I say "potential" there because I'd like to know how much support studio Virtuos is "helping." I keep hearing, though, how Konami is "making" such wonderful games currently, and dammit, they're not making anything.
- Did you like the Silent Hill 2 remake? That's due to the efforts of Bloober Team - and, of course, the extraordinary original work from Team Silent.
- Did you enjoy the Castlevania campaign in Vampire Survivors? That's all on Poncle.
- The upcoming Silent Hill f? Ryukishi and NeoBards.
- The DbD Castlevania DLC? Behaviour. The Dead Cells DLC? Motion Twin.
It's not Konami that's doing a highly-acclaimed job; it's the individual development studios. Konami's involvement has so far been limited to signing development deals to get checks; they would've been happy to publish pachinko-level no-effort projects for all eternity if it brought them money. Recent Konami projects have earned acclaim only because the studios actually producing the games have, evidently, truly cared about the franchises with which they've been entrusted.
I'm glad, in a way, that Konami's foundational franchises are getting new installments that many fans are enjoying (though I do have misgivings about how they're still, ultimately, being farmed out to hired hands, and I think Silent Hill 1–4 represent an artistic achievement that cannot be divorced from the games' creators). The "Konami did it all" revisionism, though, erases who's doing the actual work here - and let's not forget Konami has a hell of a lot of red in its ledger with the abysmal way they for years treated the creators who made their fortune and the IPs in their care.
Update: I've finished a huge chunk of love interest text that had been taking up my time for a while now and composes about 1/4 of the script. This puts me into new territory that should be less time-consuming—the love interest text requires more effort, as it's characterization-heavy and phrasing is important. Other text (descriptions of items, interface text, etc.) goes more quickly - though even this text, in this version of the game, has a degree of nuance in how it expresses the differences between the two protagonists through differences in their narration. But I should be in easier territory.
I have to go back and edit some lines that ran into organization problems in the switch to a new text-management system (this is actually way overdue; my apologies, particularly to those on the team). I also have to edit some text that got scrambled in some attempts to help me that didn't pan out. I haven't taken an inventory yet, but I should be past the halfway point once these re-edits are sorted.
That's where I am: making progress. I wanted to be beyond midway by this point, obviously, but it feels healthy to be making good, steady progress for a sustained period, as opposed to trying to make progress and being beset by personal disasters.
Hey, how *are* those personal disasters coming?: Paused, so far as my involvement. I had to step away from the primary ongoing problem due to unexpected issues stemming from an illness. I expect how it shakes out, though, will upend my housing situation, but that should be down the road. I will hopefully be done with the project by then.
I'm going through a personal crisis at the moment involving an ill family member and the threatened meltdown of everything in my life. The situation has improved since I last wrote, but I don't quite have the time I want to dedicate to this piece. Therefore: I'm going to put this together as well as I can before the July 31 1.0 release date, but I may go back and refine this after posting - for better phrasing; the current version, though inelegant, does reflect what how I feel about Cook Serve Forever.
In brief: I don't think this is a wholly-successful game. I think there are elements that are very strong, that I really like, that do not deserve to be dismissed. There are ways in which this game demonstrates how much Vertigo Games has grown as a developer. I like its attitude and what it's trying to say, and I think we could use more games with a similar mindset in the world. I also think there are gameplay decisions - and it's the gameplay that, ultimately, is the problem here - that detract from what one searches for in a Cook, Serve, Delicious game, and while the game underwent an overhaul to address some of those issues, the fixes introduce new problems, and some of what I feel are the basic issues remain unresolved.
I also think that the choices made in regard to the denouement, while gutsy and thematically-coherent, may be too big an ask for an audience when paired with the gameplay challenges. I may feel differently on that later. I will say: this isn't a timid game.
The complete review's below, bookmarked by section for convenience.
I have a family member who's in the hospital for an infected vertebra. The condition might have long-term implications for his mobility, as the pain during the infection, until the antibiotics take hold, is (and, prior to a correct diagnosis, had been for a good while) keeping him from walking and, combined with other conditions, affecting the muscle mass in his legs. This is causing multiple crises on my end—personally, financially, and, given the resources required to take care of the matter, likely professionally as well. This is, needless to say, impeding progress on the project on my part.
(Very obviously, I am not the person suffering the worst from this, but you're here for updates on the project.)
I'm very sorry. When I started these updates, my intention wasn't for them to be a series of delays for increasingly melodramatic reasons. This has been, without exaggeration, quite possibly the single worst day of my life, so I can only offer the comfort that this isn't fun for me, either. I will finish this project if it is the last thing I do, but there are going to be some bumps in the road as I try to find a new normal here.
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