1/3/2026, 1PM

Hello. It's been a bit, again. Time passes scarily fast when you aren't paying attention to it...

Scarred By Heaven Development

I've been taking a 'soft' break from working on Scarred By Heaven to relax a little after getting the Early Access version released, and to get my thoughts in order for the next parts of the story. 

I have been working on a small update that I'm hoping to release in the next few days, though, with some bug fixes, minor gameplay changes, and refurbished battle sprites for Sakiko!

As the protagonist, Saki was naturally the first character I attempted to sprite six years ago when I had little to no experience, and I think it was quite obvious. Even by the rough standards of the rest of my spritework, I think she looked pretty bad, and more importantly didn't have much personality in her look. I'd been putting off changing it given how much of an undertaking it would be...; but I decided I'd finally just bite the bullet.

For the most part, the differences are only super noticeable on the idle sprite and a handful of other ones, but I think they're a big improvement aesthetically, and look way more on-model to her design. Hopefully you do, as well.

Honestly, the most annoying part of the whole process will probably just be updating all the game's screenshots to use the new sprites, lol.

A Blue Spin-off...?

As a side note, I've also started working on another *much* smaller game as part of my 'break' from the main project. I won't share too much at the moment since it's still in a formative state, but it's a 'side story' set within the same city that SBH takes place in, and uses the same combat system. The events and characters of this story will have little to nothing to do with the main game other than the geography, though, so it's still a getaway from Sakiko's troubles, and it's been very refreshing to write for some new characters after all this time. 

Development-wise, it's been more like making a mod for the existing game than making a new one. It's nice not having to handle all of the boring boilerplate stuff in a project, for once.

Since it's still too early for me to want to settle on a title, I'll just refer to it as 'the blue game' for now, and will hopefully talk about it more in the future. Here's some early development screenshots, though. :)

Personal Notes

...But that's about it for today. Thank you for reading!

My personal life has been a little stressful lately. I've been forced into a position of leadership at my job, but I'm really not cut out to be bossing people around, and I'm worried it's making me into a monster...

In better news, I got a new drawing tablet with a display for my birthday the other day. I'm still getting the hang of it, but it's a big upgrade to the screenless one I've been using. Hopefully it gives me an incentive to draw for fun more often...!

These are some SBH-related drawings I did to test it out, a low quality Saki, and some design drafts for a character I haven't drawn much yet. Alternate outfits aren't fun to sprite, but are fun to draw, so I'd like to do more. 

...The only game I've played for the past two months (other than my own) has been 'Library of Ruina' after a friend persuaded me to try it, so I've had business attire on my mind. I'm not exactly sure what genre you'd call the game, but it's extremely fun. The 'boss rush' style of storytelling where you're constantly encountering and fighting new interesting characters is something I've always really enjoyed, and is done really well, though apparently I'm still only about halfway through.

But anyway, until next time.

- HSTopaz.