Raspberry Flavoured Popsicles

"If one of the editors makes a fact check and comes telling me they don't sell raspberry flavoured popsicles in Japan, I swear I am going to come to your houses at night and stab you."

Hello all, Silentcook here. It's again time for me to bore everybody to death, except maybe for the two persons or so which actually read my previous blogpost, by actually talking a bit about the tribulations of editing this time around.

So, those raspberry flavoured popsicles. That's an actual quote, if a dead one, from one of our writers. It serves as a decent example of the extremes you may have to reach when you're editing other people's stuff, and research rears its ugly head.

I have the (dubious) honor of being the medical advisor for KS; it was the main reason why I was allowed into the project in the first place. I imagine when you're writing about a schoolful of kids where most everyone is afflicted by some gruesome condition or other, you can get a little nervous about contemporary medicine, its advances and capabilities, and the possibility of screwing up something somewhere in the plot.

So it does make perfect sense to find a professional and ask questions about stuff you want to write; you'll get steered away from glaring mistakes at least, and a little feedback will provide verisimilitude to your work.

Now guess: what happens when you get the exalted position of head editor in a VN?

Right the first time. You get to go over everybody's writing with a fine sieve, getting paranoid about every single little detail.

Aside from doing common spelling and grammar corrections, rearrangement of sentences so that narration sounds better, occasional liaison duty between writers artists and directors, ghost writing for interstitial script, continuity checks, and other various odd jobs, you get to try being an everythingologist. Thank God for Internet search engines.

Unfortunately, not everything is documented, or at least not in a way that can be accessed easily. And some things you just don't think about, until someone wanders by and lets you know some tidbit of information.

Did you know, for example, that Americans smile for passport photos, while Europeans don't? Or that in some cities in Japan, you have to show proof that you have a free parking space before you can own a car? Would you think to look for this kind of information, without knowing it exists?

Yeah paranoia, feel free to get comfortable: we'll keep company for a while.

Oh, about those popsicles? I asked a friend who was travelling to Japan to buy one, AND BRING BACK THE WRAPPER. Our writer didn't follow through with his threat (yet), so I guess I'm in the clear for now.

Next time I'll prattle on about translation, I think. Now, those Act 3 scripts...

- Silentcook

April Fools: Katawa Shoujo Anime Officially Announced

As per the title, we've been discussing this matter with a certain animation studio for some time, and now with their green light can finally give some details as to what's been going on behind the scenes.

Although they do say a picture says a thousand words, so I'll just post one of the letters we've recieved first:

As you can see, we were contacted by Studio DEEN with an expression of interest in licensing Katawa Shoujo for distribution as an animation , which all in the project agreed to in fairly short measure. In the months of negotiation that followed, we worked out a licensing scheme that suited both our interests and production of the first character sheets and scriptment material began.

We were all suitably impressed with Studio DEEN's artistic quality and style, and with a minimum of fuss production began on a short pilot preview to be used as advertising material. While we do not currently have permission to distribute this, here are some still frames we've gained permission to show.

We hope you'll all be as excited as we are to see a Katawa Shoujo anime produced, and while we work both on the game and with Studio DEEN to assure the very best quality anime that can be made, we'll continue to provide our usual updates and announcements.

Thank you.

 - Suriko

Yuuko II: The Librarian Strikes Back

I could repeat what was said in the Emi upgrade blog post here, but that would be redundant, so I'll just keep it short. Produced by Kamifish, these new sprites wholly replace the Yuuko art from Act 1 and have a few tweaks to her character design in addition to higher quality art in order for her to better suit the other sprites in the game stylistically. Some on IRC may have seen this thanks to an accidental leak sneak preview given at the time.

We hope you enjoy her new look.

Aside from the new Yuuko sprites, progress on the game has been progressing smoothly. Lilly and Hanako's Act 2s are complete in terms of writing, art, and now direction, and so are now complete. Emi's Act 2 is very nearly in the same boat. In addition to this, new scenes and art are being produced as always.

 - Suriko

Edit: This is the last Act 1 character that will be recieving sprite changes.

500,000 Blog Hits

Just a little while ago, the KS development blog reached the 500,000 hit mark. We'd like to thank all our fans for their patience with us, and we all hope that you'll enjoy the full game. In the meantime, we'll continue trucking on and giving you any notable updates as they come.

In celebration of this occasion is an image drawn by me of my dear Lilly, providing ample proof of why I am her writer and not her artist. You can thank the rest of the development team who was on IRC at the time for this.

- Suriko

Happy Birthday, Lilly!

As February 7th is Lilly's birthday, here is a celebratory picture of Akira and Lilly, drawn by Weee.

There is also another announcement to make:

Pimmy, a talented fanartist many of you may have seen on the forums and on the Shimmie (and, for the attentive, the staff page of our website), has now joined the ranks of the developers as an artist. Congratulations, Pimmy.

Development of the game itself is still progressing, with scenes and CGs still being steadily produced and the paths directed. Once again, a big thank you goes out to all who are patiently waiting for the game's release.

 - Suriko

Are you ronesome tonight~♪

Not much to say about the KS development as usual (I am currently working on directing Lilly's Act 2, and if you think that this is any kind of progress indicator, you're wrong). But, there are a couple of other things worth mentioning that might be of interest to people not intimately familiar with what's going on.

Personas

Firefox 3.6 is out now (and if you're using Firefox, you should have gotten the update prompt by now), and with that, Personas have become standard. These are essentially wallpapers for your browser window chrome. Since they're easy to make, you can now now have your KS character of choice staring at you all the time. Cool, right? In fact it's not cool at all, but anyway, here they are:

Misha
Emi
Hanako
Lilly
Rin
Shizune
SD Girls

Rin is missing because her Persona contained the mural, hence boobies, hence it was not approved. (if you are curious or want to stick it to The Man by making your own, it looked like this). IT'S ART YOU PHILISTINES! I made a new one but it's stuck in the approval pipeline. Once it's through you'll find it along with the rest at my account page. There are also a couple of tweaks to the existing ones based on feedback submitted, but they'll hopefully have the same ID.

Dakimakura

In case you haven't been paying attention, there's been a trend in the KS fanartist scene to draw hug pillows. So far, pretty much every major character but Hanako has been (un)covered, a fact that amuses me to no end. Even though these are technically not unsafe for work, you'll probably not want to be caught looking at scantily clad disabled girls (or men) at work in any case, so proceed with caution. The exception to this is of course Lilly, which is not safe for work in any definition of the term.

by pimmy:
Misha
Emi
Rin
Shizune

by climatic:
Lilly (double NSFW)

by konflikti (DO NOT VIEW WHILE DRIVING OR OPERATING HEAVY MACHINERY):
Nomiya
Nurse

by VCR:
Hideaki

Twitter

We have a Twitter now, for things that are too unimportant, irrelevant or vapid to warrant a blog post. In case you don't like unimportant, irrelevant or vapid things... well, then you are probably not using Twitter anyway. If nothing else, it's a decent way to keep up with Mishimmie uploads. Also, in keeping with the theme of this post, it will be like you really have friends.
FOLLOW US ON TWITTER!

–delta

Happy New Year!

1990 was 20 years ago.