Welcome back, seedbearers! This week's update is a little more Reia focused than usual. With Sinful Sands now complete and work beginning on her Cumbat spectacle, we thought this would be the perfect opportunity to put the Anubian Lustress in the spotlight.

Today we're taking you through the finished Sinful Sands environment, sharing the first sneak peeks of Reia's Cumbat concept, introducing two of her royal guards and even giving you a small taste of what's to come courtesy of her VA, the Voice Vixxen

We've also got a special community collaboration to share, followed by a Q&A with the incredibly talented PawFeather Comics!

So, without further ado...

Reia Nefertiti

Reia holds a particularly special place in our hearts as developers. Long before Lustrya became the project it is today, Reia was actually the first character we ever ideated. A lot has changed since those early concepts, but she stuck around, evolved alongside the project and ultimately became one of the characters who helped shape the game's story.

Fittingly, Reia will also bring the main story campaign of Early Access to its climax. After journeying alongside Seraphina and reuniting with Violyn and Miriku, players will eventually make their way to Sinful Sands in search of the next member to be recruited into Seraphina and co.'s eccentric band.

And if you know Reia, you probably already know she isn't going to make that climactic encounter easy.

Sinful SandsThis sprawling desert kingdom is where players will encounter Reia Nefertiti and serves as the setting for the climax story campaign and Cumbat arena planned for Early Access. Towering over the landscape is Sinful Sands' colossal pyramid, one of the kingdom's defining landmarks and a monument to the long history of the Anubians.

You may also notice the enormous Anubian statue looming in the distance. A relic depicting one of Reia's former rivals, a powerful ruler who crossed paths with her during an earlier Blooming Eclipse. Their rivalry ultimately ended rather decisively when Reia slew her.

Because apparently nothing says "I won" quite like keeping a gigantic statue of your dead rival around. For more on Reia's story and everything leading up to Sinful Sands, you can read her story chapters here

Reia's Cumbat BeginsWith Sinful Sands wrapped up, we're excited to finally showcase the first exclusive sneak peek at Reia's Cumbat spectacle; and Reia isn't entering the arena alone.

Meet twin sisters Saskia & Anestra (work in progress). Two of Reia's most esteemed royal guards and your first indication that her Cumbat encounter may be a little different from what came before.

Without spoiling too much, our current plan is for Reia's encounter to unfold across multiple phases, escalating as the battle progresses and making her finale feel appropriately larger in scope.

We've also got a very short audio snippet from a particularly heated turning point in the encounter, featuring Reia herself, brought to life by the incredibly talented Voice Vixxen:

There's still plenty we're keeping under wraps for now.

Community Spotlight: Pawfeather Comics

We're also thrilled to share a special collaboration with PawFeather Comics, who has created an amazing animation featuring Reia at her sultriest, alongside a short crossover webcomic bringing Reia together with two of his own girls, Sorbet & Raspberry!

We've loved seeing another artist put their own spin on Reia, so alongside sharing the finished pieces, we thought we'd sit down with PawFeather and learn a little more about the artist behind them!

Q&A with PawFeather Comics

For anyone discovering PawFeather Comics for the first time, tell us a little about yourself and what you do!

Hey there. I'm a self-taught illustrator and animator who has been working in the adult comic scene since the late 1990s. I used to work with the long-established MTJ Publishing before starting PawFeather Comics in 2008.

How did you first get into drawing, and when did you realise you wanted to take your art seriously?

My interest in drawing and animating solidified in the early 1980s, mainly from being obsessed with former Disney animator Don Bluth's arcade game Dragon's Lair, and also his animated film The Secret of NIMH.

I had it on VHS and would pretty much pause and study every frame, figuring out how things were drawn and moved.

I went into college in 1993 wanting to be a computer graphic artist in the very new 3D animation industry, but 2D is still my favourite. After graduation, I worked in televised broadcast graphics and animation for 20 years until starting up a Patreon in 2017 and going indie.

Your work has a very recognisable style! What artists, games, comics or other media have influenced you the most?

Thanks for the compliment! Don Bluth remains one of my biggest influences, particularly Dragon's Lair, Space Ace and The Secret of NIMH.

I've also been a big fan of Japanese manga artists and anime from the '80s through to the present day. Katsuhiro Otomo (Akira), Kenichi Sonoda (Gunsmith Cats), Johji Manabe (Outlanders) and Masamune Shirow (Appleseed) have all played some part in helping me form a style, which is still changing.

What's your favourite part of the whole creative process: coming up with the idea, sketching, rendering, animating or finally hitting "post"?

My favourite part of the process is the conceptual stage and sketching. I've always found that to be the most fun; coming up with ideas. My pages always look like an absolute sloppy mess when I begin.

Every artist has one: what's something you absolutely LOVE drawing… and something you secretly dread drawing?

Heh, well, I suppose I wear it on my sleeve if you see my work... but I love drawing feet.

As for what I dread... anything geometric. Cities, spaceships, robots, anything with sharp angles. I'm much more comfortable drawing organic stuff. If it's got perpendicular or parallel lines... yeesh. I'd much rather draw a forest than a car.

What's something about making comics or animations that looks easy from the outside, but is actually a nightmare behind the scenes?

Probably the number of animated layers that have to be kept track of. I use After Effects to animate my characters. If you've never used the software before, looking at it probably resembles chaos, and it can be.

Just making a simple 10-second animation can involve hundreds of keyframes, animated transparencies and so on. I'd say it gets easier with time, but if you aren't paying attention, you can go nuts trying to figure out which keyframe is causing an animation to not loop correctly.

Now that you've spent some time in the world of Lustrya, what's been your impression of it so far?

I've really gotten into indie gaming over the past eight or so years, with pixel art and animation really fascinating me. I was really taken aback by how beautiful and smoothly animated all of the ladies of Lustrya are.

You have quite the talented team. It's even been making me want to take it up and try it out!

A huge thank you to PawFeather for taking the time to answer our questions and of course for giving Reia, Sorbet and Raspberry the whimsical crossover treatment!

Be sure to check out more of PawFeather's work using the links below:

Website: https://www.pawfeathercomics.com/Patreon: https://patreon.com/pawfeatherX: https://x.com/PawFeather

Another Early Access Milestone

With Sinful Sands now finished, the environments and Cumbat arenas planned for our Early Access story campaigns are complete. That's a pretty big one for us, it means a major chunk of the visual groundwork surrounding Seraphina, Violyn, Miriku and Reia's campaigns is now behind us, allowing us to increasingly shift our attention toward the remaining cumbat scenes and the heart of Lustrya's main gameplay: your castle.

Castle construction, rooms, upgrades, management systems, NPCs and the broader gameplay loop will become an increasingly large focus as we continue bringing all of these individual pieces together into the game you'll eventually be playing.

There's still plenty happening on the art side including Reia's Cumbat itself, but it feels great to see another major piece of Early Access finally fall into place.

We'll be back again soon with more game updates and devlogs

What’s Next for August(list will be updated throughout the month)Here's a checklist of what we're working on:

To-Do List

Castle's Foundation (Design)

Title Screen (Concept)

Reia Cumbat (Renders)

Development (Build System)

Web Comic: Violyn (Coloring)