Attention: A Note of Transparency

Hello, everyone! Me again.

I know I've been quiet on this site for quite a while now, and well, there's no way else to put it. A LOT has happened in my personal life than it was 7 months ago when the last update for C.U.B.E. (v1.18.1) came out. Which makes this post even more important because I want to prove once again that yes, I am still alive (despite everything) and that yes, I am still very much interested in continuing to update C.U.B.E. on my free time, it's just that there hasn't been a whole lot of that. Let me explain.

1. Updates on C.U.B.E. have resumed, I just find myself having less and less time to dedicate on this particular project. The main reason is because before two weeks ago, for two straight months, I was involved in a DIFFERENT project that I poured my blood, sweat, tears and many 4 am work sessions into. Similar to how I was when first working on C.U.B.E., in fact - old habits die hard, except this time I don't have my parents to tell me to spend my life on something else or go to sleep at a semi-reasonable hour. Anyway, this project, which I can only describe as an 'interactive webcomic' in the same vein as Homestuck since I was VERY inspired by it, but with even more interactivity, became my entire life for two months. Though my Discord community will know that on a few occasions I tried to split my attention between C.U.B.E. and my webcomic, I ultimately put more than 95% of my attention toward my webcomic, which like C.U.B.E. was actually a school assignment. 

This assignment, which was due at the beginning of March, I just got the mark for back TODAY. If anyone was wondering, I got a perfect 100% (30/30) on that project - mostly because my professor gave us an option of three mediums to do the game art project in and I chose not one but two of the three mediums to work with, on a whim. She made it very clear that I went above and beyond, just from me asking questions about including additional features that weren't listed on the rubric, and left me a personal note praising my passion and dedication to my craft which genuinely means the world to me. I mean, my professor is an actual professional in the industry and she went out of her way to tell me she was HONOURED I had included her name in my silly game art project for her class. She had also asked me to showcase my interactive webcomic at my program's open house a couple of weeks ago, but I was busy that day. That invitation was given without her even knowing the full extent of what I was making - though I had shared the link to the page for C.U.B.E. earlier this term and my professor left a comment on that post saying that she was already extremely impressed with my work and that I should be proud. 

Anyway, in case it wasn't clear, I am IMMENSELY proud of myself right now, and it honestly feels like another form of vindication in addition to all the positive and constructive public feedback on C.U.B.E. in the past year. It's also so funny to me that I launched C.U.B.E. online out of spite for the disappointing mark I received for the school assignment version of it (v1.0!) and that's the reason I'm writing this right now. I'm going to be riding this wave of motivation for as long as I can, I promise you that. Which brings me to item number 2:

2. I'm seriously considering releasing my interactive webcomic on itch.io as well. It's called KeyQuest and I am so excited to continue working on it. It's a much different work of art than the one C.U.B.E. is; I created KeyQuest using a tool for choose-your-own-adventure stories called Twine and it includes original writing and on nearly every page there is original pixel art and animations all done by myself. It's a multilayered, multimedia experience, and I have no idea if I'll ever find the motivation to finish it as what I handed in for my assignment was just the fully completed and cohesive Chapter One. But I'm excited to show my newest creation off to the world just the same way I did with C.U.B.E. last year. I might not do that at all, or maybe I will, or I might only share it with my Discord community, who knows. The only way to find out is to join us! : ) (> https://discord.gg/cby8cESYmF)

3. In the last couple of months I have actually been working on small stuff for C.U.B.E., and I've been updating its page as well. A little time ago I changed the font colour so it wouldn't be painful white-text-on-black-background and instead a gray-text-on-black-background, and hopefully this post isn't too hard on the eyes. I also just added some impeccably spoiler-free screenshots. That's right, this is a puzzle game, so I'm not going to just give away the answer to any of the rooms. My dumb grade 12 teacher didn't understand THAT logic when he gave me that mark, insisting that I had to make it clear to the player what EXACTLY they needed to do. Man didn't even know what genre my game was because he assumed that it would be written all over the title page and didn't bother to read the proposal that HE made mandatory. I would bet good money that he didn't make it past the first room.

But I've been working on the actual game mechanics too. I just wanted to make that clear - a working save/load function included in the pause menu is in the works. You are no longer able to softlock yourself in the first room, in this latest version I'm working on. The next update might also come with the tiniest bit of renovation to one or more of the rooms. Most people will probably not notice any change in that particular manner. Yes, a speedrun timer is also still on my mind to include, along with many other suggested features from my community. That's not even to start with the list of quality-of-life fixes I haven't even started tackling yet. 

With finals season coming up scarily fast, this update for C.U.B.E. might not come until well into the summer (during which I have other classes), but I haven't given up on this passion project yet, and I'm definitely interested in expanding my portfolio in the near future. I just wanted to sign off by reiterating that I'm just a single person working with limited resources and I'm doing my best. A huge and sincere thank you to everyone who has supported me thus far, even if it's just dropping a view on my page once a month. I appreciate you all.