Dev Log #2: Alpha

01/19/2026 - 02/11/2026

It has been a pretty hectic few weeks to say the least, but Poorly Translated Raccoons has continued to meet our deadlines and hold ourselves accountable for the work that doesn’t get finished, resulting in it moving to our next sprint.

RECAP

First of all, I appreciate the feedback I got from my previous dev log -- there has been lots of crucial feedback and actionable advice that my team and I are able to reflect upon moving forward. 

One key takeaway was the recommendation to delve into more detail about how we intend to differ from the stereotypes and prejudices related to the stigma of drug users and addiction as a whole. When it came to figuring out our main character, we chose to pull from personal anecdotes rather than relying on characterizations of those shown in pre-existing media. On top of this, we have decided to showcase traits and attributes from our own team members to ensure that the character did not - even accidentally - get influenced by what we see (poorly) represented around us.

GAME DESIGN DOC

After receiving valuable feedback from our advisor throughout check-ins, I took on the responsibility of creating an overarching GDD that would hold onto all valuable information viewable at a glance, as opposed to the previously individualized (albeit detailed) documents. This has allowed me to maintain a live page that holds all of our high-level design decisions including - but not limited to - design pillars and our development timeline.

I have continued to keep this page up-to-date with recent developments such as the character profile of our protagonist’s partner who will be met within some sections of the game, as well as copying over the audio asset list from its own document (which itself was written by our lead sound designer), providing all team members with the necessary rundown in a compact and digestible way.

BURNDOWN CHARTS

As seen below, our team didn’t handle the sprint process entirely effectively, as we had either largely forgotten to transfer our tasks to the complete section, or the tasks were so big that they didn’t get done until the end of the sprint -- making it look like they hadn’t been touched at all until then. This resulted in the chart not accurately representing our workflow.

(Burndown chart Jan 22 - Jan 26)

In order to encourage us to pay more attention to the Jira board, we added more specificity to the tasks, that way we can knock them down like pegs (subtasks) rather than multi-hour dedications. This seems to have provided a bit more enlightenment than we expected to the amount of work we are distributing to each team member, giving too many tasks in some key areas. This time around, we have been a lot better at transitioning the work to the completed section, however due to the larger number of tasks, we still aren’t hitting the recommended guideline (as shown below).

(Burndown chart Jan 30 - Feb 5)

Our most recent burndown chart was another case of unfortunate timing and scheduling, as we have hit a very busy moment in our collective time. Because of this, regardless of whatever progress we are able to accomplish, chances are that we don’t get it moved to the complete section until much later. Additionally, we added more tasks for ourselves after some reconsideration - causing some upticks (as shown below).

(Burndown chart Feb 6 - Feb 10)

PLAYTEST REPORTS

During this Alpha period, we have also begun initial playtests to gather necessary information regarding our visual effects -- specifically attempting to figure out the best way we can accurately represent chronic pain to the player. As a team, we decided on our top three combinations of visual effects:

1. Vignette + Bloom + Chromatic Aberration
2. Vignette + Chromatic Aberration
3. Bloom + Chromatic Aberration

(In-game screenshot demonstrating the vignette + bloom + chromatic aberration visual effects)

I was able to gather effective feedback in these sessions, as there was a particular remark a tester made that stood out to me:

“I think the bloom and/or chromatic aberration should always be visible/lingering to some extent, because that would feel a bit more realistic since chronic pain doesn't fully disappear even on medication-- and then the vignette (and/or other effects increasing) would indicate the worsening symptoms”

So far, I have gathered varied opinions on the visual effects, so I am eager to see what kinds of responses the rest of my team gets.

In preparation for the official Alpha Playtesting, I was responsible for assembling the playtest form, and although it is still a work in progress (at the time of writing this), I have set the foundations for information we are wanting to dissect during these sessions - what is appreciated, confusing, and what is the priority as we move forward:

NARRATION

I was tasked with handling the narration that occurs in-game between memories. In doing so, I wanted to keep the text concise but detailed enough to effectively set-up the coming scene. This was a bit tricky, as I wanted to make the narration feel natural in the context of our character telling someone about her past while providing the necessary information to the player. Inspired by the other narrative lead, I wrote this in a way that makes it easy to translate into YarnSpinner, here’s an example of this:

Narration written in Microsoft Word

Narration implemented in Unity via YarnSpinner

CONCLUSION

Overall, this has been an incredibly stressful but quite productive stretch of sprints - that being said, I have learned some valuable information in the form of collaborative work processes and what it takes to deliver something functional.