Game dev blog!

Updates:

Rie specific endings and breakup failsafe added.

Working on Yuna's Route; Implementing Events 11-; Some events were already written, but edits had to be made to account for how another route effects this one.

Working on Nana's route; A lot of dialogue and 1 choice selection have been edited in events 1-10.

New Events for Nana/Moving events around; Totally new events: 11-13, pushing back the original events in these spots.

Started work on new event for Nana, 14, but haven't finished.

Plans for the month:

Continue Working on Nana's Events

Maybe dip into Yuna's events or a side character's?

I had a lot of stuff written for Nana's route, but since extending the number of events, I have to adjust for that, hence some events being edited, some events being pushed back and new ones added. Her route wasn't fully written out, but a large majority was and so it's just changing things around there.

Rie's route doesn't really need any editing now, so I can say that's fully behind me!

And yeah, this month, I'll work primarily more on Nana's eventing.

It feels kind of surreal to type that, even though it's been so long. It almost feels like I just released it yesterday.

Finishing this 2 years ago have me such a boost of confidence and amounted to me being happy because I've always wanted to have 1 finished project out as a signifier of being alive. I guess the feeling runs deeper than that, but that's the gist of it without being embarrassingly personal.

Even as I write a sort of post-mortem for the game, this story line still isn't complete and even though I'm currently working on another long-term project (set in the same time/place, actually), I do really wanna revisit this story line; Both in game form and comic form.

By the latter, I have to do a self-promo for my webcomic of the same name (That I never advertised here... Despite that coming up on two years...!)-- 18782. It's more focused on Yukio than Arakawa, but one of these days as I get farther, I'd really like to cover the events of the game in a branch-off comic, perhaps both from Arakawa's POV and Yukio's. Of course, as it stands right now, that plot line is a far way away.

Actually, speaking of the comic, it kind of made me realize how much I had to move around things with the game for better sense making... Hindsight and all; These things probably aren't super noticeable unless you're me or I guess you're really trying to do a hardcore timeline of this project (... Which is quite unlikely unless you're me-).

Similar project related news, at some point, I really wanna do a play through stream of this game. I think it'd be fun to revisit for myself, to have online somewhere, to help as a walk through (aside from the text-based one on my site), and just if anyone's interested to talk about it. I planned to do it this week, and maybe I still will, but I also for some reason thought the game was released on the 11th and I had more time to do it beforehand aha... (I also have a better anniversary picture planned). When I do go through with that, I'll stream it on YouTube... Sorry, I hate logging into Twitch.

Anyway! Rambling over. I can sum up everything a lot quicker with this:

Thank you so much everyone who's played, everyone who's commented, everyone I've met after they played this game, everyone who believed in me while making this, and even thank you to past me for persevering through development hell.

Happy 2 years! Happy 2 years!

Updates:

Rie events: 41.5 - 45 (+33 Pages; Total is at 183)

Plans for the month:

Add in Rie-specific endings

Add specific event notes that are missing from Rie's document

Work on Nana or Yuna's?

It's been kind of a hectic month for me personally. To make a long story short, lots of personal things happened and to cope I ended up gaming way too much, and then when I was like, "Oh yeah, I gotta write!" 1. I wanted to write something else 2. More personal stuff came up and put it on pause. Oh well, life goes on. I try and remind myself there's no real time limit to this stuff as this game will be free (Unless I decide to make an r18 patch and set it at like. 10 cents to deter minors lol. But that's still up in the air for many reasons.).

Anyway! Enough personal chitter chatter, let me get down to the game itself. Rie's route is done! Mainly...! How I planned to code endings is sort of a tally system (If you romanced her, if you didnt, how well you did if you did romance her, special events, ect). It probably sounds more complicated than it is; It'll probably just be a few lines to a page of text in the end. Of course, by "done" I still mean first draft... Second draft I'll work on tone consistency and whatnot lol.

I didn't really keep up with my personal event notes, so I need to add those in. That's just read over the event and sum it up and more for internal bookkeeping.

After that, it's finally someone else's turn! I'm thinking Nana or Yuna still... Right now, my mind is leaning more towards reformatting Yuna's route.

Hopefully next month will be better! I do have a lot of stuff in my immediate future to attend to, so I can't be certain.

Updates:

Rie Events 38 -> 41.5 (+31pgs, leading to 150pgs for her route)

Plans for the month:

Finish Rie's route

Work on Nana or Yuna's?

It's finally warming up... I've enjoyed the snow but I've missed the sunshine. I've had a really rough month personally, so I didn't get a lot of game work done for this project, but there's at least something small to report! Some progress is certainly better than none-- especially because I always forget how short February is.

I have the last few events for Rie plotted out; It's just a matter of filling them in. Things will hopefully be better for me this upcoming month so if all goes well, I'll have more to talk about next update.

Updates: 1. Rie Events 23 -> 37 (+47pgs, leading to 119pgs for her route) 2. Part of the Winter Comikat event is written out (Routes that involve things with Yoshiki and Rie) 3. 1-3 "Special" events with Chihiro are implemented; These are not for her main storyline and actually function more as fail-safes to make the game more realistic. (4pgs)

Plans for the month: 1. Finish or get close to finishing Rie's route 2. Work on Nana or Yuna's?

This month has been... A lot of writing! More than I expected!

Mainly I've been locked into Rie's route... I'm on the wind-down of it, leading me to work on her final events (~8 to add). From there... I'm not quite sure who's route I'll work on next, but probably work on fixing up and adding Nana or Yuna's route over to Obsidian. I may work on some stuff involving side characters too... Either way! A lot done, and hopefully even with a shorter month, I can make a lot of progress!

​Hello and Happy January and Happy New Year!!!

This is a bit of a special update as not only will I cover the update from last month, but I also want to do a general check-in of overall game development!!

First things first: The recent updates:

1.  I'm slowly moving over all my script work from Google Docs to Obsidian! It's mainly for organization purposes, and I've found Obsidian is exactly what I wanted ^-^ I am backing up things on GD still-- also because the one feature I wish Obsidian had was page count (and find/replace... Oh well, honestly, the organization is worth it) 2.  I've been adding events for characters! A lot for Rie and Yoshiki, but adding for Chihiro as well. Also, events have been further edited as I add in more. 3. Due to better organization and having what I need at the ready very easily now, I was able to map out time-based events better!

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The whole overview:

Now... Where does the project as a whole stand? Well, I tried my best to figure out how to quantify progress and figured the best way to do it would be by page count and event count simultaneously. Of course, as the 2nd part of the game stands, it's not an event-based situation and instead plays more linearly (in comparison), so that'll be solely page count. 

Kissy Kissy Purr Purr Deluxe Edition:

Main Routes -- These are supposed to be around ~40 events each (The game is 47 weeks, but I want a few weeks saved for failsafe purposes)

Chihiro: 48 pages / 14 events Rie: 72 pages / 22 events Yuna: 92 pages / 44 events* + ** Nana: 36 pages / 16 events * Yui: -- pages / -- events

Side-routes -- These are non-romanceable characters; there's no real set event count and are more based on what I feel is right. 

Jun: 8 pages / 10 events* Yoshiki: 11 pages / 7 events Emi: 3pages / 2 events* Yuuma: -- pages / -- events ZAKURO: -- pages / -- events

Bonus events -- They're usually involving "bonus" situations that stray from the main events. These involve Romanceable charas and/or side characters. Bonus Events: 5 pages / 2 events *= These events have not been fully transferred to Obsidian and edited

**= Part of Yuna's storyline is split into 2 parts at a point, this is the overall found

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Kissy Kissy Purr Purr:  234 pages

This was the first part written and the initial game before I went a bit insane with things. The script is all written out, but it still needs to go through checks and edits. This is kind of on the backburner for now.

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Now, onto the future!​

1. Finish transferring things to Obsidian 2. Work more on different routes? I don't know how I'll be jumping around with these...

I feel like I have a little to report, but it's still a decent amount of work done (33 pages of writing!!)! I've focused primarily on Nana's route and bonus mini-interactions with her. I’ve been working on both her core route and the “bonus” mini interactions. I’m doing the same approach I did to Yuna’s route, which is try and get the first few events established, do the “turning point” event, then work out of order. I’ve found with both Nana and Yuna’s events this has worked the best.

I also did a quick ref for Nana. This was both to establish a new outfit (sort of more of a 90s gyaru flair) and to test out drawing in a certain style.

Now, going ahead: October is always a busy month. It’s OC-tober, my girlfriend’s birthday is this month and… I might be working on a small game project on the side LOL. This isn’t anything super new– I tend to work on multiple projects at once because I find it works better for me to work on something, take a break with another project, then circle back. Even as far back as 18782, this has worked with doing outlines of other projects I’ve wanted to do. I have a mini halloween vn I wanted to do… So as long as I don’t go crazy, maybe that’ll manifest (if it takes too long, I’ll prob push it off for some other time lol).

So, aside from the aforementioned things I’m busy with this month, I’m going to try and keep on keeping on with what I have been working on with KKPP! Busy, busy~!

The main thing is still the script: Yuna’s route is officially done! The total page count is 92 pages, with about 10 written early this month! She has two main “branching” paths, so there’ll be a lot to explore there! Once I was done with her route, I started on Nana’s route! I’m still pretty early with it, clocking in on 19 pages and 9 events. 

Some minor work has been done on a side character route, Yoshi, but it’s only 2 pages as of right now. Similarly, I started planning out better events that’ll take place between characters if you have enough points with both of them. I’m working on some events with Nana and Chihiro right now, but I’ve only gotten the basics of the first few events down (planning for ~10 in all for each of these mini events).

Alongside scripting, I was thinking a lot about how the MC will look. I ran a poll on my site the last two months about what style of protagonist people prefer in visual novels (i.e, unseen, pre-made, customizeable). I originally was going to go with unseen, but I realized that’s not quite possible because I want certain event CG (like activities) to show possibly one of the girls and the MC. I think a minorly customizable protag might be best, so I did some minor sketching of what that could look like. I figured a happy middle lies where the character model you can choose from but their backstory and such is set (and you can build skills to your liking, which influences things in the game).

As for what’s planned this month… Mainly just focusing on Nana’s route! I doubt I’ll get all of it done, but I’m hoping I’ll knock out another ⅓ of it. I also really want to continue working on side routes and stuff. Perhaps I’m too far future pacing, but my goal right now is: 1. Finish Nana’s route 2. Finish Yui’s route 3. Go back and edit Chihiro and Rie’s routes with more to them 4. Make sure side chara and mini-events are finished 5. Go back over both versions of KKPP for editing. The final steps are a long way away… But I am looking forward to that, especially because at that point I feel as though I can provide better visuals! Ah, I’ll let that be my motivator…!!!

I don’t have a lot to report on due to ArtFight [and writing other things] taking up most of my time in July LOL.  I guess the take away is I should be happy that I got just a few pages done. I’m pretty close to finished with Yuna’s route in general; I have the last events mapped out, I more or less just need to fill them in. From there, the idea is to start on someone else’s route…!

I mentioned last month I’ve been organizing my plot beats in Twine and I’ve continued to do that! It’s really helped me see where I need more [vs a very… very long document]. 

Hello, hello~! Happy July! This month, I didn’t get as much done as last month. In part this is due to prep for AF, but this is also due to I was recovering part of this month from a minor surgery. 

What I did get done was a decent amount of writing! I wish I got more done, but either way, I’m happy with what’s written down now. I started 2 different side-chara routes; One is decently fleshed out (I’ll probably add some more here and there to round it out more), the other is just started. Yuna’s route has a lot more written down and her route has become a bit complex… Oops… However, I started organizing thumbnails of the plot beats in Twine and it’s really helped me a lot. At this point, I have nearly 30 solo events for Yuna, which is close to what I wanted for main routes (off by around 10, but I still have a bit more to write).

As for this month… It is Artfight!... Which means I’ll be devoting a lot of time to that (oops…). I’ll still try and get things out, but like with OC-tober, I know it’s one of my more busier months in terms of how I spend my free-time. I don’t expect a lot to get done… Which means if I get a little done, I’ll be happy, but if I surprise myself and write a lot, I’ll be ecstatic!

I said up top I re-did Rie’s route… And I did…! But as my girlfriend often remarks, I am Sisyphus and making things more convoluted is the boulder I continually push up. However, this is not to say all the progress up till this point is for nothing– in fact, a lot of good work was done!

However, a lot of this is also affected by me extending the length of the game… (Good thing KKPPDE is now the ‘main’ part huh-). More or less, I’ve been playing a lot of Tokimeki Memorial Girl's Side 1 and it’s influenced me a lot (even more than the original in some ways– both with gameplay elements I really like and gameplay elements that really annoy me; That’s a whole other discussion though). 

I decided the initial 4-month span the game takes place over is… Painfully short, especially for romance. It made the pacing really awkward and I don’t really like it. So, instead, I decided to extend it to around 11 months. This makes it not feel as weird pacing wise… But it also requires more writing. So, while now I’m putting Rie and Chihiro’s route on the backburner, I will circle back to them at some point before doing a full over edit (I’ll probably finish Yuna, Nana, Yui’s and the non-romanceable character’s routes first)

Working on Yuna’s route is a whole thing of itself… I’m actually kind of working on it backwards– Writing the more ‘meatier’ part of the story first to figure out what I need to properly set up these later scenes. That’s actually been pretty helpful in this! I still have some bullet points to hit, but I’m also just seeing how many scenes I can make while making this natural as well.

Another big thing is adding in some non-romanceable characters. My girlfriend really helped ground me and realize what I needed to round out this world and she made a good point: the world felt kind of empty with the only characters you encounter being romanceable characters. So, to help make it feel fuller, I added 4 mini-routes! The classmate [Yoshi], the salary man [Jin], the kid [Emi], the older lady [Yuuma]. [Names/Designs tentative] I don't plan on them being as in depth as the romanceable options, but I still want them to have a decent enough route each.

Also, I organized my thoughts really well in yet another new doc for myself..! However, it was mainly a doc about things such as ideas, things between the two parts of the game [Deluxe and Chihiro’s story], and small gameplay mechanic notes for DX. 

To sum up this month, I did around 40 pages in the last 2 weeks… Which amounts to 17 different events (~2.3 pages per event). 

Lots to still do this month, but June is also Artfight prep month for me… So, busy, busy!

A lot of this month I was slacking off, I have to admit… But! I did finish re-doing Chihiro’s route and I am soooo much happier with how it feels! There’s still a lot that needs to be ironed out and tweaked, but that’s for future go-overs. Right now, the bones look really good and that’s what I want from this first draft!

Speaking of changes from the first draft, I thought this draft would end up being shorter than it due to the changes in the amount of events… Wrong! In fact, it’s 7 events shorter, but it’s actually 5 pages longer than the first draft. I think the space each event takes up is utilized a lot better in this version as well, so it feels like a better and more well-rounded story.

Now, for this month... Time to do it over again with Rie! Rie’s route, like Chihiro’s, was fully written out so it’s another rewrite. I’d say Chihiro’s rewrite probably took 2.5 weeks (taking out the time of slacking off)... So hopefully Rie’s will be done in a timely manner as well!

Not pertaining to rewrites per se, I’ve been thinking about the “play order” of the main two sections of the game: The more standard dating sim part [KKPP-DE for quick clarity sake] vs the “vn” part [KKPP]. Originally, I had planned to have players complete a route of KKPP first, and then be able to unlock KKPP-DE… But I think I’ll do it the reverse. This doesn’t really affect much right now, but since it’s been a new decision in the work, I figured I’d write it out.

Reading this, you might say ‘Didn’t you do all of that…?’ And I did…! I was working on Yuna’s route when in late March, I felt a bit of nervousness and a need to start over… So I did! I debated powering through and finishing the first draft of it, but I knew I would stress the whole time about it. 

I also decided to scale back my scope for KKPP-DE; I was aiming for KKPP-DE to be around ~24 main points per route, and decided that it would be better to scale it back to around 15. This may sound like a downgrade, but it’s all to make the story beats a lot tighter. I think this is the better way to go.

I also am re-working parts in terms of better thinking out how to go about dialogue options. I think it’s better to have dialogue options based on more or less “personality”-- a choice that’s flirty next to a choice that’s mellow, and have it be based on the girls’ individual preferences on which choice they’d prefer. I think this also adds more life to the routes and makes them more rounded. 

I had some personal things to take care of at the end of March which made progress go a little slower than I had hoped, but I’m ½ through re-doing Chihiro’s main route points! So, hopefully it won’t take that long to re-do her and Rie’s, and then I can sail on to doing Yuna, Nana and Yui’s.

Another month focused on more writing! I decided based on Chihiro’s route I’m aiming for 24 ‘main’ plot points to occur per route. Currently, Rie’s count is 20, but on track to be 24. Of course, this is just a ‘for now’ number, as the first draft will get moved around a lot between now and the final. Also, this number of 24 doesn’t include other events that’ll happen based on other conditions. 

I did think about playing around more with the UI of the game this month, but didn’t get to it. In a way, I’m worried about leaving code behind that’s placeholder, but in the same note, I really want to code… So… Oops… I’ll see if I get to that; I’m not putting it in the to-do because it’s not set in stone I want to embark on that.

After Rie’s route, I’ll embark on Yuna’s; My hope is to finish Rie’s, finish Yuna’s and maybe start Nana’s? I’m not quite sure how it’s all going to shake out yet, but that’s the goal!