Greetings everyone! With Episode 1 in the rearview mirror, we want to take this opportunity to look ahead at the future of Hazelnut Latte. 

This is the fifth of a six-part series in which we will discuss the future of Hazelnut Latte. What is changing, and how we will release the game.

In this post, we will discuss the release schedule for Episode 2 of Hazelnut Latte.

Episode 2 Content

We have covered the overall plan for the game, but I want to look ahead to the immediate episode we are working on. Episode 2 of Hazelnut Latte. As you can see, it is a huge episode and the size that we want to aim for going forward.

60k words is a lot, and honestly, that is just the rough draft. As we continue to build the episode, Frisbee and I will do more drafts, with Frisbee overseeing most of the redrafting while I work on the rough draft of Episode 3. We estimate 4 hours of content, not accounting for the need to redo choices to find new outcomes. The word count will grow.

In comparison to the old Episode 2 on Ren'Py, this episode is huge. Our old Episode 2 was 19k words. This new Episode is 3x the amount. Pulling scenes from our old Episodes 2, 3, 4, and 6, along with a load of new scenes. If you recall, we talked about how the end of Episode 4 will now be when Noto makes his declaration. So pulling stuff forward just makes sense, especially with all the changes with Jamie.

There is a lot to do in Episode 2! 6 New characters, though most won't be new to those who played the old Ren'Py builds. As you can see in the image, Jade City has a local band that you will run into during your travels. Before you ask, no one in the photo is dateable/bangable. 

We are going to commission our composer, Lolurio, for 17 new music tracks, which will undoubtedly be a delight. Including a track for the band, Noto's Restaurant, a Hazel theme, and an Ice Cream Parlor?

Pamika is planning to whip up 14 new backgrounds! At the moment, she is working on this pier/marketplace you see above. The background of the image above will change, as it is just a WIP. But in Episode 2, Pamika is going to reimagine familiar locations such as Noto's Notorious Cuisine and the movie theater while creating new locales like the marketplace and a convenience store.

17 animated lewd scenes and roughly 34 special moments, some of which are already drawn, but none are animated yet. These will include most of Hazel's scenes from the original episode 2, as well as new scenes for Jamie and other characters. I say roughly 31 special moments because we may read a scene and realize we want a new one. (That happens a lot)

Episode 2 is going to be a big one, almost double the size of the episode you all just enjoyed.

But all that content means it will take time to make. We estimate that, at our current speed and staffing, it will take 8 Months.

Wait, it's going to take how long?

Here is the current release schedule for Episode 2! Once again, the green date is the final content update, and the build after that is a catch-up build in case we missed anything and to prep for Episode 3.

But seriously? 8 months? This game is never coming out!

I hear you, because you sound a lot like the voices in my head that keep me up at night. So let me explain what is happening and why this will take some time.

The short answer is: Money. It's always money.

We are a fairly sizeable team working very hard putting out content regularly every month. But we are still a ragtag group of indies who worry every month about how much we'll get paid and hope Patreon maintains it so we can eat. There is only so much money to go around, so people can only work so many hours.

Not everyone at our studio is full-time. It is only Kokman, Lotus, and me. Everyone else is part-time. I want everyone to be full-time because if they were, we would get stuff done faster. More backgrounds would get drawn, and if more backgrounds are drawn, then we can utilize more locations. More sprites would get animated, and if more sprites were animated, we could utilize more characters. More scenes would get animated, and if more scenes are animated, then everyone is happy because that means some femboy is getting their cheeks clapped, and that is primarily why we are here.

Once we have a background, it becomes a location we can return to. We don't need to worry about drawing a new background for that place. Since our game is now so early on, we don't have a big pool of backgrounds to return to.

Sure, we could push ahead and use old assets, but then our background artist would be constantly fighting from behind. And if they are so far behind, how does our main artist know what to draw as a scene's background? This just causes a terrible ripple effect.

Episode 2 sees us going to locations that will get a lot of use in the future, such as:

Noto's Notorious Cuisine

A prime spot for the narrative where lots of events take place, and it will be important for the rest of the game.

The Movie Theater

A date spot where pretty much every dateable character will be taken to.

The Market

A new date spot where you, as the player, will take dateable characters.

Convenience Store

A place to meet characters, and also, when free roam opens up, a place to buy things.

So, it does suck that this may take 8 months, but we need this time to build up our asset pool. Each new character we introduce in this build will consistently return for future episodes.

But it doesn't have to take 8 months. If we hit a point where we see a consistent increase in revenue, then guess what? Hours will get bumped from 20 a week to 40. If revenue increases more, we can hire another background artist, another animator, another programmer. 

The time it takes to make this game depends entirely on how much money we earn and how many people we can hire with that money.

We hope that Episode 3 will be just as long as Episode 2, but take far less time. Ideally, at the end of Episode 2, we have a big asset pool and enough money to hire up. Especially since our current outline for Episode 3 includes two new locations (for now). Hopefully, when we get to Ep 3, our background artist can be working ahead on Ep 4 backgrounds and beyond. (Need that full Jade City map.)

Wrap up

This is huge news, I know, and I am sure people will have questions, so as always, hit me up either in the comments or in the Discord server.

Tomorrow is our final post in this week of updates from us! We will be talking about the immediate few updates and what is in store for the rest of 2026.

Don't forget to join us for our YouTube Live Stream on Wednesday, August 12th, at 9 AM Pacific Time, where we will hold a large Q&A about all this information!

https://youtube.com/live/orTdqwcfGeo 

If you are not available to attend, but still want to submit a question (or want to be nice and give us time to prepare), you can fill out this Google Form with your questions so we can read them during the livestream. 

https://forms.gle/QSkiF2hfsymSnCwT7

Thank you all so much for your continued support! You're the reason we're even making this game. With that said, Stay Rad!