Howdy!

For this devlog, we'll be focusing on the coding side of development, and the inner workings of the game itself--a nice change of pace, for sure! Around the end, we'll cover our more general progress.

Without further ado... let's begin!

New Dialogue System: Diannex!

Previously, we had been using a dialogue system called "OpenDayDialogue," created by our coding director, colinator27. Since then, we've moved onto using a brand new engine, "Diannex," created by colinator27, Shad / PeriBooty, and MadCreativity.

This new system, for one, is much cleaner to work with, and allows for quite a bit less repetitive coding with tasks involving randomness and choices. Something you'll be pleased to hear, however, is how it also allows for much easier fan translations!

Translation Support

Upon the demo's release, we plan on releasing a public, non-spoilery dialogue file which can be translated to your heart's content--after that, all you need to do is pop it into the game's data folder, and the game will automatically recognize it as a valid language. 

Whether it's for an unofficial translation patch until we start rolling out some official ones, or it's to fulfill your dreams of TS!Pirateswap, you'll be able to do so with ease! 

When the time comes, we'll have some guidelines for hosting public translation files, with the most important ones being:

• You ONLY host the translation files, and absolutely no other files from our game.

• You appropriately credit us, and link back to our GameJolt page.

Mac Support Issues

Unfortunately, while in the past it was somewhat easy to produce applications free and easily for the Mac operating system, the situation has vastly changed in recent updates. Apple has introduced tight restrictions on applications downloaded from the internet, making it very difficult for cases such as ours.

EDIT: While we initially stated we'd have to drop Mac support indefinitely, we've decided that we may provide an experimental build for Mac on release. However, users will need to find a workaround for Apple's security restrictions. This build may update less frequently than others.

Support for Windows, Linux, and Android is still planned.

Engine Upgrades

TS!Underswap was originally being developed within GameMaker: Studio 1.4, utilizing an original engine made from scratch by our programmers. Since then, we eventually upgraded the project to GameMaker Studio 2.2, and just recently to the 2.3 beta. Over the course of this, a lot of the code has been gradually refactored to utilize new features, but some areas have yet to be upgraded.

For some reason, they got rid of the colon in the name of GMS2. It's weird.

GameJolt Integration

This one isn't too major, but it's something we haven't covered! Upon starting the game for the first time, you'll be greeted with several accessibility options (which we've covered in a previous devlog), followed by a prompt asking if you want to log into your GameJolt account.

By doing so, you'll gain access to some trophies to mark your in-game achievements! Such as... getting an item! Talking to a very specific someone approximately 14ish times! The possibilities are endless!

In addition to this, you're able to upload your SAVE data to GameJolt, allowing you to download it onto other platforms! This is especially handy if you want to play the same file across multiple platforms, such as PC and Android.

General Progress

As of recently, all Ruined Home areas have been successfully implemented in-game! While this isn't to say that all of the scenes are complete, and other interactions, we've hit a major milestone. The rooms themselves are all added in, most with functionality and basic interactions, and cutscenes/events to come.

• The City of Old: All interior and exterior artwork is complete, and NPCs are being added in-game, all with unique dialogue,

• The Greasers: Their overworld encounter, and post-battle event, are both complete. All assets and writing for their battle are completed, and are in the process of being coded.

• Mettacrit: His battle is complete, with a near-finished overworld encounter sequence. This applies to the Pacifist/Neutral routes, and Genocide route.

• Asgore's House: All interior and exterior artwork is complete, with most of the writing for the interior being complete. We're doing some touch-ups to the older script leading up to Asgore's fight, and the battle itself, just to flesh them out more.

• Post-Asgore's House: All Ruined Home rooms are added. Older script is being touched up for quality improvements.

• Shop System: The shop system has been completed and added in-game! The interface, for the most part, resembles Undertale's--though with some slight tweaks. We were a bit too ambitious with this one, and had to scale back our ideas a bit.

New Music!

We're only showing off one new track this time around, which is "Chill By The Grill," the Grillby's shop theme!

We don't currently plan on posting any tracks after this one, besides planned touch-ups as we see fit.

Well, that's all for now!

As always, thank you so much to the 28,000+ of you who have been following our development over these past few years. Your support is always greatly appreciated, especially as we get closer and closer to the demo's eventual release!

Make sure to check us out on Discord, Twitter, and Tumblr if you haven't, and have a nice day!

 - Beethovenus