#echo devlog

[naturalecho]

APRIL 2026

Hello, hello! Welcome to the April 2026 WMU progress update! Much like March, this month practically didn’t exist. It’s all a bit of a blur lol I don’t have much to say this time around, so I’ll focus on what you came here for: the update!!

HIGHS: Guess who finished the Cold Zone route? It was me. I did.

Well, mostly. There are still spots I need to edit and a few things I’m considering adding in, but it’s essentially wrapped!

I think my favorite thing about this chapter so far is that this is the first real opportunity for MC’s conflict type to shine depending on your choices! Not to mention the amount of layers. There’s the whole Makai mess, the revamped advantages, and now Marcel and Misty are disrupting the balance 🫣

I was playtesting Makai’s route earlier today and there are quite a few ways that can go 👀 Getting through this route was rough at first, and then it all started coming together, and now I love it. I hope you all will too!!

Now I can properly move onto the lodge routes. I’ll probably start with Dmitry first. I already drafted your first night sharing a bed and it’s…ya know?

And! In addition to having Misty and Marcel in the mix, you'll meet two more characters this chapter as well, one of whom has one of my favorite routes 🙂‍↕️ Can you guess who??? 👀

I also added more visual signals to the choices. Originally, I was planning to keep MC’s malice/helpful/messy choices hidden and have the consequences emerge later. But then I thought it might be jarring if you haven’t been paying attention and your MC suddenly says they don’t care about someone or refuses to apologize for a very intentional choice.

SO while you won’t be able to see the totals, you’ll be able to see which choices will earn you those points 😊

LOWS: Writing the Cold Zone route was a slog. I’m not even going to pretend it wasn’t.

I think a lot of it came down to stress in my real life and not feeling motivated or inspired to write the way I usually do by the time I get home. But also, this chapter, as I mentioned, has a lot of opportunities for conflict. The struggle this time was trying to address that when, like, half the cast is extremely conflict avoidant lol

It was a good opportunity to define the characters’ voices without having them fly off the handle, but man, it wasn’t easy getting there 😭

I think my biggest problem for this chapter has been deciding when to let MC’s locked-in choices come through versus letting YOU make choices in the moment. So far, I’ve been leaning into those application choices. And when I read it back, I’m pretty satisfied!

Still, the perfectionist in me thinks there’s more I can do, and that’s where things get tough. Because then I’ll hyper-fixate on a passage instead of making the progress I want to make.

I also think I'll need beta testers soon…

Anyways...

Last month I asked your opinions about chapter releases, and it seems like most of you prefer getting the full chapter when it’s ready.

Okay, heard. I’m aiming to release it this summer. What? No? Who said that? 👀

BYYYYYYEEEEE~

Current Total Word Count: 125K (approx. +45K words for ch.2)

[naturalecho]

MARCH 2026

Where tf did the month go? Hello? March is supposed to be the longest month ever. Does time not exist anymore???

This month was sooooooooooo busy! Work has been kicking my ass (for context, I lead a team of two...and now I'm flying solo until August…so…double the workload. Yaaay...) It’s also conference season this time of year for my line of work which means stresssssssss until the end of May 🙃 Still, writing every day is non-negotiable for me, even if it's just a little. If I don't, the day feels wasted. Don’t worry, though! I’m taking care of myself and making sure not to push myself too hard 🫡

Anyways, let’s catch you up!

HIGHS: I’ve been thinking about relationship statuses for a while now. For transparency, there are 8 of them: lover, anchor, platonic, wary, warming, rival, stranger, and dismissed. As I’ve been writing this chapter, there are certain…things that can happen where if you were platonic it might be kind of jarring in context. So I introduced something that lets me officially account for previous statuses. I'd been tracking them locally before, but this makes it so much easier to call whenever I want! It also opens the door for more flavor. If things were purely friendly and suddenly there's flirting, now the ROs and MC can actually acknowledge that shift. I already tried it in one scene, and it's just the subtlest little phrasing but I love it and it makes me smile~

Aside from all that, I've got a lot of scenes drafted and have a full road map for chapter 2! I just need to finish writing it all...which brings me to...

LOWS: I won’t lie; I haven’t gotten as far as I would’ve liked to in this chapter 🥲 I was hoping to have the Cold Zone route completely done by now, but I still have quite a bit to write. I haven't even officially touched the other routes yet 😭 Some days I write a ton; some days it’s only a couple hundred of words. Life has been life-ing. I did find something that allows me to block certain apps and websites so I can just write without distractions for a few hours. I'm trying to use it more often, but I think my mind's too noisy lately so it's admittedly been hard to focus.

The other thing I've been wrestling with is deciding which variables should exist and which shouldn't. I worry about bloating (and my own sanity 🫠) I want the game to be as customizable as possible, but I don't want to add variables just for the sake of having them. If I include a custom choice, it needs to mean something and get referenced enough to justify its existence (I'm looking at you multi-lingual choice set 👀)

So that's all for this month! I'm gonna keep trucking along, but I do have a release date in mind~ wish me luck 💗

BYYYYYYEEEEE~

Current Total Word Count: 115.35K (approx. +25K words for ch.2)

Actually wait! I have a question for you lovely people! When I read IFs, I find that I like when the full chapter is out (unless I'm absolutely hooked and can't wait 🤭) Still, I'm curious what you all think.

No promises on a schedule or anything! This is purely for research 😗

When it comes to chapter releases, which do you prefer?

I'm peckish. Release the chapter in multiple parts!

I want it fully cooked. Release the full chapter when it's done!

My hunger cannot be sated. Release multiple chapters at once!

I'm not picky. Release whatever makes sense!

Voting ended onApr 2

[naturalecho]

FEBRUARY 2026

This past month has been a time for celebration 🥳 Yall really showed up for the demo and I'm still sitting here like??? Thank you so much for all the love!! It genuinely means more than I can put into words. Knowing you had fun and that you want MORE? It’s motivating in the best way 💗

Alright, TO THE UPDATE.

HIGHS: Okay, so remember when I said I wasn’t going to do any major edits because I wanted to focus on finishing the story…? I technically lieddddddd

Taking some constructive feedback + a few things that were personally bugging me, I went back into ch. 1 and made some updates. I just kept re-reading it thinking, “what’s missing?” and eventually accepted that I needed to do this.

SO! First, I addressed the situation where MC is friends with certain ROs and promised to pick who their friend wanted. Based on feedback and after re-reading it again, it felt weird not to acknowledge it. So now, MC can mention it, and the friend should react accordingly.

Second, there are obviously MCs who haven’t built romantic connections, which makes the Cold Zone pretty much inevitable. I actually already have mechanics that can support that route...it's even briefly mentioned right before the ceremony if your MC hits that threshold! I just kind of forgot it existed in my excitement to publish the demo 😅 Anyways, there will be some extra text in place post-ceremony to make that path feel more intentional.

And lastly, because I am who I am…I CRAVED MORE DRAMAAAA

So I reworked the advantages; the upgraded versions are much spicier imo 😈 But you’ll have to wait to see exactly what I mean though~

I have a few other small tweaks I want to make in ch. 1, so these updates won't go live just yet; my top priority is still ch. 2!

LOWS: Expectation is both my biggest motivator and my worst enemy.

I’ve got my own standards for the quality of my work, and then there are the expectations I think everyone else has. You all have been so kind and excited and enthusiastic; I want to give you the same level of fun you had playing ch. 1. and I’d hate to let you all down, let alone myself 😭

There have been moments where I write thousands of words, reread it, and immediately think, “Ah this is shit, I hate this. They, too, will hate this” And then I scrap it, then rewrite it. And then I still wonder if it’s good enough!

For example, some characters’ scenes come so easily, and then there are ones I sit with for days and days and days…right now, that character is Makai lol HE’S PMO LIKE HE’S PISSED YOU OFF AND I’M TIREEEEDDD 😩 I’ve been on his first solo scene for a WEEK AND A HALF! I've lost count how many things I've cut and rewritten for him!

I want to build his arc carefully, and that means I can’t reveal everything too soon. At this point in the story, everyone’s only known each other for a day. So what level of emotional intimacy makes sense? How deep is too deep? Is it believable for him to say this? Does that line push things too far too fast? If he holds back, will it feel unsatisfying? How do I create something that feels meaningful without rushing him? How do I leave players curious, and even better, wanting to stick around with him? That’s the puzzle I’m currently sitting with.

*sigh* I just need to lock tf in

With that…MAKAI GET YOUR BITCH ASS OVER HERE! We are finishing this SCENE 😤

Catch you guys in the next update!

BYYYYYYEEEEE~

Current Total Word Count: 109.9K (approx. +18K words for ch.2)

[naturalecho]

JANUARY 2026

Hi all! Happy New Year!! December feels like it flew by and so many things happened. I’ve had a lot of friends and family visiting over the past couple of weeks which definitely slowed my work progress on WMU, so I had to make up for it with a couple of all-nighters to catch up. My introverted sensibilities simply cannot handle my new hosting responsibilities! But now, my apartment is blissfully silent, and I’m determined to reach my publishing deadline. Alright, let’s get into the update, shall we?

Highs: You’ll be pleased to know that the demo is essentially done! I've still got some editing and playtesting to do, though to make sure I didn't miss anything. I wanted to avoid putting an official release date in case I couldn’t honor it, but of course I have my own deadline in mind that I’ve been working toward. It happens to be the exact date that Warm Me Up starts filming. I’m still not telling you when that is though lol patience my friends! Just know that it is muuuuuch sooner than you think 😉 I shared a test file with one of my friends who's an interactive fiction newbie and always gives it to me straight, and she really liked it! She gave me some great feedback too, so I was able to edit a couple of things based on that.

This past month, I was finally able to fix the mobile version! When I tell you it was driving me INSANE! The back button wasn’t showing up, then it was peeking out from behind the passage, unclickable and taunting me 😒 then the setting buttons were overlapping and too small. It was a headache, but if I did everything correctly, you should be able to comfortably play on mobile (I hope) I also introduced a TON of new widgets that’ll help me update things easily as the story grows. They do increase the outcomes/branching by a lot, but ultimately, it'll give you more personalized story beats based on your stats and choices!

And the lows: You know, I mentioned last time that this is a variable-heavy game and that I have two trackers to stay organized. I think what’s most concerning is my own human error? My process is this: simultaneously write and code, and then, after I’ve finished a chapter, log all the variables, choices, and stat changes in my trackers and use the totals to determine/review stat thresholds. But I make mistakes! So when I’m trying to account for conditional statements and their thresholds, I find that at that point in the story, you might not see the flavor text because you haven’t hit those stat thresholds. Then I realize, oh wait, maybe you actually did, I just accidentally typed in a 1 instead of 2 or something in my tracker. Then I gotta go back and review it to make sure I’ve got it right. I either need to take my time and pay better attention or stop working into the wee hours of the morning…or both. Both is good lol

And that’s it! As always, if you’ve got questions, I’m happy to answer 💗

BYYYYYYEEEEE~

Current Word Count: 84.95K