Happy New Year, everyone!!

Keeping this update short, since we are in the thick of development right now, but things are coming along great with Episode 5! Right now, we're continuing to hack away at the middle third of the chapter, but we're rapidly approaching the point where it will finally be time to move on to the climax.

Here's where we are, in numbers:

• Over 140,000 words of script have already been fully implemented for the episode. That's writing, art, music, sound design, code, and bugfixing, all essentially locked in. For reference, that is about as much content as there was in all of Slay the Princess on release.
• 723 sprites have been finished, as well as 64 backgrounds.
• 11 new tracks of music have been finished.

If you want to check out what's finished, preview builds are available for the Alpha Tester tier on our Patreon, which also has a dedicated section on our Discord to discuss new content and help us eliminate bugs before release.

Episode 5 has a lot of branching and player agency in it, and it's also the first time the story can become locked in to early conclusions, though these endings will still have additional content waiting for them in The Final Chapters*.* They'll also be heavily (diegetically) signposted, and it will be difficult to reach these branches accidentally. This will be the most replayable Episode to date, with many routes to explore with the same start of chapter save file.

One thing I'd also like to highlight in this update is what the remainder of Scarlet Hollow's development is going to look like. While the game is still going to have seven Episodes, the last two are really just a single unit, split into two chapters. They'll be released as a single update together, and it's best to view Episode 5 as the penultimate "Episode," as well as the game's final cliffhanger. So this will be the last opportunity to hop on the train while still leaving room to theorycraft alongside the community. This also means that the conclusion of Scarlet Hollow is probably closer than you think!

All the best, and Happy New Year! We're almost there.

Abby and Tony

I’m brainstorming

It is October which means it is time for my annual rereading of The Last Halloween

... creature

Kaneeka Forsyth, town skeptic on sabbatical from veterinary school to run her late father's general store.

One day she'll go back and finish her degree, once life finally stops getting in the way.

Which it will. Someday.

Right?

Hey folks!

Another month, another update, and wow do we have a lot of progress to share with you!

First and foremost, in case you missed it, Episode 5 finally has a release date! Your return to the Holler is set for Friday, February 13th 2026, on Valentine's Day Eve. We announced this release date with a painstakingly animated trailer put together by our dear friends over at SmallBu Animation, and you can check it out here:

We've also finally released our first alpha build to our testers. All in-all, it contains:

• 34 brand new backgrounds.
• 270 brand new sprites
• About 70,000 words of total content.
• 6 new tracks from our maestro, Mr. Boone.

Even though we call these builds "alphas," this section of the chapter is bug-tested, and effectively locked and finalized. While it's hard to get a full sense of scope, I'd say this means that roughly the first quarter of the episode, in terms of density, is essentially finalized.

If you're interested in trying the beginning of the episode early, you can access this build through the relevant tier on our Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/posts/first-scarlet-5-142499990

Joining this tier also gets your name added to the alpha tester section of the credits when the next update rolls out!

No pressure to join, but the option is there.

We also wanted to use this update to talk about a small retroactive change we're making to pre-existing romance content. In the current live build, romance options essentially fully ignore your character's gender, but as time went on, we felt like writing their scenes this way stripped them of a little bit of character.

You can still date any of our romance options regardless of your character's gender, but there's now a little extra dialogue referencing their preferences and history to make things feel a bit more organic.

This applies to:

Oscar
Stella
Kaneeka

And it will also apply to Sybil and Doctor Kelly in the future. But we'll leave the details for you to discover once the new update drops.

Work continues to go well, and we look forward to sharing more with you as we continue to progress.

Best wishes,
Tony and Abby

"You two can be the family you were always meant to be, free from the sins of generations past, if you let me do what needs doing."

Scarlet Hollow Episode 5 releases in February, on Friday the Thirteenth. The day before Valentine's.

A huge shout out to our friends at SmallBu for animating this trailer!

"You two can be the family you were always meant to be, free from the sins of generations past, if you let me do what needs doing."

Scarlet Hollow Episode 5 releases in February, on Friday the Thirteenth. The day before Valentine's.

A huge shout out to our friends at SmallBu for animating this trailer!

Fruits of today's livestream! Tony presented me with a Chapter 1 scenario and then challenged me to come up with Chapter 2 and 3 designs that would branch from it.

What if you went down unarmed and just told the Princess everything, and you managed to work together against the Narrator to get her out of the cabin earlier than any other route?

Similar to The Stranger, which would be its sister chapter, you are able to glean that she changes based on perception, where your own actions shape her. But instead of that going out of control like it does in The Stranger, you can try to work together to make her something that can tear the Narrator from your mind and free you both.

That leads to either The Horde or The Singularity, the latter of which is a fusion Princess with The Stranger. (Chat requested I draw her chibi form too, probably to torment me lmao)
Many of the Chapter 3 princesses are meant to have echoes of the Shifting Mound, and I would say this one certainly does XD

This would also mean we would want to add a standalone Chapter 3 for The Stranger. So what if the Voice of the Contrarian was able to help you "put her back the way she was?"
So you accidentally implode the cabin with you inside, everything goes dark, and you die. Waking to Chapter 3: The Cabin.

The whole cabin is Princesses now!

We aren't doing any more DLC for Slay the Princess, so these will remain as sketches :] But these were so fun!! I didn't know if I was going to be able to ideate a whole Princess line live and get anything good out of it, so I am happy with these.

Once the VOD is up, you can see our design/idea process in real time >:3

slay the princess digital art book out now

290+ page of CYOA inspired paths to explore, complete with creator commentary!