Okay, the Unreal Engine4 part first, because I’m super excited about that and could hardly sleep thinking about it. Epic Games just announced their public licensing terms for UE4 yesterday.

“If you need C++ source code, the steps are: 1) create an account at unrealengine.com (you have to do this anyway to download the engine), 2) submit payment, 3) download and install the engine, 4) create a GitHub account, 5) link your GitHub account with your unrealengine.com credentials (see here), 6) access the source code from github.com/epicgames. Once you reach this step, you can fork the code and make any changes to Unreal Engine 4 imaginable!”

In lamens terms, this means I can really program anything I want with UE4.  I get the entirety of the code. I can change the rendering pipeline. I can change the tools. I can create a system to procedurally make maps from data fed from the server. I can stream data from the server instead of requiring a big initial install. So on and so forth, whatever is needed I can do without limitations. I don’t need to create all the basic parts of an engine from scratch, I just have to add the MMO parts.

Unreal Engine had an “indie” version of their engine called Unreal Development Kit. There are no MMOs on that engine, but there were many MMOs on Unreal Engine 2 and 3 like TERA, Ragnarok Online, Lineage 2, and some others.
Why?
UE is not suited for MMOs “as is”. It only supports up to 64 players in multiplayer. It needs an entirely newly written server (like the one I have been working on for LEWD), with client netcode to match. It is not suited to making massive environments. Multiple maps need to be stitched together, which it has no means of doing. Besides being expensive, you just can’t do it without all the source code to modify the engine which required an expensive license.

But now, with UE4, they’re giving source code to even their most basic licensee. I’m getting something that publishers/developers previously had to spend hundreds of thousands of dollars up front for. I can modify it to make the LEWD sequel happen.

I was thinking I’d have to simply make my own engine. I could do that, but it’d take at least an extra year before I’d have anything to show.
Now I can probably be showing some real time rendered 3d tentacle fuckery within a few months.

The only issue may be their EULA. Their EULA does not state that you can’t use it for porn, but they can also change it any time. I’ve started to get in contact with them so I can clarify this and make sure I’m not going to have problems. Scarlet Blade, for example, is supposedly on a proprietary engine.

Now, as for when this is all going to come together? This second game, that is.

First things first, I’m finishing LEWD. I have to do that anyway, to get most of the features of the MMO server done, and to get some money coming in.
But, programming is something that can be fun to me. I love making new things. A lot of LEWD is going to be tough work that isn’t fun.  It’s just like any profession; artists can have lots of fun making art, but other times it can simply be work; writers can enjoy writing stories, and other times it’s work. When I need a break from the tougher work parts of making LEWD, that’s when I’ll switch over to 2LEWD for a weekend or week or so and then have some new things to show from that every now and then.
Once LEWD is “done”—well let me clarify, it may never be done; tons of content can still be added after I say it’s “done”, but that’s a point where I’ll rarely if ever need to write any code for it because the tools will have made it self-sufficient for content creators to keep adding content. Okay, once LEWD is “done”, that’s when I’ll start full time on 2LEWD
Well, it also depends on the support that’s there. This is all assuming that LEWD puts me in a place where I can work full time doing something that I want to do. If it doesn’t, well I just have to move on to something else, but I really want to make this happen.

Once I have just a bit of money from the LEWD Kickstarter, and the money is allocated to writers and such, what’s left over I’m going to start getting concept art and then 3D assets made along side making LEWD, so when I need a break I can start putting those in engine and showing off some neat things that’ll be coming.
This assumes it doesn’t just barely hit that 15k mark that’s the minimum to barely get LEWD made, but I feel/hope that that won’t be the case! I’m just sort of assuming people will want this and help spread the word, and get this going full steam ahead~

A thanks.

I also just want to say thanks.

I posted before that it was nice to see a sudden influx of 50 people a day registering.
Lots of people would leave a message in the chat saying that it looks nice, or that it’s promising, but far far fewer people were actually registering an account to follow it, and showing that they’re really interested in seeing it finished and move on to even better things.
There was a bump of 100 registered in one day, and still a steady 50 after that. It’s really great seeing more people show that they want to see this happen~
If this keeps up, getting 100 people a day that really want to see this happen, that’d be another 3000 a month from now and I see no reason why I wouldn’t be able to get some preliminary work started on 2LEWD right along side LEWD, getting the 3D MMORPG coming much sooner than it otherwise would.
If you know a way to spread the word, feel free to. There’s so many places to mention this game and the next one on, I can’t possibly figure out them all or post on them all. And telling your friends is one of the best way to spread the word~

Lastly, a few updates.

Game:
-Fixed traits not changing stats correctly. I think I made some new bugs with them, though. Ah well, that whole thing is getting recoded later.
-Fixed a bug with Zone chat not sending to the correct players.

-Added the current Zone the player is in their profile.
-Chat from the same Zone that you’re in now shows speach bubbles from where the person speaking is.
-Each argument in an Event’s functions can now host a chain of functions. There is also a “delay” function to have them recursively loop through with a delay.
I originally added this because I wanted to have bBot seem like something that was actually “there”, which would come back to you and trigger a new Event(scene). This required a delay for an Event triggering call.  But the delay is something that could be useful with a variety of server-side functions, so it’s part of a standard API instead of just for triggering Events.
GC pls don’t hate this.

Content:
I haven’t yet added the content that I added these new features for, but I should be doing that today or this weekend.