸̘̟̻̰͘-̴̦͚͈̟̆̿-̷̘̲̞̥̩̖́́̅͘-̶͈̦̘͚͂̾͗̃̈-̷̦̜̻̪̬̈͛̀-̵̖̳̹͈̀̂-̵̝͎̣̓̈́́́͊̆-̶̤͈͓̉͊̃̒̓̔-̶̤̥͓̰̠̓͋̂-̴̣̥̼̦̓ ̸̩̘͉̫̌͑͗̑̉̋#̴̰͗̃͒̕#̸̠̞͖̱͋̌͠#̴̧̣̩̈́͒͆̓͊͜#̷̘̓̄͗̓̕#̸̨̥̓#̶̫̺̜̄͊̏͂̆#̸̡̛̣̠̲̏ͅ#̴̢̛̫̤̘͕̈#̴͖̣̖͓̤̦̏̏̾̈́#̴̰̀̈́̀̕͝#̴̜̭̠̍̓̓͆͘#̷̨̨̞̿ͅ#̶͉̗̉͋̏#̶̫̖̪̱̃́̉͜#̷͚̲̻̩̀̒̔͠#̶̼̋#̵̖͚̲̫̻̄̈́̉̿̌͝#̴̳̯̤͓͊̾̚͠#̷̣̳̓͑̚͝#̴̛̠̩̟͚͎͑̈́̚ ̶̡̟͙͗̅̈́͒͝͠|̶̛̜̹ ̶̤̫́̓̐T̵̮̽̊ò̵̭̯̀͂ț̴̬͝a̷̭̝͓͆l̶̼̐̎̓ ̵̧̜̮̖̉̄͌̇(̸̯͓̺̪́̍̉̎͜ͅ%̶̤̲̋)̷̮̺̞̪̉ It's almost done ok. _________________________________________________________________ - Meeting the bestest boy in Cellia again - So... what's left, Caz? Well, not much, actually... but more than I can easily explain. Nevertheless, I'll try my best by separating content into the bits and pieces that remain. 1) Old content: all that really remains here is the completion, testing, and balancing of new fields, as well as internal testing to rule out significant bugs. 2) New content: Asides from a chunk of plot at the end of the episode, all sidequests and main story content are complete. After the last few bits of plot are done, the team will need to internally test new content for balancing and significant bugs. 3) Miscellaneous tasks left to complete (things like bug fixing, items, reflections, map icons, etc.). THIS is the part that is difficult to quantify. 4) Testing testing testing testing - we're running this bad boy on a new engine that is a combined effort from Reborn, Rejuv, and ReDeso teams. There are many bugs yet to iron out - but it's starting to look pretty polished. 5) Closed testing and finally Patreon testing: these are self-explanatory - Patreon testing will occur immediately after closed testing. - Development-wise, it's safe to say that the nightmare has finally passed... - Long story short - our workload is quite manageable now (the worst has certainly passed) so we're in a good place, and we're almost there! The content remakes took FAR longer than I originally planned (as I had never gone to such lengths to update past content), but I absolutely know it was worth it. So if there's anything to apologize for - it's my poor estimation of how long that content would take to complete! Whatever the case - we're on the home run, now. Or the final stretch, whatever you want to call it. Let's get it yo~ Cellia East does not support or condone gambling... right? So Desolation doesn't have its own arcade yet, apparently. It almost didn't in this episode either... but then I realized that the arcade was literally MADE for Cellia East. It had to make it into E6, no matter what. So... we pulled some strings, and Ruby got to work, along with a super helpful member of the community, Ace, on making sure we got our own arcade up and running! Here's a sneak peek at the arcade, including our own graphics for the Slot Machine and Voltorb Flip! Once again, a round of applause for every member of the team who got involved to make sure that players could still go gambling in the place where it made the most sense... Cellia East. Can't wait for you guys to see this spot for yourselves. The last wee screenshot dump, I swear... Alright, without much more to personally add in this update... I present to you the last official screenshot dump from my own internal testing ventures. After that, you'll get to hear a long awaited update from the Post Man himself! - Cellia Manor Glow-up, courtesy of Ruby - - A fiery situation down in the Undercity... - - Another look at the direction we've taken the Grid... - - Me squaring up for the first time in Cellia East... - - Visiting the Cellia Prison to find the true faces of crime... - - Absolutely NYOOMING... - - And finally, taking a much-needed break. - Now that I'm all caught up... it's time to finish the deed. The game's almost there, folks. Anyway, that's all from me. Let's hear what Posty's been up to over the last few months, shall we? Postman, dropping some fresh mail at your door Howdy folks, your local postman here! It’s been a good bit since I’ve written up something like this for our development updates, but besides being in the midst of job hunting and wishing for a certain cryo archer to come home (spoiler alert: she didn’t.), I’ve been hard at work on one of the core elements of Desolation. Gameplay and Balance When I originally joined the team during EP5 development, my main task on the team was updating and overhauling trainer’s teams, redoing the concepts of important fights, and adjusting encounters to accommodate for Gen 7 at the time, as well as giving the player more options throughout (also axing Scyther, lol.). Since then, not only has my role in the team expanded, but I’ve improved along the way in all aspects. Where am I going with this? Well, once again I’ve gone through and updated every fight in the game, introduced Gen 8 into the mix, changed up my formula on how I conduct fights, and made a few somewhat big changes. Also Fields, I’ll get into that in a bit. Encounters Gen 8 has been introduced to the region of Ayrith. I worked alongside Crim to place these new friends across the map, sorting out some events for a few of them… And ofc adjusting teams now that we have these new lil creatures on our beautiful islands! (Caz absolutely loves Gen 8, also Wiglett). Alongside Gen 8, there will be some new faces at some points in the game, and some familiar faces have either been moved back or axed… or jailed. Pokemon availability is an important part to the game, I want to make sure we give out a reasonable amount of Pokemon for players to build unique teams in each playthrough, so I hope that these changes lead to some fun team building! Seeds Yes, you heard that right. Like Reborn and Rejuvenation, Desolation now has Seeds. They had always been in the files, but why were they never implemented? Honestly? No Idea, heck I forgot about their existence in EP5 and didn’t want to go around shoving Seeds across the map for the player to obtain when we mainly just wanted to get EP5 out to the public. So now you’ll notice a bunch of battles will utilize them! Which should shape up the overall gameplay and make things a little bit spicier! Level Curve This is a short note but, we have decided to adjust the level curve to help with balance: Old Curve - 20, 35, 45, 50, 60, 65, 70 New Curve - 20, 30, 40, 50, 60, 65, 70 This new curve should help with some of the earlier game fights and mainly, the overall flow of the game. The Overhaul Moving onto the next topic of conversation, the actual overhaul. Some of you may remember a google form I put out a while back that asked the community (you guys!) which fights you felt were a bit too strong, too weak, or felt they were just right. This was extremely useful to go through so thank you to everyone who took the time to fill that out! With this in mind, there were some individuals who were clearly a bit too strong for that point in the game. Yes, I’m looking at you, Aderyn. Honestly? I don’t know what happened! If you saw her EP4 team and compared it, you would genuinely think that she was nerfed! Nope! Aderyn has been a problem child for the longest time now. Who would have thought somehow removing Honchkrow’s Life Orb would make it even more of a menace… That fight pains me and I’m sorry for everyone who struggled with her. I have changed her up, in more ways than one. This leads me to the main point. Fields. Desolation has a few “custom” fields, however, to be personally honest, in EP5, these fields were quite unfinished. Giving a few buffs here and there and overall, not having much impact. It made some fights feel a bit… weird? Let's go with that. So alongside these updates, I have finished these fields. I sat down, wrote out a bunch of notes, and made these fields, well actual fields! (don’t worry, I will be including a field manual in some form so you all know how to use them to your own advantage!), big shout out to Yumil for doing the scripting side of things and giving me feedback on it. Let me go in depth a bit about one of the more used fields in important fights: Darkness Field As of EP5, to put it bluntly, Darkness Field has been essentially a carbon copy of Dark Crystal Cavern from Reborn but removing some of the buffed moves and adding a few of our own. For EP6, this is not the case. Instead, it is now its own unique field… with stages! The concept behind this field is well, the more the field is consumed in the shadows, the more and stronger buffs Dark types will get. Seeds will work differently depending on which stage of the field you are on. In the battles that take place on this field, you will have to think about whether or not you want to advance the field to the highest stage. There will be moves to push the field to the next stage, and some moves that will move it back a stage, some abilities, status effects, and moves will all vary in power depending on the stage the field is currently in. Fights that take place on this field will really take advantage of this so you’ll have to come up with a strategy in order to get past them. Sometimes brute force won’t be enough… New Fields EP6 will be introducing some new fields into the mix! In the last update, we showcased this screenshot and hinted at new field effects to go alongside optimized gym battles. Well… we are proud to introduce the Crowd Field! The concept behind this field? Well, you gotta impress the crowd! It’s in the name… Crowds like this tend to like a good all-out brawl, so make sure you put up one while fighting on this field. Using physical contact moves will benefit you a lot more than trying to control the opponent’s mind with some psychic attacks. Think of this like a boxing match, the more punches you land, the more the crowd will cheer you on. And sometimes, crowds don’t like seeing a one-sided match, so I hope you weren’t planning on a quick sweep in this fight... if you are, then all I will say is good luck! Some of you might have guessed who we fight here (I would imagine the majority of you aha), especially since said trainer didn’t have a field prior to this update. And that’s all I’ll say on that front. Summary Boy that was a wall of text, for a quick TL;DR summary: - Overhauls to important fights, and also every trainer in the game. - Encounters have been updated, including Gen 8. - Seeds are now in the Game! - Level Curve was slightly adjusted. - Fields have been updated, including new fields (Crowd Field and others). Well, that just about wraps up what I have for this update, a good amount of text on what has been both fun and painful to do! So I do hope that you all find enjoyment in these changes, in both an “oh boy I hope Aderyn doesn’t kick my ass so bad that I need to grab a fast electric type to win” way and in a challenging way. I will continue to balance the game to hopefully ensure a fun experience for all! That’s all for me, now I will return to the depths of Dota and Dev Hell. ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- I hope Posty's update has got you excited for what's coming gameplay-wise to Desolation! Normally, Darius would show off a track at this point in the update, but we only decided to feature one on Patreon this month, and as such, we won't be featuring any here this month. I hope Posty's words were more than enough to keep you on your toes. If you're keen to hear Darius' track (Baron's Theme), you can find it on our Patreon. Final Thoughts Boy, oh, boy... it's been a wild few months for the team working on Desolation. I'm super grateful that we've made it through that grind, with the lot of us finally being able to envision that light at the end of the tunnel. Personally, seeing the fruits of our labor has made it all worth it... and soon, you'll be able to see them too! This is, ultimately, a whole new game, and the foundation for all of our future work. Development for the next episode, E7, will, as a result, be certainly more streamlined. However, we've gotta finish the job here first, so let's keep at it. We'll be in touch. Caz

~ These are excerpts from a post on our Patreon - you can find the full post there ~ ~ Looking back... for the last time ~ Once again, we find ourselves at the end of an extremely busy and productive month. We are all working incredibly hard to pull things together, and are now deep into internal testing! Most of our efforts have been focused on bringing past content up to par with E6, and we're really happy with how things are going. This update will be more of what we saw in the last update... so we can probably call this update part 2 of that. So yeah, expect loads of screenshots without much of my yammering on. _________________________________________________________________ Pokemon Desolation Episode 6 Development Progress Old Content #################### | Map Updates (100%) #################### | Script Updates (90%) #################### | Past Episode Remasters (100%) #################### | Misc (95%) -------------------------------------------------- New Content: #################### | Story (95%) #################### | Mapping (98%) #################### | Scripting (95%) #################### | Sidequests (100%) -------------------------------------------------- #################### | Total (97%) _________________________________________________________________ Important PSA: The Future of Content Remakes To begin, I need to discuss a topic that I see thrown around pretty frequently - that is, how frequently I will be remaking early game content, and what this means for your current save. I have heard some players wonder if it's worth replaying from the beginning, and even some players consider waiting until the full release of the game (in however many years that is). Firstly, my philosophy around remaking early game content is similar to how I approach life in general, and my work as a junior doctor in a large city hospital - I don't like wasting time - whether it be my own time or others. As a result, there are two rules I wish to follow: 1) Do not waste the player's time. 2) Do not force the player to restart the game unless absolutely necessary. To be clear, I do not like remaking content. I am a forward-focused person who wants to focus on the future as much as possible. I am only remaking the early game of Desolation as it is severely outdated in comparison to later in the game, and because I needed to address certain character issues that I was not satisfied with. This is the culmination of years of feedback and is an opportunity to finally give a more balanced experience to players. My goal was to do this remake ONCE, and to leave it at that - and I am sticking with that. To clear any animosity around this discussion, I will create a short FAQ: 1) Will there be more large remakes in the future? A) No. Of course, there will be some fine-tuning, etc. that is present in each episode, but there will be no more significant changes. As I said, I only want to do something like this ONCE. 2) Should I wait until the game is fully released to play? A) This is up to you, but I believe that equal enjoyment comes from playing the game episodically or continuously. I write episodes to be fairly standalone (while still contributing to the overall plot) so that each episode feels fun and unique. Furthermore, Desolation is planned to be ten episodes in total - so it would be a LONG time until the full release. For me, creating Desolation is a journey that I would very much like others to undertake with me! 3) Should I restart my save from scratch? A) My number one goal was to not waste the player's time. This means that you DO NOT need to restart your save from scratch. There have been significant changes in the story and how characters go from A to B, but the end result is the same. This means that you are not at a disadvantage if you do not restart. That being said, if you were looking to start again, this would be the time to do it as I have no intention of making any more large-scale remakes. I hope this summarizes my thoughts on content remakes, and I hope this clears up how you should proceed with your future playthroughs. I hope everyone continues to undertake this journey with me! PS: This segment has been added to the FAQ if you want to double check anything. Speaking of Content Remakes... Now, back to our regular schedule. The team has been working really hard to wrap up our early game remakes, and we have made excellent progress thus far. In fact, all MAJOR work has been done - simply leaving fine-tuning of the later episodes over the next couple of weeks to fully complete this work. While this has been going on, the team has begun internal testing to iron out whatever bugs we find along the way. It's a lot of work... but we're making great progress, and the results are now speaking for themselves. We're covering all bases - from dialogue to graphical improvements, to eventing changes, new effects, etc. The goal is to go through it once and make a more complete experience for new players. One of the major remakes is that of Route 4, and the Blackview Outskirts, which have both been completely remade from scratch. The northernmost part of Route 4 offers a slight reprieve before witnessing the effects of Blackview's waste... The middle and south portions of Route 4 illustrate a marked change in the environment, as you enter the neglected outskirts of Blackview... Finally, you make your way through the smog-ridden slums of Blackview, before finally entering the city itself. You find yourself in the midst of radical industrialization, with the smog raining neatly down on you as a reminder that nothing here will ever be the same... But hey, at least we finally have signs marking major locations in the city! Amelia's had a bit of a facelift, along with the location we meet her in... Aurora has also entered the development scene... with a brand new facelift! We continue to work to optimize Gym Battles and team-balancing (Posty is suffering). Not to mention brand new field effects to go along with them... And finally... the creation of brand new scenes! All of these new additions have been completed already! Healing in Style! That's not all when it comes to remakes, however... because boy, Ruby, and Crim have been busy! What if I told you that our brilliantly talented artists decided to sit down and re-create every city and town healing center in the game? Or would it be better if I just showed you a few... but not all, of course! 1) Redcliff Town 2) Route 2 and Celeste City 3) Blackview City 4) Cellia Central and Docks 5) Cellia East Ruby, framing the picture... As discussed in the previous update, Ruby has also worked on numerous menu frames for E6. Let's show off a few, yeah? Maybe I'll even show off in some new locations... 1) Cellia (Central/Dockside) 2) Cellia (East) 3) Dreamscape 4) Crescent That's all I really planned on sharing in terms of remake content for this episode. How about we round this update out with some tracks from Darius? Making puns or alliteration for Darius tracks is too hard, so I'll take this month off... No, seriously. It's difficult. Anyway, any good development update requires some news from our main beat dropper, Darius. Again, just click on the hyperlink if you're keen for a listen! Once again, there's an extra track on our Patreon up for listening (the new Ranger's Theme) - so if you feel like you're wanting some more tracks - you can find them on our Patreon! Again, just click on the hyperlink if you're keen for a listen! ~ Crescent Theme ~ you can click on the hyperlink above to listen to the track! "This was also a really difficult piece for me to get down. With my school picking back up a couple weeks ago, I found myself having less and less time to compose which really bothered me because I knew exactly where I wanted to go with this piece, I just needed to actually sit down and write it. If I had to describe this theme for Team Crescent in one word, it'd be "sleuthy" (which I don't actually think is a world but I digress) and one of its prominent features is the stacking drum rhythm. Stacking refers to an ostinato (recurring theme) that builds in complexity as the piece continues, and in this case, it is utilized to signal the String quartet that supports the melodic pattern. This theme takes a great deal of inspiration from Rachmaninoff's "Prelude in C# minor" - highly recommend taking a listen btw, Rach is one of my favorite Romantic composers - especially in the middle section of the piece which follows a similar chromatic sequence. You may recognize the initial drum pattern as well which I wrote in reference to Pokemon Reborn's Peridot Ward Theme! Unlike the Ranger theme, Team Crescent is very string focused which is exemplified during the string soli interlude. This piece was an absolute joy to write and although they were a little skeptical about my vision at first, they ended up really liking the compositional liberties and overall feel of the piece, so I thank them for their trust in me. Super excited to see where this one gets implemented, and thank you if you have made it this far. Until next time!" That basically rounds out this month's content drop. As I have said, we are deep into internal testing, which means that other forms of testing, including Patreon Alpha Testing, are just over the horizon. We're almost there, it's just taking a little longer than I originally planned. Remember, the main takeaway from this post is that this will be the last major remake and that even despite this, you still don't need to restart your save, even though it may be encouraged. The content remakes should be finished over the next couple of weeks, which will leave us with numerous chores to complete before we are ready to extend our testing circle. Please bear with us as we try to finish things up - we're working as fast as we can! As usual - if you feel like supporting us as we approach the finish line, want to see some extra sneak peeks, or are keen to get involved in testing when it starts, find us over at our Patreon! Once again, thank you for the support. Caz

~ These are excerpts from a post on our Patreon - you can find the full post there ~ ~ Who said you can't change the past? ~ Welcome back to this month's update, where we rewrite history. Well, at least the history for this game. In my opinion, this month has doubtlessly been the most productive, grindy month of E6's development. It's been a lot, that's for sure. This update will feature an in-depth look at early game area remakes, Ruby's idea processes being these graphical advancements, and of course, some tunes by Darius' to keep you interested while you read through. Let's get underway, shall we? For completion, here's some bars. I need to highlight however that, due to our plans for past content changing dramatically this month - these bars don't really resemble what kind of work was done. _________________________________________________________________ Pokemon Desolation Episode 6 Development Progress Old Content #################### | Map Updates (99%) #################### | Script Updates (90%) #################### | Past Episode Remasters (80%) #################### | Misc (95%) -------------------------------------------------- New Content: #################### | Story (95%) #################### | Mapping (98%) #################### | Scripting (90%) #################### | Sidequests (100%) -------------------------------------------------- #################### | Total (95%) _________________________________________________________________ Now, let's get started on the real update... A Fresh Start Last month was of course a huge milestone for us, as we ticked off the final side-quest of the episode. As I have iterated on numerous occasions, it was imperative for me to find ways to reward exploration in a more open landscape for this episode, and thus it was important to create numerous engaging, yet concise stories throughout both Cellia and wider Ayrith. This episode has really helped me sharpen my story-writing skills overall, which leads us to, well... an interesting and very intense month of development. The next task on my to-do list was to trawl through the early game and make improvements to the dialogue, the events, and the overall flow of the story. So it was obviously time to get started on a new save, right? I loaded up the game, picked my character, and started a new adventure. And, well... that didn't last for very long. Whether the quality of the early game simply wasn't that great by any standards, or if it's just that my personal standards have risen substantially, it didn't take me long to realize that the early-game just wasn't working for me anymore. A simple re-tool was not going to be enough to reach the quality threshold I'm aiming for. Thus, I reached a crossroads - do I continue to keep fine-tuning a broken set of events, or do I simply smash it to smithereens, and make something that can actually work? So there I was... completely remaking the early game from scratch. Oops. S/O to Crim, once again, for these incredible cruise ship tiles! Yes, what was originally meant to be a dialogue tune-up with some slightly better eventing has turned into a complete rework in the early game. Of course, this has been extremely time-consuming for everyone involved, and this has certainly pushed back my gauge of how close release for this episode is, even if only slightly. However, I have no doubt that this update is absolutely essential to this game. It is no secret that the quality of Desolation seemingly improves as you progress, but I have always wanted players who are just entering the game for the first time to have a true sense of what they're getting into... and this update is our first real shot to pull this off. Consistency is key, y'know? This early-game update project features completely remade dialogue, events, and maps. It introduces different sets of characters at different times, and sets up future events much earlier within the story. When I went about rewriting these early game events, I did so with the intention of tying the game into a more culminative experience, as opposed to what is currently numerous plot threads that don't hold together as well as they could. My other objective with these rewrites was to offer more development and continuity for characters that sorely required them. I won't disclose which characters I'm talking about in particular, but critics of the early game will have no difficulty in inferring some of the changes I have made. What does this mean for development time? Well, with full transparency... it means a little bit, I guess? I suspected the remake project would initially take a few weeks, but when I completely shifted how much I ACTUALLY wanted to do, it became apparent that it was no small feat, and more time was required. I have been working extremely hard this last month on the re-imagination of these early areas, but I still haven't completed the work I want, and there is still much to be done. I suspect this pushes things back a few more weeks, but it's impossible to say exactly how long this will take. Once again, I am extremely proud of what the team has accomplished for this episode, and I believe that these remakes are essential to guarantee a more even quality bar throughout the game. I want everything that Desolation offers to be appreciated, and not just the new content. I am so excited for you guys to see what this remastered game has to offer. Now, I could ramble on and on about my reasoning for undertaking such a large ordeal, but I'm sure that based on my previous comments, no one is surprised by this decision at all. So instead, I'll just throw up some of the reworked areas for you, with some brief thoughts by yours truly. It's a little cozier with Connor by the campfire than you might previously remember. Can't remake his attitude, I'm afraid. That's your job as the player, after all. We figured it'd be nice if you could actually, you know, see which starter you want to spend the rest of the game with. Unless you store it in a PC and never look at it again. Kuiki's "villagers" have certainly seen a glow-up, but are more hostile than ever. Shiv still knows how to act all dark and mysterious. No one could cure that. At least the huts look, you know... ALMOST livable. Croagunk is still alive... for now :) It even got a new cave for you to steal it from. We decided that the cave was in some need of a glow-up, but it didn't get much brighter, I'm afraid. And how about a VASTLY improved Beamer Grid! For Ruby to become an unstoppable force, all I needed to say was "purple". Just thought I'd give you some evidence that battles do in fact work... mostly. Yumil has been hard at work in overhauling the game's scripts in conjunction with the Reborn team, and I'm super stoked with how things are shaping up under the hood. Here's a quick look at the new aesthetic of Route 2. It's cooler, calmer, sharper, and matches well with the personality of this area's Gym Leader, Aderyn. That's not to mention the new and improved Rangers Guild... Which clearly had some more money thrown into it. I'm sure the Ranger's aren't complaining. Finally, that takes us to Celeste City, which has had a significant redesign to be far more in keeping with the personality of its Gym Leader, who is hiding at the bottom of that second screenshot. Long story short, Ruby has done some tremendous work on redesigning these areas, and looking back and admiring the difference is really astonishing. While I am confident, I can only hope that my story recreations are up to the quality bar that Ruby establishes with the art. And that pretty much sums up what I want to show from the remake project so far. Once again, this is an enormous undertaking, and I am dedicating huge amounts of time to completing it in a timely fashion. Now... with that stuff out of the way, let's see what others have to say, yeah? A word from our sponsor, Ruby's Clinic, by Ruby herself.. Well, you've heard enough from me. I couldn't feature such a huge graphical overhaul without Ruby herself talking a bit about it, right? Take it away! "Hi, I am back once more and have been in a predicament ever since the start of this month. I've run out of things to do :) Ok not necessarily, but anything I had to do for E6 and polishes of my own work I've long since finished. You've seen plenty of my sprite revamps, but late last month I also finished polishing up, like, all the old character art. That was painful but I'm probably an overly self-critical masochist bc I switched art programs while working on the old art and have a new pc that doesn't have that old art app so I had to draw over the old pics cuz I can't access the files now lol... but i did it anw. At least I'm happy with the art now \o/ Oh yeah, those will all be updated during the release of E6 so you guys gotta wait i'm sowwy ANYWAY. Out of stuff that I didn't really need to do but went looking for like a lil gremlin cuz I love working on deso to a fault (debatable), I hope you all love the new frames I made,, it took a lot of trial and error bc it's weird how they work and idk how to explain so have fun with that? Anyway, like Reborn based some(?) of their dialogue/menu frames off of their gym leaders, I decided a fun lil thing to do would be to make them based on some of our locations in-game as well as key, uhh.... story things? Some of which include, the Dreamscape, the Cellia branches (that differ a lot), as well as some lowkey frames based on the two major teams~ Besides that, lately I've been working on some map recolorings to simply polish them up! The ones I've done atm have more reasoning, but I'm planning on doing some more before the ep drop. I thought that Celeste could use a teeny recolor since at the moment, most of the leaders and the places they reside in correspond to their aesthetic/type while Celeste was like a generic town lol. Thus, I also did Route 2 to fit. The same is said for the MC's manor, which was previously occupied by Nova, so I tried to make it fit her color scheme more! And to tie it all together, I've made a couple custom buildings cuz wtf I enjoy tileset work now??? who am i. Anyway, while working on Route 2 it felt like the old rangers building was staring at me threateningly so I had enough, destroyed it and painted over its corpse. That's not even all the old big buildings I've nuked lol. I also edited and mapped out the interior of them to fit the exterior~ Omg I almost forgot- So, the Beamer Grid is insane now? I just like galaxy neon stuff and purple. Funny coming from me who goes by RubyRed, huh? Caz actually had me take a look at that and I thoroughly enjoyed making it Extra As Hell but it was worth it~ It was his idea anyway to make it starry galaxy-like but I went overboard as I do with anything I work on hehe. Also, since it's called the Beamer "grid" I added a lil grid-like pattern to make it stick out more~ Okok ty all for reading this way too long segment about what I've been up to. I'll continue to uh..... look for more things to do until I can't and drive myself insane probably, but I hope at least it'll be pretty and colorful~ I'm looking forward to what you all think!" Yeah, so Ruby pretty much just went crazy and overhauled everything. You know how it is. I don't know where we'd be without her. DJ Darius dropping some beats... A blog update would not be complete without some beats for the man himself, Darius. I hope your ears are ready. Once again, there's an extra track on our Patreon up for listening (the new Cellia Council theme) - so if you feel like you're wanting some more tracks - you can find them on our Patreon! Again, just click on the hyperlink if you're keen for a listen! ~ Black Foxes Theme ~ you can click on the hyperlink above to listen to the track! "This theme is all focused on the buildup. From the first interaction you have with the Foxes, they seem like an ordinary street gang, but as you progress through the story, you realized how organized and intentional they are. The Saw Synthesizer playing runs throughout helps to tie the chord progression together, which is completely necessary considering how the chords are filled with crunchy, clashing diminished, and augmented tonalities. The horns in the background are also significant, ripped straight from Pokemon R/S/E. They help the music swell and work well to reverberate during the intense sections. The oboe is the lone wolf (or should I say fox) in this tune, as it is the only woodwind melody throughout. Oboes have an interesting timbre because they are woodwind instruments but are also reed-ed like saxophones. This makes the sound quality sound much more nasally and gives the tune some sophistication instead of a wishy-washy flute sound. I can't wait for you all to see where this theme gets used in-game! Thanks for reading my ramblings." Well, that pretty much wraps up this month's update. After this remake business is complete, we'll just have to sprinkle on the finishing touches, and then we'll be pretty much done. I'm so excited for everyone to play what we have created. The team has worked so hard over the last month, and the payoff is incredible. To a large degree, Desolation has been remade from the ground up, and I can't wait to see all of your reactions. As usual - if you feel like supporting us as we approach the finish line, want to see some extra sneak peeks, or are keen to get involved in testing when it starts, find us over at our Patreon! Until next time, Caz

~ These are excerpts from a post on our Patreon - you can find the full post there ~ ~ The King of the Jungle ~ Welcome back to our monthly shenanigans - this will be a fun one! This update will focus on my progress with the final sidequests of the episode, as well as looks into Ruby's work remaking characters and areas, a music drop from Darius, and finally... the reveal of a major character entering in Episode 6! Previous updates have drawn us into the outer areas of Ayrith, but now, as we get closer to release... it's time to start back at the heart of this episode - the nightlife jungle known as Cellia East. Let's get underway, shall we? Bars. _________________________________________________________________ Pokemon Desolation Episode 6 Development Progress Old Content #################### | Map Updates (99%) #################### | Script Updates (85%) #################### | Misc (90%) -------------------------------------------------- #################### | Total (91%) New Content: #################### | Story (95%) #################### | Mapping (98%) #################### | Scripting (85%) #################### | Sidequests (100%) -------------------------------------------------- #################### | Total (95%) _________________________________________________________________ An expansive world, with many stories to be told... This month, I have been wrapping up the final sidequests of E6. It's well-known at this point that E6 is focusing heavily on exploration, and using side content as a medium to deliver concepts relevant to the main story. I've always wanted sidequests to feel as though they can stand alone as stories, but utilizing the greater concepts in Desolation to make these stories even more immersive is something that I've really leaned into in E6. Of course, this also allows me to experiment with numerous recurring characters that have been, for the most part, absent from the main storyline... Bringing these characters forward into these new areas and allowing them to develop further has been really great in E6 - and I'm looking forward to seeing how things move forward with them in the future. It's also been fantastic to see how characters originally intended to have minimal time on the screen have been given their own two feet to stand on, especially by being bumped up by Ruby's artistic expertise. Case and point is this guy. Admittedly, it has taken me longer than I intended to wrap up these longer sidequests. Of course, telling the stories I want to tell often ends in these quests being longer than originally planned, leading to longer development times. However, it's paramount to me that I'm satisfied with each story told within this world, so it's worth the wait! A Fresh Coat of Paint Even cities as large and expansive as Cellia sometimes require a fresh coat of paint, and Ruby has been pretty busy making sure things hold up. One of our aims was to improve immersion as much as possible within these cities, and one of the most important ways to do this was to extend graphical overhauls into the gameplay itself, namely, battles. As such, Ruby has designed a selection of new backdrops for all our Ayrith cities! Yes, the Popplio is called Bidoof, don't ask. This is Cellia East's new battle backdrop, which I am happy to say has achieved the goal of really immersing the player in the realm of the district. As usual, Ruby has really smashed it with the colors and overall aesthetic. Here is the backdrop for Blackview, paired with its new counterpart, just so you can see how sorely these updates were required... Even small updates like this have been paramount in improving immersion in Ayrith's major cities, so I'm really happy with Ruby's work in bringing these areas to life. The remakes of course extend past battle backdrops, as you've seen from numerous previous updates. With complete character redesigns, other parts of the game have also required a redesign. For example, here is the new intro screen with Ruby's Rosetta redesign... I hope you're excited to be welcomed to Cellia (again)! The King of the Jungle! Now, finally, for what everyone has been waiting for... the reveal of one of our new major characters, the King of the Cellia Jungle, and the Gym Leader of Cellia East, Reeve! Meet Reeve, Cellia East's most historical entrepreneur turned excessive partygoer and Gym Leader. Reeve embodies what it means to live in Cellia East - he is cool, calm, and collected, but absolutely LIVES for the party. He owns Cellia's most prestigious fashion brand, Surge, and partially owns Cellia East's flagship nightclub, Bar 101. Anyone that's anyone knows who Reeve is... from the lowest thugs in the Cellia Outskirts, all the way to the businessmen and women of the Cellia Council... for better or for worse. What this dynamic entrepreneurial tycoon has to offer you, however, remains to be seen. Perhaps there is more to Reeve than meets the eye... after all, his past is riddled by obscurity... Reeve is absolutely one of our crowning achievements of this episode, and we're extremely excited for you to meet him. It's been a long time coming for him to finally reach the community spotlight... but in Ayrith, he's been in the spotlight of the nightlife for a long, long time... DJ Darius' Delicious Desolation Delicacies I don't know why I referred to music as delicious but it's too late for me to turn back now. Just own it. Whatever the case, Reeve wasn't going to sneak his way into this update without showing off one of his beats, was he? On our Patreon, Darius also shows off Ryder's new theme - so head along there if you want to give that a listen! Let's hear DJ Darius describe the meaning behind the music himself, yeah? Remember, you can just click the name of the track to have a listen! ~ Reeve's Theme ~ you can click on the hyperlink above to listen to the track! "Reeve’s theme was much more difficult for me than I had anticipated. When I originally wrote this, I was thinking of a way to make it fit in with the already existing theme for Cellia East, which is why the two tracks are in the same key. However, as I developed this piece further, it became clear that I needed some historical allusions to bring it together. This piece is a prime example of 1950s jazz music and the runs throughout the alto & tenor saxophone are distant quotes from, the Legend himself, John Coltrane. Reeve is a star and stars deserve some flourish and glamor. The repeating bassline and chord progression are based on Latin Jazz harmony and similar examples can be found in modern tango music among other things which makes you want to throw your hands up and dance! This is Cellia East, and it’s time to party! Reeve is here to make sure you’re having a good time. After all, celebrities’ personalities are entirely based on their public image right? It’s not like there’s anything else he’s feeling behind the scenes…" That essentially brings us to the end of this update. All hands are on deck, and I am extremely proud of how hard the team is working to bring everything together. I know people are hoping for a release date to be announced, but in a project such as this, where every element is essentially being remade from scratch (from the gameplay and scripting side - LITERALLY from scratch), the moving parts make it difficult to truly predict when the game will be ready for testing. This uncertainty makes nothing concrete - and without this reassurance, I am not comfortable in announcing a release timeframe, as above all else, the wellbeing of the team is my absolute top priority. The content that I am now revealing, however, should be a reasonable hint at how close we are to wrapping up. Testing will start when it starts, and if you're a patron to Desolation, you will have the first opportunity to get involved and immerse yourself in the story (as well as seeing some other goodies)! We're grinding our way to the finish, and it has been so fantastic seeing the teams' reactions to some of the things we have created. One last push, yeah? Until next time, Caz

~ These are excerpts from a post on our Patreon - you can find the full post there ~ ~ Off The Road, Through The Bush... ~ Hey everyone! Welcome back to my monthly essay - hope you guys are pumped for what's to come. This month really sped by, that's for sure. It feels like no time has passed at all since we announced Artem, as well as the rest of last month's content. For us, we've certainly been on the grind lately with development work. We're very excited for the next few months - that is, finishing the game, testing, release, and really seeing the fruits of our labor all come together. However, there are still a number of steps that need to happen before that, so let's just take it one step at a time, and start with this update, yeah? This update will cover my progress on the story, as well as some sneak peeks and artistic insight from Ruby, followed, as usual, by a fantastic track created by our composer, Darius. Let's get into it! Testing will be starting sometime in the near future - if you want to play the game early through the alpha, be sure to check out our Patreon! To start with, here are some bars (tm) _________________________________________________________________ Pokemon Desolation Episode 6 Development Progress Old Content #################### | Map Updates (95%) #################### | Script Updates (85%) #################### | Misc (85%) -------------------------------------------------- #################### | Total (89%) New Content: #################### | Story (95%) #################### | Mapping (98%) #################### | Scripting (85%) #################### | Sidequests (95%) -------------------------------------------------- #################### | Total (93%) _________________________________________________________________ The Great Outdoors So - to begin, I am in the midst of finishing up the final areas of the game and wrapping up the story. It's been a long time coming, but I'm super proud! The mapping for these areas is now entirely complete, which is a fantastic milestone because, as you may have noticed from our progress indicators, we map, event, and develop each area in turn, rather than just mapping everything at once - which should indicate how close we now are! After these last events are completed, there will be a generous list of miscellaneous things to complete before we are ready for testing - but it's not entirely clear how long these things will take. Obviously, it'll take some time, so please, bear with us! With that out of the way, let's get a breath of fresh air and check out some of the episode's new outdoor areas! These areas, with full transparency, are on one of the game's new islands - Arcanius - where we will certainly spend some time over future episodes. Let's showcase a few areas here, yeah? This is a screenshot from Sunshell Town, one of the new areas you'll be able to access in Episode 6. This is a small seaside town that we have shown in a previous update - but now the area is more developed, and this screenshot is taken at night. Crim has done a fantastic job with the graphical elements of this area, and Posty worked meticulously to put as much great content as he could into this wee town. I'm really proud of the work they did for this area. This screenshot is from an outdoor route that you will traverse in Episode 6. Once again, the screenshot is taken at night. Posty and Crim did a fantastic job here giving this area its own unique identity. I wonder what kind of story will unfold here? Finally, these next few screenshots are from another area in E6 that we've recently finalized and packed full of content, and I'm really happy with how it's worked out. I won't reveal the name of this area, or that "content", but you simply need to know that the team is super proud of it, 'aight. This area has an electric-type theme to it, so we've really gone all-in with the blue and the bright colors amongst the fog. Hats off to Crim for doing the majority of the work here - it's turned out great and I'm excited to see you guys explore it soon (tm). Now, obviously, this is a fair smattering of new outdoor areas for you to explore, as well as the endless city jungle that is Cellia East. We haven't entirely shifted outdoors, however... as the most hidden secrets in Arcanius aren't exactly out in the open, waiting to be found... #*#&%*%$*( $#&#$&#&#&$*($*(*($ #(&*$&($*&($(*(#$*(*()#(#( > Are you sure, really sure? We can't afford to mess this up again. > I have never been more so. This is our destiny, after all. > And can we control it? > Of course. Why would you ever doubt me? > Something that powerful can't come for free. At the very least, she taught me that. > I don't play with chance, not anymore. You have nothing to fear. > And if you're wrong? > Hmph... when have I ever been wrong? #(&*$&($*&($(*(#$*(*()#(#( $#&#$&#&#&$*($*(*($ #*#&%*%$*( So, that'll more or less conclude my contributions to this update. Now then... let's involve some of the gang, yeah? The Clinical Director of Ruby's Plastic Surgery Clinic - Ruby herself: Ok, this place really needs its own name, anyway: "Yooo it's me Ruby with my first little explanation post thingy? idk what these are called lol I just wanna get a word out B) Hope y'all are doing well! You might've noticed I've been doing a massive overhaul of the old E5 sprites, and that has a big reason behind it more than just general polish. During development for E5 my art style was starting to change since having the same style for around 5-6 years (thanks to demon slayer kimetsu no yaiba I have learned to embrace the typical weeb anime style when it was much different lol ). It's been 2 years since E5 now and my style has fully changed from what it used to be 3 years ago, making me very unhappy with my older work and the style I made them in. I'm happy with my style now so I don't see or want any dramatic change in the future (besides upping my skills ;D) so no need to worry about that hehe, I promise this won't become an episodic thing of massive overhauls due to the reason stated a second earlier. I can attest to the fact that the others will physically come to my apartment and restrain me if I even dare think of another overhaul like this in the near future lmao. Anyway, with that out of the way and off my chest, maps! in E6 y'all will get to explore a map made by yours truly~ It's my first map in general and one that I made all the tiles for successfully without lying in the dirt and wishing the earth to reclaim me. Before Crim was brought on the team, for E5 I did very little tile work and only did a few things for E6 here and there, until now. I had earlier knowledge of mapping from just messing around in RPG maker for fun a while before coming on the team, so I knew the ins and outs already (and I was the one to teach Posty >;D ). I'm pleased to have my role expand to be able to help Crim, and to make the game environment more unique alongside her work! I'm really looking forward to your reactions and seeing if any of you can guess what map I made! ehehe ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)" Speaking of Ruby's stylistic evolution - let's see how some more of our characters have fared, yeah? This month, we're featuring Scarlett, Aaron, Ava, Aurora, Emily, and Rosetta. You can see that Ruby has really had her work cut out for her, and we're super grateful - just look at the results! I spend every update rambling on about how grateful I am to have Ruby dedicate so much time to these characters - but it should be obvious to everyone why, they look fantastic. I'm so excited to see everyone get to interact with the whole gang again next episode - we're almost there! Now, there's certainly more... well, novel character creations from Ruby, but we've decided to save the first major reveal for next month's update - so stay tuned... that'll be a biggie! DJ Darius... another one Darius is back to share another track used in E6 of Desolation. As I often say, Darius is more or less a prodigy when it comes to this, so I'm super grateful to have him on the team - in my opinion, the best is yet to come - trust me, you'll see what I mean when you get to play! Heads up that Darius shares two tracks this month over on our Patreon! Let's hear DJ Darius describe the meaning behind the music himself, yeah? Remember, you can just click the name of the track to have a listen! ~ Garret's Theme ~ you can click on the hyperlink above to listen to the track! "Garret's theme: Garret is an interesting character because of how "liberally" he views the laws of Cellia city. He was a tough character to write for and I went through several iterations before Caz and the team found one they were happy with. Boasting overdrive and distortion guitars, Garret's theme is meant to hit hard and overwhelm with persistent percussion. This theme takes inspiration from quite a few different sources: From Chopin's Waltz in C# Minor to Pokemon BW2's Lentimas Town to "Jersey Anniversary" on YouTube to Astor Piazzola's Libertango. It's a mashup of themes and genres because Garret's a mashup of emotions and a complex character: calm, cool, and collected when he's talking with the gang or giving orders to his goons, and brash, fierce, and strong in battle or when facing against the Black Foxes. One cool feature about this track is that the percussion/drumset that you hear throughout is actually ripped from Pokemon HGSS, and the guitars are taken from Cyrus' theme in Pokemon DPPT." Now, that more or less concludes this update. In terms of a few housekeeping items and clarifications: 1) Yes, we're close to finishing E6 development. Thank god. 2) We don't know exactly when we will begin testing, nor do we know when we will release. We're optimistic, but I'm sure you can appreciate that we will have a better and more concrete timeframe when we're a touuuuch closer to release. 3) Yes, patrons of the Delphinium tier or above WILL be part of beta testing experience - HYPE! I can't wait to see all of your reactions. If you're keen to play the game earlier, our Patreon can be found here. It's been a long journey, but we're almost there. Until next time, Caz

~ These are excerpts from a post on our Patreon - you can find the full post there ~ ~ Bringing it Home ~ Reflection About two years ago, we started our first hype posting for Episode 5 of Desolation. This was a really significant experience for me, as it was the first time I reappeared in the public light after a three-year absence. We didn't show much - just a small teaser gif - but it was enough to let everyone know that the rumors were true, and that we were back. Two years later, I am pulling the final threads together on the story for Episode 6, the most expansive episode we've made for this game. Of course, there is still much to be done, even after the story is complete - but that won't stop me from getting excited. In the coming months, we've got a bit to show off, and many more details to give away before the episode actually enters testing (remember to sign up to our Patreon if you want to get involved!) and is released, so stay tuned. This month's update will feature content from myself, Ruby, and Darius. Without any further ado, let's get into it! _________________________________________________________________ Pokemon Desolation Episode 6 Development Progress Old Content #################### | Map Updates (90%) #################### | Script Updates (85%) #################### | Misc (85%) -------------------------------------------------- #################### | Total (87%) New Content: #################### | Story (90%) #################### | Mapping (95%) #################### | Scripting (85%) #################### | Sidequests (85%) -------------------------------------------------- #################### | Total (89%) _________________________________________________________________ The road ahead, and looking back... This month was important to me, as I ticked off the last of the things I wanted to do with the main event of this episode, that is, Cellia East. Our focus is now entirely set on completing the last major areas outside of the city, their side content, and the story. We continue to be dedicated to having the scripting side of things in order, as well as polishing as many bugs as we can before testing. In testing Cellia East, I was able to visit some of the locations we've created over the last year, and really feel like I was seeing them for the first time again. When we designed Cellia East, we had a very specific goal in mind - this is the place where trainers come to party, and act the fool without anyone finding out. This city is meant to be the nightlife of this game, and I think we've pulled it off well. We took the creation of this district very seriously... although sometimes, we did get a little silly, especially on stream: Outside of the aesthetic of the city, we have not only put a ton of effort into the main story, but also the side stories of Desolation. The game is built upon a foundation and lore that isn't explicitly told through the main story - and must be discovered and worked out for itself. Therefore, the side stories of Desolation aren't just to provide filler - they're to allow you to figure out the world around you. Despite those broader concepts, the focus of this episode has of course been the characters and making sure I do them justice. Yes, this includes older characters that we perhaps haven't seen in some time, and who deserve a fresh chance in the spotlight. Some of those characters form the very core of this game, and were amongst the first characters I ever created. On the other hand, some of them are, well... more or less there to make you slam your head against the keyboard. Whatever the case, I'm looking forward to bringing these characters back to life again, and letting you explore Ayrith with them... it's been a long time coming. That being said, developing based on my own nostalgia alone isn't enough to make the experience that I want to deliver. Of course, there are a handful of new characters set to make their debuts in this episode... we've just been very careful to keep their identities secret until we get closer to release. But I'm in a good mood, so we can give you one. Artem Meet Artem, a Team Crescent lieutenant, and researcher. This character is calculated, calm, and collected. His most useful trait to Crescent is his intelligence and his precision. However, contrary to belief within the organization, Artem is not heartless. He differs from other Crescent researchers in the fact that he does in fact have a strong moral compass, and ultimately wants to do the right thing. While being a significant part of Team Crescent, Artem is equally ambitious to his own causes, that is, his research on the Grid, a mysterious and poorly understood plane of existence outside of Ayrith, and Perfection, a state of being that is currently understood to be related to evolution. Prior to E6, Artem has been in the deeper regions of the Grid, researching the area and trying to better understand it. As always, Ruby has done a fantastic job at designing this character, making him distinguishable, recognizable, and without feeling out of place. I'm really proud of her for helping me make this character feel so unique and turn out so well. $$%%# %&*$&#$*#*# %&*$&%&*$&#$*#*# %&%&*$&%&*$&#$*%&*$&#$*#*# %&*$&#$*#*# > It's time for you to return... I suspect I am almost out of time. %&*$&#$*#*# > Is that so? You wish for me to leave my work, despite my progress? I am closer than you think. %&*$&%&*$&#$*#*# > The grid can wait... with what they have discovered, it would seem that we are looking in the wrong direction. $$%%#%&*$&%&*$&#$*#*# > Meaning? %&*$&%&*$&#$*#*# > It's not what lies beneath that matters... but what HE has discovered above. $$%%#%&*$&%&*$&#$*#*# > Are his intentions so maleficent as you believe? Or is it simply the unknown that you fear? %&*$&%&*$&#$*#*# > We don't have time to find out. %&*$&%&*$&#$*#*# %&*$&%&*$%&*$&%&*$&#$*#*# $$%%#%&*$&%&*$&#$*#*# %&*$&%&*$ Ruby's Plastic Surgery Clinic Welcome back to the monthly reveal of Ruby's surgical candidates. This is a testament to the fact that, yes, Ruby will make alterations to every single character, every single episode. Perfection comes at the cost of sanity. Here are some examples, including Garret, Aderyn, Chad, and Hardy (who looks extra depressed). As per usual, Ruby's commitment to perfecting these characters is part of what makes us feel like this game has such a high potential, and it contributes to me really wanting to do these characters justice on screen. The work that Ruby has done with these characters is what makes them feel so alive in-game, and I can't wait for you to see the content that she hasn't shown yet! DJ Darius' Desolation Delight(s) Darius is back in full with a selection of bangers. Only this time, I've decided not to include the "bangers" per se. I find myself being very careful when I pick which tracks to use in Desolation, as the music is often what separates a scene from being just good, or fantastic. Therefore, it's not always the high octane battle music that makes Desolation what it is, but in fact, the slower, melancholic pieces which pull heavy scenes together. Darius has created a number of tracks like this which really pull both old and new content alike together. On our Patreon, Darius discusses two tracks, but I'll just put one here this time around. Now, at last - I'll hand it over to him. ~ Scarlett's Crescent Theme ~ you can click on the hyperlink above to listen to the track! "Scarlett’s Crescent theme is meant to be played on top of the skyscraper in Blackview City during the events of the main story. The theme is a variation of her regular theme (unreleased as of yet), operating with the same general structure. Unlike her regular theme, however, the Crescent theme is shifted down into A minor which is related by a secondary Dominant to Bb Major (the key of Scarlett’s regular theme). While writing this piece, I tried to think of it from the point of view of the narrative: Scarlett is torn between siding with her friends or siding with what she thinks is right (Team Crescent’s goals). This struggle is signified in the music by the “conversation” between the violin and cello. If you listen carefully, you can almost hear the two instruments passing the melody between each other - almost like they’re fighting with no one gaining the upper hand. The piano and reverb throughout are meant to maintain musical tension since the scene is a pivotal part of the story." And with those final thoughts from Darius, this update is pretty much complete! Thanks for tuning in guys! Thanks again for your support - we're almost there! I'm very excited about the near future for E6 of Desolation, and I can't wait to finally show some content that we've been keeping close. Testing is certainly a discussion we're having now, so again, remember to sign up to our Patreon if you want to get involved! Until next time, Caz