Hello!

It's hard to believe it's been another year. This past year has been a busy one, and I didn't get as much done as I would've liked to. Regardless, let's look at what's planned for the future.

First up, I've been working on an expanded version of my jam game Momentous (woo! shameless plug!) called Momentous: Monumentum. It's almost ready to be sent out to my playtesters who will give feedback on difficulty and search for any bugs I missed. Once that happens, I'll make any necessary changes and then ship it out. That should hopefully be pretty soon, so keep an eye out (or join our Discord).

Speaking of our Discord server, that will be getting a redesign once Momentous: Monumentum comes out. This redesign will focus on making the server less about specifically Bast and more about my games in general (don't worry, Bast will still have a significant portion dedicated to it).

As for Bast and the Sky Shards itself, there hasn't been a lot of work in-engine done recently. I've been pretty busy working over the summer, and even busier now that college's started up again. I have been making some detailed plans about new features I plan on adding. One of these I feel is well-developed enough to share with you: a food system in which you can equip different items to gain various boosts. Inspired by games like Hollow Knight's charms and Paper Mario's badges, food will allow you to customize the game to suit your playstyle. Some foods may increase your max health, while others might increase your speed or damage. There's a limit to how much you can eat until you're full, though, so choose carefully. Unlike the charms and badges that inspired it, the food system won't just be free stat bonuses. Food items will cost currency (with weaker foods being quite cheap, while powerful foods cost more) every time you use them, meaning you'll have to decide when it's worth splurging on a nice meal.

Bast's story has also been going through deccently-sized redesign. I don't want to spoil too much, but I've been working both on world-specific plotlines as well as the overarching story as a whole.

The next alpha build (yes, it's still in alpha) will feature the new room progression system along with some water to test out Bast's swimming. I don't yet have an ETA on when that's coming, but it'll definitely be after Momentous: Monumentum (which you should totally follow & play once it comes out).

That's all for this post. See you all next month.