Hello everyone, TROT has been released for a week now -- and in this dev log (very likely the last one for this year), I want to talk about my journey over the past few months and my 2024 development plans.

But first...

Thank you all for downloading, playing, rating and leaving a comment for the game! We reached to 2k downloads now! Yes!!!

I released the demo at the end of August (including Prologue and Chap1) and I think the demo got ~1k downloads... and the reviews I received in demo stage supported me A LOT for a very long time! Thank you again for everything...!!!!!

Anyway, today I want to briefly look back to the work process for the game development and how much time each part took me. 

-- And if you're also creating visual novels (or planning to start), I hope my experience can be helpful to you!

About Me

Basically, I am a solo developer.

I don't dislike group collaboration, but when it comes to my own projects, I prefer to work alone—because forcing myself to work hard is easy, but I always find it difficult to ask others for help. I completed the prologue from March to May in 2023, followed by finish Chapter 1 in July to August. 80% of the programming works in this game was completed in my spare time in 2022. 

So I will only share my experiences during the development of chapters 2 and 3.

First, working hours:

I have a full-time job during the day, finishing at 5 PM, so every day I start working on the game at 6 PM to 10 PM. On weekends, I work from 10 AM to 6 PM. So, I spend approximately 20+16 = 36 hours on this game each week. I guess that's the only advantage of living alone—you can freely allocate your time. And I happen to have some workaholic tendencies (haha).

What do chapters 2 and 3 include? What have I finished in these months?

50k+ words, 22 CGs, 17 small CGs, 5 new character sprites. 

Let's see the process.

The Script

After the demo was released, from September until October 20th, I was working on the story—more precisely, I was struggling with attempts at writing, overturning, and then rewriting in a whirlwind. I had a clear outline for the game, but the actual writing process turned out to be very different and difficult. 

Since my story is not linear, I paid close attention to the  smoothness and readability of the story. The result was that I eventually deleted 40% of what I had written and rewrote many paragraphs to get the final product you see now. But the good news is that I am quite satisfied with the current structure of the story, and everything is still under control according to my outline.

The only advice I can give is that if you feel uninspired and unable to write... perhaps going out for coffee with friends or doing some exercise in the park would be helpful.

Once the s cript is finished, the next is putting the copy into Ren'Py. It's a copy-paste work, not much to say. Maybe in the future I should consider writing directly in Ren'Py. Currently, I use Scrivener to manage my script.

But honestly, sometimes I just force myself to sit at the desk and write something, so maybe 40% of those hours were me torturing myself rather than actually working ahaha ( ᐛ )

In total, the script took me 36 * 6.5 = 234 hours.

After The Script, Before The Art: Proofreading, Sketches, and UI

Thank goodness, the script is over.

I usually send it for proofreading after finishing the story. Proofreading generally takes about a week, and to save time, I use this period to confirm the UI changes I want to make, count how many art pieces I need to draw, and prepare their drafts and placeholders.

And then, I imported the drafts (CG, sprites, small CG) into Ren'Py, also did some programming to make the UI more visually appealing.

Finally, after proofreading completed, I imported the new script into Ren'Py.

These smaller tasks took me about a week, from October 10th to 25th. Approximately 35 hours were spent.

The Art

God knows how much I wanted to draw while writing.

Well, now we're officially entering the hell of drawing.

Generally, a CG takes about 3 hours for me to finish. Chibi CG is about 30 minutes each. I haven't calculated for sprites, but because they need expression variations and import into Ren'Py, it's probably about 3 hours each? (If they're side characters, it should be an hour each.)

In short, after completing all sprites and small CG in 3 days, I decided to draw 2 CGs per weekdays and 3 CGs per weekend-days. This is almost at my limit, but it ensures I finish this work as quickly as possible and get all the drawings on the same level. Additionally, I tried to add some UI effects, rearranged the gallery layout... and prepared new background images.

My usual approach is to make a list, tick off each art asset as I finish it, so I don't miss anything.

One piece of advice: While drawing all CG and art assets at once is indeed a time-saving decision, it will make your wrist and waist quite sore...

But the benefit is that you can quickly draw all CG and ensure they are at the same level. It also avoids the awkward situation of having to abandon drawn CG if you decide to changes in the story.

If you want to draw CG for your work, I suggest:

• Less CGs. Only draw the essential ones.
• Extend the timeline of art tasks according to your needs; don't tire yourself out too much.
• Find a universal and simple drawing method to save time (make good use of filters, Gaussian blur, gradient mapping, etc.).
• Don't draw a CG unless you're completely sure it will appear in the game.
• Start thinking about the BGM that needs to be inserted during the scene when drawing CG.

In the end, I successfully completed all art within three weeks—specifically, from October 29th to November 18th, approximately 100 hours in total.

Special Effects,  Musics and Run Through

After importing all the drawn CGs into Ren'Py, I ran the game for the first time! In the most optimistic scenario, I would run the game twice and it will be perfect (and the result is that I ran it so many times I memorized all the lines).

During the first run, I made sure there were no typos in the game and characters' position and background images were accurate. At the same time, I added or deleted some lines (basically, I removed all unnecessary lines), ensuring the best reading experience.

After that, I would blind-insert all character expression variations, special effects, transitions, and music into the code.

This work isn't fun; I have a Google Sheet that includes all the expressions for each character, so I'm basically copying and pasting the same line of code over and over, then modifying the expression names. To save more time, I would only work on one (main) character's expression variations each round. For example, in the first round, I finished all of Hendrix' expression variations at once, and in the second round, I finished Edmund's... and so on. As for side characters, I would add them all at once in the final round.

My Google sheet for expressions

After expressions, simple effects, basic sound effects, and music were added, I started the second run.

The second run mainly focused on ensuring there were no code errors in the game, making sure each character's expressions looked natural. At the same time, I would add or modify some expressions during the run.

Additionally, in this round, I would try to refine the visual effects, sound effects, shaking, etc., to ensure an immersive gaming experience.

Although it looks simple, the end result is that you keep running a certain part of the game, keep modifying, keep checking from the beginning... and in the end, you don't even know if your game is even fun or good... *sigh* ( ˚ཫ˚ )

Overall, this is not the most creative part of the game, but it is important. So, no matter what, I have to do it.

I spent a little over a week on this, so approximately 50 hours.

Final Works (Beta Testing and Translation)

If you've reached this point, it means your game is ready! Maybe it's not in its perfect state yet, but... I would say 90% of the work is done! Yay!

For most people, just testing the game's playability is enough for release— but my game is bilingual, so I also have to do the translation. At this point, I'm exhausted, and I needed some motivation to keep me going, to persist until the game is released... So, to save time, I conducted internal testing with some of my players while doing translation!

They are simply the best people in the world, and all their reactions and feedback made me smile all night. I still take screenshots of them and look at those today (just like how I keep repeatedly checking the reviews of my game on itch and stupidly giggle all the time).

As for translation... I don't know what to say. Overall, in the first round of translation, I fill in the translation files provided by Ren'Py. In the second round of translation, I polish the previous copy.

This work also took me a little over a week, around 60 hours. It's a bitter-sweet experience.

Release The Game

It's DONE. Everything is DONE now.

I completed this game, I received positive reviews, and I met the deadline. I accomplished everything within this year.

Honestly, at this point, I don't know what to say.

Months of continuous work made me feel numb; I love this project, but when everything is over, I find myself going home every day with nothing to do— and at this moment, a sense of emptiness fills my heart. During the wait for release, I had to find something to distract my mind, so I tried finishing Collar Malice and did some drawings.

I don't even want to open this game because I've seen every scene too many times; I can recite every line, every plot, every piece of BGM. I think unless I need to fix bugs, I won't want to replay Act 1 for a long time.

But I'm still very happy.

This is something I've always wanted to do, and the results make me quite satisfied! I feel proud of myself!

In summary, the work on Chapter 2 and 3 of TROT took me about ~500 hours in total.

Of course, more than half of that time I was just trying to write the story. But after going through everything that followed, I feel like I've regained my passion for writing! It feels like I could start writing Act 2 right now! But I think I should force myself to take a break first...

2024 Development Plan and Upcoming Hiatus

Ok, this is the last part.

Firstly I want to mention that I will have a Hiatus in early 2024... due to life stuff.

Specifically, I will stop TROT's development in January and February (maybe March), and then everything will return to normal. During this period, I will still be online on itch and respond to comments, but I won't release any dev-logs.

My (very optimistic) goal is to finish this game within 2024. Currently, my plan is to release Act 2 in August and Act 3 in December. Then this story will come to an end (oh my) — but that's my plan.

Finally, thank you for reading, (early) Merry Christmas, and if you have time, maybe give my game a try and leave a feedback&rating!

Christmas screenshots! Love from Hendrix and Edmund~

And that's it, I’ll see you next year.

— Cherish