Ch. 3A Public Release!


Chapter 3A is now public!

Hello, fellow netrunners.

In Chapter 3A, Ravy continues his plan to follow through with Kavir and Crown’s task, but becomes uneasy as the growing stakes of recent revelations are laid bare.

If you’re enjoying yourself, please consider subscribing to our patreon so we can continue to fund development. Thank you for your support and patience!

Scroll to the bottom of this post for the full changelog.

Update

It’s been awhile since our last release in March, and I feel a little guilty that we couldn’t have a full chapter ready after 3-4 months, so apologies for that. We decided to break this chapter in half to spread out asset creation since we knew we were going into a busy season (development slowed to a crawl in April-May due to moves, conventions, full time job issues, and so on).

My personal philosophy from professional experience is I’d rather wait to release something polished than push out buggy builds with missing assets that accrue problematic “technical debt.” (No shade intended to other games; I just strive to try and eliminate future work.) We did take the time to address several user experience issues we’ve received in feedback from patrons, ratings, comments, and posts on third party sites, so we appreciate all of that reporting.

Of specific note are the changes we made to the LOOM database. Foremost, we’ve added a preference toggle to allow readers to tailor the notification. It can be its previous large size, the new and now-default small size, or no LOOM notification at all. This should address the concerns about the notification being too aggressive. Further, notifications will now fade.

For the LOOM UI itself, we added a category indicator to alert readers which categories have updated topics. No more hide-and-seek hunting to find where topics have been updated.

Looking Forward

There’s still a significant number of art assets we need for chapter 3B, though all of the music, sound, and script writing is complete. I’m trying to wrangle an early September release, but expect delays.

Chapter 3B into Chapter 4 will be the climactic conclusion of Arc 1.

The next episode of our Bringing the Heat podcast will release sometime between this release and 3B, and will build on subjects and topics brought up in both Chapters 2 and 3.

Also, a Spanish translation is coming soon! It will typically be one build behind. We’ll make a different post about that when it’s ready.

Chapter 3A Changelog

Chapter 3A Content Update:

  • Added Chapter 3A script, assets, and LOOM entries (first half of chapter 3)
  • Approx. 10k Words of new content
  • 4 new CGs with 2 variations + title card
  • 4 new songs
  • Extras updated with new Chapter 3A content

Other Content Updates:

  • Various small fixes across existing LOOM entries
  • Fixed various typos and CTC glitches
  • Updated prologue/intro with updated text, new background, and easter eggs (I know, I can’t stop…)
  • Tweaked music cue in Chapter 1 during falling sequence for better drama
  • Updated “Sentinels of Doubt” music tracks (they’ve been extended)
  • Replaced music during Tarrolf CG in Chapter 2 with new “Hunter” track; previous music was a placeholder

General Updates:

  • Studio Splash Animation added on launch
  • Chapter Select feature added to main menu
  • Renamed “Options” in all locations to “Preferences” for consistency
  • Added preference for animated vs static HUD overlay to address glitching/memory leaks on some devices
  • LOOM notification toggle added to preferences (default changed to small notification)
  • Added timer to fade notification regardless of size
  • LOOM “Unread” notifications on topics changed to “Updated” for clarity
  • Added notification to LOOM categories to indicate categories with updated topics
  • Updated a LOOM unlock trigger to ensure entry names have already been mentioned
  • Updated credits and patreon supporter slides

Edit: There was an issue with the macOS version as of 7/15. We have since corrected the issue and reuploaded a new version. Our apologies for the trouble!

Files

StringZero-0.3.0-pc.zip 295 MB
67 days ago
StringZero-0.3.0-android.apk 280 MB
67 days ago
StringZero-0.3.0-mac-broken.zip 292 MB
67 days ago

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Comments

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I'm not sure if it something with my macbook or something with the new update, but I don't even get the option through setting to open String Zero . I just get a message saying 'The application 'stringzero' can't be opened' with a ok button.

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Thank you for the report!

I am being told by my mac testers (I’m not a mac user myself) that the first time you open an unverified app on a mac, you have to hold the control key while launching the game. If that doesn’t work, please let us know!

See: https://support.apple.com/guide/mac-help/open-a-mac-app-from-an-unidentified-developer-mh40616/mac

(+1)

I'll give it a go and let you know, though pressing command key is new to me

(1 edit)

I typed “command” but it was apparently “control.” I’m very mac-illiterate lmao. But yes, give the instructions in the link a shot and then please circle back and let me know. We’ll figure it out.

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My programmer recompiled and reuploaded the mac file. Redownload and it should be working as expected now!

For Reference’s sake:

So I had my folks look into this more, and it looks like there was some compiling issue that’s breaking the default macOS unzipper. Using a third-party unzipper (they were using https://theunarchiver.com/ ) works just fine, which is why we didn’t catch it initially.

So that’s a temporary solution in the event this happens again. But it looks like a simple recompile on our end fixed it with default macOS.

(+1)

The new mac file with 'The Unarchiver' worked a treat. Thank you for your fix and your VN. :)