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TS!UNDERSWAP [Undertale Fangame]

8 months ago

Dev Update - April 2024

Hey there!

It's been a few months since we've done a progress report -- and given we finally released Demo v2.0 in January, what better time to give a Dev Update on what we're working on?

Before the end of this devlog, we'll also be featuring our longest Community Spotlight segment yet, showcasing a multitude of fanworks since the release of Starlight Isles. Let's start!

Progress Updates

Following the release of Demo v2.0, most of our in-game dev work focused on either updates to fix various issues and small tweaks, or preliminary work for Crystal Springs. This included implementing nearly every planned room for the Crystal Mines (first sub-area) in a very barebones manner -- just having the rooms themselves in-game and using basic tiles, without any interactions or more in-depth content.

We've also been working on fleshing out the in-game mechanics for the Crystal Mines, which we may or may not showcase at a later date once we've gotten things looking prettier.

Most of our development priorities, and general focuses, have been on outlining the entire rest of the game -- fleshing out some of our less-developed plans, structuring future areas in a room-by-room format, and getting a better idea of certain things we want to accomplish.

While we haven't been able to do much in-game work due to various circumstances, we've been getting a lot done in terms of general outlining! Currently, we have:

Crystal Mines mostly outlined for all routes, with a room-by-room outline structure.
Crystal Springs mostly outlined for all routes (excluding some Evacuation-specific details), with a more rough room-by-room outline structure.
Boreal Bluffs roughly outlined, with all major areas and most major events defined.
The City of New, endgame events, and multiple game endings fleshed out more.

While we've discussed this before, there will be three sub-areas to Crystal Springs:

Crystal Mines: the first area the player traverses through.
Crystal Springs: the "main" section of the area, consisting of abandoned historical monuments, shrines, Royal Navy outposts, scattered settlements, and attractions.
A third smaller area that'll likely be specific to certain routes.

(Concept art by Devilredd.)

For Boreal Bluffs, we have several sub-areas planned:

Undying Robotics Lab Complex: home of Undyne's workshops and various robots. Connected to "The Bluffs" via Cherrywood Town (one-room area.)
The Bluffs: the "main" section of the area, and testing grounds for Undying Robotics machinery. Connected to "The District" via Ice Pass (1-3 rooms area.)
The District: the Underground's biggest city of entertainment, and home of "Club Scratch."
The NEXUS: the power source of the Underground, and final gauntlet before The City of New.

We're looking forward to developing many of our ideas more, and getting back into more in-game work!

v2.0.6 Updates

We're currently planning on releasing a v2.0.6 update once we're able to -- and unless any major issues pop up with that version, or we end up making some changes, it'll likely be our last v2.0 update for the foreseeable future.

We have a variety of various small fixes planned for this version, as well as some updates to our localization system to support languages with varying character sizes that don't currently work.

However, what's probably the most noteworthy change is that we'll be changing the name "Mettacrit" (MTC) to "Mettalot" (MTT) -- and "Ser Scratchalot" to "Ser Scratch." Due to these changes, we'll also be updating the localization files on our website. If you're making your own unofficial localization patch, keep this in mind!

We understand the first change is a bit out of nowhere, and will definitely take some getting used to. Due to reasons of a personal and private nature, we decided to make this change in order to disassociate ourselves from Storyshift and its creator -- where the name "Mettacrit" had originally come from -- and because we wanted a name that was unique to our project, and better represented something we created. Please respect our privacy in this regard, and don't ask us questions about it or spread rumors in the comments.

Introducing: Mettalot!
For some development insight, we chose "Mettalot" because:

"Mettalot" sounds theatrical and pompous, befitting of Mettaton. We drew inspiration from Arthurian legend (the knight "Lancelot," the kingdom "Camelot," etc.) in this regard.
It has the same number of letters as "Mettaton."
It allows us to use the acronym "MTT."
"Lot" is a synonym for "ton," with the joke "Met a lot" mirroring Undertale's "Met a ton."
We wanted something that was easy to pronounce, felt natural, and rolled off the tongue.

We also considered (and almost chose one of) these names:

Mettacast (keep MTC acronym, "cast" as in telecast / casting spells)
Mettatel (MTT acronym, same number of letters as Mettaton, "tel" as in television, "telly" as a nickname that he'd hate)
Mettatric / Mettatrix (MTT acronym, "tric" / "trix" as in magician tricks, and "theatric")
Mettajak ("jack" as a colloquial name for "person," similar to how "Napstablook" may reference "bloke")

We almost went with "Mettatel" before thinking of "Mettatric," but then realized it was accidentally an anagram of "Mettacrit" -- then considered "Mettatrix" before someone came up with "Mettalot" in under 2 seconds, and we decided on that one. A lot happened here!

Introducing: Ser Scratch!

The name change from "Ser Scratchalot" to "Ser Scratch" was actually something we did prior to changing Mettalot's name, but haven't talked about yet. Now seems like a great time to!

While we've been working on fleshing out more of the game as a whole, we decided to re-evaluate the way we were handling the relationship between Undyne and Ser Scratch -- as well as the latter character itself. This led to a substantial redesign, and change in direction in regards to their personality and narrative, to something we felt was much more fitting.

Introducing... Ser Scratch: the robot DJ behind "Ser Scratch Music," the Underground's top radio show! Their sprites are still a current work-in-progress, but here's some of what we have so far!

When we started redesigning them, we experimented with different shapes and ideas -- straying away from some of the original design elements which were shared with other characters (i.e. the monocle with Alphys, top hats with Koffin-K's minions) and leaned more into the Fallout Securitron inspiration we took for the original "Sir Scratchalot" design (seen in the top center.)

After some iterative work, though, we settled on a design by one of our artists, Devilredd! This blends together aspects of the "combat robot" design inspiration we took -- while incorporating aspects of music (i.e. speakers, record) and some older PC tech (computer mice, trackball, and the Mac "Finder" application icon.)

We're really looking forward to doing more with this character down the line, and showcasing their relationship with Undyne in-game!

Community Spotlight

We're including a Community Spotlight for this devlog!

We started these back in June 2021 to highlight community fanworks, and fellow fan-projects.

Counting today, we've had a total of 14 Community Spotlight segments!

If you'd like to check out the fanworks in each of these, explore the links below:

2021: July | Aug | Sept | Oct | Dec

2022: Jan | Feb | April | May | June | Aug | Dec

2023: Dec

TS!UNDERSWAP Fanworks

With this being our first Community Spotlight following the release of Demo v2.0, we really wanted to shout out as many fanworks as possible here! We asked our fans on Twitter to share their own creations -- and since we can't include absolutely everything, make sure to check the replies of this post to see what people have made!

(Trust us, you'll want to stick around for this one.)

First up, we have an art piece by Connor Wingah depicting an assortment of UNDERTALE fangames which released during Winter 2023-2024:

TS!UNDERSWAP (that's us!)
Omega Timeline: Poppy's Story ~ A ChristmAUs Carol by FmsDraws
DELTATRAVELER (Section 3) by RynoGG
Undertale Yellow by Team Undertale Yellow

We wanted to include this piece, and start off with it, due to the number of fanworks it depicts -- and the personality that's gone into depicting each one and their respective characters!

Here's some fanart by heres1nyan_ of Count Koffin-K, floating before the Crown Jewel! We really enjoyed the colors, pose, and overall positioning of this piece.

Coincidentally, here's a piece by TNTvale depicting the Count preparing to battle! We enjoyed the "glowy" shading and visual details on this one, which evoke a nice sense of movement. (Some of us may or may not have made this our desktop wallpaper...)

AnotherJooby drew Crossbones grappling away, Papyrus in hand! We enjoyed how this moment from in-game was portrayed here, down to the characters' expressions and the stylized effects.

KirbyGirl200 drew Count Koffin-K, surrounded by bats! We really enjoyed the dynamic pose here, befitting of the flashy supervillain himself.

Cloverfoe drew an assortment of Koffin Keep fan characters alongside Count Koffin-K and the Boogiemen! It's been really neat to us seeing people coming up with original minions, and writing their own stories -- keep it coming!

ItsMeBeff_ drew some doodles of Admiral Alphys! It's nice seeing fanart of her, and the team is really looking forward to working more with her character down the line.

Kopf_Salat drew fanart of Sgt Splosion! It's also been really nice seeing the reception to this character, and we enjoyed the way he was depicted here.

Cheeky drew fanart of assorted characters from throughout the game! We really enjoyed the variety of characters depicted here -- including "A.S. Dreamer," and some of our new Temmie designs.

Speaking of our new Temmie designs...! Here's some fanart by CentForNothing that depicts just that -- the unique shadowed sprites we've given each of the Temmies. We've enjoyed seeing people depicting both these and the "revealed" designs thus far!

Raspoza drew a comic depicting an encounter with Asriel! We really enjoyed their interpretation of Crystal Springs here -- with the idea of "diamond rain" -- and the overall interaction between the two here.

Gronnblade drew fanart of Count Koffin-K and Undertale Yellow's Starlo with swapped outfits! We loved seeing the way their outfits were adapted to one another, as well as the poses they've been given.

Cafefiorentini drew fanart resembling a comic book cover, prominently featuring Crossbones and Chara -- with Papyrus and Koffin-K on the sides. We really enjoyed the style and organization of elements in this piece!

Squidd325 remade a piece of theirs 2018 featuring the skeleton brothers and Chara, but now with Flowey! Seeing this one really took us back to the earlier years of development, and it was such a pleasure to see how it's been revisited with Starlight Isles finally released.

C1hno3 drew some fanart of Chara doodling in their journal! We thought this one was really cute, and enjoyed the pose and style here.

SlimySlimer created a Deltarune battle arena for Koffin-K, pitting him against the Delta Warriors! We really enjoyed the concept of this piece, and appreciated the dead pixel.

Ankitsters drew Crossbones and Papyrus! We enjoyed how these poses from in-game were adapted as drawings, as well as the overall shading and style here.

Salt_Alee drew two scenes from in-game: Chara's race against Crossbones on the dogboard, and the skeleton brothers' bonding moment during the Sans hangout. It was a bit difficult to choose between these two pieces, so we included both! We really enjoyed how these were depicted in regards to the poses, stylistic decisions, and expressions.

Techie_central drew Count Koffin-K, the Boogiemen, and Spooky Servant Chara! We thought the poses and style here were really cute, along with the detail of Chara's oversized outfit.

Its_Connor drew Crossbones, along with a completely unfamiliar skeleton! We felt the colors, shading, and background style here meshed really well to make things pop out.

As the first of several animated works we'll be featuring: marsh_ber animated Chara taking a break to draw during the Crossbones fight! We really enjoyed how this scene was adapted, and how the characters were animated.

(The embedded video was uploaded by Farfrom Tile on behalf of Tramon, make sure to support the original post linked below!)

For a university project, Tramon81 made an edit of (spoilers!) the Boogiemen Ruthless fight -- having Larry falling off of Stargaze Mountain to Aerosmith's "Dream On." We were absolutely surprised by the effort that went into this piece, and hope his professor recognizes that!

Zedleaked's "KYOUFUU ALL BACK" is a short animated music video of Yukopi's 強風オールバック (feat.歌愛ユキ) "Strong Wind All Back" (feat. Utaii Yuki) that features Koffin-K, the Boogiemen, Chara, and Flowey! We thought the visuals in this were really cute, especially the end portion.

For something that's a bit different than the rest, Kamera made an analysis video of our project's depiction of Chara! We already love seeing people getting into in-depth analyses and theory-crafting, so having someone put in the effort to make an entire video like this -- and pointing out many little details we've spent a lot of time carefully crafting -- has been really cool.

If you remember the "Remote Work" sidequest, you'll enjoy this one! It was voice acted by Fever (Sans) and DeepSeaAngel (Chara), who added their own bits of flair and dialogue. We really enjoyed how this one was handled, and highly recommend checking it out!

Georgelolwut has been voice acting various characters and scenes of ours -- and here, you can see his voice acting for scenes with Asgore and Mad Dummy in Ruined Home! Go check out his channel for others he's voice acted -- including Crossbones and Papyrus, as well as Koffin-K and The Boogiemen!

Inky nic made their own cover of Skeletal Showdown! The instrumentation and added flair were really neat here, really honing in on a nice mix of "cool superhero" and "goofy Sans."

Kappy Nerd made a SEGA Genesis Remix of Monster Bash! The way the track was adapted to this style was done really well, and does a great job at retaining the eerie feeling of the original.

Drama Josh & co. have continued creating entries to their "TS!UNDERSWAP With Lyrics" series -- and while it's always difficult to pick out which of their covers to showcase, it seemed fitting that Skeletal Showdown's would take this spot. The crew continues to do a great job adapting these songs in regards to their lyrics, artwork, and of course the singing, so make sure to go and check out the entire series thus far!

To end off this Community Spotlight, we have JazzeBee's "Magical Girl Sansformation," a very silly animated video of Sans's superhero transformation into Crossbones! Each of the little details here are well done, and are definitely befitting of this goofball skeleton.

And there we are! First devlog following the release of Starlight Isles!

To say that we've been both thrilled and humbled by the reception to Demo v2.0 is an understatement. We're overjoyed by how much our little project has resonated with players, and that the time and effort we've put into it have been recognized by so many.

Despite this being something we do as a hobby, this project is really special to us -- due to its existence as a love letter to the games which inspired us, and its original elements that are uniquely ours. We've said this before, but realistically, we won't be working on this game forever. We'd like to see it through, despite how long it's taken us -- and while we've definitely had our fair share of good and bad times throughout the past 6 years, our drive to create keeps us going.

Thank you so much for the kind words, patience, support, and feedback many of you have given. We're really looking forward to further development, and everyone's reactions once we're able to release future areas. See you in the next progress report!

- Beethovenus and Team Switched