2020 has come to an end. It was a particular year for everyone, in which we had to adapt to a new situation that affected the entire world. Despite all this, we were able to carry out the development of "Bella Muerte" together with our team. We communicate online and work remotely.
The pandemic did not affect us negatively. Everything continued as planned. The only thing that prevented us, and unfortunately we could not achieve this year, were the voice recordings. We decided not to gather many people in the same space (for safety reasons). These meetings will be planned for next year.
We started the year with great enthusiasm and with a goal in mind: release the first demo, including the complete prologue and the first chapter.
Chapter 1 was almost finished by January. We had to polish a few issues and add two rooms (Erica's bedroom and the tool room).
The Demo of Bella Muerte arrived on PC on July 15th (with an Itch.io and Gamejolt page). A few days later, on July 23th, the Android version came out (on the Google Play Store).
We are amazed by the results the demo achieved. At this time, it has more than 590 downloads in total 😱. The Itch.io Twitter account also made a post about our game.
All the feedback we received from all of you help us a lot in polishing and creating a better experience for Bella Muerte. In fact, because of your comments, we tweak some little things from chapter one and replace them in an update (v0.1.1) that came out on July 23rd.
As for the rest of the development, we tell you some highlights:
- To create a more immersive feeling inside the house, we coded a system that makes the objects you interact stay in place even when you leave the room.
- We implemented and refine a save system for the game.
- The Camera ratios adapt to every screen size from every device.
- You can activate a "Smart Cursor" during the game. It changes its image and shows you when you can click, move, equip, talk, and more. Now it's easier to detect interactive objects around you.
- The house is getting bigger. You'll be able to explore the first floor in Chapter 2, so we've added a map that will make it easier to find your location in the house. It's not going to be available from the beginning, you will have to find it. The map will mark your current location, the side you are looking at, whether the doors are open or closed, and the name of each room.
- A lot of the rooms from the first floor were created and illustrated.
- We also created a system that allows you to make choices that affect the dialogue and later moments in the story.
- Talking about later moments in the story, the full script and some scenes for chapters 3, 4, 5, and 6 are in the way.
- Chapter 2 is almost finished. Only small illustrations, a room, and the voice recording are missing. Although the polishing and testing process can take some time.
At the end of the year, we can say that we accomplish our goals. We look forward to updating our demo in 2021 with the entirety of Chapter 2 while we continue working on the rest of the story.
We wish you a happy new year!