that's right folks! as of september 9th 2025 it's been 3 years since i started on this little projects(well technically i started a little earlier , and it's really just been 3 years since i made the project folder, BUT IGNORE THAT !)

huh? September 3rd, not September 9th... whoops!

anyway, that aside to commemorate the (apparently late ) 3 years of development! i figured i'd both revamp the game jolt page, as well as show ya'll the journey to this point! (especially since the page has only been up for about half the development time!) I'll be showing off a lot of the unused / outdated models , old concepts, and development milestones that won't be seen in normal gameplay! i can't show everything cuz i some concepts and ideas would spoil certain parts of the game! but that most certainly doesn't mean you don't get nothing. Oh and just a fair warning, i've lost a decent amount of development material over the years, so i'm mostly going to be going off of whatever screenshots and renders sent to friends, and anything else i could scrounge up, so bear with me! oh and this is gunna be a lil' long!

with that being said let's begin with what i'd consider the first era of development, which i'll call "The roman age" since there was a much more grungy and roman theming for what the game was going to be like, more closer to the original dorm's style before I developed my own identity for the game from there, oh and cuz it sounds cool!

-The First ever concept art/ Design for chica

-first ever endo used, it was extremely unoptimized and the head was taken from a 3d printing project

-unfinished first havoc chica, "modeled" off the concept art using the endo

-beginning to model a part of the boa (earliest dated screenshot!)

-the Original BOA & walk cycle

-the Original Soulcage (don't give the model too much credit, the new lighting i did for it is doing a good amount of heavy lifting)

-one of the earliest images of the purgatory map! with the aforementioned roman influence ,this is in the games real infancy! no doors, a much more differently shaped office and that old boa model!

-begining to set up the camera shots! and adding detail like floors coark board and door frame, even if it doesn't have a hole to walk through yet...

-an unfinished model of The early Garvey design!

-a scraped 3d recreation of the mangles quest minigame, there would've been multiple of these in the style of each game i think?

-early idea I had for the title screen where >Dormitabis was on the top left, and MANIFESTED was scribbled on a torn post-it note and slapped on beneath it... honestly kinda fitting for this era lol

-work started on the puppet's mask

-the making of amireal

-some newer screenshots of a preserved older version of the map from this time,that i didn't realize i had! lighting looks different cuz blender changed it's lighting engine or something since then

-early map layout from around this time

-in game screen shot of manifested's first build! with golden calls mechanic originally going to be done through a text box that would show up on the bottom of the camera tab

-and of coarse the first ever title screen for the game, it's still in the bottom layers of the game today actually!(you can actually see the new title screen peaking through at the top,whoops!)

And with that ends the Roman era, from september 2022-april 2023!

overall this era was an important stepping stone and starting point for me to get an understanding and grip of what I wanted from this game, basic untextured walls and layout. Whilst a lot of models and designs were scraped a few designs/models I made back then are still being used today actually, even if lightly fixed up as my skills have improved (for instance all of boa's head models were reused for basilisk, to kinda "honor there legacy" if that makes sense, keep em alive,oh and didn't have to remodel em lol). that being said though, there were a lot of things that did change from here, the older vision of the game was going to be more of a basic combination of other, ideas and game's identities; the grunge of the original dormitabis, with melty plasma designs being more center stage and playing more of a role in the 'story'(which at this point was just the original that i was modifying), the lore and secrets of fnaf 3 and a decent amount of vintage roman theming as well. these concepts weren't very well blended though, and each element was very unstructured, emphasized and "saturated" of lack of a better word (like everything's very colorful and almost cartoonish, probably because I was overemphasizing certain details I liked), when they showed up, it wasn't quite as reserved & smooth as modern manifested, i'd say it's like a prototype or alpha/pre-alpha(even though we're technically currently in alpha by my strict definition, but from a game planning perspective i mean) I'd call it the "Delta" Δ, though that does make it kinda charming, you could see 15 yo me's passion, but i just didn't quite know how to properly apply it yet! for me Boa & "eviceration" ,as she was originally named, were a pretty Iconic part of this era!

and so begins what i'll call the "foundational" era as I started to develop basic key final ideas and assets that would give the main structure of what the game would actually end up looking like.

-new office render now with Textures, a second arcade and the keyboard keys are only half untextured? how deluxe!

-begining work on old free roam section...

-am i real on cams

-first foxy model, using the prototype endoskeleton based on a newer design closer to the final one

-further progress on that garvey model, starting to wither it

-old phone icon on the bottom left!... and a foxy placeholder image...

-unfinished and unused old chica model using the prototype endoskeleton

-amireal without mask! and do corpse yet either

-unused and unfinished prototype freddy! also with prototype endoskeleton, i didn't realize I was gunna use the prototype endo for all the Havocs until now!

-Garvey almost entirely finished! minus teeth

-making the tape player!

-almost entirely finished Foxy model, with the prototype endoskeleton, notably it's not able to load because the endo was so unoptimized

-this one's just called "evil"??? yeah i don't know what this was about

uses garvey's skeleton and evisceration's torso tho!

-the aforementioned reused parts from boa being set up for basilisk

-the original, now lost, model for Garvey, pretty much complete!

-original Tattered Puppet model, not lost But i was ultimately unsatisfied with it's design, even if it can be kinda cool. it would've used it's tentacles to bang itself into the glass, slowly breaking it

-the tape player implemented in the in game render! and much better lighting!

-and finally we end with the end title screen for this version of the game!

that concludes the foundational era April 2023 - December 2023

you can see a lot of what would later become the final product in this time, as well as a few scraped ideas as well! environmental detailing was done amireal was added, freddy, foxy & chica had started using there newer designs (even if there models weren't quite the best yet) and even a tape player was added near the end, but wait what happened to that phone icon that was on the monitor? oh well! Garvey's models as cool as it is and as sad that it is that it was lost, prolly would have been redesigned anyway, similar to the puppet. and ultimately I'm glad that I got the chance to remodel them for the better, I'd consider these the "Prototype" designs for them if anything. Even if it wasn't quite there yet this version of the game was starting to take on it's own identity and shape, maybe even without needing to rely on Dormitabis to be something worth playing, and could try bringing it's own ideas and spin on things. you can see it starting to maturing into what we have today, I'd consider this to be the real "alpha" α version of the game.

moving on we continue to the "exploration" era named after the Exploration of many new and interesting ideas around this time that were being tried out, and because i'm running out of ideas of names to call these eras!

-basilisk's MKI model continues development. I was actually stumped on what to use for his "pelvis" , debating on using scrap metal, but then i realized i could just use the paper pal instead

-I actually used those old withered toys hoaxes for reference on Basilisk's face "withering", figured it'd be a fun reference!

-the inside of basilisk MKI's maw, with a more standard endo_02 design

-the finished Basilisk MKI! , who's endo was the first teaser actually!

-the MKI version of tattered chica, again lost & unused, i actually forgot i made one for her lol

-the MKI version of Tattered foxy! with much of the MKI endo shown as well!

-this is the older MKI version of freddy i talked about before! he was actually in a few teasers! wonder if you can find em (;

-freddy MKI's window animation!

-HVAC freddy MKI, with n64 promo Mario as reference for that 90s pre rendered look!

-improved office...

-the ORIGINAL MKI Tattered freddy at the office door! yeah i think i prefer the teaser version lol

-this version's main menu, which is what was ultimately settled on for future builds!

and that concludes the "exploration" era from january 2024-june2045

as you can see a lot of stuff was actually getting done and i'd say a decent amount of the assets and the games identity had been developed and was finding it's footing during this time! unfortunately though there was a road bump, the drive that had all of manifested's assets on it had failed! I was luckily able to recover various major assets like maps, the mfa and some characters, but all the MKI models were lost. this was, whist initially annoying, ultimately a blessing in disguise as it forced me the perfect opportunity to remake and redesign them, this time making them exactly as I wanted, not skipping out on the details that I did before, after all if i'm putting in the extra work any way I might as well. this era of development, while certainly not too far off from the final idea, certainly has a lot to be desired... things are, whilst defiantly still there, are basic and under detailed, that being said you can still get a feeling for what it'll be, making me consider it the "beta" β phase of development.

thus begins the "Refinement" era, where the ideas developed are what will be refined and used going forward, meaning the base vision for the game and how it will play is pretty much figured out and is ready to be finalized!

early Idea for Basilisk MKII to have a "Mask swap" mechanic... and be a 20s mobster...

-Basilisk MKII's endo head!

-Basilisk MKII's endo

-killer render i did, you can use it as a wall paper or something idk

-concept art for Tatted Freddy MKII (slight redesign)

-oil pastel of my boy(by me!)

-early yet to be Tattered, Tattered Freddy MKII ! already you can see the improvement over the original

-freddy MKII's now outdated window animation!

-freddy MKII's Jumpscare now outdated animation!

-Tattered Foxy MKII in "pirates cove" with amireal! huh? what's with the vents?

-the original soulcage got to be used as a place holder model in this version, good for him!

-the games menu at this point in development

-the final build of this era, being played on a computer for people to playtest at a local convention me and my friends held a booth at! a lot of people took interest in it and were very receptive! (even if it was a lil' broken)

and with that concludes the "Refinement era" of manifested from july 2024 - may 2025

this was the longest development eras and the most recent one too! almost all main night characters were programed in to some extent (even if I didn't show them here for spoilers sake!) and a lot of character and environmental modeling and details had been done as well! this all culminated in a public beta test at a booth me and my friends were setting up for a local convention. I stayed up the entirety of the night before rushing it out the door in time, and i just barely managed it. it was a lot a fun to see people and friends play through and they all really enjoyed it and gave some great suggestions! everyone there was great and if you happen to have been someone who attended and played thank you very much, it was great to have you! oh yeah and the booth made a pretty nice amount of money, about 200$ i think, which we put towards a neat graduation party!

now as much as I wish I could've shown this newest build, I can't, mainly because it only existed for one day! (well more accurately i only got to have access to it for one day!) yeah so basically my computer got stolen later that night and I lost all the new models and mfa files I made... yeah not ideal! now as much of a set back as this was it wasn't exactly the worst thing In the world, I still had a lot of older files like the map backed up and i had the previous build of the game for code, though i'd have to change all the assets for consistency's sake with the newer assets. i was going to take a break after I finished this mile stone anyway since i knew i'd be a lil' burnt out from constantly working to meet the deadline. if you think about it though, the build wasn't really wasted, sure the assets were gone and i'd have to remake some things, but really the purpose of this was to provide playtesters a rough outline of the game, see their reactions , get feedback and make sure the basic idea was good! and well, it did just that! this version though lost was a really important test to make sure that the idea is sound, whilst still being an early version, for that i'd call this era the pre-release or "Gamma" (Γ) version.

so where does this leave us now?

well naturally The Final phase of the games life cycle before release, the "Finalization era" or the "Omega" (Ω) phase! everything is planned, gameplay, character roster, story, designs, game structure endings ( ; and most parts of the game are at least partially implemented from here all that's left to do is really just model it all! now it's worth keeping in mind that i also have a lot of important stuff going on IRL around this time and just "modeling it all" still does take time, but i can guarantee that there aren't going to be anymore major steps back anymore (gunna be backing up AAALLL my stuff from now on, a lot more than i did before!). as you can probably tell, this game has come to mean and represent a lot to me, it's been with me now, through a very formulative time in my life formulative, ive poured a lot of myself and who i am into it and i'm proud of it. despite all i've shown you, there's a whole other side to this game i haven't even talked about, and don't get me started on the characters and story! (for better or for worse admittedly) i have a few games dedicated to properly exploring all their stories properly, that being said you should be able to understand the important parts with just manifested of course! so with that i'll said (well tbh there are a thousand more things i could say about this game but i think i've said well enough!) thanks for sticking around, and i hope you'll all see this through with me, take care.

-katz....

p.s. i'm so sorry for the long post here's HVAC freddy busting a move as consolidation for the poor souls who read all that