Creepy Lily [Horror][18+]

Because less is more: Noncommercial games of < 1 hour playtime and < 2 month development time.
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fullmontis
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Re: Creepy Lily [Horror][18+]

#16 Post by fullmontis »

I'm back! Sorry for the lack of updates as of late :oops:

Just wanted to remember that the project is alive and well, despite this thread's lack of updates may lead to think otherwise. I'm still working on it every day and I have no intention of leaving it hanging.

The development is chugging along nicely. I had some business to take care of during january so things have been slower than I wanted to, but despite that everything looks good. I had to rewrite most of the script because after rereading I noticed a lot of problems that couldn't be fixed just by a touch up here and there. So I had to fix that, and the script is mostly rewritten, with just a few minor things to take care of.

Because of this, I couldn't work on the graphics/music, but as I said a few threads ago the game is already in an advanced state of progress.

I hoped to release the game before the start of NaNoRenO19, but as it is now I realize I wouldn't be able to do it without rushing stuff out, and considering all the work that went into it until now, it would be quite a waste. I also really wanted to partecipate in this NaNo because I had an idea nagging me for the longest time now, at least since november, and I wanted to give it a try. Hopefully all the constant mismanagements of Creepy Lily will teach me to keep the scope limited and complete something acceptable.

Since the release isn't far off either, I will start posting weekly updates every monday with what has been going on that week. That will force me to speed up the progress.

I'll see you next week!

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Re: Creepy Lily [Horror][18+]

#17 Post by fullmontis »

Updates!

This week I didn't work on the VN as much as I wanted to. I've reread the script, worked out a few problems, and worked on the animations and sprite scripting. I've also reworked the UI fixing a few problems.

This upcoming week I'm going to focus more on the graphics, and hopefully finish the programming. I've decided to go for a simpler style for the backgrounds and CGs, since it looks better (somehow) and is less time consuming at my current skill level. I'm trying not to sacrifice mood for convenience here, but this visual novel needs to get out sometime in the future! :D This project taught me that aiming for perfection doesn't really pay back, because you end up with a pile of unused work and nothing really to show in the end.

Something that popped in my mind. I started Creepy Lily for NaNoRenO 18, and now the new edition is at the doors. Which means it's been one year since I started working on Lily's game. And that is a lot, way more than I ever worked on any other project, even including the few months of iatus.

Despite that, I don't really feel burned out by it. Maybe it is just because I am really liking the story, and I'm not trying to force a deadline anymore; or maybe because the scope is quite sizeable for a single person but still manageable. In any case, working on this project has been tiring but never exhausting. This is really encouraging.

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Re: Creepy Lily [Horror][18+]

#18 Post by fullmontis »

Important update:

I've finished the script for Creepy Lily. I'ts been 7 months from my last post on this thread, and in this time frame I rewrote the script three whole times from scratch. The final script exceeds 50.000 words, but I think I've written more than 200.000 total from when I started. Yeah, it's been quite a mess writing this thing.

To keep my sanity, I had to remove my initial idea of multiple endings, and the script is basically a kinetic novel. It kind of hurt to do this, but I think I wasn't really comfortable with multiple endings.

Now, however, I'm facing a rather big problem. Most of the work I had done outside of the script is now unusable. For one, a lot of the CGs I've been working on have been cut, and the graphics that I could still use I don't like anymore. I've worked a lot this year on my art, and I've improved to the point where I can't see anything but flaws in my old artwork. I realize it is a huge amateur mistake to throw it away and start from scratch, but I guess it would be moew work to repurpose my old art than simply start from scratch. It's annoying to have spent all this time on this art just to throw it away, but to me it isn't even a choice at this point.

While I feel I dropped over a huge hurdle of the project by (actually) finishing the script, the biggest one by far, it's far from downhill from here. And it's been quite a while since I started the project. There hasn't been a single day in the last year when I didn't at least think about this project and how to improve it. And while I realize that I'm not getting paid to do this and there is probably just a handful of people out there that want to see this project completed, I feel guilt when I go to bed one day without having worked on it. I grew emotionally attached to it which is dangerous, since you end up caring about it more than it's healthy for the project. Which, combined with my lack of experience, only ended up making me trip on my own feet over and over again, and wasting way too much time.

This is just a long winded way to say that this project has been really stressful for me, and even if the output has been lackluster, I still spent more energies on it than I can handle. On top of this, I have at least half a dozen small scripts that I want to convert into visual novels, and among these there is one that I want to make my first modest commercial project, and I feel that my energies would much better used for these instead than just building up the courage to dip into Creepy Lily from here until it is released.

So I'm deciding to hybernate Creepy Lily until at least the end of the year, and dedicate my time to my first commercial visual novel (for which I'll make a thread here). I'll start working on it again when I feel I've dropped solots of energies on itme of the pressure off my chest. From there, I intend to just work on it until it's completed in one big block, which is what works best for my workflow.

Just to clarify, even if probably it is already clear: Creepy Lily is NOT cancelled. I'm just taking a sabbatical period from it to recover some energies. As soon as I'm starting to work on it again, I'll post again on here, which hopefully won't take another 7 months.

Sorry for the wait.

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