Methods: The Canada Files News

Hello everyone! After lots of hard work by the translators, File 02 is finally fully translated! I'm happy to announce that File 02 will be releasing within 10 days! Dive into a brand new mystery, as well as many improvements to the game!

Please note that the price will be increasing after File 02's release — but to thank all the players who have Wishlisted and supported the game, you will be able to get File 02 at the current price before Oct 6th!

I know it's been a long time coming, so thank you for your patience! I think this file is even better than File 01, and I'm glad you get to finally play it!

Until next time,

— LockedOn

The Canada Files translation continues!



Guess it was too soon to say goodbye to the graph... whoops! Anyway. To simplify the graph a bit, from now on I'm counting "Designs" and "Sprites" as just... "Sprites". Since designing the sprites is essentially working on sprites. Not sure why I counted them separately.

The translators have been working hard on File 02 and estimate having a playable build of the Chinese version by the end of the week. Of course I'll still need to create custom renders and graphics, but it will likely be released into Early Access before the end of the month.

But I'm not sitting on my hands — I've been busy working on Hangout Two so that it can be released soon after File 02. It will come with its own Outfit set that I'm very excited about. And I will be going right into writing File 03 after that!

File 03 is what I would call a "key turning point" of the story. In order to break a pattern, you need to establish one.

That's all I'll say about it for now.

Until next time!

— LockedOn.

With the beta now available for a week, now the progress graph looks like this!



I won't be needing this progress graph anymore soon... :') Say goodbye to the File 02 progress graph everybody. :')

With the feedback from the beta implemented, we have begun the translation process and will be launching File 02 when translation is completed. While I'm waiting for the translation to finish, I've begun writing Hangout Two.

I've been trying to think of ways to make the other four files' development go a bit faster. My new plan is to do the hardest tasks simultaneously— So I will be writing and creating the backgrounds for Files 03 & 04, and Files 05 & 06 at the same time. This means when I release File 03, File 04 will already have been written and the backgrounds will be ready to go. And then the same for Files 05 & 06. I'm not sure how this will turn out, but one advantage is that I do think coming up with the mysteries for the next four files will be easier than it was for File 02. I will explain more about the challenges I faced with File 02 in future behind-the-scenes content!

Until next time!

— LockedOn

https://store.steampowered.com/app/2063530/Methods_The_Canada_Files/

View the backlog of devlogs here on my website!

Support the game's development on Patreon!

File 02: Montréal's beta launches next Tuesday.



You may be a little surprised because in my last devlog I said that I'd just completed Chapter 7 — after many months of production. Now only eleven days later, the final three chapters are completely finished and beta is set for next Tuesday. So what happened??

Basically, a bit after I began working on File 01, I got a part time job. This is a necessity at the moment — I do not make enough from just game dev to completely cover my monthly expenses. Though it's only part time, I find that it kind of exhausts me, and my productivity levels have definitely been affected. But I've gotten a break for the past two weeks, so I thought I'd make every second count, and spent every waking moment working on File 02 trying to finish it before my break ended — and I managed to do it!


What really kicked it off was trying to create simple, rough versions of all seven remaining backgrounds in just one day. Turns out all I needed was to get the ball rolling, and I basically finished them in only three days. It took a day to complete the remaining sprites. Another to complete the music. The next six days were just implementing code and the minigames.

Even though I worked harder than I've ever worked, staying up way past midnight every day working on it, I was having fun. Something I would like to say about crunch before the File is released is that when you are "crunching" on a personal project, with your characters, your story, about what you are passionate about, and nobody forcing you to do it — I find that a euphoric and exhilarating experience. Every day I felt productive and full of energy, as I could see how fast I was making progress compared to these past few months. "Crunching" on a project for some company that's forcing you to do it is a completely different experience — a horrible one that I wouldn't wish on anybody.

Hopefully File 02 will be ready to launch in early access next month. But if you are impatient, the public beta launches on the 22nd for Patreon and Afdian members. If you are planning to get the game, now is a good time because the price will increase with File 02's release.

With that, I leave you with this sneak peek of File 02. ;)



Until next time!

— LockedOn.

https://store.steampowered.com/app/2063530/Methods_The_Canada_Files/

View the backlog of devlogs here on my website!

Support the game's development on Patreon!

Latest Montréal progress...!



I'm pleased to say Chapter 7 is now complete. It was definitely more complicated than I thought. Now that I've completed the music tracks for the chapter, I think it really came together well. Now I can focus on the three remaining chapters — which are less complicated, but still require a lot of backgrounds. I'll be devoting my time this week to completing those backgrounds.

The Outfits feature has now been completed — File 02 will be launching with one alternative outfit set for Hangout 01 (the Casual set), and an additional outfit set will be released with File 02's Hangout.

I also spent a few days finally adding achievements to my other games on Steam — I was prevented from doing so for a while due to some glitch with Ren'Py which has now been resolved. Achievements will also be coming to Canada Files with File 02's release!

Until next time!

— LockedOn.

https://store.steampowered.com/app/2063530/Methods_The_Canada_Files/

View the backlog of devlogs here on my website!

Support the game's development on Patreon!