Maids & Masters (& A Post About v0.15.2, Finally)

I'm a smidge behind schedule thanks to the inordinately busy last couple of weeks, but development on v0.15.2 is actually in full swing. There's a whole 20 affection quests to put together along with a good number of other things I want to try and fit into this update, so while this isn't a story update, it's probably going to be one of the biggest updates I've put out. It's basically both the first and second Freeze updates put together, plus extras.

As of right now, 5 of those affection quests are done, and roughly half of the background infrastructure around the affection quests as a whole is done. With as busy as the new client work as been keeping me, that pace is probably going to more or less hold steady. That means v0.15.2 is probably going to be ready at the end of the month. Not to say that v0.15.2 may not be ready in time for a July release. v0.15.2 will  release on the 26th at the latest, but some of those extras may not be present despite some of them being more than a little overdue to be put into the game (and the update may be a little light on playtesting, which is a little more important for some of this because it uses existing infrastructure in a number of places for the affection quests to function).

 

What I would like to do is get both v0.15.2 plus Precious Kouhai v0.3 out this month to make up for last month's only release being the Dawnfall demo, but with where I am mentally and creatively, I really want to knuckle down and try to get MnM story-complete shortly after the start of 2025. Reaching that goal isn't impossible; once v0.15.2 goes out, if I stay focused on story-centric updates and ignore additional side content (while still leaving room for a Haunt and Freeze update for October and December), there's roughly 7 major updates left; two more for Act 2, two for the holidays, and three for Act 3. Of course, that would result in pretty large updates, and keeping up with monthly releases for updates that big would be difficult at best. It's more likely that Act 2 will have 3 more updates and Act 3 will be closer to 5 updates, but this is all generalized speculation for the future anyway.

For now, I'll have a test build go out to VIP Patrons on Patreon each Friday until v0.15.2 is ready for proper release. I'll also be trying something new to accompany these test builds for the rest of my Patrons, sharing a preview of the content in the test build and giving a short summary of what the test build contains, instead of just posting the test build for VIPs like I've largely done in the past. After that, it's on to v0.16 and the second half of Act 2.