CoTTR: Expanded Edition Devlog - Feb 24
about 2 years ago
– Sat, Feb 24, 2024 at 05:26:15 AM
Weary travelers...
Arch Magus Ze here, of the Square Weasels.
It seems we've all collectively survived yet another circling of this little blue rock around a fireball hanging in the endless void. Well done us, let's give ourselves a pat on the back.
If you're wondering what we've been up to, and haven't the time to read me wax poetic, here is the long and short:
-Progress was relatively little compared to months prior mostly due to us taking some time off (also we caught a wild covid, it was somewhat effective)
-Sanguine Sage voice acting stretch-goal unlocked
-Made a few hundred more sound effects and integrate some of them
-Continued with some editing, moving on to finer tweaks rather than big changes.
-We're most likely going to release the Expanded Edition as a digital update on Steam and Itch.io first. The physical rewards and funny post-true-ending side-story will come soon after.
-Latest estimate of the digital release is end of June 2024.
-Due to the significantly increased file sizes from the audio stuff, the Physical CD may be switched up to a double disc package. The cost may go up, we may have to charge a little extra for it. Details to be determined.
For exclusive rewards, back us on ko-fi and patreon
Join our Discord
If you want to know more in-depths about the events of the last 2 months, feel free to read on.
We took the new year break to have a little gathering with friends whom we met from the game's discord. It's one of those unexpected-little-thing-that-turned-out-to-be-a-bigger-deal-than-you-thought type situations. Something, the game, the way we did, whatever it is, made it so that our discord is full of people who are some of the best we've known. We quickly became not just creators and fans but friends and comrades who can totally spend a day together without even trying, hence the trip.
We caught Covid on this trip and everyone was sick in the house. We had fun despite the 39+ degree fever I had. It wasn't any worse than the bouts of self-induced alcohol-poisoning we euphemistically call "partying" from my young and foolish days, so I'm not complaining.
Soon after we came back, I took around 3 weeks on a yearly pilgrimage to Canada to visit my aging parents. No rest for the unenlightened. I say it's a pilgrimage because the whole thing exists in my mind as a kind of (un(?))holy ritual that culminates at the end of a thousand mile journey. A questionable mix of fulfillment of filial obligation, the return of the prodigal child, and a sinner bargaining their very self away for atonement. There are some big words in there, some two-dollar words, as a learned person might say, but what it looks like, in reality, is me, jet-lagged, sitting in a flat all day with my parents while they watch Chinese TV dramas. Am I going to unpack any of that? No. And you're welcome. Trust me on this.
A very generous backer surprised us with a pledge, and unlocked the voice acting for Sanguine Sage stretch goal. We already fooled around with some tests last year, and found the result quite compelling—lilting, mysterious, and baffling. So we're very much looking forward to doing this. I hope we'll have a sample for your perusal for the next update.
The sound effects are numbering in the hundreds now, and we still have plans to create more. We are not professionals. We get an idea that something might be fun, and we pick up pieces and bang them together. The craft gets refined as we go along out of sheer inevitability.
The entire process calls to mind an image of adventurers setting out to sea with nothing but a loose collection of logs, inventing fresh ways of cobbling together the craft before it sinks, motivated by the best motivator of all, the need to forge forward into an unknown.
It may sound dangerous, daft, even, but it's the same way we made this entire thing. So if you found any sort of merit in what we've created, then just imagine what we can do when we start to actually know what we're doing! Minds shall be boggled irreparably. Consider yourselves warned.
It is a good sign in our editing that we no longer cringe painfully at every other paragraph, and find only small irksome things to tweak. We have been reading voraciously, and absorbing writing and story-telling practices we adore, a process which hopefully elevates one's taste and eye for quality. When we run out of things to tweak, the expansion can be called complete, and the result released to the world, to you. There is a sense of impending-ness now. It is closer than it is far.
On a more serious/boring note:
When we started, the game and sound track already had trouble fitting onto one CD. Now with the addition of several hundred million bytes of sound effects, it is simply impossible, even with re-optimized files all-around. We will either have to truncate the number of soundtracks on the physical CD to a meager few, or to grab another disc and shove it on there. We will look into the cost of this, and see if we can absorb it ourselves. It makes us feel somewhat slimy to ask people who have already been ridiculously generous to us even more money. But if the cost is such that it might really disrupt our continued livelihood and operation, then we might thicken our facial skins and request backers who want the CDs to extend their generosity. If you have thoughts on this, we're very much open to hearing them.
Regarding the post-true-ending side-story. We figured since it does not impact the actual plot in any way, and is pretty much a cameo of other characters we love from other another game of ours, delaying it to a further patch is a rather minimal loss compared to the gain of releasing the game earlier to all backers. You can let us know your opinions about this too.
Phew, we did it.
Take care of yourselves, see you in the next update.
Ze
CoTTR: Expanded Edition Devlog - Dec 23
about 2 years ago
– Sun, Dec 17, 2023 at 01:31:16 AM
Dear weary travelers, I hope you're faring well.
The editing of the Expanded Edition is continuing, but as with many things, the pace tends to slow after the initial rush of excitement.
That is why Ze has started working on the immersive sound design for the game. It's likely easier to show than tell about it in this case, so take a look at the sneak peek. We're 200 sounds in or so, with perhaps several more times to go than that. Immersing takes a volume, but I intend to keep going until there's enough sounds to pull you right under.
Nim is also putting their fuzzy mittens on more artworks, the total touched-up pieces are sitting somewhere around 12? Much higher than what we promised in the campaign. And they're itching to do something original for some of the new scenes we've added. But it may be too spicy to just spoil in an update, so you may have to wait until the new edition is released to feast thine eyes upon it. *Wink wink*
New fans and supporters keep trickling in to our discord, which is sitting around 280 members now, with 40 some online at a time. Our ko-fi and patreon aren't going to pay our rent by themselves quite yet, but let me tell you, it feels a bit surreal to have people throw their money at you for just doing something you really love. Creating your own world is so sumptuous an act that I think I should be the one who has to pay for it, not the other way around!
If you feel the touch of Waters in your veins, if you hear the Seas call your unpronounceable name, then dive into the realm of Square Weasel.
Don't worry, we're not as dramatic as all that. Generally, we lurk, we post the occasional funny cat memes, we discuss our mutual infatuation with mysterious, white-haired companions, and sometimes we play Elden Ring co-op, which is a whole thing.
Take care of yourselves out there, wherever you are, until the next update.
Ze
CoTTR: Expanded Edition Devlog - Nov 23
over 2 years ago
– Tue, Nov 07, 2023 at 08:30:34 AM
Greetings Weary Travelers,
How are you faring on your journey?
We here at Square Weasel have been busy tinkering with The Remainder, and hope you will be as delighted as we are to know of the progress we've made.
This month has seen a lot of writing. We're combing through the entire script from the start to massage things.
There are grammar mistakes, odd phrasing, characters speaking not quite like themselves, and many other minor blemishes that have become obvious to us since we've released the game.
More substantially, we're putting our heads into Vyn's and Ilar's, and just like the first time around, asking "What would I do or say here?"
Sometimes, we discover that something that they would absolutely do or say is not there, so we will add it in.
Another branch, another set of choices, another conversation that both reveals and conceals. If you've played the game, you'll know what I mean. If not, I hope it sounds intriguing enough to you to look forward to.
Long story short, we're enriching the story, adding more of what is already good, and polishing up the not-so-good. Very reasonable stuff. No shananigans, unless Fuzzpants is concerned. Then it's all shananigans.
The script is currently 167k words, up from 145k, so that's an addition of 22k. The total changes must be higher, perhaps 50k, since editing is mostly replacing what was already there.
The drafting of a side-story has also started, but it is in its infancy so I will not say anything more. You will have to imagine what happens with this clue alone — Soggy. That is all.
A fair warning. We wished to finish the expansion by Jan 2024, but since we reached a number of stretch goals, for which you all have our sincere gratitude, we think it will most likely take more time to finish the work. Current estimate is March of April 24. I hope it's not too bad a piece of news. After all, the delay before a delight would only enhance the experience.
If you really cannot wait that long, like, it's a sort of medical or spiritual emergency or something, then you can always play the current version on Steam or Itch.io to scratch that itch.
Finally, I want to thank you all again, our lovely supporters, for giving us this opportunity to work on this story that's dear to our hearts. We're enjoying it tremendously, and have confidence it will be worth the wait.
For more frequent updates, you can join our discord and see what we're up to. We post something there a few times a week.
On the weekend we have a group life-drawing session, an anime/tv show watch party, and sometimes we just get together and stream a game or chat about stuff. It's a lot of fun, even if you only want to lurk or stealth or whatever.
That's it from me, take care out there and you'll hear from me again soon!
Ze
Arch Magus
CoTTR: Expanded Edition Devlog #1
over 2 years ago
– Tue, Oct 03, 2023 at 09:10:58 AM
Greetings weary travelers, I hope you're faring well on your journey.
It's been a few weeks since the successful KS campaign for CoTTR's expanded edition, and we've got some updates to keep you sated until the new edition comes out!
Since we're most comfortable with art, we decided to get into some re-works of existing artwork to get us into the mood for the whole project.
We noticed that Ilar's face looked somewhat...varied across different illustrations in the game. I would like to blame it on the nature of magick, being based on Waters and fluid and all that, but it's actually just because we couldn't quite get their likeness from different angles right.
To remedy this, we asked them to sit for a few portrait photos so we wrap our eager tendrils around their illusive anatomy.
(Translation: we created a 3D sculpture of Ilar's head so we can see it from various angles.)
With this, we can adjust the existing illustrations, here are a few in progress.
And a few that are finished.
And when it comes time to make new illustrations, we'll have an easier time of it. We've hit the funding goals for 2-3 reworks, but with this workflow, we could squeeze in several more reworks where the only thing to be improved is Ilar's likeness, so you'll have those to look forward to.
The next steps will be to begin editing the text, sketch out new scenes to be added, and producing the writing and art for those scenes.
You can rest assured we'll be throwing out updates whenever we have something appetizing on our hands.
If you've been to our discord server, you'll know that we have a horrid time keeping anything to ourselves, and are constantly filling the servers with a deluge of updates, chitchats, and general good-natured nonsense. So if you'd like to really get into the thick of our development, then that's where you'd want to be. Here's a portal: https://discord.gg/PgZASVhN7E
That's it for now, take care and we'll talk again real soon.
Ze
Arch Magus
Square Weasel Studio
Success! Thank you! What's next?
over 2 years ago
– Fri, Sep 01, 2023 at 05:03:23 AM
We did it! Thanks to you, we've reached nearly 4x our original goal and will be able to really expand and enrich The Remainder in the coming months!
It has been quite fun and fulfilling to interact with you all and go through our first crowdfunding effort. Now that the kickstarter is behind us, what comes next?
First thing first, we will begin sketching stories and art for the new content, and keeping all our fans, supporters, and friends updated as we make new stuff. We're the most active on our discord, which we encourage you to join if you haven't already, here is a link. We'll also send updates now and then through our mailing list, and our itch and steam store pages.
At the same time, we want to give people who missed out on the KS for whatever reason a chance to get in on the action, as well as try to reach more stretch goals so we can add even more content to the game. We will have a Backerkit page up shortly which will have many of the rewards from the KS campaign(minus the KS exclusive stuff). We'll also update our Ko-Fi prints shop with new artworks we add.
In case you missed it, we did not charge any shipping for the physical rewards. A backer survey will go out as soon as we can make a list of all the physical reward options, the various illustrations you can get as postcards and prints, the hand-written letters, and the physical artwork. You will be able to choose which artworks you want to get printed as part of your reward, and pay for the shipping charges.
We'll also have a FAQ page up on backerkit to help answer the most common questions we're encountering from you.
And here is a tally of the stretch goals we've hit!
Since we're pretty close to the Sage voice acting goal, we might still put it in, but no promises. :)
That's it for now, we'll be back soon with more news and we move forward.
Take care, thanks again, and talk to you soon!
The Square Weasels
