Introducing Under the Table - the Game!

​​I've been talking about this for a while but I am finally in a position to properly announce this game's development, and it now has a public page on itch.io here.

Under the Table, and interactive novel and one of my most popular books, is now partway through conversion to a fully illustrated visual novel format. And I'm delighted to share with you the first few images and a preview of an opening animation, attached.

In the past few weeks I've managed to finish a first draft of code for the entire book, which worked out to tens of thousands of lines of code, and I'm now in the process of illustrating it. As is my usual way, I've made things more complicated by also custom-designing a lot of models for the game, including the entire office layout (though admittedly I've sourced most of the furniture and props from elsewhere).

The first estimate from the code, though, is requiring roughly 1,400 images. I'll try to get that down, but it's still going to be a whopper.

As far as what to expect, if you've read the book it's almost all going to be in there, though I've simplified a couple of areas. As I develop the pictures and redraft the code, I expect we'll get quite a few new additions, though, as the way I've built the models owes itself to a more flexible design. I can also more easily put in more tiny tweaks, like extra decisions, for more choices than the book, and more adaptable gender reactions (including images that show your character as male or female).

If you haven't read the book, it's up on Patreon for higher tier patrons, or it's 40% on my website this month.

So. What to expect?

The game mostly takes place in an office environment where you've been shrunk by a wicked manager. At only a few inches tall, you soon discover your coworkers are very dangerous people.

It'll include:

• 9 major characters to encounter

• Over 1,300 images

• Over 80,000 words of text

• Multple video cutscenes

• Play as a male or female character

• An office of environments to explore

• Ways to shrink every character

• Ways to get eaten by every character (and more!)

• Multiple paths to survival, many more paths to doom, but only one route to success!

When will it be ready?

​I've had a bit of extra time to work on it this month, so I've been trying to get as far ahead as possible, but it's hard to say how long it will take to get all the images framed. I'm hoping to have a beta ready within a month or so, at least. But there will be a lot of testing required.

In the meantime, you can expect occasional artwork shares along the way here, most of which (like this little animation!) will be Patron exclusive.

I hope you're as excited as me for this project, it's a mammoth one!