Happy Halloween!

Hello everyone, and Happy Halloween!

We've been hard at work on version 28, and are still expecting to release on the 2nd as planned. Well, as long as something truly crazy doesn't happen like a zombie outbreak or something on Guam, lol.

There's been some new craziness in my personal situation, but since it's not really affecting development and we're busy getting ready for 28, I'll wait before saying anything about it. For the immediate future--the next few months--it's unlikely to cause any problems or delays in development. Because of my commitment to transparency in development though, I just wanted to let you know that there's been a negative development in my wife's health situation. 

It does seem like I've hit a rough patch of luck over the last few months, but I really do hate the idea of being "that developer" that's always complaining about something or making excuses. My goal is and has been to make sure we have a solid plan and contingencies to handle these sorts of situations. I think we've done pretty well so far, we haven't had any serious delays in overall development due to our personal situations. For the most part, we've even been really good about hitting our release dates, with only a few delayed releases over the last couple of years.

That said, sharing all the negative stuff that happens in our lives does tend to give a negative impression about our commitment. We can't really change that, so all we can do is continue to do our best to make the very best game we can. As always, thank you so much for your support. Emotionally, I can't really express how much of a difference it makes not only in development but in my life as well. Thank you!

Special Preview

I forgot to add it to the blog post I just wrote, so I figured I'd add it in here for all of you who look at the actual dev blog :D

This is some late-night art that is being used in a scene with Lily providing some "encouragement" to the female start protagonist. This is a bit graphic/extreme, so if that kind of thing bothers you, you may want to skip viewing it. The game's content filters will hide it as appropriate, of course.

Deep in an Institute Lab...

Science Fiction

So I've been pretty obscenely busy the last week or so, but I've finally been able to scrape together the time to write a new post. I'll go into why I've been busy in a bit, but first I'd like to share some of the cool stuff we've been working on.

There's some cool new content for the Oldest Profession and Maid Pouffiasse schools. There's also the first fair, being held at the Farm Coop fairgrounds. It's a yearly event that happens from May 26th to 28th. There's plenty of 'fun' things to see at the fair, and there's even a little something special for some of you folks out there...

We get asked about it rather often...

I've also added in the ability to get animal ears and tails, by using some experimental gene tonics produced by Nekomatics, such as the Cat-A Tonic. Right now you can get cat, dog, or fox ears and tails. Some parser calls have been written, but right now the only place it shows up is your character description. Technically I've also added in support for non-human cocks, though this won't appear in-game until the parser calls can be updated and we enable it on some NPCs. 

I also discovered a rather silly bug, that was causing some character-specific text not to show up properly. Because it was set up for a soft fail, it was just showing the default text in certain circumstances. All because of a silly [i] that should have been [j].

As for why I've been so busy... I've been dealing with the bureaucratic process of requesting an emergency transfer through the gov't agency I work for. Basically, it's been determined that my daughter can't get the help and treatment she needs here on Guam, so we have to try and make it back to the mainland U.S. to a location where more medical resources are available.

While it's called an "emergency transfer", that's emergency in bureaucratic speak, which means several months. Which in some ways really sucks, because we're basically stuck out here until then, and that means no real treatment for my daughter unless we send her back to the states without us. Thankfully it's not exactly an urgent issue, but she also can't go to school right now. Right now we're doing a sort of weird homeschooling thing with help from the school, which falls to me to do most of the week. 

So that takes up a lot of what used to be my limited amount of free time. I love my daughter, but I can tell you, I do not have the skills or natural aptitude to be a teacher for children. :P

So anyway, for now, this really doesn't mean much for the development of AW. Now that this little spurt of paperwork and such is taken care of, it'll mostly be waiting for something to happen... so pretty much status quo. When and if something does happen, I'll be busy for a couple months to pack up, sell the house, move across the planet, find a new place to live, and get settled in, but I should be able to get back to AW pretty quickly afterward. As awful as all this is, being able to live on the mainland again is a definite silver lining.

And of course, even if a hypothetical move becomes a nightmare, we'll still have Besty to work on things. AW progress will continue to march on!

Thanks as always for your support in all its forms, AW wouldn't be possible without you guys!

I'd also like to take a moment to give a special thanks to Demichan, who has been helping to edit Besty's writing lately. Proofreading/editing can be a lot of work, and it's greatly appreciated; it goes a long way towards helping us get content into the game faster!

That's all for now, thanks for reading.

o7

ThaumX

Keep Going Mom

Hello everyone, It's time for another update. 

It's been pretty hectic in my life lately, with everything going on with my family, but I've still been hard at work on AW. In addition to writing new content for the schools that didn't have content yet (Maid Pouffiasse, Oldest Profession, Mrs. Fubb's Parlor), I've also been able to play through a solid chunk of gameplay to search for bugs. Fortunately, I didn't find any major ones, but I did pick up on some minor ones, as well as a couple that wouldn't be obvious without developer tools. Besty as well has been spending some extra time looking for bugs. It's good to spend some time on a more careful bug check every so often.

The more interesting thing I've been working on is the addition of children to AW, something that I get asked about a lot. Right now you still won't be able to interact with them (until we get the creche up and running with some writing), but you can name your children after birth, and keep tabs on them via the social menu.

The children are now proper objects, with physical characteristics determined by the parents on a by-child basis. And for "unknown" fathers, we use a part of our procedural generation code to generate a suitable 'father' for genetic purposes based on Appletree's demographics. The only caveat is that if you are gestating children from Progenerate via the fecundate division or being a part-time surrogate, you won't be able to track or visit them because they're not your children.

Besty has also added an interesting organization to the game, something called the U.S. Fert Corps. A sort-of grassroots organization promoting citizens to do their part in making new citizens. It's... unique, to be sure. There's at least one event in the game already where you encounter some of their members. :D

That's about all I've got for you in this update, we'll keep working towards v28!

You might catch a new documentary if you watch some Appletree TV.

Summon Your Own Thaum

I thought it was time we answered those Q&A questions you asked in the last survey. In the end, we ended up just typing out the answers... Old habits die hard, I guess.

Check out the Q&A HERE

Nevermind, it's actually HERE (sorry!)

Bug Hunting - v0.27.1

Hello everyone,

We had a couple annoying bugs with this release. Not game-breaking, but annoying. It was mostly with the new changes we implemented in version 27. Because we focused on fixing those first, I thought I'd go ahead and do an incremental release. Nothing major as far as new content goes, but it should be more enjoyable without the player-character energy problem.

Original Version 0.27.0 Change Log is HERE.

Changes:

• Energy bug has been fixed.
• Player now properly has a maximum energy amount based on their body and athleticism, and an "effective" maximum energy which also considers the player's health, depression, late-term pregnancy, very large breast size, gestation acceleration treatment, excessive lactation, drug addiction, etc.
• Max energy will never go below a value of 2, however having only 2 energy won't be enough for moderate to high-intensity exercise.
• Several minor errors in the updated medical district have been corrected.
• You can now properly get general health treatment.
• Bug with attending regular psychiatry appointments has been fixed.
• An error with calculating lactation breast size and max size has been fixed.
• This will remove issues some players have experienced where breast size is inconsistent.
• Besty has expanded the cooking system a little bit further. (Or broke it, who knows?)

The Burst Release v0.27 Change Log

Hello everyone, and welcome to the Burst Release!

This release got its name from a rather dramatic addition to the fertility system: the ability to have your stomach literally burst during a hyper pregnancy. Don't worry though, this event should be rather rare, especially if you take advantage of the new 'elasticity' body transformatives such as UteriGrow™.

This has been a rather rough month, with my daughter and wife having some health issues, along with both Besty and I managing to catch a cold. I'm still pretty happy with what we've got accomplished though, which includes a whole bunch of new content. The additions to the Institute SPERM job alone clocks in at 20,000 words along with a bunch of scene images. I've also written 5 new Progenerate Technologies events, mostly related to fertility drugs, though there's also an interesting pre-birth stretching event. Speaking of fertility drugs, a bunch have been added along with the Gestique fertility clinic and spa. Gestation accelerators, elasticity drugs, fertility enhancement, fertility boosters, and even a zygote splitting medication are available. You can also avail yourself of the sauna at Gestique to help heal your unborn children.

We also got a lot of bug fixing done, some other content additions, and we've added the Resort area at Lake Clitea. Besty has also added an early version of the cooking system. You can currently cook a cheeseburger or blini as a trial, but next month you'll be able to make more complex dishes and add your own special "extra ingredients" to the food. Eventually, you'll be able to feed your date that fancy Rotini a la Rohypnol you lovingly crafted, or give your blini a nice sugar-semen glaze. The bug fixing was definitely a big part of our focus, however, as well as implementing some of your suggestions. One example is changing the class times for the various schools. Now they should be a lot more accessible if you wish to raise your skills.

Thanks for your support; we really hope you guys enjoy this release!

Changes

Words: 1,999,997     Characters: 12,095,923

Code: 184,823 lines

• Pregnancy belly size is now calculated for pregnant characters
• Based on the fundal height measurement, for a more accurate estimation of belly size.
• The description of belly size is now part of the character description in the character menu.
• Fundal height and the size of your fetus/s can be found in the character details page.
• Added gestation acceleration functionality to the fertility system.
• Players can now take three accelerant drugs, each of which will shorten their pregnancy. (Amount shortened depends on the drug and whether the player has the rapid gestation mutation.)
• The drugs can be found at the Gestique Fertility Clinic & Spa or will be administered automatically in the Progenerate Technologies job.
• Refined the temporary fertility boost functionality of the fertility system.
• Added two fertility-boosting medications, available at Gestique.
• Note: fertility boost naturally decays over time.
• Added a consumption scene for Fertili-Tea fertility-boosting beverage.
• Tea will now tell you when you drink it if it boosted your fertility, or if your current fertility boost is too high to be affected by the tea.
• Added zygote splitting functionality to the fertility system.
• Splitting zygotes is how identical twins happen. Previously all multiple pregnancies were fraternal.
• Added a drug called Saradberol that dramatically increases the odds of zygotes splitting when taken shortly after egg fertilization. (Available in Gestique.)
• Added womb elasticity and womb burst functionality to the fertility system.
• It is now possible for the player's belly to burst during a hyper pregnancy, resulting in a bad end.
• This effect should not be unlikely for most players, provided the player has taken the elasticizing treatments if planning on hyper pregnancy.
• In most cases, the belly burst will require the twin-wombs mutation and dual pregnancies. 
• Belly burst thresholds will likely need to be adjusted based on player feedback.
• Players working for Progenerate Technologies will never have their wombs burst thanks to their advanced technology.
• Three elasticizing treatments/transformatives have been added to the game. They are available in the Gestique Fertility Clinic & Spa, or via working for Progenerate Technologies.
• Added a unique bad-end for the belly burst event.
• 11 new fertility-related drugs have been created and added to the game.
• All of them are available at Gestique in the medical district.
• All of them have had their own unique ads created, along with mini-scenes for having them administered.
• The player's base fertility score (comprised of the results from several variables) can now be increased to 6 via fertility transformatives.
• The Progenerate Technologies Fecundate Division job now has 5 new events.
• Primarily scenes for the administration of fertility drugs/treatments
• One scene involves vaginal stretching near the end of pregnancy. This will also improve birthing results.
• Major overhaul of the medical district to meet ThaumX standards.
• Medical services are now obtained from clinics that each have their own unique offices as planned.
• Dr. Weiner now provides general practice services from his clinic
• Abortion is now available during the first trimester from Dr. Weiner.
• H. Lecter's psychiatry clinic has been created.
• New writing for the emergency mental treatment scene.
• Therapy appointments now happen in his clinic and have some new images.
• Cosmetic Surgery is now available from the Dollmaker clinic as intended.
• Transformatives can now be purchased from the Irresistible or Proliferant clinics.
• The Gestique Fertility Clinic & Spa has been opened for fertility treatments.
• Fetal Health Sauna scene is now available to increase fetus health.
• Full range of fertility treatments available.
• Reformatted in the resource load skip buttons so that people would be less likely to click them when they shouldn't.
• Fixes and improvements to Screen Reader Mode (SRM).
• On-Off toggle buttons now properly display as system checkboxes in SRM.
• SRM can now be turned on from the system menu using a dropdown.
• Details on SRM on the accessibility page have been clarified, with a better secondary on-off button.
• Some other minor fixes to SRM functionality.
• New huge event chain for the Institute S.P.E.R.M. job.
• Events become available upon reaching the "Technician" rank, as it involves assignment to a new research project.
• A total of 6 events in the chain at about 20,000 words, with some internal choices and different possible outcomes.
• Events include some more extreme content, primarily BDSM and torture, but also impregnation and a potential lesbian sex scene.
• New job content items (5) for the S.P.E.R.M. job.
• Wrote location description content for the new Resort area off of Lake Clitea.
• A new random event that can occur late in pregnancy.
• New unique text colors are now shown for the 2nd and 3rd NPCs that take part in a conversation to make it more clear who is speaking.
• Skill training schools have had their class times adjusted to make it easier to attend when working a normal job.
• A new recursive function is in use with the game's backward compatibility function.
• Backward compatibility is now more stable, and should no longer cause game errors when playing with old saves (provided the save isn't corrupted).
• Scenario window will now scroll-to-top when displaying a new page of content.
• Fixed the problems with the Sperm-Vac and items cheats.
• Fixed the bug preventing the use of prologue skip in $5 builds.
• Made it so that the escape hatch doesn't work on death/bad-end screens, and the escape hatch window will now properly close after use.

Besty

• Prevent "go to sleep" double-clicks
• High-tech bed fix
• Body liquids drying over time
• Fix NPC initiated convotags
• Strip club private show scene (738 words)
• Bodyweight gain\loose fixed
• 2 Stripper job events (1600 words)
• Test possible after-sex bug in maid job events
• Swapping work on the first day fix
• Create map passages for Lake Clitea resort with navigation.
• Stripper work Wednesday bug fixed
• Random minor events (1100 words)
• Test two dates at the same time
• Autosave fixed to keep it from overwriting after loading
• Test jobbing once again to be sure it is okay.
• Ball-sack shop opened
• Bullseye athletic clothes department opened
• New athletic items and shoes.
• 20 new jewelry and accessories items added.
• You can now cook hamburger and blini