Alora Fane

I composed two new pieces of battle music this week... which I can't show off due to technical issues with my composing program. I'm also wondering about other ways of talking about my progress that might be more noticed...

I've done a lot again this week - I've been fairly consistent about getting in 4-6 hours of productivity per day - but most of it has been working through the many little, uninteresting but necessary tasks from a big list that I recently made during playtesting. Things like "Victory [music] should play instantly; there's currently a brief overlap", or "Walking over when tamed might be out of sync with the Dynamusic?". Much of development is like this, and I've surely written about it before. I've almost got through the list now, thankfully and excitingly, though the straggler tasks tend to be the ones I put off and find tedious, plus in the process of fixing some I find more to add so the list feels neverending. Still, I'm getting somewhere. Another alpha test feels close.

I felt the need to include a screenshot even though all the work I've done this week has been for non-visual stuff, so here's yet another of this battle against The Beast.

The most interesting bit of progress this week was composing two new pieces of 'Dynamusic' for battles: one for battles in the drealm, the other for the battle against The Beast, both of which are used in the intro. I'm fairly happy with them, and the solution I've found for incorporating instruments into battle feels more fun and satisfying for me the more I play around with it. I keep getting distracted actually wanting to play the game!

I wanted to post them on Patreon, but I've been having some frustrating issues with Sibelius - my music composition program - for a while. I used to be able to export mp3, wav, and video files without issue, but now it usually - but, weirdly, not always - crashes and closes at the end of a wav export (though thankfully the wav is created), and always crashes before it can export an mp3 or video (so they're not created). It's very annoying!

I wrote a post not too long ago about switching from Sibelius to something else, since Sibelius is old and apparently poorly-supported, and I did get another program, MuseScore, as a result of that (since it's free). All the music I've already composed uses some virtual instruments that are part of Sibelius, though, and I don't know of any way to use them with MuseScore, or anything else; they're literally called 'Sibelius Sounds', so I can see there being restrictions in place that means it's not possible to use them with anything but Sibelius. And while the timbre is less important to me than the arrangement of the notes, these pieces just don't sound right with substitute instruments since that's not the music I originally composed. I never converted my old midi music to 'better' instruments than the default midi soundset for this reason; they no longer sounded like the pieces as originally conceived, and as such were like impostors, imitators, or something.

I should really look into what I can do about it. I've googled it a bit, but the solutions are things like modifying the registry, doing a fresh install, fiddling around with drivers, etc, which I've not had the time or mental energy to get around to yet, ugh. I need to sort out getting a new PC, still, which I've been putting off for similar reasons, and I wondered whether this might motivate me to do that. It hasn't yet, but... I really should try to focus on that!!

Another thing: Do people read or keep blogs anymore? I've been concerned about the views on these for a long time now, and they've only continued to get lower and lower, which is discouraging.

Blog post views over time.

I keep wondering about alternatives. YouTube seems like an obvious one, but videos are many times more effort to make than these already fairly effortful blog posts. Plus social anxiety makes recording even my voice extremely off-putting (I also don't have a microphone or camera). I saw a thing on an indie dev subreddit a while back complaining about how indie devlog videos apparently 'always' cut mid-video to the guy's workout routine or something, which felt like an odd window into a realm I didn't know even existed. Are indie devlog videos an established thing with conventions common enough to be familiarly commented about? Do you watch any?

I suspect a big part of the drop in views - other than the fact I've been toiling away at this for two years, so interest is bound to wane - is because I had to disable the email notification system I used to use, so I should at least look into an alternative. Again; I looked into it before and found something called MailChimp, which a lot of devs apparently have mailing lists with, but it requires you to provide a real, physical, verifiable address which is included at the bottom of every email sent out, which put me off. Maybe I need to ask on Reddit how other indie devs got around that...

I used to be terrified of posting on Reddit at all due to mental scars from running my communities in the past, but I've become more comfortable engaging with it recently, at least on the social anxiety related subreddits. Posting on indie dev ones too feels like something I can almost do - though I'm not quite there yet - and doing that might help, if I post gifs and stuff. I'm not sure exactly what to post though, where, and how often; I've joined a handful of relevant subreddits, and I often see posts that seem to be from the same game - so some devs post often, maybe even every day - but I've also read in the past that that's discouraged? I'll need to look into it more.

I also wrote a mid-week personal post about wanting to revise my life a bit, get a 'normal job', etc... though that elated enthusiasm didn't last very long. Maybe getting a part-time job would be a good first step, at some point.

I'm at a point with Atonal Dreams though where I'm excited to work on it and to play it, and I'm eager to get some other people playing it again. My task now is to clean up what I have so it's ready for another alpha test, which I hope won't take long... though I don't want to predict anything because my attempts to do so in the past have been consistently way off the mark! So let's just see how it goes. I'm working as fast as I'm able!

After that I'll try to do a Kickstarter - after researching how best to approach that - and I'll use that to gauge how feasible doing this for income is.

5 COMMENTS

purplerabbits147~3Y

Since I live in the US, I know that some people have a PO box where they can rent a box at the post office for a period of time. That way, they have an address and not dox their own home address. I don't remember if the UK/Wales has something similar, but if they do, maybe that could work for a verifyable address.

Congrats on overcoming the anxiety of posting to reddit. :D

For how frequently to post about game dev stuff, I am not sure since I don't spend a lot of my time there. However, I do like playing video games and do follow game devs. From my own personal take, I would like to see updates when there's substantial updates. The way how you an Matt Rozak(the EBF guy) update people on game dev progress is where I am happy with. I also like seeing your own thoughts since It gives me something to think about.

I occasionally look at how the state of Yandere Simulator out of morbid curiosity, and I rarely see any updates of any substance with that game. In fact the game has been in "development" for 7 years. He periodically posts on youtube, but the "updates" are ... not that important for the most part. Like one update announcement was a change in the character's hair. That's not that important update in comparison to the glaring issue that the main gamplay loop is still not enacted. Yandere Simulator is a game who's story of what not to do for game development.

Congrats on overcoming the anxiety of posting to reddit. :D

For how frequently to post about game dev stuff, I am not sure since I don't spend a lot of my time there. However, I do like playing video games and do follow game devs. From my own personal take, I would like to see updates when there's substantial updates. The way how you an Matt Rozak(the EBF guy) update people on game dev progress is where I am happy with. I also like seeing your own thoughts since It gives me something to think about.

I occasionally look at how the state of Yandere Simulator out of morbid curiosity, and I rarely see any updates of any substance with that game. In fact the game has been in "development" for 7 years. He periodically posts on youtube, but the "updates" are ... not that important for the most part. Like one update announcement was a change in the character's hair. That's not that important update in comparison to the glaring issue that the main gamplay loop is still not enacted. Yandere Simulator is a game who's story of what not to do for game development.

Tobias 1115~3Y

I remember reading about rented PO boxes last time I looked into this, but I think it had some substantial monthly fee or something? Which hardly seemed worth it if I'm not actually getting any money from these posts...

I'm glad the things I write are worth thinking about! And that how I'm handling writing about updates isn't too terrible. It's just a shame that so few people see them because I'm not posting on a platform where new eyes are likely to see it.

I keep seeing mentions of Yandere Simulator, usually in the context of the prolonged development or broken promises, but I only just looked it up for the first time. It apparently has a Wikipedia entry, which suggests a fair bit of notability. And the guy making it is about my age. Sounds more elaborate and better-looking than I expected too (though not at all my kind of thing), and the article suggests it's playable in some form, just constantly updating or something? Isn't that true of a lot of games these days though? They become technically playable, but continue developing over the course of years. I've seen a few memes about how games were released fully completed back in the good old days, as if the norm now is that they're not. Unless that's purely referring to bugs etc or explicit DLC.

I'm glad the things I write are worth thinking about! And that how I'm handling writing about updates isn't too terrible. It's just a shame that so few people see them because I'm not posting on a platform where new eyes are likely to see it.

I keep seeing mentions of Yandere Simulator, usually in the context of the prolonged development or broken promises, but I only just looked it up for the first time. It apparently has a Wikipedia entry, which suggests a fair bit of notability. And the guy making it is about my age. Sounds more elaborate and better-looking than I expected too (though not at all my kind of thing), and the article suggests it's playable in some form, just constantly updating or something? Isn't that true of a lot of games these days though? They become technically playable, but continue developing over the course of years. I've seen a few memes about how games were released fully completed back in the good old days, as if the norm now is that they're not. Unless that's purely referring to bugs etc or explicit DLC.

purplerabbits147~3Y

The Yandere Simulator game is playable in the form of a playable alphas since the 2015's. Most of the models have come from asset packs that are buyable. Technically, a demo has been released with the promise of a kickstadter, but no kickstarter has shown up and a dlc update had been implimented like a month or two ago with the same promise of a kickstarter and still no sign of one.

Many suspect that the different types of assets the cause of the crazy lag when looking at random parts of the game, since at one point there was a photorealistic toothbrush model that had some crazy amount of polygons that occupied a very small space of the world map.

Yandev(That's what the dev calls himself) has unpaid volunteers that help with his game. He is known for blamimg his volunteers for being slow and for the delay of the game. That's a behavior that I find highly reprehensable because those volunteers were fans and don't deserved to have the negative manipulation that the game's delay is their fault. All the while, Yandev could be doing some of the work himself instead of blaming and complaining about unskilled/untrained fans not working faster.

Considering how much of a splash the game made when major Youtubers picked up the game in 2016, I am not suprised a wikipedia page exists for Yandere Simulator. There also exists 2 subredits for the game, one where Yandev bought with real money form someone else, and another where all the other people congregate to either when a mass banning happens in the other subreddit or when someone wants to mildly put some critisism about the game in a space where they won't get banned for being a "hater."

Yandere Simulator first came into my attention back in 2016. I did not pay attention to the game again until The Right Opinion posted a 1hr 30 min video detailing what has happened in the past years. Link here if you are curious: [LINK] I took a look at the game and I thought that the dev did no progress no the game since it still used those assets from 6 years ago. Looking closer, there have been updates, like increasing the number the elimination methods and having cutscenes with story. But, maybe I have a warped perspective on the way how game development works since you and Matt Rozak have a lot of progress on more than one project and released a game in the same time that Yandere Simulator has been in "development." Furthermore, you did everything yourself so that's even more impressive, that you completed Sindrel Song and graduated from Uni before Yandere Simulator released a demo.

On the other end of the spectrum 7 Days to die has been in development for almost 13 years, but there have been clear improvements when you take snapshots of the game when you look at older builds and compare it at yearly intervals.

Many suspect that the different types of assets the cause of the crazy lag when looking at random parts of the game, since at one point there was a photorealistic toothbrush model that had some crazy amount of polygons that occupied a very small space of the world map.

Yandev(That's what the dev calls himself) has unpaid volunteers that help with his game. He is known for blamimg his volunteers for being slow and for the delay of the game. That's a behavior that I find highly reprehensable because those volunteers were fans and don't deserved to have the negative manipulation that the game's delay is their fault. All the while, Yandev could be doing some of the work himself instead of blaming and complaining about unskilled/untrained fans not working faster.

Considering how much of a splash the game made when major Youtubers picked up the game in 2016, I am not suprised a wikipedia page exists for Yandere Simulator.  There also exists 2 subredits for the game, one where Yandev bought with real money form someone else, and another where all the other people congregate to either when a mass banning happens in the other subreddit or when someone wants to mildly put some critisism about the game in a space where they won't get banned for being a "hater."

Yandere Simulator first came into my attention back in 2016. I did not pay attention to the game again until The Right Opinion posted a 1hr 30 min video  detailing what has happened in the past years. Link here if you are curious: https://youtu.be/p1Zb90MFf20. I took a look at the game and I thought that the dev did no progress no the game since it still used those assets from 6 years ago. Looking closer, there have been updates, like increasing the number the elimination methods and having cutscenes with story. But, maybe I have a warped perspective on the way how game development works since you and Matt Rozak have a lot of progress on more than one project and released a game in the same time that Yandere Simulator has been in "development." Furthermore, you did everything yourself so that's even more impressive, that you completed Sindrel Song and graduated from Uni before Yandere Simulator released a demo.

On the other end of the spectrum 7 Days to die has been in development for almost 13 years, but there have been clear improvements when you take snapshots of the game when you look at older builds and compare it at yearly intervals.

Maniafig222~3Y

It's good to hear you've been in a state of flow recently! It feels good to get things done, satisfying.

I'm amused by The Beast's stats, 666 HP and 66 Darkness and Mental Defense. I'm guessing they're just for show and he gets headsploded by suddenly cutscene-competent Savitr. I look forward to all the grizzly details, oh yes.

I never read these blogs! Especially not this one!!

I am curious how many of the extra views on the old blogs are just from them being older and getting more views over time? How many views will this blog have in 5 years? (Also what are those two blue blogs in 2017? How weird!)

I keep track of a few devlogs, most of them in the form of a forum thread where someone posts the stuff they added recently, sometimes with screenshots. There's a forum I frequent (but aren't a member of!) that is full of these devlogs. [LINK]&sid=57a8bd6078ac24938d30328c0fb27051

I don't think I'd want to follow a bunch of video devlogs though, videos take more effort to make, but they also take more effort to actually listen to for me compared to reading a blog. The only devlog videos I follow are of Yandere Simulator, and at this point that's just a morbid curiosity if anything. Apparently someone else brought that game up too, it's kind of infamous for all the wrong reasons!

Weird about the workout routines in the middle of devlog videos though, unless it was like a fitness-themed game or something I suppose. Maybe if the dev was really good-looking...

I'm signed up for email notifications of like a single project and that's it! I wouldn't want to get a mail every time you posted a blog! But for people who do like that, could you use a dummy address for that MailChimp thing? Like an address of a vacant lot or something. Just like those little houses on faraway tax haven islands where apparently thousands of companies are located!!

I wonder how much you can get out of indie game subreddits, I'm guessing most people going there are there to show off their work, not look at what others are making. I never go to such places, anyway.

I look forward to the next alpha!

I also finally got around to making another one of those end of the year blogs!! I talk about quite a few indie games in it, and my plans to play Sindrel Song, which I currently am! [LINK]

I'm liking Sindrel Song so far! It's good!! I've been posting videos to YouTube of me getting high scores and I've made it to Course now. She's as difficult as I remember!

It's good to hear you've been in a state of flow recently! It feels good to get things done, satisfying.

I'm amused by The Beast's stats, 666 HP and 66 Darkness and Mental Defense. I'm guessing they're just for show and he gets headsploded by suddenly cutscene-competent Savitr. I look forward to all the grizzly details, oh yes.

I never read these blogs! Especially not this one!!

I am curious how many of the extra views on the old blogs are just from them being older and getting more views over time? How many views will this blog have in 5 years? (Also what are those two blue blogs in 2017? How weird!)

I keep track of a few devlogs, most of them in the form of a forum thread where someone posts the stuff they added recently, sometimes with screenshots. There's a forum I frequent (but aren't a member of!) that is full of these devlogs. https://www.slimesalad.com/forum/viewforum.php?f=2&sid=57a8bd6078ac24938d30328c0fb27051

I don't think I'd want to follow a bunch of video devlogs though, videos take more effort to make, but they also take more effort to actually listen to for me compared to reading a blog. The only devlog videos I follow are of Yandere Simulator, and at this point that's just a morbid curiosity if anything. Apparently someone else brought that game up too, it's kind of infamous for all the wrong reasons!

Weird about the workout routines in the middle of devlog videos though, unless it was like a fitness-themed game or something I suppose. Maybe if the dev was really good-looking...

I'm signed up for email notifications of like a single project and that's it! I wouldn't want to get a mail every time you posted a blog! But for people who do like that, could you use a dummy address for that MailChimp thing? Like an address of a vacant lot or something. Just like those little houses on faraway tax haven islands where apparently thousands of companies are located!!

I wonder how much you can get out of indie game subreddits, I'm guessing most people going there are there to show off their work, not look at what others are making. I never go to such places, anyway.

I look forward to the next alpha!

I also finally got around to making another one of those end of the year blogs!! I talk about quite a few indie games in it, and my plans to play Sindrel Song, which I currently am! http://maniafig.blogspot.com/2022/01/2021-roundup.html

I'm liking Sindrel Song so far! It's good!! I've been posting videos to YouTube of me getting high scores and I've made it to Course now. She's as difficult as I remember!

Dingding32167~3Y

I suspect part of the problem is your original audience is getting older and busier, and fewer new releases mean that no additional people are joining. This didn't stop the MARDEK re-release from generating a reasonable amount of attention, so don't take your page views as an indication of future success :)