- Bookshelf Puzzle Devlog and Demo Update - 15 September 2026
This week's devlog covers how I made a new puzzle with the bookshelf cabinets and lights using a custom struct I call a conditional trigger payload. Using a custom enumeration, and Blueprint interface, I can compare different trigger events to figure out if an interactable object in the game should be able to be opened or not. Essentially, a very fancy combination lock that is abstract enough to use in many different parts of the game.As a bonus, the changes made in this devlog are available in The House Dreams Along With Them Demo right now!Here's the demo changes:- Removed Umbral Personae code from demo (it was always meant to be temporary!)- Added custom light switch to power off the living room dream lava lamp- Added conditional triggers to bottom cabinets on bookshelf - They require the fluorescent lights to be turned on in a certain pattern- Added new clue to left peephole in foye…
- Composing Dark Ambient Music Devlog - 9 September 2026
In this week's devlog, I go over my workflow for creating music for my game. It's Cubase and Adobe Audition. So....not that complicated!One of the puzzle rooms in my game is a brick facade wreathed in chains, set on an endless wooden expanse. The only soundtrack at first is the creaking of your footsteps and the sparse, distant reverberations of grinding metal.In order to create a seamlessly looping dark ambient soundtrack for this wood and metal nightmare, I start by opening my music sequencer of choice: Cubase. The free instruments I'm using are the fantastic Spitfire Audio LABS and the Tyrell N6; the former for beautiful and melancholic strings and the latter for weird synthesized noises.After laying down some arbitrary long notes and drones in the key of B minor, and a few bursts of percussion with a stereo delay applied, I export the WAVE audio to Audition. In Audition, I use a mix…
- The Big Demo Music Update - 1 September 2026
The Demo for The House Dreams Along With Them has been updated to include 3 brand new music tracks and an in-universe justification for the music as well. In each lucid puzzle dream, you'll be able to find a radio. When turned on, the radio will play a unique chill-beats-to-solve-puzzles-to style looping music track.The Guest Bedroom features the uplifting groove of "The Guest Bedgroove".The Living Room features the Philip Glass inspired 6/8 chillout sounds of "Pyroclastic Floe". Yes, it is spelled that way because of the track from Glassworks.The Garage features the brooding and chaotic energy of the track "The Light Eater".In addition, there's some miscellaneous fixes to the demo that also made it in to the update including:Updated project settings input default for mouse capture to "lock always" (Hopefully will prevent mouse from leaving the window when in fullscreen window mode)Adde…
- Making a Weeping Angel Devlog - 26 August 2026
In this week's devlog, I cover how I created and implemented the logic for a Weeping Angel / SCP-173 style creature that only moves when the player isn't looking at it. There's a lot of different ways you could script the interaction, but for an Unreal 5.3 blueprints project like mine, I settled on a combination of line traces, custom enumerations for the player's eye state (open, closed, or squinting), and the useful (but not entirely reliable) WasComponentRecentlyRendered node.Here are the steps as an easy digestible list!Array Modifier in BlenderTo create the creepy multi-armed creature, use an array modifier parented to an empty in Blender on an arm mesh ripped from a free base mesh found online.Creature Blueprint Setup in UnrealImport the FBX exported from Blender into a new blueprint making sure to have all static mesh components as children of a single parent scene component for…
- The Floor Is Lava! Devlog - 19 August 2026
In this devlog, I go over 5 steps I used to make the classic "The Floor Is Lava!" game into a puzzle. The considerations in helpful list form:Lava MaterialAnimate crisscrossing noise patterns and use mesh distance fields to give the illusion of movement and dynamically change the material contrast when meshes intersect with the lava planeFIREBLUAdjust the colors so the lava resembles the immortal FIREBLU texture from the original DoomParticle EffectsUse bubbling lava particles from a store asset pack and have the niagara system spawn particles in world space near the playerTo get a more immersive soundscape, use a callback on particle creation from the niagara system to play a spark sound effect when certain particle splashes are spawned inCollision LogicUse a line trace straight down from the player's collision capsule to check if the actor directly below them is tagged to be part of t…
- Getting Unreal to Run at 60 FPS on Steam Deck - 12 August 2026
In this devlog, I go over 12 practical (and increasingly specific) steps you can take to optimize the frame rate of a UE 5.3 game so it can run at 60 fps even on a Steam Deck.I found some of these optimizations to be counter intuitive, such as the default scalability settings needing to be updated in the game engine's install folder rather than the project's install folder, so hopefully these tips will help other solo devs out when trying to get their builds running smoothly on older hardware!Tl;dr:Add custom scalability settings iniAdjust foliage percent for low scalability settingsReduce max texture sizeReduce nanite triangle percent on high-poly assets like treesUse simple wind versions of megascan tree assetsDisable WPO after a short distanceDisable shadow casting on small grass and shrubsDisable shadow casting on far away treesReduce attenuation on lights to minimum needed for desi…
- Arachnophobia Mode Devlog - 5 August 2026
In this inaugural devlog, I explain my thought process behind adding and implementing the accessibility feature of an arachnophobia mode. The mode allows people to remove or add more spiders at their discretion.The second half of the devlog covers some of the minutia of my process for creating a demo version of The House Dreams Along With Them as well as how to separate out the press exclusive version of the demo while still keeping the public version of the demo in tact for people to play.Enjoy and let me know if there's any particular part of the process you'd like to hear more about!
- Demo Available and New Short Gameplay Trailer - 30 July 2026
I have reactivated the public demo of The House Dreams Along With Them! The demo was unavailable for a few weeks because I had created a special press-exclusive version of the demo that was intended for a more limited audience. I've got a devlog planned to go into the technical details of creating the press demo, but that's a story for another update.To commemorate the return of the demo, I've also made a refreshed trailer that was based off of the short 30 second trailer I produced for the WISHLISTED event. For the editor-curious, this version includes more single word imperative title cards taken from the game website's description as well a new clip from the garage puzzle in the demo.Here's the refreshed gameplay trailer!And finally, here are the major changes to the demo:Fixed physics bug* where by stacking multiple objects, then removing the bottom, the top ones are left floating i…
- Public Demo Unavailable - 20 July 2026
Starting today, the public demo for The House Dreams Along With Them has been deactivated so that I can pitch a special Press Demo to certain press folks for a few weeks. And by "I" I actually mean the wonderful Tom from Strange Signals who is helping out with the marketing for my game! Thanks, Tom!The press demo includes the "Master Bedroom" puzzle which isn't in the demo usually, if you're curious. This is one of the most difficult and involved puzzles where a love of King's Field dungeon crawling is a boon.Once the press folks can take a look (and hopefully shower it with interest and praise so that I can pay rent and have health care and so forth) for a week or two, then I'll reactivate the public demo.
- The Demo Performance Update - 8 July 2026
This is (likely) the last major update to the demo and contains a huge amount of optimizations so that the game can run smoothly on lower spec GPUs. I was able to get my hands on a Steam Deck so I'm using that as a benchmark and have been able to get the Demo running at 60* fps on the Steam Deck specific graphics preset.*= Technically, the area with the trees runs between 50-60fps on the Steam Deck preset but can go up to a smooth 60 if you turn down the amount of trees that are drawn (i.e. set Foliage Quality to Low). But I think the forest looks better with more trees so, yeah.The rest of the Demo's updates concern tweaks to some of the puzzles, especially the Guest Bedroom, and the Garage. Where relevant I also mention which Twitch demo playthrough I was watching when I wrote down the bugs to investigate.Performance Fixes:Performance improvements for the forest area around the houseL…
- Demo Updated - 8 May 2026
The House Dreams Along With Them Demo has been updated!Here's the change list for build 23153379:Made the house easier to see in the intro dream's first tutorial messageGuest Bedroom: Observation about door code no longer needs the light on to be put into the observation logPossibly fixed mouse losing focus (by clicking outside the game window)? Set Input Mode Game and UI is set to "lock always" the mouse so hopefully people using windowed mode, fullscreen window, and variants with multiple monitors don't have the mouse wander out of the window randomlySolved issue where holding "G" (default deduction menu shortcut) causes deduction menu to pop on and then off quickly, but only on keyboardIf in keyboard mode, delay 1 second before resetting the inputCan now breathe and blink when precise mode is on (the mode with the visible hand cursor)
- The House Dreams Along With Them featured in WISHLISTED pre-show - 24 April 2026
Today is the WISHLISTED April live streaming event and I was able to get a 30 second trailer spot for The House Dreams Along With Them into the pre-show trailer showcase!I posted the trailer to the Caranthos Mori Youtube channel here:It is a shorter variant of the April gameplay trailer from a few weeks ago (naturally).
- April 2026 Gameplay Trailer is live! - 6 April 2026
The April 2026 gameplay trailer for The House Dreams Along With Them is now live!The trailer has been added to the store page, but here's a YouTube link as well: I'm excited for folks to get a look at some of the surreal parts of the game that aren't featured in the demo. A reminder that the demo shares save files with the full version so your progress will carry over!Also, if you're interested in chatting about the game or even becoming a tester, here's the Discord link: https://discord.gg/tp6gqpDVs6
- New Gameplay Trailer out next week on 4/6/26! - 31 March 2026
I'll be releasing a new gameplay trailer for The House Dreams Along With Them on 4/6/26!I spent most of the recent weekend recording and ingesting gameplay clips for the new trailer. Other than providing a more up-to-date vision of the game for the store page, the new trailer also coincides with my efforts to market the game with ads and (hopefully) game showcases, both of which benefit from novelty.Here's a teaser trailer. Well, a teaser for the trailer. So, more of a trailer teaser. These words have lost all meaning.
- A new lore-appropriate shower curtain courtesy of misreading licenses - 30 March 2026
The model I was using for the guest bathroom's shower didn't have a commercial license, so I got a new asset from CGTrader that *did* and customized it with a lore-appropriate shower curtain material. Remember to double check your asset licenses!If you're curious, the new asset (with the commercial license) I ended up buying was "Bathtub With Shower Curtain Low-poly 3D model" by PropDrop on CGTrader here: https://www.cgtrader.com/3d-models/interior/bathroom/bathtub-with-shower-curtainThe shower curtain's mask pattern is relevant to the events of the Master Bedroom puzzle in the full game.
