Hello everyone! How has 2024 been treating you?

This will be a rather eventful year for me, since it will bring... drum roll 🥁... the release of the game!! There is still much work to do before Sigh of the Abyss becomes available for everyone on June 26th, but everything is progressing smoothly.

2023 was a year of tremendous development progress. Let's take a walk down memory lane!

The first completed artwork of 2023 was the sprite of a Javidyan merchant who will occasionally appear in the story. Her garbs are inspired by traditional Berber dresses:

Three sprites, seven busts and five illustrations were completed in 2023, with three additional illustrations receiving variations (mostly kisses ❤️).

In 2024 the focus will shift on completing the remaining three ending illustrations, plus sprite work; several of the existing sprites require costume changes and some additional expressions and arm poses.

The last completed artwork is a very spoilery illustration that features the protagonist and Malec at the end of the game. I don't want to spoil the surprise, but I also want to show off the wonderful work of the artist... so here's the tiniest preview:

Let's talk about backgrounds now! The Stitch and Seam, a seamstress shop, was the first completed background art piece of 2023.

It's a very people-y background, since the shop is so busy!

A grand total of 46 backgrounds have been completed, and some have multiple variations like day/night effects, or different décor to suit diverse scenes ✨

The very last background art piece of the year was this enhancement of Atri's Rest, with the hills sprawling behind it and the Citadel perched atop the hill. 

The game's soundtrack has been completed as well, and it includes 17 original pieces and 5 arrangements for over one hour of music 🎵 

Let's go over the script now! It's currently 396k words in total. That's... a lot, and the number will go up as editing progresses and I tweak or add scenes to account for different variables/romances. I have currently edited 1/4 of the script, and the proofreader has already worked through the introduction.

Some fun facts:

• The introductory chapter is 21k words;
• The first chapter and first interlude have been consolidated and are 54.7k words (roughly the length of Shadow Bonds!) 
• The longest chapter is currently 112k words ✍️

What's left to do? A lot of editing! Once the script has been proofread, I will select the scenes that will be voiced, and will hand the script to the VAs who will breathe new life in it with their talent.

Once editing is done, of course, coding will begin in earnest as well.

That's it for me today—expect more updates as June approches 😃

Toodles~!