Hi folks! This will be a large post, with a review of the work we’ve done in the last almost two months and a more detailed introduction to our new game. But first things first.

In the first half of June, we released a Luna in the Tavern update with three new scenes. It looks like you enjoyed this titjob-centric update - we worked hard on it! Next on the list was releasing the new game, Luna: Dirty Deeds (play here!), and we fully intended to release it before the end of June, and a new Tavern update after that. As you can see, things didn’t go according to plan. Releasing a new game, even using the previous one’s base, is not releasing a new update, and it took a lot more effort than we originally estimated.

I’ve mentioned before that the idea for Luna: Dirty Deeds was born after watching some Dota matches. This is the story of a reporter/caster at the world championship, shining a new light on familiar moments from your favorite MOBA. But I also tried to structure the plot in such a way that even people not very familiar with Dota could enjoy it. I wrote the script and showed it to DJComps, who agreed to collaborate with us on this project. We never intended to make it a full game running in parallel with the main, but we were nonetheless serious about its development. I quite like the format of a small visual novel with a mostly-linear storyline with no serious mechanics, so I knew immediately we’d be doing something similar. My main reference was Akabur’s Mating Season - I’m still astonished by how he managed to stretch 1 main sprite with edits into 5-6 scenes - and it was my guide for the format and pacing. Since DJComps also does commissions and runs his Patreon, we agreed on the amount of content he would produce for our collaboration in advance.

I had the idea of presenting in-game events in two ways. The first is the usual visual novel narrative - scenes like the ones you’ve seen in Luna in the Tavern. The scene just happens, with no special qualities besides its contents. The second is voyeuristic play… broadly speaking. The player can see the same events from a different angle and interpreted in a different way. It was an idea that stuck with me, since the players can get more content and we wouldn’t increase the volume of art we were going to commission too much. But during testing we realized that the second way isn’t nearly as interesting as it seemed in my head or even after writing the script. Then I had the idea to add an entire new layer of plot. You could call it Stream POV - it’s not just peeking at someone, but as if you’re watching a stream. After more testing, we knew it was the right idea. The plot gained a new luster, and it just fit well into the theme of broadcasting the events of the world championship.

But for the idea to work well and for the players to have fun, we had to completely rework the game’s visual framework. Creating a UI might seem trivial to some, but there are many technical decisions under the hood of our new interface. I’ve already showed off the stream visuals on Patreon and Discord, but we wanted to make it into more than just decoration - a fully-fledged part of the game with clickable interface elements, its own text scrolling, references to mainstream streaming platform design and no screen space waste. Optimizing all of that was what took us so long. In the end, it doesn’t exist in a vacuum - it’s added to the engine of Luna in the Tavern. While working on expanding it, Flamie fixed dozens of bugs she didn’t have time for before, including a rare skip text button bug! Also, we’ve heard your feedback and so we want to test a new save system. It’s like a profile you might see in other games - it has an autosave and save slots. All of that is inside a pretty interface with all the right features like creating, deleting and so on. You’ll like it.

Luna: Dirty Deeds is fully planned out. There will be enough content for a chapter of Luna in the Tavern. Considering the smaller scope, we saw that there was no point in restricting saving and text skipping to paid members. At the same time, we don’t have the resources to make a big exclusive scene for our most generous patrons, and even unlimited access to the gallery in a fairly linear game doesn’t feel very exciting. Considering all of that, we brainstormed some new ways to thank our patrons besides the usual early access, and we’ve come up with... super early access! The way it works is that Semi-Support and higher tier patrons will have access to some unique in-game content even after it enters public access. Every scene will have either extra content or an alternative version - we’ll listen to your feedback to see which one you prefer. After the game fully releases, however - that will take about half a year, give or take - alternative versions/extra content will become available for free to all players. If you’re short on funds or can’t donate to us on Patreon, don’t worry - after about half a year you’ll be able to play all the content we have planned right now. I would also like to pre-emptively respond to the argument that we cut already created content and hid it behind a paywall. That is not true. The entire script went through about 3 large iterations. We haven’t sacrificed anything to get extra or alternative content, it really is extra or alternative - it was added later.

And so, the plot will consist of six notable in-game moments, each telling you about Luna’s way of handling a specific task. In this first release, you’ll see two of them - picking heroes and laning phase - with two ways of finding out how Luna does it. Each new version, we’re going to add a new in-game moment. What is it? You can see it on our roadmap. While playing, you’ll see that you have three choices, similar to our main game. The first two are different ways of seeing the same events happen to Luna. Option three is currently a skip and placeholder option, but if you enjoy Luna: Dirty Deeds, we will add events dedicated to heroines from the other team after we release all the planned content. To be honest, I’ll have to convince DJComps somehow, since that will be outside the agreement we have. I’ll think of something!

Well then, happy new game release to you and to us! I hope you like this new take on familiar moments from Dota.