VoidBound News

Progress Report #84: September 2023

The final batch of the new art should be ready by the next post, so stay tuned :)

Meanwhile our writers came up with new faces. Specifically, building the character of Mr. Sykes, one of the characters/targets who will face off against Caly if she chooses to walk the path of the hunter. Details are still a bit light but hopefully the character will mature out fast as the story picks up the pace.

Additionally, they are also reviewing and analyzing the maps of Henosis. The scale of the space station is impressive but sometimes empty. We want to make sure that some of the bounty-hunting content will take players to parts of Henosis they may have overlooked previously. Explorers, dawn your hats!

Finally, draft for the first bounty hunt for Caly is being expanded upon. Priority is to build a mentor/handler character, an ex-bounty hunter, who will help Caly find the targets to fill up her wallet and not fall into obvious traps and get caught. Though whether or not if Caly will follow his tutelage, will entirely depends on the player *wink wink*

Our resident coder was nose deep this week working multiple game systems simultaneously. The Randomized Battlefield system, we're told, has been developed further. With the idea of each battle being unique to the region it is fought in, the aim is to make the backdrop match the zone, as well as its foes to enhance player immersion.

Not only that, but the Bestiary system got some much-awaited updates as well. Finishing the Quest Log might be our highest priority currently but we still wanted to let you know that we haven’t forgotten about the secondary core systems and are making progress on multiple fronts.

Finally, after the recent OS compatibility revisions, we decided to revisit our Steam Deck testing once more. Though we’re fairly confident that a hardware platform such as the Deck is running the newer standard, it doesn’t hurt to recheck our older conclusions just to be on the safe side.
And that is all for this one! We're brewing some plans with fellow devs to do something special in the coming few days, but things haven't exactly developed conclusively, so stay tuned as we work on the specifics.

Till then though, thank you for reading and as always, stay awesome ^_^

Kind Regards,

Cursed-Atelier Team

Weekly Progress Report #83: August 2023

"That's it?", you say? Of-course not, dear player. More variety yet to come!

In addition to the above, new sprite-works is in the pipeline as well. Expect to meet more unique planetary characters while traversing the Voidverse in the coming updates. The intent is to try and deploy sprites alongside the new standing art, but if priorities shift, we might have to do a tandem launch. But for now, the goal is set.

Finally, to top the graphical news off, new artwork has been made to commemorate a “special occasion” for VoidBound and all our fans and supporters. This one is dedicated to our social media presence so tune in there as we'll make the unveil shortly in the next few days.

Next up, the pen-masters!

Our writers have established the outline for the first batch of criminals that Caly will go after in her expanded Bounty Hunter career. Meet: The Garum Circle. A criminal organization mainly made up of Garumites, one of the original populations that set up home on Henosis. After decades of toiling for few credits for other species, bands of Garumites got together to protect their own interest and carve out their own slices of power.

Now with the balance of power shifting throughout the galaxy, knives will come out and blasters will be charged. In addition, we're building a proper rogue's gallery for Caly, along with a mentor character that will help lead her on this new path.

And now, a word from our Binary Tongues.

We open up the Codeland bulletin with a bit of "Eh" news. Last week we informed you that Windows 7 was no longer a supported OS due to its EOL status affecting other program supports as well. We can now further confirm that support for Windows 8.1 has also been affected by recent Node updates. This means that in the future, Windows 10 has essentially become a baseline requirement now for VoidBound compatibility.

Furthermore, work on a new map is now underway. This one was supposed to be part of the revamped intro but was taken at the last minute out due to plugin issues. It will add that extra little bit to Caly's harrowing adventure as she grapples with alien tech trying to figure out her escape from Urtu confinement.

And that covers it all for this one. With September coming to a close, we'll start making our monthly post preps soon, so until, then take care and we'll see you in the next one!

Kind Regards,

Cursed-Atelier Team

Weekly Progress Report #82: August 2023

We already had a lot to work with the earlier art but this new generation will offer more polish and give us a whole new world of Caly interactions as she goes through her adventure. Stay tuned as we bring you new samples periodically!

Of course, we're not just stopping there. We're going for the whole enchilada with some smart animation to kick this new stage off.

Though basic to some, but we feel adding even the little things like blinking would give more life to her character. Who knows, if well received, we might fiddle with some more possibilities and maybe even extend it to other characters as well!

With focus shifting away from the intro story and slime tales, our story-weavers have decided to go all in and start expanding the bounty quest series further! When crime is rampant and the police are stretched too thin or just don't care, it's up to the bounty hunters to fill in the gap. Bounty hunting is already present in the game, but we're looking to take the concept to a whole new level with new quest chains that give the player the chance to have Caly become an agent of justice or a cold methodical hunter.

Who is the worse criminal? The person who stole food to save their family? Or the soldier without an army forced to use their hard-earned skills to become a leg breaker for the local cartel? These are the questions Caly can ask herself in the upcoming bounty hunter content. Of course, if she doesn't care, she can always just go in and break some legs of her own. It will be all up to you to decide as to exactly what kind of hunter she will be.

Finally, an important update from our resident Codekeeper regarding the Game's Compatibility: From 0.5.4 onward, VoidBound no longer supports Windows 7 due to the recent node build update. There is a high chance this applies to Windows 8.1 as well, but we're unable to verify this at this moment. Stay tuned for a separate post in the future where we will go in more detail about the why and what for this change.

Unfortunately, we also encountered a bit of compatibility issues in the Quest Log coding and current plugins. It's not great as it does delay plans a bit, but we're already troubleshooting to come up with a solution. The Quest Log is the benchmark of any RPG worth it's salt and we won't stop till it's complete.

And that covers all our highlights for this week. We've have our hands full making final preparations on the latest patch, so we bid you fond farewell and will see you in the next one o/

Kind Regards,

Cursed-Atelier Team

Progress Report #81: September 2023

We regularly update our timelines with some of the more "explicitly" NSFW content over at our Discord and Twitter.

Find us at:

[h3]Twitter: https://twitter.com/CursedAtelier[/h3]

[h3]Public Discord: https://discord.com/invite/tG7DKBa[/h3]

Hi everyone!

Welcome back to our September coverage of the latest from the world of VoidBound. With releases back to back and work on STEAM picking up pace, the crew found themselves with plenty of work to keep themselves busy with. So, lets take a peek on what was on their individual desks this week:

This month saw both our Patreon 0.5.5 Alpha build and Public 0.5.4d build see the light of release and it was a general chaos for our artist balancing work on both of these. Between finishing work on newer assets for upcoming Patreon launch and touching up the CG work on the Public build, lets just say his desire for some time off has skyrocketed lately.

Additionally, STEAM promotion work continues on in full progress. This includes new standing and logo art and just making sure everything looks sharp to help our Wish-list count continues to grow. You can help us by doing so if you haven't already!

New concept plans are also being discussed for overhaul of older in-game artistic elements. Details are vague at the moment so bear with us as we bring you more specifics down the line via future reports.
Behind the walls where our storytellers dwell, come the following tidings:

"The new Introduction segment is being monitored closely with feedback from internal testing being taken into account. Nothing is set in stone and can be changed if it'll make the intro more fitting."

It seems with the game going into a more RPGish direction, the scenario is no longer solely governed from the writer's POV only. The programmers too are chipping in their 2 cents with what can and what shouldn't be done so, here is to hoping it makes the upcoming content more interesting for the players moving forward!

Finally, the codeworks! As is the norm before every release, aggressive testing was underway to find any game breaking bugs. Fortunately, little were found. Unfortunately, some benign ones(like leftover sprites) were missed -_- Apologies, our overworked intern will be virtually whipped a thousand tongue lashings for this travesty!

On other fronts, more Quest Log work continues in order to bring it over the finish line as quickly as possible, while compatibility evaluation efforts remain underway for Linux and Mac platforms.

And that is our first report for September. Thank you for reading up until here and we'll see you in the next one ^_^ /

Kind Regards,

Cursed-Atelier Team

Weekly Progress Report #80: August 2023

We regularly update our timelines with some of the more "explicitly" NSFW content over at our Discord and Twitter.

Find us at:

[h3]Twitter: https://twitter.com/CursedAtelier[/h3]

[h3]Public Discord: https://discord.com/invite/tG7DKBa[/h3]

Hi everyone,

We apologize right off the bat for keeping this report short and to the point. Even though we just jumped on STEAM, we can't seem to peel ourselves away from working on the upcoming content patch and focus on improving our presentation style here.

That being said- not for long. Once we release, we've a few ideas we want to implement as soon as possible. But for now, to the topic at hand:

Tank Scene CGs have now been fully remastered. The new renders turn an already great scene into an incredible encounter for new and current Space Cadets. We cannot wait for you to see it.

Additionally, multiple new assets have been marked for creation/re-creation replacing older designs and other default RPG Maker ones. These new pieces will rejuvenate the design of early parts of the game primarily including, but not limited to, downed states, dungeon levers, balloon icons, etc.

Tank Scene story-line, the first scene in VoidBound players will see, has been completed. We are excited for your feedback to make sure the writing is up to the grade of the fantastic asset-work created for the scene. The first 'Loss scene' has been written as well. It's not as long as the Tank Scene, but it is certainly explosive.

Finally, the Quest Log work continues. We have made some good progress with the code which will help makes thing compatible with the engine. New plugin rework initiated as well for better optimization.

This will assist us in the upcoming content coming to VoidBound. Speaking of which, time to dive back into the game code again. We're absolutely not giving up on our August release commitment without a fight!

Thank you for reading and your patience.

Kind Regards,

Cursed-Atelier Team