Hope you all had a happy New Year! Hope you were able to get some good rest and spend some time with loved ones!
Anyways, I wanted to talk a bit about the progress I made this year, as well as briefly go over the last couple of months and how I'm going o be moving forward.
Also this is a lot of text to read so tl;dr My lack of confidence has been the main reason for so many of my projects stalling, and I'm going to work on getting over that problem so I can be more consistent. I'm also going to bring back polls for doodle pages and start uploading source files again.
November + December report
November and December were interesting months. I was disappointed that I wasn't able to finish as much as I wanted to in October, and unfortunately that put me on the back foot when it came to November and subsequently December as well. I had planned to finish both Booette and Lustful Nun and get those voiced ( as well as 2 other smaller animations), that way I'd have more experience on adding sound to videos for both Pyra and Mythra's NNN. But I ended up having less time that I thought I would and that ended up kneecapping my plans. Finishing Mythra's NNN by November was always kind of a long shot, but at the very least I wanted to get the other animations done and that way I could just focus on Mythra. But when I realized Mythra still needed too much work, I figured I'd switch gears and focus on getting Pyra's NNN voiced and sent out. I thought it would be great to throw in a small bonus loop at the end, but as I usually do, I ended up making the loop a full scene. The main reason being I really liked the idea (clones animations are my favorite, but they always take a lot of time), and I also thought it would be a good fit for the other parts of the animation and would save me time in the long run. While I liked how the bonus scene turned out, it did end up pushing the release date for Pyra's NNN back into mid December and by the time I finished it I was heavily burned out. I think it came out okay, but there was a lot of complications and problems that arose from my inexperience. So it's kind of difficult for me to go back and look at it without thinking it could have been a lot better. I still have a lot of projects I need to work on, but I took the rest of December to think about my art and the direction I want to take it. I guess I'll lead that into the yearly report.
Yearly Report
I've been very grateful for all the support you all have given me this year. But I've been disappointed with the way my art has developed and my output. The main problem I think has just been a lack of confidence in my art and my projects. It makes it difficult to work consistently as some days my output drops to practically zero. So basically the problem is there would be somedays where I get a lot done, and others where I don't get much done at all. I think that duality caused a lot of burnout as I would try to get as much done as I could when I felt like I could work more, but then wouldn't be able to motivate myself during the following days. The lack of confidence also stemmed into my projects as a lot of the time I'd begin working on something, and then think it's either not a good enough idea or that I'm not good enough to execute it well enough. This lead to me jumping from project to project trying to make simpler and simpler things, just trying to make something that I could actually get finished. This lead to a whole bunch of projects laying on the cutting floor as I never committed to a single thing. It also made posting art a bit hard too as a lot of the time the work I did didn't feel like it was good enough to post. It's something that's frustrated me a lot this year and I know you all have felt frustrated from it too. I say all this not as an excuse, but mostly more to isolate the problem so I can start finding a solution to them, which I've spent the last couple of days trying to do.
I think one of the main things I'm going to do is go back to the fundamentals and build my hard skills as an artist. The main goals with this will be to isolate things to practice (lighting, muscles, poses, etc) , and also build up a style that I like and resonate with. As a pixel artist, I never really sketch much which I think is a big part of a getting enough mileage to be a confident artist and define my strengths and weaknesses. I think that's the main reason I don't really have a "style" of my own an tend to try and mimic the art/s style of other artists. Up till now I've always tried to apply everything I make into a project as either an asset or concept art. But ultimately I think that just led to more stagnation. So I'll be making more pin up art and off hand sketches in 2021.
Same thing goes for animation. I haven't actually been a pixel artist for all that long (3 years about now I think) and I've been an animator for even less. And ultimately I never properly applied myself to learning the fundamentals for each. I think that lead to my animations being very basic and simple. So like pixel sketching, I will also start doing smaller practice animations to try out new things and improve my fundamentals and knowledge. If everything goes well, I hope to make a 1 to 2 small basic practice animations each week. These will be made with a simpler pixel art style and color pallet that I'm also going to use for my pixel sketches. I completed one the other day and it went well, so I'll be posting it soon.
That leads into my game projects. I think these have suffered the most from my lack of confidence and feeling like I'm not good enough to complete a project. Renapet was the biggest project affected by this as both the scope and people's expectations of it grew more and more. Which lead to me shelving the project in order to try and make a bunch of smaller projects in order to build up the skills I thought I'd need. That's what originally inspired me to make smaller interactive animations like Neko Touch and Hilda's Reward, so that I could learn how to make games easier and more efficiently. But like with other animations and other things, projects started to move slower and slower as I lost faith in the work and thought it might be better to take a different direction or questioned if anyone would even want to see it completed. Palutena's game (Palace of the Goddess) suffered from this the most as after I put out the first demo for it I lost a lot of faith in the project and it became harder to work on. Then when it came to the Neko Touch update, a similar problem happened where I though it would be a quick project I could do to get some momentum, but my motivation dwindled more and more. And that led to a lot of slow down when it came to redoing the sprite artwork for things like the climax animations. I think that's why I always slow down when it comes to the climax animations, because my motivation dwindles during the more "tedious" work for these projects. So, similar to how I'm going to approach animations and pixel art, I'm going to start trying to spam small and basic game ideas and get them out there. They probably won't be anything special or will have basic gameplay, art, and design, but the important thing will be to increase my ability to take ideas to term and finish them. One of the main problems I've had with games is thinking that they always need to have all the bells and whistles before I release them like larger animations, CG scenes, etc. But I think that's lead to a lot of stagnation, so now I'm going to focus on just getting small ideas out without worrying about things too much. That way I can use them as stepping stones for my bigger projects. This won't mean I'm abandoning my current projects, but I want to shift my mentality into one that's focus on competing things, so I'll be working on things one thing at a time. Working on things until they are complete, and then sharing them with you all.
Projects review
I also wanted to quickly talk about the projects I've done this year.
Released Games:
Neko Touch: Technically this game was released on 2019, but I figured I could still talk about it now. Honestly I'm still a bit surprised it was received as well as it was, but I'm glad people enjoyed it. Looking back at it now, I was definitely too reliant on black lines for pixel art, and I think the DX sprites look much better already. The DX scene will be adding an oral scene which is turning out well. I draw Ankha as a character with not much emotion, so it's fun to add small bursts of emotion here and there. And I tried to add a few more moments like that in the DX version. The DX version of the game will be the next project to be completed so I'm hoping it won't take too much longer.
Hilda's Reward:
This was the first "Big" game (160 x 120 pixels) I made to see how long it would take me to make these interactive animation games. I ran into some issues with the original animation used for Hilda, as there was a pretty glaring anatomy problem. Another symptom of me not knowing my fundamentals well enough haha. So I ended up going with a more traditional missionary pose. I think it came out well overall. While it did have a bonus scene with Lopunny and a small comic as an intro (which I think I'll bring back in future games), it still had less scenes than Neko Touch. It makes sense since the game had a much bigger resolution, but I still wish I could have done more with it. Maybe I'll make a deluxe version of it eventually with some more scenes. Once I finish some other stuff first at least. I also did a lot of coding into the menus, making sure that you can control the menu with the keyboard and mouse. As well as making it so if you hover over an option with the mouse and then press an arrow on the keyboard, it would move based on what button was hovered over. It ended up being a huge mess though as I needed to have code for each individual button. So in the future I will probably just have something simpler even if the keyboard and mouse don't play off each other as well.
Released large Animations:
Pyra's No Nut November:
This one was quite the undertaking haha This started in November 2019. I remember I did the 1st part and got a lot of good reception, so I wanted to start the other parts right away. The entire anim set was started on just a whim honestly, that's why the first part was finished on the 15th haha I remember being really proud of getting parts 2 and 3 out before November ended. Part 3 especially was a challenge since I wanted to do a continuous loop that changed throughout the anim. It was all going well but woo boy part 4 was tough. It was the most complicated animation I had made up until then (and still is honestly) and obviously ended up being pushed way past the deadline until I finally got it finished... At the very end of January. After finishing it I was honestly super burned out since I had spent almost all of my free time working on it. I remember the week I finished it I had only slept for 15 hours total and I finished the Mythra part in 2 days. It was quite the hectic time and probably the main reason why I felt so burnt out for so long haha, but I still had a lot of work to do on other projects, and I wanted to add sound to Pyra's anim as well. Originally I wanted to add voice over and sound to another animation before I did Pyra so I could get some experience. At first it was going to be Booette, but that confidence issue flared up again and I thought it would be better to make a smaller animation and add sound to that first. Combined with the burnout, this lead to a lot of stagnation and failed projects. But as we worked through 2020, November started to crop up again and I really wanted to do a sequel anim set featuring Mythra and wanted to get the sound version of Pyra out before the month was over. I had planned to work on Mythra WAY ahead of time, but unfortunately things didn't go as planned. I didn't get the projects I wanted to get done in October, and I ended up trying to cram too much stuff into November and as a result. The Pyra parts were going well, but when I got to part 4 I ran into some trouble. Since this was the first actual sex scene I was editing the voice for, I kept running into small problems, mainly ones that stemmed from my bad direction that I gave to the VA PixieWillow. I think she did a great job overall, but I directed her to place more of an emphasis on the dialogue and I think I should have directed her to add more moans in between lines to fill the silence. I also think I could have edited better to give the dialogue more of a flow to it. Not to mention that I don't think I did a great job on the dialogue itself. Managing the SFX was also more of a hassle than it should have been, as I had to keep adjusting the length of sounds and where they were cut off to match with the animation. Doing all this was a lot of work, but I probably could have finished it on time with a bit of focus. But of course, I thought of an idea for a bonus scene and tried to cram it in at the last minute. I really wanted to do an anim with multiple Pyra's since I really like clones as a fetish, and using the main animation as a base would help me save a bit of time. But even then animating 4 other Pyra's was a lot more work than I was expecting, especially since the top Left Pyra (well, her ass at least) was animated frame by frame since I thought her just moving side to side was too boring. And then I thought it would be too jarring to just have the ending transition to the new fucking scene so I ended up making an intro that showed her getting a "fertility tattoo" which gave her succubus powers that allowed her to make clones of herself. I just kind of winged it on the magic part haha fun fact, the VA for the intro scene was actually made from left over takes since I was rushing and didn't have time to contact Pixie Willow again to do a new dub since I was already late on the project. Even then I think it still turned out pretty good. But like I mentioned before, all these small problems really stuck in my mind and made it really hard for me to actually sit down and watch this animation now. I can't help but feel like it could have been a lot better if I managed the project better. But oh well, all I can do is take those lessons into the next project. At the end of the day, I just have to remember that it's just another animation and it's a stepping stone for something better. My feelings aside, I hope you all enjoyed it regardless.
Unfinished/ Unreleased projects:
Renapet:
This is still the big one that needs the most work done. The biggest problem that I've been having is that confidence issue I mentioned earlier. When the project started to get attention, even though the demo was very lack luster and lacking content, I started to think the project wouldn't live up to expectations. So I figured at the time that it would be best to put the project on hold and make some smaller games so I would know what I'm doing. But I know that a lot of this is just in my head, and if I just wait till I'm "ready" I'll just never end up working on the damn thing. So from now I'm going to work on working on this consistently and tackling the problems I don't know the immediate solution to head on. If it sucks, I can always fix it later haha. The first thing I'm going to do is put the game in a spot where it's more clear what content is available and what isn't. Then I'll start working on the "Minimum viable product" for it, or in other words, the smallest demo I can make that still has the main game loop intact. Sorry that this project has taken so long to even get off the ground, I know a lot of you are looking forward to it, so I won't give up on it.
Mythra's NNN
This animation set has already had some hiccups along the way. Clearly I didn't hit the November deadline, but even if Pyra was completed on time, it was still bold of me to think I'd get the animations done. Especially since these animations are much longer in scope than the Pyra ones. Regardless, I think the story I'll be able to tell with them will be a fun one, and I'm eager to get the parts out one by one. I had to take a bit of a break after Pyra since I ended up burning myself out trying to get the bonus scene done on time. But I'm going to get back to working on these and hopefully the wait for them won't be too long. Hope you look forward to it!
Booette
Oof, this one has been in the back burner for too long. Thinking back to it now, this was actually the first animation movie I wanted to get completed, but it ended up getting shelved for Pyra's NNN. Originally it was just going to be a loop that I could finish in a day to get out for Halloween, but I kept having ideas for it, so I thought it'd be fun to expand it a bit. Regardless, it's been more than a year now since this animation was announced and that's defiantly too long . I wanted to get this done in October for 2020, but I ran into some problems during then month and then, like last year, it had to be put aside for Pyra's NNN and Mythra's NNN. The other problem with this animation is the fact that 've grown a lot as a pixel artist and animator since I started it, which lead to me making a lot of small changes to bring it to my current standards. I even ended up redoing part of the intro since I wanted the animation to be more expressive. The "Boos" specifically are really fun to animate since they are very simple designs, so I wanted to try and make them very expressive. I want to finish Neko Touch DX, the next Palace of the Goddess demo, and some Mythra parts , but in between those, I'll be working on this and will try to get it out as soon as I can.
Isabelle
Like Booette, this is another animation that's been in the back burner for too long. The main thing about this animation will it will have a lot of different backgrounds and more unique shots. When I was actively working on it more, I wanted to make things more dynamic and have a lot of different shots to give it a bit of flair. However, through a combination of burnout and other projects, this ended up getting shelved. I still really want to get it out the door though. Based on how things are going now, I'm hoping that I'll be able to get it wrapped up by the end of Spring/ early summer.
Fox Hole
This was the first "monthly" game I wanted to get done after you all voted on it. The game itself was going to be very simple, but there was going to be a lot of scenes and small intricacies about it that I thought would make it more engaging. At the same time though, those are the things that led the project to stagnating a bit and it suffered from not having a central core idea to it. There was going to be "stats" that you had to balance like hunger and happiness and a day system and day limit, which would lead to different ending depending on how you treated her in that time. But I still need to balance all that out and actually lay out how I want things to work. I still want to get it completed though and I have been working on it's scenes slightly here and there. I'll let you all know when I have something substantial to show for it.
Midnight Princess
The second game that was voted on that ended up getting put on the back burner as well. This one was going to be much simpler than Fox Hole and would be closer to Neko Touch on it's content. Basically all it was, was going to be 2-3 scenes with Midna with little "gameplay". But I've also been trying to add some more substantial gameplay to my games to make them more engaging, so I'm going to try and think of what I can add to make the experience a bit more complete. I'll let you all know when I have more news on the project.
Rouge game
Another voted on game that ended up getting set aside. This one is still in it's early phases and I'm still thinking of what exactly I can do with it. At first it was going to just be an interactive animation, but like I mentioned before, I want to start adding a bit more traditional gameplay into these projects. I was thinking it could be cool to maybe make it an action or stealth game since that would fit Rouge's character. I'm still thinking of what I can exactly do for it, but I'll let you all know when I decide on what to do.
Blake animation
Another animation that is still brewing in the pot. This was originally going to be a very simple animation featuring Blake from RWBY, but then I remembered that the character can make clones of herself with her semblance (super power). So I figured I couldn't pass up the chance to use that in the animation and as it often goes, I ended up making this small animation into a fuller featured movie. so now there will be Blake and 2 of her clones, who will each include their own scene with the other 2 watching/ being involved. So the animation is going to take a while, especially since I have other projects I need to prioritize at the moment, but I think it will be a fun and enjoyable animation when it's all wrapped up.
Lustful Nun
This was another animation I wanted to get done before Halloween as a simple movie that I could add sound and VO to as practice for Pyra's NNN, alongside Booette. Unfortunately like I mentioned earlier, things didn't end up working out and I didn't get this project done in time. At the same time though, the story of it was going to be very simple and I haven't been satisfied with stories like that as of late. So I wanted to add a some more interesting dialogue and other elements to to make the animation more memorable. The goal is to still keep things simple, but give a bit more flavor in the dialogue and animation in order to make things more interesting. It's low priority at the moment, since I still have a lot of games and animations I need to finish before hand, but I'm hoping it will be an animation you enjoy when it's finished.
Source files
Also, I'm sorry I haven't been posting the source files (aseprite files) to my work recently. That is a $10 tier perk, so I want to make sure I'm getting that to you all at the end of each month. I'll be making a sip file that has all the one's I've done recently. Also, if any $10 supporters want the source files of a specific piece, just send me a message and I'll get it to you.
Polls
I also want start doing polls again since that is a supporter incentive, but since I'm already behind on animations/ games, I've decided I'll do polls and then the winner will get a doodle page similar to the Mona or Dark Magician Girl pages. That way you all still get to see a specific character from me and I can get it to y'all relatively quickly without putting another project on my plate.
Conclusion
Anyways that's a grand overview of everything that I've been up to this year. Sorry it probably sounds a bit too doom and gloom, but I want to be honest with how I feel about my work so I can properly think of how I want to develop myself going forward. I'm still disappointed in my output this year, but I'm going to be putting in some new strategies for my work that should help get things out more consistently. Once again thank you all so much for your support and I will work hard to earn it. I look forward to working with you all and I hope you continue to enjoy my work.
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