August Update

As of about an hour ago, Act 4 of Shadow of the Eagles is story-complete.

This was… a considerable amount of work. This Act 4 alone clocks in at nearly 300 000 words – and the whole game is easily well over 850 000 words in total by now.

Of course, all of this was necessary. Act 4 covers the Wars of the Third and Fourth Coalitions – usually considered the high points of both Napoleon’s military and political careers, as well as perhaps being the most well-known part of the Napoleonic Wars altogether. That being said, I don’t really see the next two acts being much smaller. Act 5A will cover not only the Russian Campaign of 1812 (iconic in its own right), and the pivotal 1813 German Campaign, but also the final Campaign of 1814. Act 5B will cover the Peninsular War, which has certainly become a disproportionately visible part of the popular understanding of the Napoleonic Wars in the english-speaking world thanks to the involvement of two particular British officers (one real, one fictional).

That means it might be another three months each to finish these acts, and depending on how long Act 6 (covering the Hundred Days) and the Epilogues take, that might mean that I’ll be cutting it awfully close if I want to make my best-case release target for the middle of next year.

But in the nearer-term, I’ll be taking a bit of a break over the course of the next week or so. One thing I’ve discovered about being medicated is that I also burn out faster. I suppose that makes a lot of sense, I’m writing at a rate of something like two and a half to three times faster than I used to, which naturally means that I also work through my mental resources a lot faster too. I also need to make sure to take tolerance breaks, so that my my brain doesn’t build up a resistance to my meds. I’m currently on the lowest possible dose for these, and I’d like to keep it that way.

That being said, I’ve already written about 50 000 words this month, and I’ll certainly be adding quite a bit more before the month ends. I’m still on track to finish the next interludes and start prep work (research, outlining, and so on) on Act 5A before the start of October – and I’ll also try to find the time to reorganise some of my variables for ease of use, and implement more of the soundtrack and maybe the portraits too. I’ll be building up another “polish list” for that sort of thing to tackle sometime this month, which means even if there’s not as much new story content added as compared to last month’s build, there’ll still be plenty of changes.

If you’d like to help me out by funding additional art and music – and get access to the development Discord and the playtest builds, take a look at the Patreon page for Shadow of the Eagles here.

In the meantime, my first Patreon’s still going. This month’s Soldier’s Guide to the Infinite Sea and Creator’s Guide to Writing and Worldbuilding, are now also up for general viewing, now that they’ve been up for a week for existing backers.