Mongo

Exciting news! The first half of the game is pretty much completed along with almost all of the game's features. And that's important because those are all things you get to see for yourself soon in the DEMO! I'm not sure of the exact release date yet for the demo (I still have some polishing to do, and am also still waiting on some assets), but I expect it to be done sometime this summer or early fall! That's it for now. I'll continue sharing any updates on news or progress. In the meantime, you can wishlist the game here if you'd like:

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Steam page progress

My original plan was to make this update after publishing the Steam page, but it's taken longer than expected. As it turns out, registering an LLC, opening a new bank account, and researching how to make a professional-looking Steam page takes time, lol. It's almost done, though! All that's left is to finish the capsule art.

I was going to publish the store page with rushed placeholder art, just to get it out there. Before I went through with it, I asked some of my friends what they thought, and I got the impression it was probably not the best idea. This is what I showed them:

I mashed a bunch of assets together and color shifted everything to be brighter...

It seems like the best decision would be to make an original piece now instead. Making good art will take much more time than just mashing assets together, but I think it'll be worth it. Here are some of the rough thumbnails I came up with:

Trying to go for a cool and dynamic composition

I'll post the final whenever it's completed, so look forward to that!

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How far is development?

Very far. Like, I'm currently working on the final boss far.

Honestly, I somewhat regret waiting this long to start making NNFF public (2 years!!), but also working with zero pressure and zero need to think about social media for so long helped me get a lot of work done. So I actually somewhat don't regret it.

Here's a rough idea of the major tasks left:

Final level + final boss

Some cutscenes

Most CGs/big art pieces

Some fluff features, such as a sound test

Polishing the story draft and dialogue

Getting feedback and testing

Music and SFX

There are a few more things, but those are the least spoiler-y and most time-consuming ones.

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What I'm currently working on

I've been hopping between working on the final boss, finalizing the story and writing, and random bug fixes.

One specific thing that took a lot of my time recently was finalizing a monologue that's told in the background of one of the end-game stages. I still have to run it by some friends to see if it sucks, but here's a snippet of it:

I'm trying to make NNFF as unique of an experience that I can, so I added quite a few experimental things like this.

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Thank you for reading this far. I hope to have more things to share with you soon!

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Intro

First, a little rundown the power system:

Collecting pink stars raises your power, changing your shots and making them do more damage. But you can also sacrifice some of it to use a "spell"! Each character has their own unique spell, with varying usefulness and power. And speaking of characters…

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Character playstyles!

Poly ~ Balanced and simple

The homing fireballs she shoots let you focus a little more on dodging, since you'll always be hitting something. She's a great choice for new players!

Esther ~ High risk / high reward

Her shots do massive damage if you get up close to the enemies and aim them just right. Also, her item collection range is much bigger than Poly's

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Stages

There are 7 stages total, each with their own gimmicks and bosses (and little dialogue events)

Something that's a bit special about the end-stage bosses:

Right before they are defeated, they'll use one more extra-challenging spell. During this bonus phase, your spells are locked. But if you get hit, you won't lose a life!

(The post I made last week about the music shows another one of these)

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✿ A few other features ✿

A replay system!

An in-depth practice mode!

(which hides a few secrets...)

And a "bestiary"!

You can learn more about the bosses you've beaten, and look at their sprites. And if you manage to beat them on the hardest difficulty, you'll be able to view their concept art!

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I hope you enjoyed learning a bit about my game! Next week, I'll share the specifics of what's finished and what's left

Also, if everything goes well, I should be able to have a playable demo out sometime in a few months, which is pretty exciting!

~Mongo

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