Friday, November 18, 2011

Update on the work in progress



As you are probably aware Chronotrig has recently
announced that the final patch of EP8 will be
relesead somewhere between early and late December
of this year. The release of the final version
of Witches & Woodlands will come shortly
after that. If all goes well it will be between
late December and early January.

The main bulk of the changes and new contents that I
had planned for this final release is basically done.
All the new portraits are finished with the exception
of Fighter Battler who needs a few adjustments.
Etrien is currenly working on it and should be able
to provide the material in a few days.

So I guess it's time to make a list of what has changed, and
what was added, so you can have an idea of what to expect.
I couldn't do this before because I wasn't really sure of how many
of the things I wanted to make could actually be done.

CHANGES
-The three parts of Witches & Woodlands are merged in a
single continuous story now renamed "Witches & Woodlands 3.5"
-Several new portraits have been introduced and replaced existing
ones in the fantasy side and "real" side.
-Right-click menu enhanced providing detailed informations about
the fantasy characters and a few of the "real world" characters.
The menu will update frequently in response to changes inside
the story.
-All dialogues are now enclosed in quotations marks.
-Several adjustments in the script and dialogues are made in
order to: improve clarity about the game rules, adapt to the new
continuous format and new portraits, improve consistency with
in game mechanics and characters' stats.


NEW CONTENTS
-"Ura Tea Party" unlockable after completion of the main story,
(already published on youtube)
-"Tea Party" unlockable after completion of the "Ura Tea Party"
(yes I inverted them). This will be a very short scene where the
characters discuss about the game they have played a few minutes after
its ending. Several matters that have remained unresolved
will be explained.
-TWO "surprises" will be unlocked after completion of the "Tea Party".
I can't tell what they are about because... they are supposed
to be a surprise! Two of them!
-A third minor surprise will be accessible from the two "surprises".
That will be basically a simplified music box linking to almost
all the musics of Umineko (excluding the boring ones).
It will also include the missing musics from EP4 provided
paths are set correctly.


All the new contents are already scripted/programmed.
What's left to do are adjustments in the main story and
the right click menu (which is however at a good point).
Proof reading pending, as it'll have to wait for the EP8 patch first.
You can take a sneak peek from the few images below (click to enlarge).
Stay Tuned!