Devlog - 10/23/23 - Entangled 0.8.9.6

>The past year has been turbulent, to say the least, haha. Long story short, health issues prevented a lot of things from happening, namely the amount of work I was able to do, and the amount of work I was able to pay my team for. Development beyond my own capabilities has essentially been on pause as I try to bring things back to stability, but I still wanted to have something to show this year.

>So! Getting into the meat of the update, the most noticeable change is the graphics. They creep ever closer to finalized, receiving some much-needed polish and variation compared to the previous update.

>The enemy AI has also received a massive update, now able to not only actually patrol between waypoints on specified maps, but also with much more sophisticated chasing programming, thanks to team member RCXGaming.

>I've also implemented in this update a preview for accessibility settings. In the options menu, players can now choose to show visual indicators for sound effects, including locking and unlocking doors, as well as The Girl's footsteps. It's still a very early and rudimentary work in progress, but it's important that our game be accessible to as many players as possible, and while I figure out if things like color blindness settings are even possible to implement in-engine, settings for hard-of-hearing players is as good a place to start as any.

>And finally, arguably the biggest change necessary to make Entangled entirely a stand-alone program, the RTP is no longer required for the game to run! All necessary files are included in the .exe, and while it has increased the file size a bit, the game itself is available to a much wider audience than before, with less setup before starting!

>The demo unfortunately needed to have some stuff cut out of it compared to the previous update -- the mansion and wolf chase are still undergoing redesigns, and the demo ends upon exiting the lodge -- but I think it's in a much more stable, cohesive state than it was before, and I hope players can have fun with what's there regardless!

>Thank you for playing Entangled, I'll see you all again when the next update drops!