We're nearing the end of the year now, which means Turnabout Creator is releasing soon! There are a few final things that I wanted to say before the game comes out. Unfortunately, not everything is good news, so let's get that bit out of the way first.

Slightly Less Than Everything

Unfortunately, various unforeseen events cropped up in my personal life over the past few months. As a result, I wasn't able to work on Turnabout Creator as much as I wanted to. That, in combination with my already lofty goals content-wise has led to a couple things not making it into the initial release.

The things being cut are the following:

• All characters not from AA1 (with the exception of a couple that are already finished)
• Any UI style other than the PW:AAT and AJ:AAT ones
• Investigations

I've gone over in the past about the character importing process, so there isn't really anything that needs to be added there.
In terms of the UI styles, while all of the textboxes themselves are in, the remaining UI elements are significantly more time consuming. I'm debating whether or not to allow for the text boxes, and just have them default to the PW:AAT UI until completed. It could be a good compromise, but it might be a bit jarring to see.
The biggest cut though, is to investigations. Even though investigations are fully functioning from a gameplay perspective, it's a different story on the editor side of things. Because of all the variability that comes with each investigation screen, it's proving difficult to find a way to make a clear UI for it. I think I've found a way to go about it though, so hopefully it won't be long until it makes it in?
I'm incredibly sorry about all this. Hopefully releasing the game like this is a better alternative to a sea of delays.

Sequence Organizer Complete!

Aside from what was previously stated, the sequence assembler is complete! This means that it's possible to create trials entirely within the editor. I don't think I've said exactly how the general workflow of the editor works, so I'll explain it here.

Editor Overview

The main screen you'll start at is the Sequence Organizer, where you can create various nodes. There are many types of nodes, but the one thing they all have in common is that they each have a sequence inside them. A sequence is a series of dialogue lines strung together. Should you want to edit a sequence, you'll be taken to the Sequence Editor.

Editing a sequence is fairly straightforward. You enter the dialogue you want to be displayed in the text field, and if there are things about the environment you want to change (character, background, etc.), then you click on the preview window to access those options.
After editing the sequence to your liking, you can go back to the Organizer and determine the flow of the sequences. As stated before, there are various types of nodes. Each type determines how the node is able to interact with other nodes. For example, a Normal or Testimony node only has one output, but a Choice Prompt node allows for up to four outputs.

And that's the general gist of it! Obviously it gets a bit more complicated once you add evidence into the mix, but at the end of the day it all boils down to linking nodes together.

Well, that's all from me until the 28th. I hope that you're still looking forward to it coming out despite what's being cut. I've said it before, but I have a Twitter and Bluesky account. I'm not very active on either, but if I do have anything smaller that I want to show off, I'll put it there.

Make sure to have a wonderful end of year celebration, and good luck!