SALUTATIONS!!!
Welcome to the first seasonal FOUNTAINTALE Newsletter!
It’s the end of summer! If you live in the Northern Hemisphere, that is.
The last few months have been very productive, so let's get straight into the news!
Progress has been going smoothly! We have shifted focus onto map-making as of now, utilizing the assets we already have done to make all of the game's rooms while the artist team makes the tiles and props for the missing areas.
Once all that work is done, we'll work on the cutscenes and polish the puzzles aiming for a more intuitive/cinematic look!
We already have most of the puzzles ready to go, with a few exceptions related to Stage Hazards that we may or may not remove.
Finally, once that part is done, we'll start work on the boss battles, of which there are 7 in total.
We have also finished a good portion of our Soundtrack, with only 2 songs left to go!
As the time of writing this (9-04-25)
The total amount of progress done is...35%!!!
About a third of the game!!!!
With this said, let's discuss something important for the future of our team and project.
Since the last progress update on March, DELTARUNE Chapters 3&4 have released and the experience has changed the way I view this project.
Ever since the first rewrite in 2023, we already knew that we would have to create an entire alternative universe with our own laws and mechanics to avoid being completely negated by DELTARUNE's full release.
This renders story changes and canon compliance as unnecessary, which is very good! We even predicted a thing or two...
The only exception is the addition of a few songs to replace ones we re-used from DELTARUNE, more specifically "The Door" and "The Chase," as they have motifs that are linked to something that won't be featured in FOUNTAINTALE, and will be replaced with original songs that fit our intentions more.
However, playing through Chapters 3 and 4 has made me see all these years of this project's development through a different lens.
Thinking about the community that blossomed, the friends I've made, and the projects that I worked on for years, it made me realize that FOUNTAINTALE has morphed into a love letter of sorts; One dedicated to UNDERTALE, to the first two chapters of DELTARUNE, and to the general fangame community.
So many people have contributed to this project over the years, and soon enough their efforts shall make this game a reality.
A huge challenge we've had to deal with this year has been managing the team while managing my personal life and the lives of core team members, which lead to some huge bumps throughout development. Jobs, personal projects, family issues, moving out, college...
Making a Fangame is a hard and slow process in its nature. When doing unpaid, voluntary work for a non-profit final result done purely out of passion and love for the original game, issues like these are to be expected.
As an example, one of the issues I've had to face recently was an injury I've received due to a personal issue. It left me unable to lead the team properly and we went without any progress for a few weeks.
It's a very challenging process, but as we go on, all of us get more experienced in how to work with each other, and the whole process gets easier.
We've set an internal deadline on ourselves as a way to speed things up, if things go well we could even set a public release date soon! But, that's a story for time to tell...
Yes, you read that right. Comics. With an S.
Misty has finished sketching all 11 pages of Stella's prequel and she's already working on rendering them. It is a very time consuming task, especially when it's paired with her studies, but she's doing it at a nice weekly pace!
I won't commit the same mistake and promise a deadline that we might not be able to meet, but I heavily doubt it will take too long, so stay tuned!
Meanwhile, the next comic is already being storyboarded! With a story written by Rosaic and visuals brought to life by L1zard.
Can you guess what it will be about?
This month's interview is with THE SUPER 3 CHIPS!!!
Billian Deckster is also here.
Thanks for reading! Me and the team are excited to keep working on this project.
It's been a blast to make a story come to life, I'm very excited to see the reactions of people experiencing our project.
See you in Autumn, ciao!!!
