VSCS-II End of 2022 Update

Hey all, since 2022 is coming to a close and you may have noticed I changed the release date of the game to "2023" at the last minute, just wanted to post an update on the state of the game for anyone who was curious.

Also as a quick note: yep, I rebranded my itch page. "Skullbutton Interactive" 🏴‍☠️ is still just me, just Oliver. I don't have a dev team or a publisher or anything. I just didn't want to have my name on literally everything anymore.

On to the update:

The Short Version

• Development is going well, aiming to be in beta for January (ie: game is feature and story complete)
• VSCS-II won't be released until bugs are ironed out of beta builds (so no early-access), but release is slated for mid-2023. Think April-June depending on how many tweaks are required. Don't quote me on that.

Quick call-to-action: if you haven't done so, wishlisting the game on Steam and following me here on Itch helps me out a ton. Also, since a trailer is in the early stages, you can subscribe to my YouTube channel so you don't miss it when it's out.

"What have you been working on this whole time?"

Good question.

Here's a list of recent additions and work on the game in the past few months (which is by no means exhaustive):

• More story.  There are 17 planned chapters including a prologue and epilogue, and the first 15 have been written (and rewritten). Similarly, articles (VSCS-II's version of audio logs) are WIP but there's not much left to add.
• 30+ Steam achievements, plus rich presence
• Icon and UI overhaul, generally to make sure things don't look empty or all the same, and have that clunky-but-functional 80's feel.
• Systems rewrites to make things run faster and scale better. Hardcoded story stuff has also been removed so all elements of the story can be swapped out easily.
• A couple of minigames, plus extra secrets and achievements mostly for people who enjoyed the puzzles in VSCS-I. These have also been worked into a new "Easter egg hunt" for those who are observant.
• Bug fixes (so many big fixes). I had one recently where save files would multiply exponentially in size (they're usually small, but weren't after a few save/quit/load cycles). It's fixed now.
• New music by Roboplomat (their social media links are WIP), one of the few things in the game not done exclusively by me. They're great and I'm excited for you to hear them. Also new ambient tracks and SFX.
• Building on the previous point, early work on the game trailer is in progress. Currently in the concept phase; no footage recorded and music is WIP, also by Roboplomat.
• A trillion other tweaks and bugs and story elements that are invisible but I promise the game would be at least a little worse if they weren't there (ex: if the in-game VSCS-II is off, you used to be able to still see the mouse. But now you can't. Genius design.)

I started work full time this year (not as a game dev) so progress was slow at times while I found my footing there. I do post more frequent updates on my Twitter and Discord if you'd like to be more up-to-date, though. Now that the game's in the home-stretch (so to speak), things are moving a lot faster again, so hopefully you can expect more updates.

Expected Launch Date and Price

There are a few Steam-specific features (ex: tons of achievements, Steam rich presence) but yes, the game will still be released on Itch. Worth noting since I've had some folks ask:

• VSCS-II will not be playable in browser.
• VSCS-II will cost money (not a lot).

Both of these don't follow the trend of stuff I've made in the past, but are a consequence of the game just being that much bigger than past projects (after all, it's taken 2+ years to make). 

For price point, look to similar games like Hacknet and Emily is Away for the most likely regional pricing (ie: ~$10 USD or equivalent).

Post-Launch

I've floated the idea of mod support due to some interest, and so this might be added in a post-launch update with some mod tools, along with other minor fixes. The goal is to release the game in a state where I can theoretically not update it frequently aside from bug fixes, but we'll see. 

Thanks to you all as always for sticking around, and have a  great rest of 2022. As the game comes together, I'm starting to really look forward to everyone having a chance to play it in the new year.

Cheers,

Oliver @ SBI 🏴‍☠️