Ramping up for the demo

Hi! First, let me take this opportunity to wish a Merry Christmas to everyone who celebrated it yesterday! Now, without further ado, to the list of changes.

Intro sequence

A small introductory text has been added to the game, shown at the first launch. When the game gets closer to the final stage, I'd like to replace it with a full-fledged opening video, but for now it's enough to give the new player at least an initial idea of what's going on here.

Encounter revamp: stuck in wall

The heavily reworked encounter with the girl stuck in the wall is back in the game. It's no longer just a tiny room, but a real maze! I'm still missing a couple of tiles, but most of them are there now, and the map looks much better with them:

The labyrinth is quite large, and without seeing the whole picture it would be easy to get lost in it. Luckily, near the entrance you'll find a Guiding Thread: an item that will show you the way out. If, however, you'll take your time and explore further afield, you might find a small reward there (but this isn't certain).

The most important reward, though, awaits you at the exit of the labyrinth. The Minotaur isn't what it used to be, but I'd say that's for the best!

Encounter revamp: The Succubus

The tiles in the Succubus' castle have also been updated, and the castle itself has been slightly expanded. In addition, the location will now always look the same, regardless of the level of relationship with the Succubus (might sound like a feature-cut, but I think it wasn't that important; cutting it now will save me a lot of time in the future). Work on the encounter is ongoing - in future updates the Mirrors of Knowledge will be redesigned (but it's still a long way off).

Help with controls

The "?" button, which has been doing nothing for a long time, is finally functional! You can click on it to get a short help on the actions available in the game. I didn't add lengthy descriptions to each action, just a list of them, so feel free to experiment!

Miscellaneous

• Work on the storytelling engine continues - small optimisations have been made and a new type of transition has been added.
• Work on updating the tiles continues: all of the current items and effects tiles have been updated. Also, the appearance of the equipped item now depends on the character's gender (i.e. if the hero is turned into a girl, the leather waistcoat will look different on them). Also, water and adjacent area tiles were updated. Also, all actors (hero and monsters), as well as trees, now have shadows.
• All active buttons and links now have a sound on hovering; also, the sound on clicking has been updated.
• The cursor will be hidden if the player has not moved the mouse for 10 seconds, so that it won't distract you while you're not using it.
• The "(A)ctivate" action has been removed: now, to activate an interactive object, you should simply "walk towards it"; in addition, all objects that can be interacted with are now highlighted with special particles.
• The images on the game's end screen have been updated.

In conclusion

First of all, this update changed a lot of things inside the game; so, if you're one of the few who've played it before, I'd recommend that you clear the storage. Here's how to do it:

1. Run the game.
2. Press F12 to open devtools.
3. Click ">>"to open the list of tabs, then select "Application".
4. Select "Storage", then something like "https://v6p9d9t4.ssl.hwcdn.net" (I suspect that hash might change), then click "🛇" (Clear all).
5. Done, now you can refresh the page and start the game.

From now on, I recommend doing this after every update - it won't always be necessary, just in case. Sorry for the complexity - maybe someday I'll add a tool that allows you to do this in one click right from within the game. And yes, it will erase your progress. Sorry again. Such are the costs of development.

Now for the more pleasant news: the next update should be the first public demo. I'll finish some fine-tuning, and finally start showing this game to a wider audience. I'm not sure I can make it in a month, though - so the next devlog may take longer - a month and a half or even two months. But I assure you I won't slack off all that time - I'll work hard to not lose face.

Thank you, and I'll see you later.