Checking in 0.20.0, Round 1

Hey y'all, my body is currently kicking my ass, so let's just get right into it.

My health has been bad for the last month. I got a stressful update about my CBS that's too early for me to get into as I'm in "wait and see" limbo with new medications, but this contributed to a stress ulcer, which then lead to me getting intestinal blockage that left me weak, feverish (which sucked extra hard as my AC has been on the fritz and I live in the South), and with severe abdominal pain. It's since resolved without requiring another hellish hospital trip like the one caused by some anti-nausea meds I took, but it took over two weeks for that to fully happen (and to be honest, it's more like I'm treating the symptoms of the stress ulcer through laxatives and softer foods than the cause of the stress ulcer itself).

I've gotten started on the update, but I've been getting as much done as possible to set myself on cruise control for the writing without having to go back and do things such as editing backgrounds, editing the art, or realizing I have a shoddy outline that I have to adjust in the middle of writing.

I can't show the HCGs in a public post as they are very not safe for work, but I can show some of the other work.

As this update focuses around Z and Keisuke reserving a smaller indoor pool for what is hopefully going to be the solution for Zoey's exercise, as it's kind of important for Zoey to cut their body fat as much as possible to reduce their breast size (or at least prevent them from getting larger) to reduce the strain from binding when Britney isn't around to build a better and safer binder, I need a few background specific to a pool.

I found this great poolside locker room background (notice the anti-slip mats), but it was a bit too blue and masculine for a women's locker room.

So, I changed the blue to the pink seen in one of the women's competition swimsuits and edited the floor texture (notice the slight reflection)...

To better match this shower area's since I'm planning on using it in this update after Z and Keisuke finish swimming (Keisuke is going to bring up how chlorine would really mess with Z's hair and skin and how they need to shower for that alone, regardless of the sex they had in the pool).

Speaking of that pool... I don't know if better options for this background existed back when I started the design documents and talking to the artists that I simply didn't find or if they got added to royalty-free background packs in the last year and a half since this scene's commissions started to be in the pipeline, but either way, given its prominent use in the CGs, I am locked in and have to use this background.

Except there's a big problem I somehow missed: There's not really any standing room.

So, I spend about 6 hours bashing my head against the wall to extend the background on the left side to give that standing room. It's not quite perfect, but the people in the way will hide a lot of the imperfections and this is the best I can do without just remaking the entire thing.

Of course, when explaining all this in an Author's Note block, I realized that it did have standing room! I wouldn't say those 6 hours were wasted as it's far more natural for these two to stand on the side of the pol instead of awkwardly standing around one of its corners, but it was a kind of silly oversight.

Like I mentioned, I can't show off the HCGs as that'd break Patreon's ToS, and I'm going to hold my cards somewhat close to my aching chest about the plot beats of the writing (I realized I probably spoiled the previous update a bit too much with its check-ins), but I should be on track to get this out the door in the middle of October? I was planning to make it by Oct 7th for the game's 5th anniversary, but I wasn't planning on getting as sick as I did last month.

Further complicating things is how sick I feel now at this moment of writing, as those hormones I'm stuck on are doing their thing again. I am so fucking out of it with nausea, exhaustion, gut+back pain, and brain fog I was just barely able to pull myself out of bed this morning to tell the long-overdue maintenance guy who was coming over to fix my AC (and other issues in my apartment) that he was going to have to come back later.

I really, really wish my body didn't keep deciding on a monthly basis to break down/make functioning so difficult, because not only does it throw wrenches in development in ways that I am still struggling to manage over 18 months later, but it utterly sucks to be trapped in bed with these feelings of uselessness and worthlessness and wishing it could just fucking stop.

I'm gonna get on an emotional rant if I keep typing (thanks for that too, hormones!), so I'm just going to stop here and reiterate that I am thinking hard about how to make the update as good as possible, I am working on the update, and I wish I was able to work on it even more, but alas, my health has other plans.