A Shot in the Dark News

This dev log was originally posted on Patreon and SubscribeStar on May 3, 2024.

Chapter 4 has now officially been released on all platforms, including Steam and Itch! The official release went smoothly and we are now working on getting Chapter 4 translated on Crowdin so that we can finally release some translated builds of the game!

If you are interested in helping improve translations for any of the following languages, check out our Crowdin page and reach out via the #translation-help channel on our Discord server!


As mentioned in previous dev logs, Chapter 5 has been in development for a while now. We've also mentioned before that we are going to be doing something totally new and different with Chapter 5 that we can't wait to tell you about!

We're excited to announce that Chapter 5 will have a 1920s themed Murder Mystery Game within it featuring all of your favorite A Shot in the Dark characters (a mini visual novel within a visual novel, if you will!). This has been an idea we've had since the very beginning, and originally the plan was to include it in Chapter 3, but as the story progressed we ultimately decided it made more sense in Chapter 5.

The story for the 1920s Murder Mystery Game is already set, and about a third of the content is written already. We also have created all of the backgrounds for the various locations in the mini game, as well as hair and outfit options for all the love interests who will be participating so that players can vote on their favorites on Patreon and SubscribeStar (which we will start doing next week!).

Chapter 5 will have regular scenes that advance the story and lewd scenes with 8 out of the 10 love interests, so don't worry. This is not a gimmicky chapter that will take away from "real" development time or progression with your favorite characters. :) This game-within-a-game was always planned to tie in with the actual story of the main game.

Without further ado, here are previews of the locations for the 1920s Murder Mystery Game coming in Chapter 5!

Official Public Release for players who own the game on Steam and Itch is here! This final version of Chapter 4 includes achievements for players on all platforms, not just Steam.

WARNING!!! SAVES WILL BE BROKEN THIS UPDATE! Opening old saves will introduce bugs. Please plan to start a new game or use the Entry Points feature to avoid opening old saves. To be safe, please consider deleting your old saves.

We know broken saves are a huge inconvenience for players, but unfortunately we made too many changes to the foundation of the codebase for it to be avoided.

[h2]Verify Integrity of Game Files[/h2]
If you run into issues with downloading or accessing the Chapter 4 update, please try the "Verify integrity of game files" option in the Steam settings, in the Installed Files tab.



If you encounter any bugs or issues with the game, please reach out to us directly so we can help you! You can post in our Discussion forum here on Steam, reach out to us on our Discord server, or contact our support email [email protected]. If you report problems in a review, we may not see the report immediately.


With this update we are adding: 16 scenes (9 lewd), ~55K+ words, 2,226 renders, 97 animations, 28 songs, and 21 sfx.

[h2]Ren'Py upgrade and code optimization[/h2]
This update we upgraded from Ren'Py 7.4.11 to Ren'Py 8+ which allows us to take advantage of the newer optimization features Ren'Py has to offer! We also took this opportunity to refactor our code to integrate well with Crowdin and help automate the translation process.

[h2]New Achievements feature added[/h2]
We've now added Achievements (which were previously only available via the Steam platform) to the game itself so that players on all platforms can access them! All players will get notifications when achievements are completed and can check in-game to see which achievements they have completed or not. If you have the Walkthrough features purchased and enabled, you can also get hints for the achievements in-game.

[h2]Unlock All Memories feature added[/h2]
We added the ability to Unlock All Memories with a toggle in the settings. We already had the feature that allows you Reset All Memories. These are quality of life features to help players who get stuck in bugged states, are playing on multiple platforms/devices that can't share saves, etc. Both can be found in the Options menu in the More tab.

[h2]Brand new GUI throughout entire game[/h2]
Thank you to m. of Tsundere Studio for the complete GUI overhaul! We couldn't be happier with how it all turned out. Be sure to add their game to your Steam wish list:
https://store.steampowered.com/app/1703610/I_Just_Want_to_be_Single/


Development of Chapter 5 is currently in progress and planned to release later in 2024! The base price of A Shot in the Dark may increase with the Chapter 5 update, but we will give the community advance notice about any prices changes.

As a reminder, we also have NO plans to split the game into Books or Seasons. When you purchase A Shot in the Dark, you will have access to all future updates until the game is complete (we have approx. 5 more updates planned). The same is true for the Walkthrough & Guide DLC.

[h2]Translations coming soon[/h2]
Currently only the English version of the game is available for purchase. Translations to the following languages are in progress: Chinese (Simplified), French, Italian, Polish, Portuguese, Russian, Spanish, and Turkish. We plan to release the translated versions to Steam in the next few months!

[h2]Want to help with the translation process?[/h2]
You can find more information in this post. Volunteers who help translate the game can request a Steam key. We have additional incentives for volunteers who make significant contributions to the translations.


We appreciate all of our fans and players! If you enjoyed the game, please consider leaving a review.

We hope you enjoy playing Chapter 4 of A Shot in the Dark as much as we've enjoyed making it. :)

The BETA/Early Release schedule for Patreon and SubscribeStar is now available on those platforms.

Official Public Release for players who own the game on Steam and Itch will happen in mid to late April, once we have had time to add Steam achievements and do further testing once those are added.

WARNING!!! SAVES WILL BE BROKEN THIS UPDATE! Opening old saves will introduce bugs. Please plan to start a new game or use the Entry Points feature to avoid opening old saves. To be safe, please consider deleting your old save files: https://savelocation.net/renpy


We know broken saves are a huge inconvenience for players, but unfortunately we made too many changes to the foundation of the codebase for it to be avoided.


With this update we are adding:

• 16 scenes, 9 lewd
  
• ~55K+ words
  
• 2,226 renders
  
• 97 animations
  
• 28 songs, 21 sfx

[h2]Ren'Py upgrade and code optimization[/h2]
This update we upgraded from Ren'Py 7.4.11 to Ren'Py 8+ which allows us to take advantage of the newer optimization features Ren'Py has to offer! We also took this opportunity to refactor our code to integrate well with Crowdin and help automate the translation process.

[h2]New Achievements feature added[/h2]
We've now added Achievements (which were previously only available via the Steam platform) to the game itself so that players on all platforms can access them! All players will get notifications when achievements are completed and can check in-game to see which achievements they have completed or not. If you have the Walkthrough features purchased and enabled, you can also get hints for the achievements in-game.


[h2]Unlock All Memories feature added[/h2]
We added the ability to Unlock All Memories with a toggle in the settings. We already had the feature that allows you Reset All Memories. These are quality of life features to help players who get stuck in bugged states, are playing on multiple platforms/devices that can't share saves, etc. Both can be found in the Options menu in the More tab.


[h2]Brand new GUI throughout entire game[/h2]
Thank you to m. of Tsundere Studio for the complete GUI overhaul! We couldn't be happier with how it all turned out. Be sure to add their game to your Steam wish list:

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1703610/I_Just_Want_to_be_Single/

This dev log was originally posted on Patreon and SubscribeStar on March 8, 2024.


[h2]The end of the development cycle is near![/h2]
All of the animations for Chapter 4 are posed and now we just have to wait for the remaining ones to finish rendering. Let's kick this celebratory dev log off with some animation previews from the ones that have already rendered:


The last two scenes of Chapter 4 are in the process of being implemented into the code. We still have a lot of little polishing tasks and basic testing before we can hand things off to our testers, but the bulk of the coding is done.

This update was by far our most efficient in terms of coding implementation, and we have been happy with how quickly and smoothly that part has gone. Not only have we learned quite a bit from previous updates on how to "touch things once" and not duplicate work (which is harder than it sounds with a game as complex as this), we also have someone helping with coding who has been able to automate some of the more tedious aspects of the code implementation.

Right now, we plan to do everything in our power to release the Chapter 4 BETA on Patreon and SubscribeStar during the last week of March. It will take a few weeks to prepare the final version for Steam release (we have to do further testing, add Steam achievements, etc) so that is tentatively planned for mid-April.

We know this development cycle has been a long one and we appreciate your patience with us as we navigated a lot of challenges and competing priorities during the second half of last year. With most of that out of the way, we have been happy with how things have gone so far in 2024 and we are feeling good about things going into Chapter 5.

Speaking of Chapter 5, we have also been doing the early work of planning and setting up a new chapter. As mentioned before, the plan has always been to do something really different with Chapter 5. We won't say more right now, you'll have to wait until after we release Chapter 4 to find out what that means exactly. So, stay tuned!

This dev log was originally posted on Patreon and SubscribeStar on February 24, 2024.

All writing and renders for Chapter 4 are now complete! As we've mentioned in previous dev logs, we won't know the actual dialogue word count until we prep the chapter for translation, but our estimate is around 55K words. The final render count is 2,240.

Our original plan had been to work on translated/localized builds during the Chapter 4 update cycle and then to update the GUI with the Chapter 5 cycle. However, the GUI update was completed faster than we anticipated and those changes had to be integrated into the code while they were still relatively "fresh" (and therefore also improved and tested during this update cycle). That is why we switched priorities to updating the GUI with the Chapter 4 update and we will be working on released translated versions once we are working on Chapter 5.

TheOmega is plugging along nicely with coding and animations for Chapter 4. Now that renders and writing are complete, Josselyn can get started on polishing and adding music to the scenes. We hate to give estimates when things can change unexpectedly at any time, but our current goal is to release the BETA version of the update on Patreon and SubscribeStar before the end of March. That would make the Steam and Itch release likely to happen in early April. As always, we will give more specific dates as we get closer!

Josselyn is also working on the early stages of writing for Chapter 5. The format of Chapter 5 is going to be different than any other chapter/update. It's something we've been planning for a long time so we are excited to finally be working on it. We'll release more details about what Chapter 5 will look like after the Chapter 4 release!

Since there are no lewd scenes left to preview, here are more story scene previews: