Hello, dear spirits! 

Thank you so much to everyone who’s played the demo so far and shared feedback! We’ve already rolled out a small patch to address a few issues and refine the overall experience.

Below is an overview of what’s been updated and what we’re actively working on next.

Bug Fixes or Adjustments

• Corrected background in Zack’s Round 4: The background has been fixed from Alice’s mansion to the Suburban Park.

• Temporarily disabled key choice filter overlay: A visual filter was meant to indicate key choices during rounds, but due to a bug that could cause it to remain on screen permanently even in other character routes or Mary’s dinner, it has been removed for now. We’ll revisit this once it’s stable.
• Fixed clickable items in Ryder’s Round 4 appearing during pause menu In the scene that allowed Mary’s bedroom background items to be inspected, pausing the game would cause those items to overlap with the menu. This has been resolved.
• Audio balance adjustments: Default audio levels have been recalibrated so the music better matches the volume of the dialogue and other sound effects.

Writing, VO, SFX, & VFX Refinements in Ryder x Mary (Rounds 1-4) + Mary’s Dinner

• Writing: We refined dialogue for better flow, pacing, and character consistency.
• Voice-over and SFX edits: Sound effects (SFX) have been adjusted to better match the events, and character dialogue audio (voice-overs) has also been adjusted to capture the intended emotions better, including intentional silences, so it strengthens the impact of the scene rather than fills every moment with sound.
• VFX effects: The screen shake VFX caused the following dialogue line to disappear. We temporarily resolved that by adding a filler line: it’s skipped over in-game, but still shown in the dialogue log.

What We’re Working on Next

• Alice’s voice-over balance: (Sometimes) some of Alice’s lines currently play softer than other characters, so we’re working on normalizing her audio levels.
• Further VO & SFX refinement in other routes: Other routes and rounds (including RxM pre-finale, MxA, and MxZ) will receive the same voice-over and SFX refinement: recalibrating SFXs and removing or adjusting voice lines, which either feel unnecessary or overshadow the writing, to improve pacing and emotion.
• VFX fixes: We’re looking for another solution for the VFX screen shake issue. Some other VFXs (text shake) also work inconsistently, so we’re also looking into this.
• Steam Demo Preview: For the upcoming Steam demo, we’re planning to include a small teaser of Ryder’s POV!