Today’s post covers some script editing updates, CG teasers, and asks!

Script Editing Progress

Currently, the common route and Heath’s route are in their final proofreading pass, while Dovah’s working on the final edits for Randal and Markus’ routes.

r "The way tonight ends is up to us...so for all your clanmates' sakes, don't do anything stupid."
r "...Everyone got it?"
u "Yeah! Let's go!"
u "Get 'em! Come on, let's get 'em!"
u "Hell yeah! What are we waitin' for?"
"As the group quickly worked back into an eager, loud fervor, rustling with excitement to turn the hunters into prey--{w}Randal glanced down to me, his brow knitting slightly."
r "You ready for this, newbie?"
r "I was pretty sure you could handle it--I like to believe people are a lot stronger than they think they are."
"He murmured to me almost gently, peering into my eyes."

_Prelude to an intense scene..._

By the start of next week, the side conversations + epilogues will be in the works! The final stretch before programming is drawing to a close~

CG WIPs!

In case you forgot, MC has a lot of variations in each CG featuring them! Hair/skin/eye colors are just a few–you can see some skin variations here.

Colors are also being added to some of the other sketches. You’ll get to see some new ones soon!

Ask answers

More questions from our Ask Box for you this week! Feel free to send in your queries about anything RE:H or AG related.

Q: How do you all work on developing such good and nuanced characters and not making them cliche?

A: Although this question is worded so kindly you’d think the devs wrote it themselves, we didn’t. Promise.

[Dovah] I’ll definitely admit that a number of characters in our other titles have been based on tropes/cliches. It kept the stories comforting and familiar, and the characters were admittedly easier to write–entering their “head space” was very simple due to their foundational tropes.

However, the characters in RE:H have a complexity that’s impossible to compare to AG’s previous games. They are, in many ways, very close to real people. And I think that’s probably the biggest thing I’ve learned in regards to developing good characters. Even if you exaggerate personality traits to make them more striking, at the end of the day, a character will be much more fascinating if they mirror the infinitely complex motivations/fears that a real human has. Many times, your own thoughts, feelings, motivations, reactions, and interactions with others are a good reference.

Q: Any advice on how to layout/write scripts as well as plan stories far ahead to keep on top of things?

A: [Dovah] Spreadsheets! I never thought spreadsheets would be necessary for a VN with no “game-y” mechanics, but here I am, in front of a browser window that looks like this:

Outlines are very useful for the meat of what you’re writing, but they can also make it difficult to keep track of the intensity/flow/emotions of scenes since their content is presented linearly. That’s one reason I really like spreadsheets. Because the story in RE:H bounces between common route and mentor route scenes, I had to make sure it worked for all 3 routes. The general result was something like this:

It’s probably possible to do it a lot more neatly, but having all the scenes laid out in front of me in this simple, horizontal format really helped piece the narratives together. In some cases I filled in later scenes and worked my way back, based on my inspiration and what best fit into the overall structure.

Spreadsheets: a lot less scary than they seem!

[Gamma] Spreadsheets are the foundation of organization. Just be careful about how you split things up.