Good evening, everyone. We’re finally getting into the real swing of autumn now. The temperatures in Niigata have dropped a lot, and the leaves on the trees of streets nearby are starting to turn red.

Now, for this month’s Penny Blood project update. As I write every time, we’re still in the middle of negotiations with publishers. One thing that often comes up in conversations is how the entire game industry around the world is experiencing a slump compared to the past couple of years. We ran the Double Kickstarter campaign itself during the pandemic, where lots of people were stuck at home, so the state of the industry was much better then. But now, (although it’s a good thing), entertainment that involves travel such as tourism, sports events, and so on have all returned to normal, so the game industry has lost that temporary boost. When you think about it, it may just seem like things have gotten back to normal, but within these circumstances, I’m doing a lot of thinking in regards to the best way to increase the value and show off the charm of the Penny Blood IP. Penny Blood needs to be an attractive product first and foremost to all the fans and backers as well as to publishers.

Kato-san drew a Halloween illustration for us this month. She has been working hard on creating character designs, drawing trihedral figures, checking lots of different things, drawing illustrations, and designing even more still… Basically she’s as busy as one of those turboprop engines that’s always spinning and making lots of noise. Her hands move so fast atop her tablet that I can’t even keep track of them. Her comment for this month is “I tried drawing the characters so that they look like Halloween-esque monsters!” Apparently her favorite is Luca showing off his cute fangs.

Hanya-san has finished the wind fusion monster, and is drawing its trihedral figures now. This month, we’ll be showing you another piece of new art right off the presses: “Ronan, the Mad Tempest Knight.” The concept for this fusion monster is “a half-beast knight who can control the wind,” so I asked him to draw a beautiful boy who uses a lyre as a weapon. Game system-wise, I think Ronan will be more of a support-type fusion monster who sings Bardic music in order to buff party members.

Watanabe-san, our image board specialist, just finished drawing the indoor race track. I believe that America was the main place where greyhound races were held in 1923, and we’re going to make sure the gambling den run by the gangster Owney Madden in Penny Blood will be ablaze with excitement. Luca will take part in the races in order to train himself, too. Oh, and there won’t just be dogs running in these races… I imagine it’s going to end up being quite a wild place where you’ll get to see a lot of unusual races.

…And that concludes this month’s update. We’re right in the middle of autumn now, so I hope you can all cherish the leaves as they start to really change color, eat some good food, and give your stomachs all the nutrients they need. See you next month, everyone.

Matsuzo Machida