2025 recap and Roadmap 2026 (Patreon)

Happy new year everyone!

I hope this post finds you well and you have an incredible NY celebration. I won't keep you for long, but I wanted to make this post to recap the year and provide the roadmap for the next one, as well as give you a bit more transparency on the current goings on.

--------------Recapping 2025 -----------------

Oh boy, where to begin. You all know that I generally try to keep my personal life out of these posts and focus on Transylvania's development, but there are times where the two go hand in hand.

So, to address the elephant in the room - you've all seen it - it has been an incredibly challenging year for me, personally. I've had one matter after the next pop up, family emergencies, moving places, and just when one thing was stabilizing the next one came. I don't want to info dump everything for the world to see, but suffice to say that the year ended with me separating from one of my long term partners, which is also a partner that I have a child with. So here I am in December, moving, again, re-arranging my life and my living circumstances and trying to keep the project somewhat on track, despite the disruptions.

In the midst of all of this, there have been nonetheless important project milestones:

-Felicia got a whole new chunk of content and mechanics in chapter 2, combining interactive scenes and relationship choices;

-we got a new pixel artist on the team (GodLike), who is doing amazing things in reworking the UI and now creating animated splash art for every character in the journal;

-Mel and I started the World Companion, which is going to bring an interactive walkthrough as a separate thing, and next year be ported in the game as a map that gets updated as you progress through the story

-and of course, even on the months when my own work was disrupted, I've done my best to keep the artists busy - we are sitting on a lot of assets and ideas in varous stages of development - there is a rework of the Pool Game scenes with the Wolf, a brand new encounter with a magical plant in the garden, spanning from chapter 1 to chapter 3, as well as an overhaul of Elise's Lair Bad Ending with lots of new art and interactive scenes.

I have to admit that one of the difficulties of this year was also seeing the project suffer all these setbacks, having all the ideas and the team working on cool content and not being able to patch it in and really wrap up everything in a state that can be shared with the fans. All I can offer you is maximum transparency on the situation and a commitment to get things back on track as soon as possible.

I'm sure you will have questions, so I will try to pre-emptively address some of them below. If there's anything else you want to ask, you are more than welcome to do so in the comments.

Q: Is there any risk of the project being put on pause or suffering further disruptions in 2026?

-I can confidently say that work on the project will continue until its final completion. While the schedule may need to be occasionally adapted, there is NO risk of overall production halting or me giving up on development.

Q: Why not pause the Patreon in times of disruption?

-It is my assumption that everyone is here to support the project towards its final completion. While I deeply regret the skipped patches and production disruptions, I've done my best to funnel the available resources towards the various artists and in making cool things that will contribute to the final version being even more polished and an overall better experience.

With that being said, I certainly will not fault anyone for pausing temporarily and coming back later.

Q: What does this mean for the merch?

-There are currently delays in merch production shipping, but I'm expecting all orders to ship in January after I move (again) and can set up my stuff.

-------------------- ROADMAP 2026 -----------------------------

So, what does this all mean for 2026?

In a few days, I will be moving again, and living alone for a while. After living with 2 partners it will be a big change, but I'm optimistic that after an initial adjustment, I will have more time for myself, to rest and get back on track and just sit down and write.

My general plan for the project is as follows:

Jan - April: Finish the Chapter 2 rework, port in all the backlog of art and scenes, and wrap up all key plot points.

July - August: focus on introducing new story-wide content and polish, such as the World Map, the Journal Overhaul, the Plant encounter, and various other general improvements:

September - December: Resume writing the endings for Chapter 3 and continue doing this until all major endings are in place in early 2027.

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So, this is how things are currently looking up. As always, I will try to post regularly, to share progress, as well as surveys and other opportunities to hear your voice and steer things in the right direction.

For now, I will go and celebrate NY. I hope you are having an easier time and I thank you for sticking with me and the project through thick and thin. It means the world.

Much love,

Vincent