A little, casual update about the process with Cupid's Bargain! (I'm, like, very bad at using social media consistently, so… let's see if this devlog will ever reach #2, lmao.) If you are not aware, Cupid's Bargain is a satirical, horror romcom starring a teenage matchmaker who summons two devilish deities to understand love and revitalize her high school business — all in a Catholic school, no less! 

It was released last year for Otome Jam 2025, and I've w/ my team been working on it since then! It's been my longest project both word-count wise and production-length, which has been a crazy fun experience.

We had some bumps on the road, but all is turning out so incredibly well that I'm so stoked to show you what we have! Here's breakdown of our progress:

Writing — I still need to polish a bunch of stuff, but it looks like this game is gonna be up to around 140k words! Which is so much, my gosh. I don't know how people do it. Editing is my frenemy because, as we all know, typos are a bane of my existence.

Programming — I've programmed most of the GUI already and re-coded a couple scenes in the opening. I'm waiting to get all my assets in before I start trucking along!

GUI — The GUI has been completely revamped as I started to not like the old one I made for the jam initially. I really like this one as it branches away from what Ren'py normally looks like, giving the game a fresh new paint.

Art — All the CGs actually have been finished, what. And let me tell you, they all look so good! Spritework is still working strong, getting all the expressions and poses down!

The goal, the ideal goal, is for an extended demo to come out for Otome/Josei Jam 2026! (Did you see that we were featured on its main page!? I still can't believe it!) This extended demo will cover the full route for one of the LIs. I'm already set on which of the boys, but I am curious as to which one are you most excited for: the "angelic" Ily or the "demonic" Eins?

I wanted to close this devlog off with dev's fun fact!  

Huh, wow. So, I managed to write up a 2nd devlog for this. Yay me! We are at the halfway mark of Otome/Josei Jam, so I thought it would be nice to share another update! Let's get right into it!

Writing — I recently hired an editor to tackle the mammoth of this game script! I know myself well enough that there's lots of typos in this script. And so, to save myself from embarrassment catching them post-release, I hired an amazing editor to crack it down (plus to reduce my wordiness). Yahoo!

Art — So, in the last devlog, I wrote how we really on have the sprites and tarot cards left so here's the breakdown for those two compartments:

Sprite Art — When I tell you how beautiful these sprites are, I don't have enough words. They're so expressive and capture the cast so well! The artist is still working hard to finish them up, but I've been using even the lineart versions as placeholders and it's such a great feeling seeing it come all together.

Tarot Cards — All the cards have been finished! Now, this isn't gonna be the Major Arcana (as that would be a lot for this game). But I did decide 6 out of 22, and here's a sneak peek of some of these gorgeous cards rendered by the talented artists we got on board.

Programming — So! With these assets coming in, I've been plugging them away in the game. It's been a fun (and tiring) experience as…Ren'py does hate me from time to time. And, it doesn't help that I've been trying to animate more, add more effects and sprite movements, this time around. Like with Wake Up Magical Girl, I gave myself the excuse with Hope being in a cramped room. But… I can't excuse myself here, lol.

I've been abusing this tool called Focus Bars to give certain scenes a more cinematic look, and I've been loving the look and feel of it!

I wrote last time that the hope is for an extended demo to come out by the end of the month. That is still what I'm pushing for, but — considering time constraints and irl stuff — it could be wishful thinking to think a full route will come out. I'm thinking maybeeeee partial. Lots of yandere VNs do have day-to-day partial releases, but I don't know if it would work in my case with how the game is structured. So, we'll see how this will play out.

Regardless, an update will come out! How long depends on if this month will bless us — I mean, a Pride miracle is bound to happen, right? Haha. Fingers-crossed!

Fun Fact #2 — Arielle is, in fact, the same Ari from The Things You Do For Love. She is rather more feminine-presenting here as they haven't given too much thought to their gender identity. That being said, they are a nonbinary girl here (she/they) whereas they are genderfluid in TTYDFL. Writing her outside of her POV has been a fun challenge as I realized she thinks way more than she speaks aloud, huh. She is still the same romance fanatic with their...rather yandere tendencies may be appearing in spades.

Haha, I didn't totally forget to share an update here. (Apologies…) But, I'm happy to announce the extended demo of Cupid's Bargain has been released for this year's Otome Jam! Unfortunately, I did end up not having demonic Eins's full route in this build, but we got around 20k words into his route giving you taste of dealing with a very curious demon who may or may not be a virgin!

The new update features the following:

A completely re-coded and re-edited Common Route, hopefully fixing every bug and typo known to man but who knows. It's very cinematic, though, I'll say

20k words into Eins's route, exploring a third of epic highs and lows of high school romance with a devilish companion by your side

The new and improved Consultation Round, so much blood and sweat went in to make this work, lol

Spanking brand-new and fabulous sprites thanks to our new sprite artist, ItssaMeMari. Just take a look at how expressive they are!

A new CG of Eins and Eros/MC that is just so adorable

Stunning, new tarot cards that can be seen during the Consultation Rounds. Take the gamble if you dare!

New GUI on the front end and the back end as I wanted to change things up for better cohesion

Accessibility options now available: toggle Sound Captions, change typeface (Gabarito, Lexend, and OpenDyslexic), and change font size

So, there's plenty for you to enjoy as the team and I take a well-earned break before we tackle the rest of this project. Besides coding, there's only have a couple of sprites left to go, certain young men for the brothers' school no less. You actually get a sneak peek of him in this demo!

you'll soon learn that i love making series/continuations of things i've made down the line. i have a lot of stories in mind for this series (even thinking of spinoffs, yea hahahaha) as i do every other series (hello counsel and wake up magical girl).

(that being said, some things will be either retconned lmao or required big brain thinking for it make senses in a continuity since i ironically hate planning things...)

BUT this game has it all! catholicism (questionably portrayed), classical myth (also questionably portrayed), demonic summoning, yandere LIs (bc ofc), a girlfailure MC, my stupid sense of humor, a returning character from the previous game, and more!