Hello All,

I know this blog is many days past the usual time I write them and I wish I could say it was for a good reason but unfortunately that is not the case.   My wife finally got to come home from the hospital after her surgery last Friday the 10th.  However by that Tuesday she had taken a turn for the worse.  Her vitals were extremely low, oxygen was just below 80 and her skin was changing color.  Per the home nurse and my Primary Care Doctor the best decision would be to get hospice involved.   My Wife’s one wish was to be in our home and not in a hospital.  This is of course what I am doing for her.  My wife is still home and I am taking care of her.  Her vitals have improved however she is not eating food.  She is however drinking water and going to the bathroom.   Hospice gave her only days to live and she has already shown them that was false.  My wife is a fighter and the strongest person I have ever met.  She is fighting for her life and I will fight with her.  Tomorrow I begin conversations with Dr’s on what if anything we can do moving forward to keep her with us and to make sure we looked behind every corner and not missing anything.  Right now I am cherishing every moment I can with her even if it’s only watching her sleep.  I have not left her side.  She is my best friend and my soulmate and if I could I would give up my life for hers.

22 Weeks ago I began this project of working on this video game.  The reason why was because of a dream.  One night my wife and I were talking about the possible outcome that could happen with her cancer diagnosis.  It was a hard conversation but one that was necessary.  It was that night I had a dream she had passed away.  To cope with death and to honor my wife I had built a video game about her and about cancer.  It was played by kids and adults and helped put a smile on the faces that were dealing with the disease.  It had also helped myself and my kids cope.  When I woke up I was crying.  It felt so real.

That day I told my wife about my dream and she began to cry.  She said however she was happy that in my dream we were able to move on and cope.  In my dream the name of the game was Saving our Sarah Cervical Cancer.  It was more than a game though it was a group put together to help all women with cervical cancer and men with what their wifes, girlfriends, mothers, etc had to deal with.  Also the acronym for Saving Our Sarah is SOS which also an acronym for HELP.  So the game is called SOS-CC.  Help Cervical Cancer and Saving our Sarah.

I decided I did not want to wait to create this.  I wanted to create this with Sarah.  I wanted her to be involved and I wanted her to see this being done.  I wanted her to see the game, to be able to play the game, and for it to become a reality.  So we started this together.  She gave her input on how she wanted it to look and helped with the creativity.  It was fun to do together.  I planned on having the game release on September 18th in the Apple IOS store.  All along I was trying to finish this game as quickly as I could.  I wanted to release the game so that Sarah could see it completed.  This may not happen, but at least she helped create it, she got to play it, and she knows it will become reality.

The one thing she asked me so far while she has been home is, “You better finish that game and release it!”  I promised her that will definitely happen.  This game will get finished and it will be updated regularly.  This is going to be in honor or my wife.  In memory of her and for everyone else that has to deal with the horrors of cancer.

I will try and make the Sept 18th release window but it may be delayed.  I have not worked on the game since she’s been home as I cannot leave her side.  Below is the change log that I got done before she came home.

Also below is an almost 2 min video.  Please watch and listen to this video.  This song has been custom created for Sarah by Dale North.  It is the title track of the game.  It’s beautiful and Sarah loves it!

Thanks Everyone.

• Completely re-designed and finished Title Menu and all option menus
  • updated all button icons
    • they are now pills with white text, blue text when selected
  • re arranged the buttons on the how to section
  • added random icon to some of the menu screens
  • updated some how to screens
  • re – designed the Store (pharmacy)
    • IAP has a proper icon and description
    • all descriptions are now in the info section of each purchasable item
      • can be accessed by pressing the “I” icon next to the item
  • Added How To areas for:
    • controller
    • navigation
    • store
• fixed some bugs that were found by play testing
• Turned on some V-sync to stop some screen tearing from the on screen joystick
• Created a section in the menu for all the Diary pages you find
  • once found in game they will be unlocked in the menu so you can read them later on, so you can “collect” them all
• All SFX are now completed and in the game, thanks @LUIS
  • they all sound amazing!
  • adjusted the volume on some SFX
• Transition screens complete
  • chapter 1 & 2 title and transition screens
  • chapter 2 completion transition screen
  • endless mode transition screen
• new fireball sprite and destroy animation
  • courtesy of Irina Mir (irmirx)
• Endless mode is now locked until you complete the game
  • transition displays the highest number of rooms reached in one run
  • always start endless run in the bedroom
• Your now able to purchase the health and stamina upgrade 3 times (instead of 2) in the store (pharmacy)
  • if you purchase both 3 times you will double your starting health and stamina!!
• Credits Screen done
• Once you reach the boss room you can no longer backtrack.  Get all the items you need before you enter boss room
• Made some changes to game over screen
  • added story context text
  • removed main menu button and now it’s tap anywhere to continue
• lowered health damage of falling in holes to half a heart
  • only hazard that depletes 1 whole heart from Sarah are the spikes
• Main theme song has been created by Dale North exclusively for this game.
  • It is the most amazing piece of music I have heard and for it to be written for this game and my wife means so much to me.  Thank you Dale!
• Moved diary page to the SOSopedia
• created a dedicated stats page in SOSopedia
  • now tracks total time played as well as other stats from game over screen
• resolved a bug where Sarah was not invincible for 1 second after falling into a hole and re-spawning

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