One month until version 1.0!

I originally wanted to avoid doing a monthly update this month, but I found and fixed some rather nasty bugs and I just couldn't bring myself to leave you all hanging for 30 whole days. 😉 But before we get to the bug fixes...

...here are the changes, improvements, and new content in this update:

• first, a huge and long-awaited UI improvement: when in the Reserve Supplies screen, if playing with a mouse and keyboard, you can now drag and drop items directly from reserve supplies onto specific characters! (And from character inventories back into the reserve supplies as well.) 😃

• a "Conclude Investigation" button now shows up in town after Malatose offers to help you investigate the summer palace; the player can choose to click it immediately or to continue pursuing leads in the investigation, at their discretion. (Note: this button is currently turned off pending the version 1.0 launch.)

• created the scenes leading up to the final battle. (Not yet accessible.)

• created the final battle. (Not yet accessible.)

• created the scenes following the final battle, including the good ending and a new, extra-bad ending. (Not yet accessible.)

• added a new, unique character spriteset to the game. (I'm not saying what it is because of spoilers.)

• created a final boss variant portrait for post-defeat.

• created a couple of new enemy types.

• new special terrain and skills added to the game (which I am being deliberately vague about for spoiler reasons).

• new items added to the game: Ladoo, Shahi Ladoo, and a handful of unique weapons and armor specific to certain named characters (which, again: spoilers).

• new battle background added to the game (also spoiler-y in nature).

• battle backgrounds now support an emissions layer, letting parts of them glow independent of the actual battle map.

• new difficulty: Challenging-. Combines the economic aspects of Relaxed with the tactical difficulty of Challenging.

• after a certain number of in-game days (200 in Relaxed difficulty, 140 in Challenging, and 100 in Brutal), if you haven't managed to address the fact that Praetor Nero is hunting you down, you'll now get a bad ending (for reasons that may be readily apparent). Don't worry: this timer is quite generous on every difficulty setting below Brutal--half of an in-game year or more. It's there more for immersion-preservation reasons than out of any expectation that players will actually run afoul of it.

• the time limit is now customizable for Custom Difficulty.

• finally got a unique animated visual effect for Vengeance; I must say, I think it looks pretty awesome! 🙂

• stat alterations caused by a character's current terrain are now noted in the character screen.

• you can now grab item sacks filled with money using Enthralled enemies and the money will be added to your total.

• the game now tracks whether you've met a variety of different NPCs in order to customize the ending based on your experience and choices.

• scripted capability for the game to permit the player to skip certain dialogue branches with the Escape key/Cancel button even if they contain multiple replies or would otherwise normally be unskippable. You can now use this to quickly skip through the first two plot events in the game (the flyer event and the camp visit event) even on dialogue branches where there are multiple reply options.

• wrote alternate dialogue for Nihal Agarwal if you visit