Dear PUM Companions,

I understand you are loving the app :D I hope you do!! and if you  do, do say it loud!! 

With this, I'd like to introduce the first round of series of DevLog (also available real-time on Discord), where I share updates about what is going on. I hope you like it, let's start:

PUM Monthly submissions!

It has been commented, thought, and discussed, that it could be fun if we all played PUM together. Each on their own (of course), but with a common target and timespan. So here I'd like to announce:

The idea is simple, a game template for the app will be given with a Plot Seed, a plot track, plot nodes, and a bunch of characters and locations. With that, we'll all get about 3 weeks to play it, and submit the Actual Play PDF of it! You can also volunteer to submit a game template for the community to play! For now, submissions will be tracked on our Discord Server: https://discord.gg/k2rQMa33Kq but the summary of monthly games may be posted here on Itch, on my blog, and maybe elsewhere too..

Roadmaps and the future of the app

With confidence, I can say that the app is really worth the value for the buck, so the APP is indeed in a usable state, playable state, and not only that, your exports and adventures are amazing! (join us in Discord to check them out, or share your own). Of course, it is not an app that is being used by thousands and thousands of players, so I ask you understand the investment and scale aspect of it too. The app is amazing, it will be forever yours, you can use it offline, and you can play an infinite amount of games with it!

Having said that, I have been requested to give more transparent updates of what is going on and where is the app going in the mid-long term. Of course long term is hard to tell, but I'll try to build up a Roadmap and share it with you soon with what I have in my head. I don't want to promise though, as I review the roadmap, there's plenty of risks, and honestly, I work fine in "passion" mode. With deadlines and timelines, I might even achieve less with a roadmap, than without one. I hope you understand this, but I'll try!

Ongoing improvements to the app

As of now, heading towards 1.8.0 - there's a few things brewing up, but most importantly, dozens of bugs reported by the community got fixed, and the following features being added:

Re-rollable plot beats

Bundled oracle rolls

Boosted PDF Export size and speed

Developing PUM Companion - a UX Journey (article)

Written by Maria, the product designer of PUMC, here is an article where you can look at the development and journey the app went through:

https://medium.com/@mariaeugeniaciccarelli/how-we-design-an-app-for-creative-wri...

That's all for this round, Companions!

JeansenVaars

Did you enjoy this Dev Log update? If so, let me know!