Well, this was something that wasn't easy to do, but I think it's the right call.

This may likely be the last devlog post I'll be making on my gamejolt page unless something extraordinary happens or BDS Re-amped ever ends up coming back to get finished.

I am here to more formally announce that I likely will no longer be making any fnafb related projects. I have attempted multiple times after releasing EVE to make something smaller and more personal to my own tastes, but I've never really been able to gather the motivation to do it other than helping other developers with their own games. I've tried again and against over the last year to do so, but I haven't really been able to get back into the rhythm other than periodic and sporadic updates to make EVE a bit more QOL and addressing some concerns and regrets I still had with it.

With that being said, I am pretty much retiring from these projects completely, and Finale Expansion is likely going to be the last game you'll play with any of my personal involvement in it. But this won't be an all too depressing post [in fact, im sure there are some people out there who will be glad to hear about this].

Instead I want to share my thoughts on all the projects I've made over the last nearly ten years and share some insights and interesting information about them just for fun. Since I'd hate to leave you with nothing.

So here's an interesting fact that very few probably know: Bonnie's Debauchery Simulator was in fact NOT my first fnafb game. I made one before that titled "Springtrap's Debauchery and Marriage Adventure" or something like that. The game has been completely lost to time and afaik nobody has a copy of it anymore. If miraculously someone out there DOES still have it, I'd like to know so I could upload it here for archival purposes. The game was about as bad as you'd probably expect from a developer with absolutely zero experience in rpg maker. RegretTourmaline's GFDS 1986 game is what personally inspired me to make my own fnafb games. It was just about springtrap walking around some random house with no walls, fighting random characters and then the game ends.

Bonnie's Debauchery Simulator I made in about two months time. The first act I managed to do really fast, because a massive rain storm hit my town and school was closed for weeks because of it at the time. So I was able to learn and get a lot of developing in there. I cringe so much about the things I put in, but really it's just a game that you can tell was a product of its' time. You don't really get fnafb games like BDS anymore, and I learned SO MUCH from making that game. Even though it is absolutely awful, I don't really regret making it. [And Re-Amped shaped up to pretty much be a 100% improvement, if we ever finish it]. God forbid that game released today, it'd be slammed to the ground so fast.

After that was another cancelled game of mine, Frooby's Acronical Excursion. [Yes I was the one who came up with that term]. The game was about Frooby having summons and Ass from GFDS 1986 being the main characters, with Frisk having some god awful TTS voice work and being the shop keeper, and it was filled with undertale references. The game was planned to be a "what-if" sequel to BDS Act 2, but I worked on it for a few weeks and got bored with it. It had a bunch of stuff ripped right out of Persono too. Another game that I had once uploaded but took it down and as far as I know, is completely lost. There is still a video of it on my youtube channel.

Phantom's Apparition is probably my least talked about game, and I just sum that up to it being pretty forgettable and just "okay" across the board. I did consider remaking it after EVE released, and even got as far as getting the maps remade and a few of the story bits redone and new balancing, but I lost motivation shortly after. It is one of the few games with a decent take on the crafting system, and it set a lot of precedents I'd end up using in later games and projects of mine. I pretty much made it because at the time there wasn't really any fangames about the Phantoms, and I wanted to try my own take on it. I don't really have strong feelings about it.

After that was the tragedy that was the original FAE, i'd really rather not talk about it. I did the 1972 part of the game, and the game quickly collapsed after the other developers had no idea what they were doing and communication between everyone was poor. I think if there's anything I regret doing the most, it's probably being involved with this project specifically. Big props to MSFan for finishing it though, mad respect.

Plushtrap's Parlous Potomania was made for a jam that was hosted on the fnafb reddit, and the game had to be made in a month or less. Fun fact, I won the entry by process of elimination, because I was the only person who entered the jam.

It's pretty funny and it was also really fun to make. We got infamous bugs like the double toy bonnie glitch [which Im never patching out because its so iconic] and there's some old final mix style jank mixed with the game just being simple fun. It's the kind where you can kinda just turn your brain off and enjoy the experience without worrying so much. I'd change a lot about the game if I could go back to it today, but it's still a good experience for many in my eyes. By the way, the playable characters were chosen based off a random roulette wheel I found online with every fnaf character on it at the time.

And then we get to Ennard's Valiant Expedition, a game I spent over 4 years of time working on. It wasn't quite that long of pure dev time.... Axel and I had a few falling-outs over the course of it and the game was put on hiatus for a long period of time after we released the first demo of it years ago. It's a miracle we ever got that game finished. With that being said, EVE was a great success!

I'd say 95% of the people who have played it absolutely love it. I do know there's a small subset of people who don't look at it as fondly, which is fine. Part of being a developer is understanding not everyone is going to like what you do. But that's despite the fact that I took a lot of risks with the game and it all turned out pretty good. I do have a few regrets or changes I'd like to make, primarily with some character choices and the story, but it's nothing so drastic that I'd actually go back and change them at this point. The comments on the game page say it all for me, and I just want to say the support has absolutely blown me away. Seriously, thank you so much.

For EVE's premise, I wanted to try a more serious story. I've always enjoyed darker plotlines in rpg games and wanted to try that for EVE while balancing it with the more wacky sense of the series we've all come to like. I think the game does a pretty good balance of the classic fnafb shenanigans while still maintaining a serious story decently well. The game did NOT start anywhere near the scale it ended up turning into, I just kept adding more and more because I wanted it to be a game that I could look back on years from now and still be proud of it. And I think I managed to finally reach that goal after so long. So here's some fun facts about the game!

1. If I was ever gonna go back and do a "final mix" rendition of EVE, I'd probably add a crafting system so that you'd have even more tools at your disposal. EVE has by far the best take on the elemental system and the vast equipment options available to you, and I love the type of gameplay it offers. I learned a lot from doing it in PA and I think translating it to this would make it feel even more fleshed out, although I understand the caveat that it could make an already extremely long game even more grindy.

2. Lefty was cut as a party member. For those who remember, Lefty was a playable character in the very first playable build of the game, but he was removed due to story changes.

3. In Night 3, the Abyss League that appeared in Burno's Blazing Quest was originally going to be here instead, before Axel repurposed it for his own game. Thinking about it now, I'm very much *glad* this happened, because I despise most of the Abyss characters, and that bunch is the sole reason I wanted to completely rewrite Gridchouli's character from how she had been done from Grand's games.

4. My favorite character to write was Lolbit. I think she's gotta be one of my favorite fnafb characters ever, even. She's just a really fun character. I really enjoyed writing Grid too. I think I did a really good job of redeeming her character, considering I despised the Abyss version of her.

5. Phantom Puppet instead of Void Alice was going to be a party member in the Bad Route of the game. Yeah, pretty much what it says on the tin, nothing more to say.

6. The entire Satori scenario was inspired by Touhou Mother, an earthbound style rpg but with Touhou characters. Highly recommend it btw.

7. I had plans to do a potential boss rush in the end game in the bonus room, but I couldn't ever find the motivation to really do it. Some bosses include the OG Jetstream Sam fight, where he got his 50% counter chance back and buffed with end game stats, and the Devourer of Gods getting its own proper boss fight. It would've been formatted in the "No Impossible" style, and you could've chosen any character from that route in the game to get a party and fight the bosses. The reward would've likely just been insane trinkets and weapons that would've made NG+ trivial in every regard.

8. When you collected all the keys for the Uranus celestial, there would've been a boss fight with a Regi superboss. You can actually find the battler in the files if you check the folder for it. I ended up cutting it because I just wanted the game released at the time and didn't feel like programming and setting up another boss fight.

And that's all I can think of at the moment. Maybe I'll add more later, I dunno.

With all that being said, I just want to say thank YOU for playing these silly things I've been making for such a long time. The support has kept me going for a very long time, and I appreciate all of you, even those who may not even like my entries, the feedback is always appreciated. Special shoutout to @AxelLino126 I could not have ever finished EVE, and many other games without his feedback, testing, and help. Seriously, show him some love too. He's a very talented dev who is currently undergoing motivation issues just like me, but I don't believe he's quite ready to throw the towel in just yet. I've known him since I started making games too. I really really value him as a friend.

Thanks for being with me for nearly a decade, the 10th anniversary of FNaFb will be very fun, and we're doing a bunch of events on the discord server soon.

Please take care of yourselves. I hope my games can serve as an inspiration for others to just do what you want and have fun with what you want. But also in the hopes that one day you'll be able to look at your projects and be proud of what you made, because I was finally able to accomplish that for myself. Thank you. All the fanart, fan projects of my stuff, praise, criticism, all of it means so much to me. I won't be abandoning the community, but I won't be making fan projects anymore myself.

Take care of yourselves and stay safe.