Welcome, dear readers, to another bimonthly dev log ~<3 

With progress occurring on so many fronts at once, I'd like to take a break from the usual content-based subject matter of our dev logs to talk a little about our ongoing learning experiences when it comes to working with a growing community of beta readers!

Now admittedly, as a writer, I have worked with beta readers in the past. Many have been friends and acquaintances, but there has been the occasional stranger as well (particularly in the context of traditional publishing). In general, I have found the experience of receiving feedback on a static work (like a comic or prose story) to be radically different from receiving it on an evolving piece of interactive fiction.

I'd like to take some time now to reflect on those differences, and what growth may come of them. 

It's my hope that the following thoughts may prove interesting or useful to fellow writers in particular!

Here's a little about my personal learning experience so far:

1—Ongoing feedback (time permitting) on new versions as they arrive seems to work better than set timelines. 

This is one of those conclusions that only seems self-evident after the fact. 

TIS is currently in a stage where it is constantly evolving (while also maintaining a manageable scope of work for our very small team). Because the approach we've taken with the narrative emphasizes breadth and depth of  choice above overall length, this means a single playthrough of the first two chapters can yield as little as 10% of their playable scenes. 

Dialogue  in TIS plays less like a traditional branching path system, and more like a  rubik's cube. Player options were (and continue to be) developed with experimentation in mind. 

Not only do the available scenes and choices vary, but even the tone of the dialogue within individual scenes will shift depending on character relationships.

The result is that hard as we try, we can't possibly account for every possible variation of choices a single player will make, and the scenes they'll end up running into. 

Every playthrough is somewhat unique. 

This also means that player interpretations of the narrative and characters vary greatly depending on the choices they've made, and this is something we're already seeing with the feedback we've received so far! While similar things could be said of a more static story (as reader interpretations will always vary depending on what personal experiences they bring with them), it seems the added layer of how interactions in TIS are structured encourages even greater variability between player perspectives.

In practice, what this means is that we're constantly learning something new about how The Inverted Spire can be perceived!

However, it also means that when it comes to narrative design, we have a very daunting challenge ahead of us. One that may require key areas of the story to be reworked as development progresses. And that means we're going to have to keep reaching out for more feedback as the work continues (even when it comes to the evolution of the first two chapters).

We may never be able to account for the differing life experiences each player brings to the conversation, but we can do our best to manage the internal consistency of the narrative itself!

2—Different forms of feedback all have their advantages and disadvantages.

We offered our beta readers many different possibilities for how to provide feedback on The Inverted Spire,  and they have certainly taken advantage of the options!

Of those players who chose to provide a written response, we found stream-of-consciousness accounts especially insightful. They may be less organized than feedback forms or lists answering specific questions, but their wholistic overview of the experience consistently gave us a lot to think and talk about. 

Similar things could be said of recorded video, though we are still sorting through all the recordings we received so far! (in future, it might be a good idea for us to suggest a more consistent method of sharing and organizing video-based feedback).

We also had our group divided between a private Discord collecting multiple readers under one roof, and readers accessible only through email or one-on-one DMs. 

One significant advantage of the Discord group was being able to respond to questions quickly, and provide updates pretty casually, without the need to compose a lengthy email. However, these advantages were only relative. There were also times when composing a lengthier response at a comfortable pace seemed to work better. This proved especially true of more deeply involved lore-based questions, or when addressing a longer list of simultaneous bug reports (though we were ultimately happy with our beta readers choosing the method that worked best for them).

One particularly interesting method of feedback we hadn't anticipated involved a series of uploaded screenshots with descriptive titles. Personally, I thought this was a pretty cool idea, and may even be something to suggest to other beta readers going forward!

3—When met with such a variety of different perspectives, maintaining a strong, consistent (but not inflexible) internal vision is challenging, but important.

At the end of the day, The Inverted Spire is still a passion project. Most (if not all) of the difficult subject matter it touches upon has its basis in real-life challenges. 

The difficulty with trauma survivor narratives in particular is that no matter the trauma in question, no two are exactly the same. We realize that due to the nature of certain topics TIS explores, it is likely to provoke strong emotional reactions in certain players. Reactions that are informed by their own life story, just as the stories within TIS are informed by the experiences of its creators. 

This is, unfortunately, a risk that we were aware of from the outset. It's a risk that any story faces when approaching emotionally-challenging topics with some degree of realism in mind. 

The reality of the creation process is that we cannot represent the real-life experiences of every player in our depictions of these topics. 

For example, I can't deny that my personal views, which are grounded in a trauma-informed approach to restorative justice, do impact the storytelling and characterization in TIS (a little more on that here). These views may not be shared by all players. And even those who do share them may vary in their preferred application of the same ideas.

However, I would like to think that The Inverted Spire is a story that can bring comfort and catharsis to some, entertainment to others, and perhaps a little of both to many players in between. 

Despite its dark themes, it's a game that carries optimism and resilience in its heart.

I will likely continue to journal as I explore my own feelings around the feedback coming in. Much of what I write on these topics may be too personal to ever make it into a public blog post. But I believe the process of earnestly exploring my own anxieties—questions around depicting these themes and how they come across to others—has been tremendously helpful in maintaining a coherent vision of what TIS is looking to become.

4—People are pretty amazing!

Anxieties aside, it's been deeply heartwarming to receive so much enthusiastic feedback. 

Our beta readers have bravely waded through a marsh of  errors and inconsistencies! They've taken time out of their own busy creative lives to give us their earnest thoughts on everything from theories about the world of New Order, to their attitude towards individual characters, and even their hopes for the game's progress! 

And we've still got more thoughts rolling in!

The process of incorporating their feedback began from the very start of October, and we've been tirelessly fixing bugs, implementing quality-of-life improvements, and exploring new interaction options between characters ever since.

Our team may be small, but we try our hardest ~<3

Thank you again to everyone who has helped us so far, and everyone who is continuing to help us as we progress!

So what's next?

With development really picking up, it's becoming increasingly difficult to balance longer, more detailed dev logs with our present schedule. This means we will probably be prioritizing progress on the game for the near future.

Our next update for you is coming on October 31st.  It may be a little shorter than usual, but we'd still love to hear your thoughts, questions and suggestions for new topics to explore! 

See you soon~