Happy Halloween! There’s a bunch of things I could blog about, but I figured I’d directly address the question I get asked most, and talk about how things are coming and what release is looking like. Here’s the current remaining to-do list (small and blurred for spoilers):

It’s a lot left to go, but it’s probably less than it looks like…? Maybe…?

• Page one has the biggest tasks — mainly the end credits sequence (lots of art!) and trying to make the game work with a greater variety of controllers. Other than that it’s mostly self-reminders to remove debug elements, so users can’t accidentally reset their achievements with the press of a button, for example.
• Page two is all the medium-priority stuff that needs to be done — balancing a few characters/weapons, fixing some bugs, writing all the extra dialogue, testing cloud saves and other Steam features, etc.
• Everything beyond is increasingly minor, and things I could ship without. Page three is a lot of polish or features I’d like to get in if I have the time — for instance, I’d like to indicate on the score screen if players set a new record, and store all the game’s text in an easily-editable file (in case someone wants to make a fan-translation or something.)
• Page four is more polish, but items at that point are things most people probably wouldn’t notice or care if they made it in… things that would add background detail to the world, but many will probably be more work than they’re worth and get cut.
• Page five is all things that would need to happen in order for replays to work, so those will probably be cut too.

So considering all that, you could mentally chop the last two pages off to get a realistic look at the work ahead! I’m keeping them around just in case I get time, though.

Even then, I’m gonna say Bleed 2 won’t be out by the end of the year. To anyone this disappoints: I’m very sorry. Back in August, end-of-year seemed like a potentially-hittable goal, and I guess technically it still is, but it doesn’t seem like a smart decision. Thanks to the MEGABOOTH and other events, I’ve been able to talk to a LOT of industry folks, and it’s apparently common knowledge that releasing in December is a kiss of death to an indie game (and it does make sense, with all the huge releases and massive sales going on.)

Accepting that: if I was going to release this year, it’d be in November, which would give me five weeks or less to solve all these issues, create all these assets, etc etc, as well as trying to hype up the release and get some kind of press attention, to say nothing of actually playtesting the game and responding to that feedback. I don’t even know if that’s all possible in that timeframe, and if it is, it would certainly come at a cost to both myself and the quality of my work.

So! Work continues, the game is coming along, but the release window shifts from the nebulous “Late 2016/Early 2017” to the slightly-less-nebulous “Early 2017”! I hope I’ve been clear as to why, and hope anyone waiting for the game can be patient just a little longer! I will continue to do my best to get it out as soon as possible in its best possible form. Thank you for your understanding.