Hey there! This is just a quick post to say that Dreadwinter is in Midwinter Spirits! It's a week long event showcasing loads of games and demos, with a spooky, cozy theme!

I'll be releasing a more detailed update later this month, but here's a short summary of what I'm planning to work on this month:

• Cafe Expansions - open up the top floor, expand outwards, set up a kitchen, and an animal sanctuary!

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• Manual Saves - Save (almost) any time and start from where you left off

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• More townspeople - All of the characters you can meet in Lunara will be added to the game. They will also have unique interactions with each other that will randomly occur!

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That's it for now! Check out the event, and thanks for reading!

-Alex

[u]Demo Updates[/u]

• [p align="initial"]Move speed increased by around 25%[/p][/*]
• [p align="initial"]Added sprinting (hold Shift)[/p][list]
• [p align="initial"]This is mouse and keyboard only right now, but the next update will add it for controllers[/p][/*]

From November 18-19 combat was broken altogether, so you probably wouldn't have noticed any issues with the player sprite in combat (what a day!steamsad)

[u]Gifting[/u]

[u]Mail System[/u]

[u]New Locations[/u]

Nought's Apartment

The Mayor's Manor

[u]Demo Bugfixes[/u]

• [p align="initial"]Doors can now be interacted with more than once[/p][list]
• [p align="initial"]They previously disabled themselves after interacting with them[/p][/*]

• [p align="initial"]It is possible that customers can sit on the same seat[/p][/*]
• [p align="initial"]Some objects are positioned in a way that you can get stuck between them[/p][/*]
• [p align="initial"]Assorted crashes[/p][list]
• [p align="initial"]Leave details of these if you can![/p][/*]

[u]Welcome[/u]

Hey! Welcome to another Dreadwinter blog, this time around it's the spooky edition (not that anything changes). There's a few things that happened that I want to talk about, and I'll also elaborate more on what the next steps are in the game's development, so stick around!

[u]Steam Next Fest[/u]

Dreadwinter was part of this years October Steam Next Fest! It's a week long event made to showcase upcoming games and demos, and is very useful for getting eyes on your game.

There have been a lot of people playing the demo, and putting Dreadwinter on their wishlist! Thanks for playing, and/or wishlisting. The demo will still be around, and will get updates when available, so keep an eye out!

[u]Bugs and Improvements[/u]

I think one thing that needs to be improved is guiding the player at the start of the game. There were a few comments that players weren't sure what to do or where to go. I wanted to give players a lot of freedom in how they played from the start, but I think it's a good idea to guide players along until the core gameplay is introduced.

For example, when you start the game, you wake up, and from there you can go wherever you want. I expected most people would leave their apartment, see the cafe, and head there first, but it seems some players chose to wander around first, and got a bit lost!

I'll work on streamlining the experience, and making it a bit more obvious as to what you need to do to start off.

[u]A Frustrating Bug[/u]

There is currently a bug that may occur when moving between levels, such as entering/leaving Dreadwinter, your room, or the furniture store (these seem to be common locations). When you move to another location, there is a chance that your character will warp, but the game does not realise that you have moved to another level, and so the camera will not follow, as well as certain background things not happening.

This makes it seem like you are stuck in a level, and is essentially a soft lock. I have an idea of what's happening, but I don't know what's causing it, and I currently am unable to reproduce the bug myself. It doesn't seem to be a consistent bug, which makes it quite hard to figure out.

For now, as a short term fix, I plan to add a "stuck" button for when this occurs. It seems that you can still access the menus, and the game continues as normal, which makes me believe that you still have control, but the camera is no longer tracking your character. The "stuck" button will warp you to a safe location, which should hopefully reset things.

I plan to add manual saves to the game as well, and have the game autosave after a cafe shift, so you don't lose too much progress if you have to restart. There's a lot of extra data that has to be saved, so I'm not sure how long this will take to add.

[u]What's Next[/u]

I outlined my plans in the last blog post, but here it is again:

• Remaining townspeople in Lunara (Around 10 or so)

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• Interiors for buildings/homes in Lunara

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• Manual saves

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• Functioning Dreadwinter expansions (Being able to unlock the expansions + gameplay features)

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• Automation in Dreadwinter (Via machines)

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• Takeaway mode - Serve orders to go! Seating not required!

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• Adding in the story/stories

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I'm currently designing the remaining NPCs in the game, and their homes, as well as any other interiors that aren't finished. Here's a preview of what I did in the last few days:

It's been a while since I designed new characters, so I'm glad to be getting back into it. Afterwards, I'll try to get manual saves into the game, hopefully I don't break it!

That's it for this blog post, thanks for reading, it was a bit of a long one!

-Alex

[u]Welcome[/u]

[u]Bugfixes[/u]

Here's some notable and funny bugs that have been fixed:

• [p align="initial"]The auto brewer didn't use any coffee grounds, which meant you could create infinite coffees[/p][/*]
• [p align="initial"]The auto brewer did not load when starting the game, instead being replaced by a regular brewer[/p][/*]
• [p align="initial"]The D-Mon merchant that appears on Wednesday nights would freeze the game if you chatted to it[/p][/*]
• [p align="initial"]Dread & Winter would occasionally walk through walls[/p][/*]
• [p align="initial"]Dread was set to inactive during the night, which meant he would disappear until you reloaded the game[/p][/*]
• [p align="initial"]Some of the new hats would crash the game if you equipped it[/p][/*]
• [p align="initial"]Claire, the manager of the Adventurer's Guild, didn't have any character data, which would crash the game when you opened up the relationships page in the journal[/p][/*]
• [p align="initial"]The demo did not end after day 7, but time would stop anyway[/p][/*]

[u]Steam Next Fest[/u]

• [p align="initial"]Remaining townspeople in Lunara (Around 10 or so)[/p][/*]
• [p align="initial"]Interiors for buildings/homes in Lunara[/p][/*]
• [p align="initial"]Manual saves[/p][/*]
• [p align="initial"]Functioning Dreadwinter expansions (Being able to unlock the expansions + gameplay features)[/p][/*]
• [p align="initial"]Automation in Dreadwinter (Via machines)[/p][/*]
• [p align="initial"]Takeaway mode - Serve orders to go! Seating not required![/p][/*]
• [p align="initial"]Adding in the story/stories[/p][/*]

Hey there! The Dreadwinter Demo is now available to play!

[u]Features[/u]

The demo has the following features:

• Play the first 7 days of the game - equivalent to around 2-3 hours of gameplay

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• Brew coffee, mix your own blend of coffee beans, and add additional ingredients to make unique drinks!

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• Day and night shifts - serve ordinary humans during the day, and the supernatural at night!

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• Customize your caf! - Add furniture, change the flooring and wallpapers, and adopt a pet!

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• Meet 6 of your regular customers, who will visit the cafe weekly in the full game!

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• Fast-paced, turn-based combat using magical cards!

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• Explore a charming, timeless town and get to know the people there

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I hope you enjoy the demo!

-Alex

[u]Welcome[/u]

Hi there, welcome to another Dreadwinter update! This is a quick, but important one, so make sure to read on!

[u]Demo Release Date[/u]

First of all, the demo will be (re-)releasing on Friday, 15th August 2025!

There's been a lot of updates since the last one, and it should be a much better taste of what the game will be like. It's not 100% perfect, but it's in a state that I'm happy to show off! I felt like if I kept trying to perfect every last detail and add things, you'd probably be waiting for another year, so I really should just release it.

I'm currently working on updating the store page; adding new screenshots, updating the graphical assets and making a new trailer. There's also a bunch of small things to take care of in the game, and making sure it doesn't immediately break.

[u]Features[/u]

The demo has the following features:

• Playable for 7-days of in-game time, which is about 2-3 hours of gameplay

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• Brew coffee, mix your own blend of coffee beans, and add additional ingredients to make unique drinks!

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• Cafe customisation - Add furniture, change the flooring and wallpapers, and adopt a pet!

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• Meet 6 of your regular customers, who will visit the cafe weekly in the full game!

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• Revamped combat - Combat has been changed to a card battle system

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• More characters and cutscenes

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Look forward to it, and I hope you enjoy the demo!

-Alex

[u]Welcome[/u]

Hi, welcome to this month's dev blog! This was quite a busy month, with a lot of content added, as well as some under the hood stuff, so I'm going to give a quick overview on some of the changes.

[u]Regular customers[/u]

One of the main features of Dreadwinter is its regular customers. These are special NPCs that will visit every week, and bonding with them can provide alternative methods to progress the game. Initially, I only had 2 added into the game, so I've been working on creating the rest of them.

For example, you have Peabody, a dwarf, builder and owner of a construction company. After you build up your relationship enough with her, she may offer to expand the caf for free, rather than you having to pay someone to do it.

Regular customers have a different relationship system from the townspeople, as it's influenced by serving them drinks they like, which you'll have to experiment with and figure out. Every so often, they will make a special request, which can boost your relationship by a lot!

[u]Cutscenes and tutorials[/u]

The vast majority of development has been spent on building the systems for the game, and designing the world, so there isn't much actually happening in the world yet. I've taken some time to add some more cutscenes into the game, which should make the world feel more alive, and help build up the world.

Hopefully, this helps establish a connection to the game, and gives you an idea of what's going on. I've also added little tutorials and help menus to the game, to make some of the mechanics and features clearer, since that was an issue before.

[u]Journal system[/u]

I've added additional menus to the game, to account for some of the newer features, but there were too many to fit into the current pause menu, so I added a journal system, which is essentially another pause menu, but is composed of the more informative parts.

For example, the settings menu is probably worth keeping in the pause menu, but something like a calendar would fit better in the journal. The calendar should help you keep track of when events and birthdays happen, and there's also a reminder of what day and time your regular customers will visit.

I'm working on adding in a mail system, map, and a tracker for which drinks your customers like and dislike.

[u]Controller Support[/u]

Controller support is coming along nicely, and most features have controller support. There's a few things that required more work than I would have liked, such as the on-screen keyboard on the Steam Deck, but most of the hurdles have been cleared. I'd say the main challenge is now to add controller support for the combat system, which I anticipate will be somewhat tricky.

[u]Adventurer's Guild[/u]

I've finally added the adventurer's guild into the game. This is your hub to take on quests, and make your name known throughout the kingdom! In the earlier version, the dungeons were just there to explore, and it wasn't particularly clear what you were meant to be doing, or how to do it.

I'm working on getting the gameplay and tutorials set up so you can get a license, gear up, and start exploring the world, which is one of the things I want to get done before I release the demo.

[u]Demo Progress[/u]

I believe the demo should be ready within the next month (fingers crossed), and there are 3 things I want to tick off before I can say it's ready

Welcome

Updates to the combat system

Game intros

Updating the game

Cafe customisation

Steam Deck/Controller Support

Welcome

January Progress

What's Next?

Hello! It's been a long while since my last devlog, my goal for this year is to give more frequent updates, alongside working on Dreadwinter.

Anyhow, there's been a lot of progress since the last update, and I think the game has come a long way from when I started working on it 2 years ago. I'll go over a few highlights, and outline my plans for this year.

I've updated a lot of the graphics, since a good chunk of it was made a long time ago. There's still quite a bit to do, but I'm happy with the direction it's going in!

I've also started working on seasonal designs for the world. Currently, spring, summer and autumn are complete, but winter is still a work in progress. There will be plenty of seasonal events alongside it as well!

There are also a load of new areas in the works!

Gameplay wise, I've added an espresso minigame, which is a separate experience from making coffee. It's a more midgame feature, since there's more steps involved, and I felt it should be something you unlock with experience.

Cafe customisation has also gotten an update, there is now a few expansions available, that range from just adding space, to giving access to new gameplay features. You can also customise the floor and wallpaper to your liking!

Last but not least is a small farm you can develop, which allows you to grow and produce coffee beans. It's mostly automated, so won't distract from running the cafe, but it allows you to grow your own variety of coffee beans, with unique bonuses!

I plan to share more of my progress on a regular basis, so check out my socials here: https://linktr.ee/vogybear

There's still a lot of things to be added to the game, and I also need to clean up some old content, but my aim is to have all features added by mid-2025.

Once that's done, I'll start prepping the demo for re-release. It should be ready around October 2025.

My goal for release is early 2026, but that's assuming nothing goes wrong, so I won't promise anything.

It's been a long journey, and there's still a lot more to go, but I think things are starting to come together, and I'll work hard to get Dreadwinter to the finish line.

Thanks for reading!
Alex

Hello!

Thanks for taking the time to read this, I'll try to keep it short!

This is the first devlog I've written for the steam page, so I'm not quite sure where to begin. Hopefully you've seen the store page and have a fair idea of what this game's about, and perhaps you've even played the demo, so I won't go over what kind of game Dreadwinter is, and what's currently in the game.

If you have played the demo, you may have tried to explore some of the places in Lunara, the main town, only to find they're not ready for business yet. In the last month, I've been working on opening them up, and coming up with some cool ideas!

First off is Lin Fei's Dim Sum Diner and Bathhouse. As the name suggests, it's a restaurant that serves dim sum, a chinese meal consisting of a range of small dishes. Each dish you order will give a boost to certain stats for a short while. This could be anything from increasing your health, making you move faster, or increasing income gained (don't ask how). Make sure to visit often!

You can also take a relaxing bath if you want to. Don't mind the color of the water, it's just tea, supposedly it's good for your skin (don't try this at home!)

I'm currently working on getting the observatory into the game. As you can see, it's a lot more than just an observatory! There's a museum section, a library, greenhouse, as well as a study/relaxation area. The museum is currently looking a bit empty, as it was recently robbed, and you've been enlisted to find some new exhibits!

On the top floor is the telescope hub. Monitoring the telescope isn't the most exciting work, though, so the museum's director, Elysa, tends to use her research budget on strange experiments. Maybe you'll be able to help her out!

That's it for this update! There's still more places to add, so keep an eye out for the next devlog.

Thanks for reading!
-Vogy Bear