Finally!

Just a quick note... Betas will be sent out tonight.

That is all.

Beta (meep!)

*sigh* I really suck at ETAs, don't I?

Well, the good news is that the beta is 95% done and ready. The bad news is that it's not 100%.

4% of that is battle-related and requires a lot of hair-pulling database work. I would use placeholder battles, but that sort of defeats the purpose of having a beta test. The last 1% is just cleaning up the folders so you don't have to download a 700MB+ sized file (yes, lots of unused graphics and music that will probably find its way into the game eventually).

When's the beta coming out, then? I want to try to make it before or during this weekend. I have no other plans until next week, and I'm hunkering down with coffee and croissants until it's done!

*insert witty title*

I'm just going to come out and admit it. Virtually nothing got done this past week. I suffered a raging (and quite debilitating, I might add) migraine for 3 whole days. The rest of the week was spent playing catch-up with various chores and work. I've also worked a bit on requests, since they've been piling up and my request-ees have been very patient.

On the bright side, this unplanned break did not squelch my motivation. I'm still very much committed and eager to work on TUAH. I've blocked off this weekend and I will try to get as much done as possible.

Other than that, not much to report. I'm still looking for a beta tester or two. Please let me know if you're interested!
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I've also changed the general look of the blog today. I hope you like it!

To-Do

Here is my list of things that need to be finished for revamped chapter 1&2:
- Finish mapping 2 extra areas for Bethlam Tower.
Thankfully, the two maps are monster/exploration maps and those don't take as long as town maps. I can churn out the two maps in a day or so. There's also virtually no eventing involved, save for populating it with chests and monsters. Since I'm using visual monster encounters, I only need to create one event that will cycle through troop possibilities and copy/paste it around the map.
- Finish skills and AI for 6 bosses.
The most difficult part about this is balancing the stats for the bosses. Obviously, they should be tougher than a regular fight, but not outright kill you on the first turn either. I've also done a few changes to the boss line-up that should make them much more interesting.
- Delete unnecessary maps and resources before compiling.
Although I know TUAH will inevitably end up as a large-sized game, there's no reason to include all the resources at once. Especially since you'll have to download the newer chapters again.
- Playtest and playtest.
Just to make sure everything is running smoothly. One thing I've learned is that no matter how much time I spend testing, I can't catch all the bugs/typos/etc. So, I'm not going to spend an excessive amount of time testing. I will try to catch any game-breaking bug, however.

Phew! That's a rather short list. I'm not giving an ETA, but I really hope I can finish all of this within a week.

In other news, Joerao is awesome and will be composing a couple of tunes for me. Volrath is also awesome and may be making a trailer for TUAH. I'm so excited!