Chapter 4 - Review: New Year Edition!

Hello everyone, and happy New Year!

Things sure moved a bit since last year, huh.

Let's hope it goes in the right direction~

It's now been a bit more than two weeks since Chapter 4's public release, and we're getting closer to the end of this first episode.

Only Sayuri's chapter left, plus the epilogue... and finally, the Class Council!

I originally planned to reach all that within the first year, but yeah...

Damn those Koikatsu skirts!

Anyway...

Like with Chapter 3, I'll be doing a "quick" review of RCD's current state, Chapter 4's development, and what's going to happen next.

One of the goals of these kinds of reviews is to bridge the gap, even if only a little, between my side as a dev and your understanding as a player.

Of course, if you don't care about any of that, feel free to skip to the end for the important stuff.

Boring Numbers

Base game: ~3,800 (+1,326) renders, 250+ layered assets, 20 (+2) animations
Patch: ~900 (+314) renders, 116 (+26) animations
Script: 144,561 (+47,128) words
Soundtrack: 66 (+13) music tracks, 92 (+15) sound effects

Some Development Facts & Anecdotes

The first event draft for this chapter was written back in July, while my computer was out.
Development lasted from 09/29 to 12/23 (~86 days).
It was my first time working full-time on an RCD release from start to finish.
I originally hoped to release the chapter at the end of November, with a render count closer to Chapter 3.
Chapter 4 is the longest chapter to date; it also has the highest word count per sentence of all chapters.
The 20th event and the Christmas event are almost entirely made of layered assets.
Chapter 4 alone added at least 11k lines of script, and the Christmas event added around 3k.
I worked on this chapter until the very last few hours before the early release, same for the Christmas event before its public release.

The Loading Issue

Well...
I managed to screw all this work over a single uninitialized variable...
And I had to do an emergency update a few hours after the public release went live...
Tee-hee~!

Last time it was Android saves getting reset, and now this...
Yeah, the truth is that I hate returning players!
I only want first-time players!!!

(Kidding, come back, please.)

Reception, Success, Failure

Chapter 4 roughly made the same numbers as Chapter 3.
Well, I did lose the first few hours because of the whole emergency update situation, but it shouldn't make that much of a difference.

I'm not sure I can count it as a success or not, but I guess I'm already hitting my first ceiling.
Looks like I'll finally have to pimp out my sorry excuse for an Itch page, huh...? Sigh

Also, I can't really back this up with hard facts, but I feel like this chapter's reception was colder than the last one.
At least, that's my impression from my POV.

On a more positive note:
After putting together my Patreon and SubscribeStar, I managed to hit my first goal of $100 (at least for now). Hurray!

What does it change? Nothing!
But now, you can be proud to contribute to both my coffee and France's strategic expenses!
Thank you for helping me pay for that €40k armchair~!

And next time...
I'll be counting on your support to pay for those €550,000 worth of bottles of champagne too~

Writing, Pacing, and Transitions

So, Chapter 4 was really different from the others, right?
Longer sentences, a bit more breathing room between major events, and... the transitions.
A lot more sounds and screen shaking going on during dialogue lines.
I actually think they account for around 3k lines in Chapter 4's script.

I was a bit afraid I'd done too much, but when replaying Chapter 3, I really noticed how silent my VN was until now.
But what do you think?

Renders and Animations

Once again, I had to cut back on animations for Chapter 4.
I tried to compensate a bit with those pseudo-animations (looping renders with sound), but I think it actually ended up being counterproductive...
It may have given the impression that I was abandoning animation quality.

So, I hope I'll be able to improve things for Chapter 5.
Actually, working on those pseudo-animation things gave me some ideas...

Supporter Perks

With the reduction of unused assets, Misaki's treasure box is starting to really lack content.

To fix this, I'd like to change it to be more like a Making-of...
I'm still working out the details, but that's the general idea.

And so, that'll take us to...

Schedule Changes

I'd like to put more work into supporter content, so from now on, those will be released the week following the public release.
This gives me a bit more time, and also reduces post spam during major releases.

When I started working on this project, I adapted my release schedule to fit my job.
I decided to use Wednesdays for major posts and releases.

Despite losing some audience by releasing midweek, I still saw some benefits, as it allowed me to collect feedback to work with over the weekend.

Well... I've decided it's no longer worth it, and I'll be moving major releases to Saturdays instead.

What's Next?

I'd like to say I'll start working on Chapter 5 immediately, but...
To meet deadlines for the last two chapters, I ended up sacrificing work on more and more miscellaneous stuff.

Add to that the fact that I need to rework transitions in all the previous chapters, and well...
I'm past the stage of hiding behind the promise of doing everything in the last week of development.
Also, I want the game to be in a good state for what comes after Chapter 5.

I'll have enough on my plate with the Class Council stuff, after all.
So yeah, the next devlog will probably be disappointing:

"Fixed X lines of script from Chapter 1."
"Added Y lines of transition to Chapter 2."

Discord Server

And finally, to wrap up this (very) long review, I'll be sharing the invitation link to my Discord.

I've been working on it since the start of the year, and while I started from scratch with my meager knowledge (and nonexistent motivation), it should be in a working state!

Feel free to come and add another place to your list of shitposting locations.

And That's All!

Thank you for your time, support, and (hopefully) feedback!

If you want to take a more active part in the game's development, consider joining the Discord.

No new poll for this chapter!

But don't worry, I'll be sure to drown you in them with the Class Council!

-Haptales
(I hate Discord)

TL;DR:

Release/Post schedule: Wednesday → Saturday
What's next: ‘Slight' rework of previous chapters, then Chapter 5
Discord server: https://discord.gg/PRFGVqjWXV

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