It's the "Release when?" update....

Hi all. 

The final version, less one module (more on this in a mo), has been out to testing since last Thursday but, as you may have guessed, despite a lot of effort, including five days solid graft, I haven't got it signed off past the QC checks.

Let's start with the good news, however. The reception of it has been positive. Massively so. The script is tighter, the game is funnier, more intriguing, and also significantly lewder than, not only the previous chapter but also the earlier version of Chapter Three. Each of the stand alone modules are regarded as a game in themselves, and we have four of those on top of the main game. You will have a lot to do...

For those who have played the earlier version, new characters have had more life breathed into them. Kelly and Mike especially, and especially Kelly who is much less one dimensional than before. 

Complexity wise it's somewhat staggering in that four new gameplay mechanisms are introduced (don't worry, Becca and Jane are on hand) with two combat mechanisms (one for "RL" and one for VR), the database ofc and (at five minutes to midnight and throwing out what was originally there) I gave Chris a basic AI for her stand alone section which has enhanced the experience significantly. This module needs a small amount of polishing and then incorporating into the final version. Both combat mechanisms also work smoothly, if somewhat basically, but they do the job nicely and don't require any fast reflexes yet somehow still give the impression of urgency. Again with this I've been looking for fun rather than grind. Your combat experience, should you have any, shouldn't require any great specialist knowledge nor, since I'm not a fan of it, be something out of a RPG maker game.

So this is a much bigger and better chapter than Two was. As to size, with 17,000 lines of code and a production need of over 8,000 renders this is, quite possibly, the largest single update ever made for a game. But with something of this size the error level needs to be barely above 0% to still cause significant error. Or at least error that would impair the experience.

The biggest issue however wasn't quality but was gameplay with the free roam section where, in my enthusiasm for detail and getting the database to actually act as a diagnostic tool, I made this section almost devoid of any fun. Without the database things were impossible to find and with it...it was like a Bioware map at it's worst. By that I mean it became a series of "go to room, scan thing, get told to go to another room....repeat". Instead of having an optional fun exploration section I'd ended up making "Ophion Power Plant repair simulator 2020", which wasn't really the point...So I  had to rip the guts out of this section ("More fun, less physics..") and now we have something more akin to what we had in Chapter Two style wise with the diagnostic database sitting on top of the gameplay as opposed to -being- the gameplay.

There are sadly still some errors to correct, especially on images. Although, there is a general feel that they are not significant enough to matter I disagree. If it's wrong - well, it's wrong and errors such as clipping errors (where two items are overlapping such as a fingernail into a chest etc) are, I feel, inexcusable in this day and age or errors such as the one below with it's correction.

Original image

Corrected image

You'll notice in the original, Chadder's normal skin texture is just too rough in this lighting and needed turning down, plus she also seemed to be hovering...

So how much longer? 

A week would be my guess. Really it's just image correction plus letting the testers have one last bash through it to test all the path hold up after my faffing and we're good.

My apologies. Naturally, since it should have been out last week, patrons will get a release version equal to the higher of their pledge tier for August or September. Quality is important to me but so is the feel that I'm not taking you guys for a ride.