Bluebird’s Illusion Rebuild Demo Release Date

Please go to our new site for all the latest news including a release date!
https://fmabbi.wordpress.com/2017/12/25/bluebirds-illusion-rebuild-demo-release-date/

BBI: R is still alive!

Hello dear followers and visitors!

We have a new website that you can visit here!

We apologize for the super lack of updates. We've been so busy we haven't been able to work on BBI. But now we do! We also have a few things to say:

• We are active in Facebook! If you wish to keep up-to-date in our progress, please join this group.
• We also have a Discord group if you are interested!

As for the development itself:

• We are working with a our new and stable game engine for this. So far it's going really well. We were able to add a lot of missing functions from the original game. Here's a list:
• Basic VN functions such as save/load everywhere, log function (press middle mouse to enter, right click to cancel) and so on.
• 720p, 16:9 display instead of 4:3 ratio. Meaning it's great for widescreen monitors!
• Animation functions
• Music layering and so on!
• Goatjesus has been proofreading and rewriting parts of the script to be more cohesive and interesting. He also did the grunt work to optimize all assets to avoid performance issues. Great work as always!

We'd love to update more in the future but thank you for following the development of Bluebird's Illusion!

~Team Autumn Bird

BBIR Team needs your help!

Progress Report 21st June

Heya! This is GoatJesus,

previously known as BluebirdsCircle. I'm here to let you guys in on all the latest news on what's going on with the blog and our project.

Just a reminder, we've got every day in the game translated from head to toe.

(Yes, we've been finished for a while)

Getting all the translations done was the first priority. We still don't have New Game + scripts and Developer Diaries done, but that's really trivial to us at this point in time. Some things to be upfront about before people go crazy; the script has been altered to be more true to the lore of manga Fullmetal Alchemist. What does this mean?

Well, the original team Ocean X, wrote this game back in 2004. This means a lot of the lore is outdated and basically guesswork on their part. We've chosen to change certain names to be more up-to-date with what we know about Fullmetal Alchemist. For example: they mistook Father for Hohenheim, so we just changed it to what it should be (Father.) Other than that, it should be pretty dang accurate to the original version in respects to the teams artistic creativity.

I just got done cutting out each remastered sprite. They've all been upscaled and repaired to work in 720p resolution. It looks stunning! More details can be made out than ever before and pretty much all the pixelation has been smoothed out. Here's a sample of that compared to the original:

(You'll need to click HERE to see full details)

I've also made some updates on this blog's media page and on downloads. New wallpapers have been added to media, showcasing our 1080p remastered opening screenshots. As for downloads, a demo may go up fairly soon, but for now the original Chinese version can be found on that page. Progress on the remastered opening itself; it's pretty much finished. We're waiting on our composer to construct a new instrumental to be able to record an English cover of Moments. Once that's done, maybe you guys will be able to check it out.

Obviously, there's been a lot of headway on our work in the passed two years. We keep having to update the game engine to have it running on the most modern PCs. By the time we're done, we could even get this to run on browsers for easy access. Basically, this thing could run even on a potato.

When will the game be finished? Hopefully this year. We've been working on this project for nearly 5 years. It's about time.

Make sure to check out the facebook page for any spontaneous updates! 

GJ

We're still active!

Hi everyone! I know we've seem inactive but here's the current state of the projects:

• All the routes and stuff are translated except NG+. We gave up at this point.
• The sprites are all cleaned up!
• We were working on hd-fying the opening theme.
• The CGs are all HD!
• All our updates are in Facebook.

I hope that everyone will follow our facebook page to see some minor stuff we've done! Please do not share the stuff we have in Facebook. Cheers and thank you!

Delays and Thank Yous

by goku-no-baka

Hello everyone. I'm the Project Leader, Renasci. I would like to apologize for all the delays of the project and my long term absence. I left all of the work to Bluebird's Circle and Archeia, both of them being busy with various projects, due to my lingering illness. I would also like to apologize about the spam in my twitter. Rest assured that I have unsubscribed. Horoscopes will no longer flood your twitter notices.

I had a long talk with Archeia yesterday and with some luck we might be able to make the progress a tad faster than our current speed. We also have a new person in the team named, Yami. I'll properly introduce him once we get our foundation stable.

I also want to thank the Bluebird's Illusion Group in Deviantart for their support and our followers for your extreme patience. Going back to the blog and seeing the conversations in the cbox always bring a smile to our faces. We're definitely doing our best to get this thing done. 

Another thing I'd like to brought up is the Engine. There had been constant questions about why are we moving to a new engine. It's mostly "Aren't you guys just translating? Why are you guys making a new engine for this?"
 

The main reason is...to make the English translation possible. 

In our dev diaries and early entries, you should be able to see one of the biggest problems we were facing. The last attempt we did is that we kept getting an error message when we use the word, "Brother." The other one would be how ugly the fonts looked and how we couldn't figure out how to change the font. Many other things. There's also the issue of repacking the game. Translating visual novels and working with their engines requires an experienced programmer. 

I'm definitely not one. Archeia, who is the only one remotely close to a programmer, has little interest in learning NScripter and is interested in other fields. The question we had back then, "Should we keep working with this engine or should we just use our own?"

It didn't take long for us to agree that we should just use our own. Because we can work better with an engine we spent our life on. We don't want to keep working with NScripter and end up scrapping the project. There's very little interest in BBI from other translation groups last time we tried to hire people or translators. If we won't do it, who will?

If that isn't convincing enough, Archeia also brought up a few things that I found interesting:

• Windows 8 is supported as long as you play in desktop mode.
• A possibility that they can be playable on IOS and Android devices.
• Everyone can use the engine if they want to make their own visual novels.

I know that our decision might be unclear to some people. But everyone is free to try to translate BBI. If they can do it with its current engine and fix the existing bugs, we would gladly support them. But as it stands, we would like to work with our own methods and develop something that is worth our time and effort. That's why we're working hard on the game in the first place! :)

Thank you very much for your continued support and we will definitely get this game done. We're almost there!

FINISHED EDITING

YYYYEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEESSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS!!

BBI is 100% complete with it's base translation! We went through EVERYTHING and made sure EVERYTHING was neat and polished to a shine. Expect the game out soon-ish enough... xD Congratulations everyone involved and thank you to all our followers! :D Now it's come down to SFX, Programming and VOICE ACTING! Woooootttt!

Autumn Birds Circle

FINISHED TRANSLATING

We're finally done... Omegawd. We're done. ;-; Two years worth of effort and we finally finished the main translation! All the days and the search... DONE! Now! *claps hands* We just need to edit it, which won't take long at all. Thank you all for your support! We couldn't have done this without you all. ^^)b

AutumnBirdsCircle

Fun News~

Hola everyone, due to work, universities, Renasci being mortally ill (it's complicated) and unable to go online at all, we had been on halt for a while now. The project has to be returned to my hands and using the scarce time I have to reorganize the project in her stead. But after a talk with my trusty partner, BlueBird's Circle, we decided that we'll release a demo on February 14. 

We were going to surprise you guys this December 25th, but alas, things happened and destroyed our plans. We would like to thank everyone with their patience and we're glad that you guys didn't give up on us! The demo would be extremely short, probably a chapter long, but hey? At least it's a proof that we are working on it. And another good news would be, the translation is now 95% done. All that's left is inputting them in the game.

We still have to fix some images, such as the ever annoying Envy's hair because of artifacts, but we'll get there~

There's also a large chance we can provide IOS, Android and Mac support. But we'll get there in due time. (They're written in LUA so it's like, lol <_<;)

Thanks and have some happy holidays everyone!

Art by Robo-Shark

Some little things

I know we've been sort of inactive lately, it's mostly because of my job that has this project on a halt in terms of development. Currently, I was looking over the old engine and slowly having some features from it to the new one. It's mostly the mouse giving me problems haha.

But the good part is some things that I couldn't do from the old engine was don with the new engine. Except, I'm still having trouble importing some new stuff in...

I'll update you guys on that when I have the chance ;-;

Meeting Ends

Hey there everyone! This is AutumnBirdsCircle, some of you may remember me as BluebirdsCircle until my google account was suspended and I had to make a new one. Copyright be darned! So, my deadline was the 29th, and there's a lot been going on lately. Me and my good friend and editor Alex have been working night and day to get the translations done for Bluebird's Illusion. He's been so fantastic!! Give him a hand everyone! 


I have to say, this passed month has been intense. Waking up only to know you're going back to the exact same line of duty sure gets to you every once in a while. Tomorrow is my 17th birthday (the 29th) and there's nothing more I want more than to say thank you! You guys have given me the greatest present of all, the will to keep at it. Every, "YOU CAN DO IT!!" Makes me feel like episode 63.


To be honest, I want to hate this game since it's consumed my entire life, but I find the will to keep going and going. Anyway, I'm happy to announce it looks like we're on scheduled for the most part! 90% of the translations have been finalized and we're back on track! There's the Search I still need to do, but I can get that done in a little while. Also, thank you Archeia for taking my BS every day~~ ;_; My only regret is that I couldn't finish in time... Blue screen of death is my fiend.

So, thank you. From me to you! 

AutumnBirdsCircle 

LIGHTNING Speed!!!

Bluebirds Circle here... Now recently, I've been living in my cave--AKA my room--doing translations and rewriting nonstop everyday for the past 18 days. So far, I went back and polished up all the previous days in terms of dialogue, finished day 4, 5 and 6 and I'm currently 25% done with day 7. I plan on finishing the entire script by the 29th. But I need your help in cheering me on!! This isn't an easy task to translate alone... But I feel with the power of all you fans rooting this lone warrior on, I can accomplish anything!!

Thank you~

Pride Edward~

Bluebird's Circle has been busy drawing and coloring for the Risembool Ranger's Pride!Ed contest. And so after 3 days of working on it with a mouse and Adobe Flash. Here is the result of his hardwork and effort. Archeia made it so it looks like a wallpaper in here. Enjoy~

Check it out on Deviant Art: http://lordofawesomeness.deviantart.com/art/Happiness-Doesn-t-Exist-301823995

Battles In BBI II

Since the RPG option is winning by a large margin, I suddenly have a brain blast from thinking of what we can incorporate, so here are some things that might interest some people gameplay wise. I would also like to add one thing...I might actually change the GUI/Hud/System graphics the game had due to not being able to emulate the exact same style and I need to make new system graphics for this RPG inclusion. Rest assured that it won't be terrible! ...I hope.

Free-Time Related Gameplay

• Remember how in BBI where you can go to certain areas and talk to people? At one point, there are no scenes in these places and most of the time, it's just Edward just saying nothing to do here and stuff. Here's the possibility of incorporating a gameplay in it. To strengthen the Alchemy of the Playable Characters, you can do requests from certain people in the army or from the city. So what does this mean?
• Falman would like to see a material that is made from X. From here you can do some research, or maybe just some small chitter chatter with the random dudes from the military to think of ways to do Falman's request.

• Did you know? In FMA, Edward actually incorporate people's alchemic techniques for his benefit. One example is major Armstrong's earth spike that he uses in battle. Edward also started doing this AFTER he saw it. He used it mostly on the Greed Battle.

• So what does the above thing have to do with this? Well you can discuss some alchemic achievements by other state alchemists so you can use them in battle too. In a sense, Edward is a learning student :)

• This new feature will also open up new character scenarios and add-ons that the original didn't have. And since we removed the Ocean-X cameos since we thought they contribute absolutely nothing to the story, we can use them to give you guys quests/tasks/requests instead, in case none of the army needs one! 

Character Related Skills

• Edward Elric
• If you guys played the GBA games of FMA, it would be something similar, if not, lemme do a very quick summary. What Edward does is that he combos cards/elements to do a specific alchemic type of skill/achievement. This can range from healing, attack, support and debuffs/hex/cursing the enemy. Another good example of this type of battle system is Legend of Legaia from the PS1.

• So his style of gameplay in BBI is mostly this. You guys can combine many different type of elements and discover new alchemic endeavors. Once discovered, they will be freely available anytime on your skill subset so you won't have to input the same thing over and over!

• Edward is also a Jack of All Trades from what I noticed with his Alchemic Skills. So he can also influence his surroundings to make a specific Alchemic Skill stronger in terms of damage.

• Alphonse Elric
• Alphonse for the most part in The GBA version a physical attacker and let's cats do his bidding. After he collects a specific amount. The same thing goes here for the most part except he can also affect the field to make Alchemic Skills stronger. But you must be wondering, if Alphonse doesn't do much alchemy as Edward, what is this for? Which brings us to the next point:

• Roy Mustang
• The dearly beloved and hated Flame Alchemist. His skills are mostly focused on fire, fire, fire and fire. So what does this got to do with Alphonse?

• Did you know? It's revealed that Roy Mustang isn't really that incompetent under the rain or being drenched in water. But it actually makes his alchemy powers STRONGER after he does some alchemic magic. This is revealed in the manga when Risa Hawkeye said, I just assumed you were useless when drenched in water. We will also have to research back and read the manga to remember the explanation, but for now, let's ride with this one recollection.

• And in BBI, Alphonse and Roy are together when fighting, this is why I thought the two should cover each other's lacking in alchemic...accessibility...that Edward has.

And that's it for now, some things might subject to change depending on your feedback guys, so please keep us updated if you guys would like to add some things or dislike or aren't sure about!

Battles in BBI

This is a very important question to y'all so you better listen. *gets tomato'd*
Either way, I'm pretty sure everyone knows the card battle BBI had right? After recalling and rechecking the script, we noticed it only appears 4x in the entire game and it felt very insignificant and useless. So here's a very important question for you guys! And we really need this input right now because it will affect the development and how we will write the script. Here are the choices:

a.) We add some RPG Elements to BBI so the battles would make sense. What does this mean? Meaning that you will have more character interactions, items and so forth. It will also mean more story battles. We will discuss what the battles should look like, but if you're familiar with Shin Megami Tensei/Persona/Etrian Odyssey and so forth, we might go that route.

b.) Retain the old battle system. The very random and lucked base card battle system that can take you upto 3 hours depending on how many times Roy/Lust/Bradley/Gluttony heal themselves and how many offensive attacks you can get. Honestly, I am not a big fan of this battle system, at all. None of the team is.

c.) Completely remove the battles. Which means very story oriented, we'll figure out something to make some choices so you guys won't have to battle.


d.) Other suggestions are very much welcome. We're not doing however another card system that requires complicated coding.


And that's all of it. Thank you for your patronage.

There is Progress! Just not that great.

So instead have an Edward as we work on rewriting and translating the remaining days.

Slow as Molasses

A Lone Warrior's Update

Life! Jesus, I swear that life sucks so hard sometimes. School's getting in the way along with other projects and staff issues, (though the team is still wholly intact). Lately it's been little ol' me trying to get the script/translations finished. But doing it alone is no easy task. Even so, I've been busy with a lot of other things as well--which is taking a major toll on my work. And I have to say on everyone's behalf, we're sorry. It seems like we're starting to turn into Black Mesa Source, but Bluebirds Illusion is STILL not dead. Far from it. Give it more time, and I thank you all for your patience. REAL updates will be streaming in shortly.

Voice Acting's Been Cast! Finally!

So after several painful months of basically having no one to play Envy, we've finally got everyone cast for the Visual Novel! *phew* Thank god that's out of the way at last.

In case anyone's interested here's the cast list:

http://voiceactingalliance.com/board/showthread.php?69107-CAST-LIST-UP!-Fullmetal-Alchemist-Visual-Novel

System Update and Why the Engine Change

This was the last thing we were working on until Archeia got an invitation to beta test a newer, faster version of the engine we were using.

We apologize for the wait, but you see, the reason we want to change is that around 0:44, the map system drops from 60 fps to 25 fps. We couldn't find the reason why, but in the newer engine, this shouldn't happen. That's why we're opting to transfer to this new engine. While it looks faster in the video because Archeia did a modification in the code, we just felt that the newer engine would be better for the sake of our sanity.

We're very sorry about this. Please be patient with us, a little while longer.

Archeia says:
If you want to compare it to the original, you can see it below. Just note that is the speed of the transitions of the game and we didn't slow it down or whatsoever.

What happened?!

We're very sorry if things haven't been progressing as of late. And yes, you guessed it, College. Winter break is almost up. Finals is coming nearer and nobody has time to even talk to each other. Timezones makes a huge effect and people having Thesis or Term papers to submit. In short, busy~

Archeia and Renasci has been fixing another issue too. We won't be elaborate, but that ate most of our time. But during one of the few moments we worked on BBI, we DID find a way to make the code cleaner. The only problem with this is that we have to redo what we have done. We also remembered that by default, the engine had text skipping, but it was disabled in this script we're using. We're currently trying to fix this issue. Mostly because the Alphonse cursor won't stay on the end of each message. We'll post a poll later to ask which one people prefer.


We will now leave off some art: