New day, new devlog! I’ll be uploading these on a slightly more spaced-out schedule, but as a little advance birthday gift to myself I’d like to deliver this one early. There’s lots of exciting things to cover, so let’s dig right in! 

First and foremost, we’ve got to address the elephant in the room: VA auditions for Tender Lovin’ Cannibal are now live, and we’ve received more than 100 submissions so far! Thank you to every single person who’s auditioned.

 At the time of writing this, Corey and I have made plans to listen through each and every submission, as well as collecting notes from members of the team to see which actors fit each role the best. I’m sure some of you will be getting some acceptance messages from us soon, so keep an eye on your inboxes!

(Disclaimer: For adult characters, only actors 18 and older will be accepted.)

On the topic of voice acting, the time has come for me to spill the beans on that interview I was keeping under wraps last time. Without further ado, drum roll please… 

A Couple of Questions For Corey LeVier!

I’ve got another sort-of-question-but-kind-of-assignment for you. When you’ve got the time, would you be willing to do a short interview for the devlog? I’ve been interviewing different members of the team and putting together some things for us to post!

“That’s cool with me!”

My first question to you is this. You’ve got a pretty extensive portfolio, having voiced dozens of animations and perfected a whole host of impressions. But have you ever voice acted for a video game before this? If so, what was that experience like compared to different types of projects?

“Yes! Two video games I’m really proud of are Pico vs. Bear DX and Space Raiders in Space. Both experiences were incredibly fun and received a lot of positive feedback! Pico vs. Bear DX was really fun to record, but also stressful because I voiced Newgrounds’ mainstay character, Pico. Pico has a huge following, and up until the game’s release didn’t have a voice. There have been other projects where Pico had some audio snippets, but had never been fully voiced. So this was going to be the first time Newgrounds members played a fully voiced Pico game.”

 “I was scared of how people would react to the voice, and thankfully everyone loved it! The game was a big hit too. Everyone loved it, which made me extremely happy!”

“Space Raiders in Space was the first game I had the opportunity to voice a lead in. I originally was asked by the developers to record the trailer for the game. After I recorded that, and after the game got picked up, the team decided to add a story mode to the game. The team asked me if I wanted to voice the main character, Andy. I jumped on it right away and I finally got to utilize my Solid Snake impression. I of course put my own spin on the voice, so it didn’t sound like an impression of Snake. The recording process was challenging, but also really fun!”

“The game did well on release, and it was recently ported to the Nintendo Switch. So I finally have a project on a major console!”

Congratulations! It’s always such a thrill when a project you’ve had a hand in gets some sort of major release or positive acclaim. How did you get your start? Did you originally voice act as a hobby, or was it always a career aspiration?

“It was always a hobby at first. I always did impressions for my friends and family. They always suggested I get into voice acting.”

“However, I was a baseball guy and played up until I was 23. Took my career professionally, but it ended earlier than I would have liked. Once my baseball career was over though, I listened to my friends’ and family’s advice, along with encouragement from Rob Paulsen’s podcast, and I tried my hand at voice acting! Once I realized I was decent right off the bat, I wanted to make it my next profession. I could be myself and simply have a lot of fun, even though it can be tough.”

“I got my start literally right away, which was remarkable. I tried out for a project through Newgrounds and after my very first audition, I landed my first gig. It was for an Arma 3 mod and I landed a small role, but I ended up getting a larger role on the project. It was such an awesome experience, and ultimately fueled me to keep going and get better!”

In the spirit of self-improvement, have there been any prominent hurdles you’ve faced in your VA career so far? Are there any particular things you’ve found yourself struggling with? If so, what tips have you found helpful in overcoming those issues?

“I mean, you’re always going to go through struggles as a voice actor. I guess that’s why I love it so much, because it’s very similar to baseball in a sense. Baseball is a game of failure, and voice acting is the same. As a voice actor, our job is to audition, audition, audition and audition until you land a role. Once you do, you record your lines, and then you audition for more roles!”

“However, you aren’t going to land every role you audition for. You’re actually going to get rejected more than you will get cast. But you can’t let that bring you down. One helpful bit of information I learned is that in casting processes, a casting director is looking for a specific voice. Once they hear it, they choose. It may be your voice, or not, and if not, it doesn’t mean you suck as a voice actor. It just means your voice wasn’t the right fit.”

“When you’re starting out, you don’t know that right away and when you experience rejection, you start to doubt yourself and imposter syndrome sinks in. When imposter syndrome starts to hit you, it’s important to have people in your corner to pull you out of it. I’m actually in my second go around of voice acting.”

“My first time attempting this, it was just myself, and I dealt with all the negativity alone. This time though, I have a LOT of voice acting friends who’ve helped me through those situations and made me keep my head up. If it wasn’t for my friends this time around, you probably wouldn’t be talking to me right now (Love you Nick and Josh!!!).”

“At the beginning of my career I thought, like a lot of people do, that voice acting was just doing voices and having fun. I was wrong though, and I learned that acting is way more important. In my second go around, I’ve read books, taken acting courses and received coaching from Daniel Ross (Donald Duck) so I can improve my acting regimen. Since doing so, I’ve landed more gigs. If you feel you’re not landing roles, see how you can improve your acting skills!”

First of all, the fact that you managed to land coaching from Daniel Ross is actually surreal. Second of all, here comes the final question! 

Interest in your work has absolutely skyrocketed ever since your appearance in Tender Treats. Countless people have found happiness and even comfort thanks to your role as Bob Velseb. Did you have any immediate interest or input on the creation of the character, or did you embrace him after voicing him? If you could say one thing to all of your fans at once, what would it be?

“It was a real treat learning from Mr. Ross, and I plan on working with him again!”

“First off, I’m so happy that so many people love ‘Tender Treats’, Bob and my performance. It’s very gratifying as a voice actor when people truly love what you’ve done with a character. I’m happy a lot of people have found comfort in Bob, and that he provides happiness for people.”

“Second, as soon as I was offered the role by David (SrPelo), I was instantly vested in Bob and the opportunity to voice him. The first character designs had me hooked, and I was excited to come up with his voice. We got it on the second attempt, and all it was was me lowering my voice a bit more, talking slower and adding that airy effect.”

“When David heard it, he was excited because it was exactly what he envisioned. I had no input on his design, but I worked hand in hand when it came to developing Bob’s voice. This was one of my favorite roles to take on and I’m hoping we see Bob more, somehow or someway!”

“To my fans, I truly love and appreciate every single one of you. I like to consider ‘Tender Treats’ as my break-out moment and I can’t wait to see what it leads to. All of your support since the release has been the greatest thing to come from it. To me, it validates that I know what I’m doing as a voice actor and people truly enjoy my work and craft. You guys encourage me to be the best voice actor I can be, and I’ll ALWAYS be grateful for your support.”

“This truly has been a blessing, and I can’t wait to entertain you all further!”

WOOHOO

Thanks for doing the interview! I know it was the world’s most impromptu thing ever, but it was very rewarding to learn about your career and process <:]

“Thank you for wanting to do the interview. I never really get to do that a lot, so it was nice.”

I’ll be honest with you folks, the script for the demo is pretty damn long. To quote fellow lead writer Ivo, you guys will be fed very well. There’s plenty of content and conversations jam-packed in there. It’ll hopefully have you introduced to Tender Lovin’ Cannibal’s world from the beginning and curious to know more by the end. 

The whole thing has been more or less filled in. The bones have been set and flesh has been placed upon that reinforced skeleton. Even so, our work is not yet done. Mechanical fixes and tweaks need to be made, each sentence meticulously worked and reworked to hopefully bring about the highest quality possible. If the plot is the skeleton and our prose is the meat, call this current stage of development adorning the whole thing with skin. 

Kind of a grisly metaphor, but the point is that we’re at the quality-assurance crossroads and unwilling to make compromises when it comes to smooth sentences and good mouthfeel. (That’s an acceptable word for writing, right? Mouthfeel?)

We’ve had placeholder sprites and mockup concept art ready from pretty much the start of development. With so many factors of the demo so close to completion already, it’s high time these placeholders got upgraded to their final versions. Our sprite artists are currently fulfilling that goal as quickly as possible. Thanks to the hard work of our concept artists, it’s simply a matter of re-drawing the initial mockups in the game’s final art style!

On that note, let us know if you would be interested in an official Tender Lovin’ Cannibal Artbook. There’s seriously a lot of images and brainstorming that have gone into this, and it would be a shame for the good stuff under the hood to go to waste. 

Speaking of under the hood…

Most of the mechanics that will be showcased in the demo have been tested and implemented into the game's code. I won’t whip out a bunch of nitty-gritty programmer jargon on you, but I’m more than happy to list some of our accomplishments in that department instead!

Custom pronouns

Everyone give a round of applause for selectable player pronouns! But wait, there’s more… for the low low price of zero dollars, you can also input custom pronouns. If you’re vibing completely outside of binary gender and he/she/they won’t cut it, then look no further than our handy dandy little neopronoun tool! Punch in whatever pronouns you want and watch the fireworks! 

Accessibility functions

Similarly to our visuals, accessibility has been a key factor to us from day 0. Cutting right to the chase, here are a few of the accessibility functions we have to offer: 

• Support for the OpenDyslexic font (as well as a built-in XL font option)
• Closed Captions for animated cutscenes
• Audio cues for SFX and musical transitions

If you have other suggestions, let us know so we can do our best to include them! 

Achievements

Here’s another pleasant little tidbit for you: functional achievements!

Some may be harder than others to obtain. The demo is only a slice of what’s to come, of course… leave no stone unturned, and you might just be able to collect them all.

Now that those updates are out of the way, this concludes our second devlog. Hopefully you enjoyed it! Feel free to leave any questions, comments or concerns in the replies below and we’ll do our best to answer it.  Have a happy weekend, and see you again soon!

— Rae