Hey Shinobi, happy 2026! This is basically tradition at this point! 😁 Kicking off the new year with our first progress report as usual: - Fixed AngelScript compilation issues and improved overall stability. - Finished full input remapping for both keyboard and controller, including reset options. - Finalized the new options menu and expanded settings across graphics, audio, gameplay, HUD, and camera options. - Added quick chat support and a new HUD option to always show chat. - Fixed UI issues that could cause certain menus/widgets to stop updating after reopening. - Continued backend updates and alignment for upcoming online features. - Added early foundations for social features (chat, friends, party, and guild/clan systems), still in progress. - Improved aerial guard, added new fall transitions, and continued movement/ability animation updates. - Upgraded Kawaii Physics further and improved batch-processing for faster physics updates. - Continued experimental shader work. - Completed Part I of the Satoru model. - Continued animation work, including ability reworks and additional movement animations. As always, we’re excited to share more with you in the coming months. Oh, and before you go, we want to show you our current prologue key visual 😊 Thank you for your continued support as always 💙

Hey Shinobi, As always, here is the monthly progress report for May: - Continued improvements to core gameplay systems and overall project stability. - Migrated saving and loading systems to a new database backend. - Began development of Character Creator 2.0 and its new user flow. - Implemented the first in-engine prototype of the Character Creator 2.0 UI. - Added new fonts, buttons, visual effects, and interface elements to support the new character creation experience. - Implemented the initial character creation layout and navigation system. - Continued planning and development of Character Creator 2.0 customization options. - Updated the base model to support the new Character Creator 2.0 features. - Added planned customization options and morph targets for the Type 1 base model preset. - Planned and prepared the Type 2 base model preset for the next development sprint. As always, we're excited to share more with you in the coming months. For this month's media, we're sharing a very early prototype look at Character Creator 2.0. The short clip below showcases one of the body build options currently being tested, allowing players to adjust their physique between different body types. As with all prototype footage, much of what you see here is still subject to change. Several assets, UI elements, and visuals are temporary and will continue to evolve throughout development. Thank you for your continued support!

Hey Shinobi, As always, here is the monthly progress report for April: - Continued internal improvements and system refinements across the project. - Made significant progress on the skill tree, with major updates and structural changes. - Began preparations for upcoming updates to core gameplay systems, including animation and movement reworks. - Continued work on the new animation system, reaching a first pass implementation. - Added new ability animations and continued expanding animation coverage across gameplay. - Added new common animations as part of the ongoing animation system work. - Introduced an initial set of customization options, including multiple M outfit sets (MVP). - Continued development of the tutorial experience, including boss design, arena, and lore. - Drafted the tutorial boss encounter sequence. - Completed Satoru’s main theme soundtrack. As always, we’re excited to share more with you in the coming months. Thank you for your continued support!

Hey Shinobi, As always, here is the monthly progress report for March 2026: - Continued major work on a new animation system, including full root motion integration. - Reworked how animations behave in gameplay to better support movement, combat, and overall responsiveness. - Built new animation data systems and workflows to support the ongoing movement system rework. - Improved how movement direction and player input influence animations, making actions feel more grounded and reactive. - Continued migrating core animation functionality into more stable systems for long-term scalability. - Fixed various issues related to animations, chat systems, and overall stability. - Continued work on ability animations and overall animation polish. - Continued improvements to customization items. - Updated character drafts and refined their lore. - Reached a major milestone on Satoru’s main theme soundtrack, with composition and lyrics completed, now entering final vocalization. As always, we’re excited to share more with you in the coming months. As a small behind-the-scenes look, here’s a glimpse of our lead animator reviewing one of the attack animations that have been in development for this month. Thank you for your continued support!

Hey Shinobi, As always, here is the monthly progress report for February: - Added new internal tooling to streamline development of core gameplay systems. - Continued progress on backend systems. - Expanded chat functionality, including automatic channel joining and reconnection support. - Implemented show chat functionality and continued improvements to the chat UI. - Added an early prototype of the Skill Tree UI. - Added support for key binding directly from AngelScript. - Implemented a new camera pipeline, with further improvements planned. - Began a major rework of core movement systems, including dive, quick dash, ninja move, sprint, slide, stairs, wall running, and collision. - Rebalanced ninja enemy health. - Completed initial drafts for several new male outfit sets: Wudang, Kusari Ronin, and Yuzuri. - Completed the initial draft for Vigil, an important character in the story. As always, we’re excited to share more with you in the coming months. Enjoy these two renders of one of our main characters, Saturo. His journey begins in the prologue. There’s still polish ahead, but we’re excited to finally share him with you in full 3D glory. Thank you for your continued support 💙

Hey Shinobi, This is the last 2025 monthly report; it only feels like it was yesterday, right? 😌 Hope you had a fantastic year. Without further ado, here’s the final monthly progress report for 2025: - Fixed packaged build issues, including AngelScript integration. - Fixed a dev server crash and improved overall stability. - Updated the project to Unreal Engine 5.7.1 and resolved upgrade-related issues. - Improved character collision and movement consistency across different character types. - Updated the character movement/animation foundation and expanded wall running support. - Refined wall running behavior and animations for smoother traversal. - Continued groundwork for more dynamic character collision sizing, with related animation and physics adjustments. - Built out a new options menu with proper categories, saving/loading, and expanded support for graphics, audio, and gameplay settings. - Began keyboard and controller remapping options, including reset functionality. - Fixed editor issues and tool-related crashes to improve development stability. - Updated abilities and Ninjutsu animations. - Added 3 new hairstyles. - Added 3 new modular outfit models. - Completed a heavily customizable female base model. - Continued work on an experimental new combat mechanic, including a new animation and early VFX. - Continued backend-related work and updates to the game's pre-launch website. On a closing note, have you ever watched a movie that stuck with you and hit you with every emotion at once? 🤔 We recently did. 😔 Our indie team wanted to pay tribute by ending this month's note with a familiar dance as a small salute. Thank you, Fujimoto-sensei, and everyone involved in that recent masterpiece. 🌼 As usual, we look forward to sharing more with you in 2026, and we wish you a happy New Year! 🎆 Thank you for your continued support.🙏

Hey Shinobi, As always, here is the monthly progress report for November: - Fixed issues in the packaged build. - Upgraded the engine version. - Added a new scripting system integration and a supporting UI system. - Began integration of the new backend, completing the initial login flow. - Added rudimentary Login, Character Selection, and Character Creation UIs. - Successfully tested login and map transition functionality in packaged builds. - Added a new overworld map. - Completed a major overhaul of the main town area. - Added new visual effects to specific attack animations. - Added new motion for cinematic confrontations. - Updated animations for all acrobatic movement options. - Improved damage motion and animation feedback. - Updated experimental voice lines for testing. As per usual, we are excited to share more with you in the coming months. Thank you for your continued support.

Hey Shinobi, As always, here is monthly progress report for October: - Fixed several rollback system issues, including read attempt past end errors. - Rollback functions now use relative position for improved stability and cleanup. - Server and client rollback functions now properly acknowledge and delete stale data. - Experimental Dynamic Cinematic Combat Camera System introduced. - Implemented Dynamic Combat Slowdown (experimental) for more cinematic hit moments. - Fixed camera jitter when collision was enabled. - Fixed sound effect persistence issue on side dodge loop. - Continued Sword Master Style combat rework (Part 1, still in progress). - Added visual enhancements and effects for Sword Down Combo and Sword Aerial Combo. - Implemented new Spark Event system for advanced hit spark handling across sword combos (neutral, side, up, down, aerial). - Enemies now grant EXP on defeat. - Completed stats system integration with character status displayed in the UI. As per usual, we are excited to share more with you in the coming months. Thank you for your continued support.

Hey Shinobi, As always, here is monthly progress report for September: - Expanded the quest system with UI updates, popups for objectives and rewards, and proper saving/loading. - Improved combat visuals with updated effects on heavy attacks, down attacks, etc. - Adjusted enemy mob visual appearance and effects. - Added first pass visual updates to specific move actions. - Fixed display issues in the quest UI. - Fixed issues with saving and loading quests. - Added a mission reward system. - Introduced a new resource framework including levels, experience, and currency. - Implemented a leveling system and linked it to quest rewards. - Completed planning and began work on the new inventory system. - Developed core parts of the inventory system, including the inventory manager and UI for stats and equipment. - Improved backend systems to streamline inventory and rollback functions. - Continued research and concept planning for impactful combat and visual effects to be introduced in future updates. - Expanded the stats system with new effects, client/server validation, and a WIP character status section in the equipment menu. As per usual, we are excited to share more with you in the coming months. Thank you for your continued support.

Hey Shinobi, As always, here is monthly progress report for August: - Implemented quest and objective systems, including completion and confirmation on both server and client. - Added networking, structs, and data tables to support quests and objectives. - Linked the quest system to the new UI. - Expanded the pause menu with mission, equipment, and skills options. - Added new visual effects and enhancements across various attacks. - Overhauled combat flow with player-facing improvements in mind. - Adjusted combat mechanics and attack movement for more consistent combos. - Enhanced guard and dodge cancels for smoother skill interruptions. - Fixed multiple combat and tracking issues. - Various bug fixes and optimizations. As per usual, we are excited to share more with you in the coming months. Thank you for your continued support.

Hello, Another month has passed, and progress continues. Here’s what we’ve been working on: - Updated engine version - Adjusted boss battle arena for first pass. - Added experimental special boss attack. - Added danger indicator to specific attacks. - Updated decal logic. - Fixed decal collision. - Adjusted water material. - Adjusted water particles. - Started implementation of a new data-driven UI system. - Finished UI background effects. - UI bug fixes. - Various bug fixes. Here is a small snippet of an experimental boss fight that is currently in early development, more to come soon!

Hey Shinobi, Here’s a look at what we’ve worked on this June: - Prepared engine features for upcoming testing and version updates. - Reworked the AI system for a more streamlined and scalable approach. - Added a new actor for mob AI to support real-time (rather than frame-time) decision-making. - Implemented new states and animations for mobs. - Adjusted movement and behavior of grounded Chakra Dashes. - Added light attack, heavy attack, and skill tasks to AI behavior trees. - Enabled per-mob speed settings within AI logic. - Extended the base navmesh query extent to support jumping player movement. - Created foundational aggro logic. - Added max awareness and aggro cap for the aggro service. - Integrated AI perception systems. - Fixed enemy combat transition animations. - Implemented an Aggro Token System to better manage enemy focus. - Completed initial development on Tutorial Part 2. To close out the month, here's a glimpse at something mysterious waiting... As the portal opens, so too does the sky. The Qilin brings the storm.

Hey there, Let's get started with the monthly progress report: - Adjusted camera behavior and logic - Added a new "Secret Ninja Art" technique - Tweaked post-processing settings - Added new wearable customization items - Fixed and adjusted shadow rendering - Buffed throws across several fighting styles - Updated behavior for unblockable attacks - Adjusted elemental damage scaling - Improved and buffed certain attack behaviors for the "Sword Master Style" - Optimizations and adjustments to the game engine Lastly, we're excited to share with you a small teaser of the first part of our brand new "Secret Ninja Art" technique. There's a lot more exciting stuff we would like to reveal in the future, stay tuned and thank you for your support!

Yo! Here we go again with the monthly highlight report: - Added experimental MP-synced & rollback-enabled root motion added (for cutscenes & acrobatics). - Bug fixes for the new root motion system. - General bug fixes pertaining to rollback errors. - Added a new experimental primary data asset type for animations. - Added root motion data to blend space animation asset type. - Connected new blend space animation asset type to the root motion rollback system. - Network optimizations. - Added a very early, work-in-progress dueling arena map (1st pass).

Hey Shinobi! It's the end of the month so here we go with another progress highlight report: - Adjustments to mob AI behaviors. - Created system for Mob entrance and exit status, effects and animations. - Started Combat Tutorial Sequence. - Added Mob behavior Editor intended for specific enemy archetypes. - Various bug fixes with Mob AI and other engine related issues. - More network optimizations. - Updated rollback netcode with experimental features. - Adjustments to the functionality of the 2 new combat mechanics. - Added VFX to the 2 new combat mechanics. This concludes this month's progress report. Thank you once again for your support! Eid Mubarak to those celebrating! 🌙🎉

Hello Shinobi, We meet again, we hope you are in good health! Here is this month's progress report: - Various bug fixes - Network optimizations - "Tutorial Level Part I" layout design first pass - "Tutorial Level Part II" layout design first pass - Added new experimental movement mechanic - Added two new combat mechanics - Adjusted post processing effects for more anime-esque look and accuracy - Set up a new experimental baseline for character customization - Quality of life improvements on "Counter" hits feedback - New additional original background tracks for tutorial levels We would like to share these images of the scenery from the tutorial level, we can't wait to share more content with you in the future! As always thank you for your support. 🙌🔥

Hey Shinobi, We hope your new year has been amazing! 🎉 Let's start this year with the progress report as usual: - Updated the Engine version. - Fixed a threading-related memory leak. - Added new event loading system. - Added Appearance loading indication. - Restarted Tutorial map to be properly blocked out, instead of PCG. - Adjustments to movements and world interaction behaviors. - Added new surface types. - More work on the tutorial. - More optimizations and bug fixes. - Added detailed facial expressions to the player model. See ya next time!

Hello, Shinobi! As the year comes to a close, we want to wish you and your loved ones a happy and prosperous New Year! 🎉 As usual, for this month there has been work on Mobs and AI as well as bug fixes and gameplay refinements. To wrap things up, here’s a little sneak peek at some of the outfits you’ll get to see in the game. We can’t wait to share more in the coming year! Thank you for being part of this journey, here’s to an exciting 2025 ahead! 🌟

Yo! 👋 As usual here is this month’s highlight of the progress report: • Quest and mission system (repeatable quests, objectives and mission prototype) • Time and region-based weather system • Movement improvements (smoother movement up rocky or hilly terrain) • Tutorial level prototype • Mob tagging system • Mob archetypes and mob behaviors • More network and performance optimizations • Bug fixes See you next month!