It’s been a few weeks now since Fred’s kickstarter update and the release of the Visual Novel Pencil Test to beta testers. The Pencil Test has had 132 downloads so far per the torrent tracker, and 33 of y’all took the time to provide us with feedback on the beta forum. Thank you very much for your help.

To summarize the feedback… In general, people really liked it. They thought the ‘slow animation’ approach was worth the extra time and effort. They liked the word bubbles, though a few suggested keeping the traditional visual novel text box as an option. There was welcome criticism over spelling errors, too many ellipses, and a few other issues. And going forward, they recommended that we prioritize extending the Piro canon route over working on branches or coloring.

We all wish the Visual Novel were coming faster, but it feels great that people like what we have so far. It certainly lifted Fred’s spirits, and he’s eager to get back to work on it.

Over the last few weeks though, Fred has moved forward on some of the other projects he has on his plate. One of those things was finishing the artwork for parts 2 and 3 of the omake kinetic novel. The omake has taken much more work than Fred had originally thought, and if he had to do it over again, he would have probably done it as a regular comic instead. But he’s mostly through it now. He has a bit more assembly work to do, but part 2 should be out very soon. There will be a part 4, and then it will be on to chapter 12 of the comic.

Fred has put some of the original arts for the omake characters and backgrounds up for sale on the megagear site. Above, you can see the GroundBeard, which is the Inn and Tavern that is owned by Sunay (Mugi’s Endgames character).

You can read more about the GroundBeard and Sunay in Chemi’s latest Endgames book, which is now available in print or for kindle from Amazon or for the nook from Barnes and Noble.

Fred will be at Youmacon again at the end of October and has been asked to do the artwork for the staff tshirts and a few other con-related things. If you’re in the Detroit area, stop by and say Hi.

Fred has a new blanket in the works. This is an updated version of the old Kimiko ‘Sad Girl in Snow’ blanket. Sadly, the mill that made the original Kimiko and Miho blankets has closed, but this new blanket will be much like the Mugi blanket from earlier this year, which was very nice and good sized at 50×68 inches. Fred is waiting on a sample from the manufacturer, but he hopes to have it up for pre-order soon and thinks it should ship in time for xmas.

And finally, Fred started roughing out the next section of his B-comic, Warmth, where the plot appears to be thickening.

As always, you can watch Fred work on the Visual Novel and other projects by tuning in to his Twitch livedraws. Sorry the visual novel is taking so long. Thank you very much for your support and your patience.