Hey there!

Today marks the fourth anniversary of Demo v1.0's release! To commemorate this occasion, as well as to continue our yearly tradition since 2022, we're sharing a new Dev Update.

As per usual, we'll start this one off by recapping our last progress report, and then get into our current progress updates -- along with some small content previews! After that, we have:

• End of Year Q&A

• Community Spotlight - Dec 2024

• A Year in Review

• Conclusion

Brief Catch-Up!

In our September 2024 Progress Report, we discussed our major focuses on making improvements to our workflow and further refining our plans for the whole game. Along with our general progress on asset creation and implementation, this included:

• Improvements to the game's outline (routes, endings, per-area content & bosses.)

• Refined character backstories for Alphys and Undyne, and review of others' (i.e. Ser Scratch) for potential improvements.

• Identified potential improvements to existing content for consistency with later material.

• Outlining and structuring work for Crystal Springs writing.

• Creation of re-styled Boogiemen sprites (complete portraits & default battle poses, other battle sprites in-progress.)

• 10 completed music tracks for Crystal Springs (18 in-progress, 14 planned.)

• 15 in-progress music tracks for Boreal Bluffs, and 2 remake tracks in-progress for Starlight Isles ("Let's Boogie!" v3 and "Kountdown" v3)

• Refined gameplay mechanics for the Crystal Mines (incl. set of introductory puzzles.)

We also showcased our current iterations of the Boogiemen's new default battle pose sprites, and a new Crystal Springs music track -- "Benevolent Interrogation" by DashingToadie!

Along with all of this, we also released Demo v2.0.7 with a slew of additions, changes, and fixes for localization tools. In retrospect, that was a lot we covered then!

Progress Updates

Our priorities have more or less remained the same since September, and we've continued working on a lot of the same content when we have the time to do so.

Here's what we've gotten done:

• Writing -- More development on fleshing out & improving certain character backstories, evaluating plans for certain routes to keep them within reasonable scope, and proposing potential rewrites of Ruined Home content for better consistency with current plans.

• Art -- Some completed battle assets and concept art for Crystal Springs enemies, and the Boogiemen's re-styled battle sprites are almost completely finished!

• Music -- Some further work on "Boogie Beatdown" ("Let's Boogie!" v3) and "Kountdown" v3, with an almost-finished Crystal Springs track ("Dreamer" by philiplol.)

• Programming -- Work on implementing new Boogiemen battle sprites, Crystal Mines puzzles and area design, slight polish to Starlight Isles content, minor improvements to a few Ruined Home puzzles, and some Spep Mode work on the side. Also, updating the project to the latest GameMaker version and figuring out what breaks!

(We've decided to give this puzzle a little more flavor, with icon indicators!)

(Certain puzzles with an order of switches now use numbered tiles as an added indicator.)

Gilded Goons, Again!

Many of the new (see below) re-styled Boogiemen battle sprites are courtesy of LuneyToons, our newest team member! They've been a huge help with getting these done, drawing inspiration from cartoon characters for some expressive animations and dynamic poses.

Here's some examples:

The process behind these resprites has been a huge collaborative effort! As a rundown:

• Devilredd is responsible for the Boogiemen's new style (angular Harry, rounder Larry.)

• Harry and Larry's dialogue portraits were made by Devilredd (with input and edits by Chip Potato, Depresso, and Beethovenus.)

• Harry's default battle sprite was made by Devilredd (with some edits by Depresso.)

• Harry's battle expressions were made by Devilredd, SuperKirbylover, and EllisBros (with input and edits by Beethovenus.)

• Larry's default battle sprite was made by SuperKirbylover.

• Larry's battle expressions were made by SuperKirbylover, EllisBros, and LuneyToons (with some input and edits by Devilredd, Chip Potato, and Beethovenus.)

• Harry and Larry's hurt sprites, downed sprites, attack sprites, and scene-specific sprites were made by LuneyToons (with some edits by Beethovenus and input from Chip Potato and Devilredd.)

PHEW! I hope I got everything right there. Suffice to say, pretty much everything with this project has that level of in-depth collaboration between team members -- even to the smallest edits.

We're now going through the process of importing these assets in-game, and seeing how much we'll need to adjust and fix (i.e. positioning, animations.) Given the amount of changes present, it may not be feasible for us to apply these changes to both the v3.0 and v2.0 branches individually (since they're on different versions of GameMaker) -- we'd likely end up including these along with Demo v3.0 as a result, rather than having a v2.0 patch, but only time will tell.

(Larry's new base sprites imported in-game, without adjusting the positioning.)

Obligatory Screenshots

Since Crystal Springs is still in relatively early stages, we haven't felt as if there's been enough progress to warrant showing much off -- though, it couldn't hurt to share some small previews!

Please keep in mind that all of these are entirely subject to change, and do not represent what they'll look like in the end. We've got a long way to go, including visual improvements!

End of Year Q&A

To commemorate the end of 2024, we announced on Bluesky that we'd be including a developer Q&A segment for this Dev Update! Our fans submitted their questions in the replies, and we selected several that we wanted to answer.

Q: "After the release the of two demos and seeing how the wider community reacts to the game, what is the team's main focus when developing the areas and other contents of the game moving on?" (renatomadguy.bsky.social)

A: As we've discussed already, one of our biggest focuses has been further outlining our entire plans for the rest of the game -- understanding what we want to accomplish with each area in regards to the overall narrative, and how to pace our content overall. This has been the main bulk of our work, and while there's always more to be done, we're very happy with how it's turning out!

Q: "For the evacuation route, I know its different from the other routes and I know it happens once you spare Asgore, but will the route have different outcomes depending on when you do the route? So like for example, crystal springs being different" (coiny555.bsky.social)

A: Given the fact Evacuation Neutral is our weird "in-between" of Neutral and Ruthless, there's definitely a lot of factors we have to take into consideration -- resulting in different outcomes.

While you can initiate the route by starting Ruthless in Ruined Home then aborting at any point, you can also trigger a "Late" Evacuation Neutral from the Compassion and Neutral routes by exhausting an area's kill count; in this case, the game makes note of which location you triggered this route in (i.e. "Level Ruin" for Ruined Home, "Level Star" for Starlight Isles OR earlier, etc.), resulting in different variations of the route itself.

It's hell for scope, and something we're making sure to keep track of to avoid getting overly ambitious!

Q: "Will we see more of Count Koffin-K in the future, on any routes?" (shadina.bsky.social)

A: You certainly will! Though, don't expect him to make a reappearance in future areas. We want to make sure that each of our characters get adequate screen time throughout the game, and so while certain characters may appear across multiple locations, others will not.

Q: "For like the future plans (that are in the works) in pacifist route, will Sans (aka Crossbones) make an appearance in those future places your working on?" (devilbeargirl16.bsky.social)

A: He might, and he might not! We've focused on a lot with Sans already, and are focusing more on other characters for future locations -- that said, we're not done with him yet.

Q: "Does Papyrus still make spaghetti? I just realized that it's not mentioned in game yet, from what I recall" (universe12.bsky.social)

A: Yep! This will probably come up at some point in-game.

Q: "We've already seen quite a bit of it in Starlight Isles, but how much new lore will you be adding onto Undertale's?" (undertraveler.bsky.social)

A: Good question! We don't necessarily plan to add too much -- our general approach is to expand upon Undertale's (with some inspiration from Deltarune here and there) to keep things fresh and interesting. Rather than just repeating all of the original game's concepts and themes, we'd like to explore them a bit further -- albeit in ways where nothing feels too out of place.

Q: "A Faq about localizations, for example the rules you have to follow when you'll do a unofficial localization and also the rules when you'll polish that; also a faq about if there's someway to help to the official localizations of other languages" (stefano9000.bsky.social)

A: We're currently working out the details for how community-created localization patches could be officially added to the game, and a list of guidelines (i.e. submission requirements, quality standards, etc.) We can't promise when this will be done, since it hasn't been our biggest priority, so please be patient!

Q: "would you say it's worth it to take the time to add localization support to a game? I've been debating adding it to UTW for a while (somewhat inspired by how nicely you guys seem to have set things up), but it just seems like so much work to convert everything at this point..." (python-b5.com)

A: It ultimately depends! Adding localization support can be really beneficial in the long term for general accessibility, though it'd be something you'd want to do earlier on in development -- otherwise you risk creating problems for yourself later on.

Q: "What exactly is the idea behind making the Genocide/Ruthless route the hard mode of the game?" (yourfavouriteexo.bsky.social)

A: Our routes are designed with heavy emphasis on consequences for the player's actions. With the Ruthless route, we've wanted to reflect this philosophy in regards to how the world punishes the player -- and for those who have already experienced what Undertale has to offer, an added challenge.

Q: "Would TS!Underswap try to incorporate more horror elements into the game itself other than the Ruthless route of course?" (qzimyion.bsky.social)

A: Yep! We've got some interesting ideas, though we won't go into specifics. The biggest thing is just making sure we utilize horror elements in a way which isn't too jarring or overdone.

Q: "will the relationship between undyne and ser scratch going to be similar to alphys and mettaton's (in terms of how they are going to interact with us0 or are you going to take a completely different path?" (larmadio.bsky.social)

A: Without getting into spoilers, we're really excited for Undyne and Ser Scratch's relationship! It's actually more of an inverse to what Undertale did with Alphys and Undyne -- with Undyne effectively acting as Ser Scratch's cheerleader (for better or for worse.)

Q: "Will Toriel's main emotion be depressed, angry, or understanding/caring? (Like how Asgore is in UT was mainly depressed knowing what had to be done but didn't want to do it)" (mewdan.bsky.social)

A: Toriel does not want to be in this position. Make of that what you will!

Q: "How many "dates" will the third (and next) area have?" (xxviniciusxx.bsky.social)

A: Crystal Springs may have around 3 route-required hangouts, though it's important to note this doesn't mean all of them will occur within Demo v3.0 -- some content will require having interacted with characters in future areas, and then backtracking to access it. We also use the term "hangout" loosely in regards to certain character interactions, rather than to the standard of the "dates" from Undertale (using battle interfaces with in-depth interactions.) This is partially due to scope, given how character-focused this project can be.

Q: "Will you have any other projects after finishing TS!Underswap?" (hamaroo.bsky.social)

A: We really hope to! There's different ideas for original projects we've discussed over the years, and concepts we'd like to experiment with -- moving on to crafting original stories would be really cool, especially with the team we've built over the years.

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 15 Community Spotlight segments!

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

2021: July | Aug | Sept | Oct | Dec

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

2023: Dec

2024: April

Buckle up, because this is a LONG one...

(We're only showing the first panel, so visit the link below to read the full thing!)

To start off, jazbell adapted the "Stargaze" Memory Moment as a comic. We really enjoyed the overall composition and style of this piece -- with how Chara's internal dialogue and reminiscing were depicted visually, and the emotions conveyed in the process.

Woop has been creating piano covers of the TS!UNDERSWAP soundtrack -- for this Community Spotlight, we're featuring his "SOUL Ablaze" cover! We enjoyed how the composition carried over to this format, and how nicely it captured the track's feel.

Over-Cod-853 created a slew of TS!UNDERSWAP characters out of beads! These were really cool to see, especially given their 1:1 accuracy with the in-game sprites.

Here's one from our Discord server! Schmippitybee drew some fanart of Ser Scratch using Animal Jam! It's always really cool seeing fanart of them and other characters who have yet to appear in-game -- we really enjoyed the style, and accuracy to the character.

Mimi_Robo created posable felt figures of Papyrus, Crossbones, Chara, and Koffin-K -- along with a slew of different poses, and even some stop motion animation! We're honestly blown away with the effort that went into these, as well as the sheer number of poses and attention to detail.

There's 18 different images in total, all of which can be seen in our Discord (#community-spotlight) -- the ones above don't do them enough justice!

Emei and REASAN made a cover of Scones and Bones! We really enjoyed the original flair this track has to it, especially some bits which harken back to Undertale's Spider Dance.

Doki dubbed the Admiral Alphys encounter! The voice acting here was done really well, fitting both Alphys and the character being put on display.

Keiichums drew fanart of both Muffet and Koffin-K! It's always neat to see interactions between characters who don't have many of them -- that, plus the way they're drawn and depicted here, were really cool to see.

Drama Josh & co have been hard at work with more TS!UNDERSWAP lyrical covers -- today's featured cover being for Scones and Bones. As always, we really enjoyed the singing (SophiaDoStuff as Muffet, Oddbrother as Crossbones, Drama Josh as Papyrus), as well as...

The accompanying art by TheWinterer, depicting Crossbones and Papyrus trapped in Muffet's webs! This was a really interesting style to see them depicted in, and accurately portrayed the mood of the encounter.

Ramari made something absolutely awful: a Crossbone plush. (We mean this affectionately.)

FunkyBunny created 3D models of Crossbones & Sans! We really enjoyed the style done here, and how faithful they felt to the in-game designs.

SquidPedia drew fanart of a non-so-heartwarming moment in Ruined Home. Once we're all done crying, we can appreciate how well this scene was depicted.

Artsyrean drew moments from the Crossbones fight! We really enjoyed how different flavor text was depicted, and how it maintained the same tone from in-game.

Binsoru drew fanart of Queen Toriel! While she's yet to be seen in-game, this art perfectly depicts how we aim to approach her once the time comes -- staying faithful to both her design, and how we're foreshadowing her eventual appearance.

Frigadae drew fanart of Admiral Alphys, as well as an interpretation of her office! In addition to the style of this piece, it's really neat seeing one of our former team members creating fan content -- especially someone who contributed to Alphys's design, and the Royal Navy concept.

Renatomadguy drew fanart of the three Temmies encountered at the end of Starlight Isles! We enjoyed the style of this piece, and their accuracy to their in-game portrayals -- all those little details count!

Historiahysteria drew fanart of Chara and Count Koffin-K, facing each other in front of the Crown Jewel! The way they're both positioned in this piece, as well as their dynamic poses, gives a fantastic sense of scale and dramatic flair.

Star_fall39585 drew fanart of A.S. Dreamer! The creative liberties taken here -- that being his fluffy ears and facial hair -- are nice details which add interesting flair to the design.

JazzeBee drew fanart of Koffin-K with both Crossbones and Sans, two entirely different characters! The way their dynamic is portrayed here perfectly reflects their in-game counterparts, and each character is styled really nicely.

Finally... Eribetra created "Rougher Upper," a remix of our "Tuffer Upper!" meant for Section 5 of DELTATRAVELER. We really enjoy the way our track was blended together with Rude Buster and Enemy Approaching -- it has a unique identity of its own, and we're excited to eventually hear it play in-game!

A Year in Review

2024 is nearly over, how about that? It's no big secret that this year hasn't exactly been the kindest to everyone, ourselves included.

We released Demo v2.0 at the start of the year, and we were really excited for people to finally see and experience what we'd been working on! To this day, we're incredibly fortunate and blown away by the overwhelmingly positive response to our little project, and the ways in which it's impacted others despite being unfinished.

Following this release, though, we unfortunately ended up having multiple stressful situations which, while thankfully resolved, definitely took their toll on us. Combine that with a slew of responsibilities and such in our personal lives which have required our full attention, and... in-game development has admittedly been much slower than we hoped following v2.0's release.

While various roadblocks have presented themselves, resulting in less work being done in-game, we've fortunately been making a lot of headway in other areas.

We've focused a great deal on properly fleshing out the game's overall outline, narrative, events, locations, and so on -- improving upon aspects which weren't as developed as we liked or needed, and even making changes to existing ideas to better suit our goals and direction for the project. All of this will significantly help us in the long term, and allow us to get future work done quicker by having a better understanding of what we want to accomplish!

While this project is going to take us a while to finish, we'd like to see it through to completion -- ideally sooner than later, mind you! Our work means a lot to us, and so has the support and kind words of everyone who enjoys what we're creating. We wouldn't be where we are without any of you, or without the hard work and contributions of each of our passionate team members. Thank you for believing in us, and for sticking around this long.

Here's to hoping for a better year with 2025!

Our official translations for Spanish (Español), Brazilian Portuguese (Português Brasileiro), and Dutch (Nederlands) are still in-progress, and will ideally be released whenever they're ready. (These are done by hobbyist translators, so please be patient!)

We're also in the process of discussing avenues for which community-created localization patches could be officially added to the game, including a list of guidelines (i.e. submission requirements, quality standards, etc.) It'll take us a bit to iron this out, so please give us time!

In case you haven't seen, we're now using Bluesky! This will be one of our primary avenues of communication going forward (rather than Twitter.) We've also been a bit more communicative in our Discord server this year -- including a new Community Spotlight channel we've made for easily shouting out fanworks! Feel free to join if you want!

Thanks for tuning in, and we'll see you guys next year!

- Beethovenus and Team Switched

Demo v1.0 Release (Dec 2020)

Demo v2.0 Release (Jan 2024)

2021: Jan | Feb | March | May | June | July (cs) | Aug (cs) | Sept (cs) | Oct (cs) | Dec (cs)

2022: Jan (cs) | Feb (cs) | April (cs) | May (cs) | June (cs) | Aug (cs) | Sept | Nov | Dec (du/cs)

2023: Feb | March | May | June | July | Aug | Oct | Dec (du/cs)

2024: April (du/cs) | Sept | Dec (du/cs)

Community Spotlight (cs) | Dev Update (du)