security-game/TODO.md

TODO

Work is grouped by theme. Each item should be small enough to complete and verify on its own; see AGENTS.md for the workflow and MEMORY.md for the decisions behind these plans.

Priority order: 3D model re-evaluation → character development → local map development → versioned release milestones (0.10.0) → future/deferred work. See AGENTS.md §Priority and Versioning and §Local Blender skills.

The MIT Blender skill pack lives locally at .agents/skills/blender-skills/ (gitignored). Every 3D workstream below names the skills to load; they are guidance only, and the project contract, blender_assets.py audit/fit/inspect and the capture gates stay authoritative.

3D model re-evaluation

Goal: re-judge every shipped 3D asset against the newly available Blender skill guidance, rank the real gaps, and fix only what the rankings justify. This is an unversioned development track: it must not change the npc_base contract, the renderer or the 0.10.0 release candidate.

Scope: 8 library characters (npc_casual, npc_jacket, npc_coat, npc_vest, npc_dress, npc_hoodie, npc_firefighter, npc_guard), the frozen npc_base fallback, 18 gear pieces, 20 library props, 6 generated props, and the three venue families.

Exit: docs/3d-model-review.md scores every catalogue asset; every P0/P1 is fixed or explicitly accepted with a measurement; inspect/audit/fit/proportions, the 24-NPC budget and the capture gates are green; no runtime contract, dependency or release artifact changed except the rebuilt assets themselves.

A. Baseline, scorecard and routing

• Load blender-director plus the per-family specialists before touching geometry, and record the skill stack and the advice that changed a decision in docs/3d-model-review.md. (Routing, QA severity/verdict, texel-density tiers, character loop criteria and budget rules recorded in the review doc; MCP-only steps translated to headless flatpak runs.)
• Re-run the neutral NPC baseline (48 frames), the final-context review (96 frames), the prop gallery and the 24-NPC budget on the current build; keep raw frames in tmp/ and do not replace committed sheets until a fix lands. (48/48 and 96/96 frames captured under xvfb-run, none blank; raw sets in tmp/model-baseline and tmp/model-review; committed sheets untouched. 24-NPC smoke still 6.94 ms / 168 meshes / 131,616 triangles.)
• Create docs/3d-model-review.md with a per-asset scorecard: silhouette, anatomy/proportion, topology/edge flow, UV/texel density, textures/materials, rig/weights, LOD/impostor, collision/grounding, export contract, provenance, skill route, verdict (P0/P1/P2/accept). (Doc created with character/gear/prop/venue tables, verdict columns and a ranked candidate list; unmeasured cells are marked — instead of being guessed.)
• Collect the baseline measurements in one table: blender_assets.py inspect, audit, fit, npc_proportions.py, texel density, triangles/meshes, 24-NPC frame time. (All seven captured; texels and inspect --json --out were added to make the measurements repeatable. All 46 assets audit/inspect clean; texel density 64–122 px/m authored, 287–440 effective fabric.)
• Review the scorecard with the project owner, rank the P0/P1 gaps and decide fix vs accept per item; record the decision and the reason in the review document.

B. Character re-evaluation (8 variants + fallback)

Skill route: character-artist, retopology, rigging, uv-workflow, texture-workflow, materials, hair-groom, asset-optimization, lookdev, qa-review.

• Face/head: review eye/mouth loops, cheek/brow/chin transitions and faceting at the 2 m portrait distance against character-artist and retopology; write the concrete edits.
• Hands/grip: re-check palm, finger segments, thumb and gear contact; decide between a finger-curl rig or the current open hand plus HAND_ITEM_FORWARD, and record the limit.
• Weights/pose: capture idle, walk, sit and wave; inspect shoulder, hip and neck collapse; fix the worst offenders using rigging practice without changing the 13-bone contract. Blocked: the new capture_npc_pose.gd reports the seated/walking pose while the saved frames still show the rest pose; direct bone writes deform the mesh, so this is a staging/ capture discrepancy that may also affect live venue frames. See docs/3d-model-review.md §"Pose evidence is blocked".
• Finish the pose-capture diagnosis. Done so far: the pose reaches proxies and skeleton bones (new headless test, 273/273), direct bone rotations deform the rendered mesh, and three standalone probes render the seated crouch — only capture_npc_pose.gd saves the rest pose. Remaining leads: reproduce the stage inside capture_npc_review.gd (known to render) or capture via SubViewport + RenderingServer.force_draw(), then add a scene test that a posed avatar renders differently from its rest frame.
• UV/texel density: measure the 256² slot maps; decide whether atlas, UDIM or a resolution change is justified. Do not change CHAR_MAX_TRIS/CHAR_MAX_VERTS without re-running the budget smoke and the Web/Compatibility path.
• Cloth and hair: re-check coat/dress hem clipping and the hair/beard/headgear meshes against hair-groom guidance; decide explicitly whether cloth simulation stays out of scope.
• Fix only the ranked P0/P1s, one asset family per commit; refresh the comparison sheet and re-run inspect, audit, fit and npc_proportions.py after each fix.
• qa-review sign-off: a ship/no-ship verdict per variant with accepted limits recorded.

C. Gear and prop re-evaluation

Skill route: prop-artist, hard-surface, vegetation-artist, materials, collision-proxy, lod-pipeline, qa-review.

• Gear: review the 18 pieces for silhouette, straps/buckles, helmet and lanyard readability; verify attach space and body clearance with fit; rebuild only what fails the scorecard.
• Props: review the 20 library props plus the 6 generated props for bevels, chamfers, silhouette, ground contact and shared material language (prop-artist, hard-surface); list the rebuilds that are actually worth the triangle budget.
• Foliage: replace the flat-shaded _shrub()/_tree() clumps with vegetation-artist-style carded clusters; measure triangles and keep the 60k LIBRARY_TRIANGLE_BUDGET.
• Materials and emissives: lookdev pass on bulbs, signs, lanterns, the marquee and the sedan at day and late; confirm the flashlight stays a tight spot with no beam geometry.
• Collision: verify every prop collider and navigation obstacle matches its silhouette and add the missing collision-proxy shapes where walking is blocked.
• Exit: a prop/gear capture sheet, budgets and collision checks pass with no unreviewed asset.

D. Venue and camera re-evaluation

Skill route: environment-artist, archviz, set-dressing, lighting, camera-cinematography, lookdev, rendering, qa-review.

• Facade/venue review: rank the top five shape-language fixes for Hollywood, the Joke Shop and the TV Studio (environment-artist, archviz) and check them against the map-budget tests.
• Lighting: lighting/lookdev pass on sconces, canopy, marquee and street lamps with day/late captures; verify local attenuation stays at 1.0 and no constant-falloff light returns.
• Set dressing: review entrance and sidewalk prop clusters (set-dressing) for occlusion, navigation obstacles and readable storytelling clusters.
• Camera height: decide 1.7 m gameplay framing vs the ~1.55 m concept frames using camera-cinematography, and record the decision instead of leaving the mismatch open.
• Hooded/winter portrait: close the deferred close-up by staging a types 5–7 capture (--portrait-type) or adding a scenario spawn that provides one.

E. Gates and documentation

• Add the measurable checks the review needs (texel density, weight/pose sanity, collider coverage, LOD/impostor check) as stdlib or GDScript gates where possible; CI stays offline.
• Add a coverage test so every catalogue asset has a scorecard row and verdict.
• Update docs/blender-assets.md, docs/npc-visual-review.md, docs/3d-model-review.md, docs/architecture.md and AGENTS.md with the skill routes and the new gates.
• Record accepted limits and deferred rebuilds in docs/known-limitations.md and MEMORY.md.

Character development

Goal: break the eight-character clone effect with four licence-cleared crowd-variety looks while keeping the frozen npc_base bone, tint-slot and gear-attach contract. The procedural generator is the primary path; Quaternius is a reviewed reference and MakeHuman is deferred to a separate local development pipeline.

The roster build is deliberately sequenced after the 3D model re-evaluation: the new variants must inherit the reviewed face/hand/gear baseline instead of multiplying whatever it finds.

Skill route: character-artist, retopology, rigging, uv-workflow, materials, asset-optimization, lowpoly-style, godot-export, qa-review.

Source review and decision

• Research free/open-source character sources and evaluate at least three downloads against the existing Blender contract. (Measured Quaternius CC0, Kenney CC0, Khronos CesiumMan/RiggedFigure CC-BY and the MakeHuman CC0 base mesh; none is a drop-in. Results, local preview sheet and SHA-256 provenance are in docs/npc-model-sourcing.md.)
• Review the sourcing research with the project owner and choose Option A (procedural), Option B (Quaternius CC0 intake) or Option C (MakeHuman/MPFB body pipeline); record the decision in an ADR and in MEMORY.md. (2026-11-03: extend the procedural generator as the primary path, keep Quaternius as a reviewed prototype/reference, defer MakeHuman to a separate local pipeline. Recorded in ADR-0015 and MEMORY.md.)
• Add a source licence allow-list and provenance rule: CC0 preferred, CC-BY only with attribution in CREDITS.md, and no service assets whose terms restrict redistribution. (ADR-0015; the CC-BY research previews are attributed in CREDITS.md.)
• Decide whether the external preview sheet stays local under tmp/ or is committed with the required CC-BY attribution. (Committed as docs/blender_previews/sheet_npc_sources_research.jpg with Cesium CC-BY attribution; the project-owned crowd prototype sheet is also committed.)

Intake and validation

• Add a Blender inspect path that imports a GLB, applies node transforms, reports tris/verts, bounds, bones, materials, UVs and skinning, and lists contract failures. (blender_assets.py inspect --file ... applies parent/object transforms, converts to Godot Y-up, ignores the importer's bone-shape helper and prints budgets, bones, slots, UVs, skinning and animations with issues/warnings; --json and --category supported. Seven synthetic contract tests added; all 46 library GLBs inspect clean. audit remains the final gate.)
• Add an adapt path for future external assets: scale/ground, weld seams, decimate, map the five tint slots, and either rebuild the contract armature or record an explicit second-rig contract. Use retopology/rigging/uv-workflow guidance for the manual steps, but keep the Quaternius no-go: a contract rebuild needs a proportion warp, so this is not on the character critical path.
• Keep tools/blender_assets.py audit as the single final gate; add a regression test for the intake report/adaptation using a deterministic synthetic or licence-cleared fixture.
• Document the adapter commands and the go/no-go checks in docs/asset-tooling.md.

Quaternius prototype

• Prototype one Quaternius CC0 variant: weld/decimate to budget and capture Idle/Walk renders. (12,518 imported verts -> 3,199 after weld -> 2,423 / 4,654 tris after a 0.75 decimate; Idle/Walk quality is good. Preview in docs/blender_previews/sheet_npc_sources_research.jpg.)
• Measure the prototype against the npc_casual controls: silhouette, rest pose, body proportions and gear fit. (No-go for a contract rebuild: T-pose 62-bone realistic rig, ~0.96 m hip, ~1.68 m arm span and ~0.153 m shoulder joint do not match the arm-down 13-bone contract. Keep as reference; a second rig/animation path needs its own ADR.)
• Make a go/no-go decision on Option B. (No-go for the current pass; proceed with the procedural generator and keep Quaternius as a visual/style reference.)

Roster and runtime

• Approve four crowd-variety looks (build, head silhouette, hair/beard, outer layer and accessory; no clothing that labels the NPC's behaviour). (npc_crowd_a bun/slim/sunglasses, npc_crowd_b bald/broad/beard/shoulder bag, npc_crowd_c coat/umbrella, npc_crowd_d hood/cup; prototype sheet committed.)
• Re-derive the four approved specs against the re-evaluated character baseline (face, hands, proportions, gear offsets) so the new variants do not reintroduce the gaps the review found.
• Add the four approved specs to CHARACTERS, build and commit their GLBs/AO maps, and update the manifest with roles and tint data. Build only the new assets, never a no-op full rebuild, and remember that export_filter="all_resources" packs committed GLBs into the next release build: keep this off main until after the 0.10.0 tag or accept the size.
• Replace the fixed character_model_for() mapping with deterministic per-role pools and add tests for repeatability and duplicate avoidance (godot-export contract check included).
• Rebuild and verify gear fit for every new variant (blender_assets.py fit plus the runtime gear checks) and re-run inspect on the four new GLBs.

QA and release

• Run the 24-NPC budget smoke, portrait baseline, gear fit, headless suite and a release build with the expanded library.
• Update CREDITS.md, docs/development-status.md, docs/npc-visual-review.md and CHANGELOG.md; record any accepted visual limits.
• Exit: a reviewed 12-character library passes contract audit, portrait/gear acceptance, the 24-NPC budget and licence/provenance review without changing the runtime contract.

Deferred MakeHuman local pipeline

• Evaluate the MakeHuman CC0 base mesh for a later separate local development pipeline. (19,158 verts / 36,972 tris; scaled to 1.82 m; decimate 0.35 -> 3,780 verts / 6,468 tris; UVs present, no normals/material groups/rig. Feasible only with retopology, a custom rig and project-owned clothing; keep out of CI/build.)
• Decide whether body-shape diversity still matters after the 12-character library lands; if yes, prototype the local MPFB/MakeHuman pipeline outside the repo and commit only the final CC0-derived assets with provenance.

Local map development

Goal: build a local, data-backed map pipeline that can replace or supplement the stylized venue geometry with licensed OpenStreetMap footprints, 3D building massing, reference-derived photoreal facades and AI-assisted composition. This is an unversioned development track, not a release gate.

Skill route: environment-artist, archviz, hard-surface, geometry-nodes, procedural-modeling, vegetation-artist, set-dressing, lighting, materials, texture-workflow, lookdev, scene-assembly, qa-review.

Data, licensing and scope

• Define the first target block and whether the result replaces, supplements or only informs the current stylized venue specs (docs/hollywood-boulevard-map.md, docs/joke-shop-map.md).
• Audit OpenStreetMap's ODbL attribution/share-alike obligations and decide whether derived geometry ships, stays development-only, or needs a separate data layer.
• Choose an offline OSM extract workflow (Overpass/Geofabrik) and pin the extract date and query so the map build is reproducible.
• Evaluate licence-compatible 3D building datasets (OSM Buildings, Overture, CityGML/LOD1–2 or local authority data); record coverage, accuracy, format and redistribution terms.
• Add a provenance sidecar for every map source and derived asset, including source URL, licence, capture/extract date and attribution text.

Reference imagery

• Write a reference shot list per block: facade materials, windows, signage, rooflines, street furniture, curb cuts and lighting.
• Download and catalogue reference images from Wikimedia Commons, local/own photography or other clearly licensed sources; record author, licence and attribution. Do not use unlicensed Street View or scraped commercial imagery.
• Separate development-only references from shipped textures; commit only images with clear redistribution rights and keep the rest under tmp/ or the ignored reference folders.
• Define the photoreal target and a material-derivation workflow (albedo/normal/roughness, AO, weathering) that matches the existing Compatibility renderer (texture-workflow, materials, lookdev).

Geometry and AI-assisted composing

• Prototype OSM footprint import into Blender at game scale and orientation, then compare it against the current venue footprint/collider layout.
• Import 3D building massing for the target block, clean the topology and assign LOD bands; do not import unbounded city-scale meshes into the runtime (scene-assembly, asset-optimization, lod-pipeline).
• Build a reusable photoreal facade kit (window bays, cornices, storefronts, awnings, signage) with environment-artist/hard-surface/geometry-nodes so buildings share materials and stay inside the venue triangle/material budgets.
• Add an AI-assisted composition step for palette, facade rhythm and reference boards; record the model, prompt and output, and keep human review as the acceptance gate. AI output must not be treated as licensed map data or shipped without provenance.
• Integrate the result behind WorldBuilder.VENUE_SPECS with colliders, navigation obstacles, occlusion and the existing day/night materials.

Gaussian splatting evaluation: photo intake and provenance

Gaussian splatting is evaluated as a photo-driven pipeline: licensed or permissioned photos become a reference, texture source, mesh proxy or distant backdrop. It is an unversioned local track with no runtime dependency or release gate until the ADR closes it, and it extends the reference-image licence and privacy gates above rather than replacing them.

• Define the accepted photo channels: project/team captures, volunteer or user-supplied photos with written permission, and downloaded images from clearly licensed archives (Wikimedia Commons, Openverse, Mapillary and similar). Record which channel produced each reconstruction.
• Write a one-page capture brief for user-supplied photos: overlapping arc or orbit around the facade, 60–80% view overlap, 12 MP+ originals, fixed exposure/white balance, HDR and filters off, no motion blur, no people or plates in frame where avoidable, overcast or even light, and the facade height/doors/steps included in several frames.
• Build an intake checklist and provenance sidecar per photo set: contributor, consent or property permission, licence and attribution text, source URL, capture date, camera/lens, location, faces/plates/interiors present, redactions applied, file hashes and whether the set is shipped or development-only.
• Set the licence gate: own photos need an explicit contributor licence; CC0/CC BY are preferred; CC BY-SA triggers a share-alike review for derived textures and meshes; reject Street View, social-media scrapes, unlicensed commercial imagery and AI-upscaled copies of unknown originals. Attribution must be feasible in CREDITS.md before use.
• Set the privacy gate: blur or remove faces, minors, licence plates, screens, private interiors and anything behind a closed door; obtain property permission where required; keep a redacted copy as the reconstruction input and never commit the originals.
• Treat downloaded photo sets as sparse and of unknown intrinsics. Use them for reference, palette and texture study, or as extra training views; do not expect a usable splat from 10–30 casual web photos of a facade.
• Keep photos, masks, COLMAP databases, checkpoints and splats outside git; commit only derived, licensed, provenance-stamped assets that pass the review gate.

Gaussian splatting: reconstruction and alignment

• Pin a reproducible offline toolchain (for example COLMAP or GLOMAP for camera poses plus gsplat, OpenSplat, Nerfstudio or Brush for training), with exact versions, GPU/VRAM/disk needs and known failure modes recorded in the sidecar.
• Reconstruct two quality tiers: a dense 100–400-photo arc/orbit capture and a sparse 10–30-photo downloaded set. Record camera-registration rate, training time, splat count, file size and held-out PSNR/SSIM/LPIPS for both.
• Mask sky, people, vehicles and moving foliage before training; verify the masks do not erase facade edges, signage or window detail, and keep the redacted input variant.
• Align the splat to game coordinates from the OSM footprint plus surveyed points (door width, column spacing, step rise, storefront height) and record alignment residuals in a Blender scene containing both the splat and the current venue geometry (scene-assembly).
• Judge quality from held-out views and a render from the game's day/night camera poses (camera-cinematography, lookdev, qa-review), not from training views alone; reject splats that only look correct from the capture path.
• Maintain a coverage map per block: which facades, corners and rooflines have usable views, and which areas must fall back to the facade kit or stylized geometry.

Gaussian splatting: map enhancement paths

• Path A — Reference and QA (lowest risk): render the splat from game camera poses and compare it with the realism captures; derive dimensions, signage placement, facade rhythm and material colours. No splat data reaches the runtime.
• Path B — Texture derivation: project splat renders onto the facade kit to produce albedo, normal, roughness and AO candidates; de-light and bake them (texture-workflow), then verify UV scale, tiling and readability under the Compatibility renderer.
• Path C — Mesh proxy: extract a mesh from the splat or dense reconstruction, retopo and dress it in Blender (retopology, prop-artist), assign LODs (lod-pipeline), and keep it inside the venue triangle/material budgets with mesh-based colliders (collision-proxy).
• Path D — Distant backdrop: test a baked panorama, impostor or billboard generated from the splat for skyline and opposite-street depth where the player cannot walk; measure file size, loading and visible pop at the venue boundary.
• Path E — User-photo supplement: let a small supplied photo set improve one facade or landmark (a signage patch, colour reference or hero detail) without rebuilding the venue; define the minimum evidence and the same licence/privacy/review gate as a full capture.
• For every path record quality gain versus effort, licence compatibility of the derived output, and whether the result may ship or stays development-only. Prefer the cheapest path that closes the visible gap.

Gaussian splatting: runtime evaluation and decision

• Probe Godot 4.7.2 Compatibility and Web support for splat rendering in a throwaway scene: addon or importer availability, shader/sort cost, memory, load time and fallback behaviour. Do not add a splat dependency to the release project during evaluation.
• Set hard limits before any runtime experiment: maximum per-splat file size and total memory, allowed frame-time delta on the 24-NPC budget scene, acceptable Web load time, and no compute-shader requirement for the Compatibility/Web path.
• Keep collision and navigation mesh-based even if a splat is displayed; a splat must never become the playable floor or the access/occlusion authority.
• Write the ADR with a per-path go/no-go, the accepted licence/provenance rules, whether each result ships or stays development-only, rejected alternatives and the evidence bundle.
• Exit: one licensed photo capture measurably improves a venue through a documented path and passes visual, performance and provenance review; or the approach is rejected with reproducible findings and removed from the release path.

QA and exit

• Compare the data-backed block against the existing screenshots and map documentation; keep the stylized fallback available.
• Run the venue triangle/mesh budget, navigation and collider checks, plus day/night capture comparisons.
• Update docs/architecture.md, the venue map documents, docs/asset-tooling.md, docs/development-status.md and CHANGELOG.md when the pipeline ships or a source is rejected.
• Exit: one local block is reconstructed from licensed data with reference-derived photoreal facades, passes performance/navigation/visual QA and has complete provenance; or the pipeline is rejected with the findings recorded.

Maintenance and documentation hygiene

Unversioned housekeeping that keeps the planning sources trustworthy. Do these when they block a task, not on a schedule.

Memory and status accuracy

• Trim MEMORY.md from ~970 lines to the durable set: drop the pre-0.8 host/disk/NSIS/release anecdotes, superseded v0.2.x handoff status and duplicated release notes, keep the gotchas that still bite (async/event wiring, import order, colliders, RNG, contracts), and keep the easter-egg note.
• Re-check the remaining memory claims against code before deleting them; MAX_LIVE_NPCS is still 16 for gameplay while the separate budget smoke spawns 24, so do not "fix" that.
• Fix stale status claims as they are found (the step-collider and flashlight-beam claims were corrected on 2026-11-03); add a documentation check or grep note only if the same class of drift returns.

Blender skills upkeep

• Re-check the installed Blender pack (version.json) when updating it and record the version in AGENTS.md if it changes; keep .agents/ gitignored and .agents/.gdignore in place.
• Prune the skill routes in AGENTS.md if a skill stops matching the project (for example if a future second-rig path makes rigging/animation guidance authoritative).

Gap Analysis and 0.x Roadmap

Baseline: v0.9.6 (2026-11-03). Three playable venues, tutorial/campaign/checkpoint resume, difficulty/help, audio/accessibility settings, a 24-NPC budget baseline, a complete escalation/access/radio loop, shift review, the Blender asset library, 272 headless + 108 Python tests, a 21/21 clean screen-design judge and an optional Forward+ Desktop HQ build. This is the baseline; 0.10.0-rc.1 is the current candidate source, with release approvals still open.

Documentation audit (completed 2026-11-01)

• Make docs/architecture.md the single architecture source: asset/content pipeline contracts, runtime venue-switch/fallback flows, deployment/version constraints, quality requirements, risk register and documentation ownership map.
• Keep command-heavy operational pages separate but subordinate: docs/asset-tooling.md, docs/blender-assets.md, docs/getting-started.md, docs/RELEASING.md and docs/smoke-checklist.md link to architecture rather than acting as parallel sources.
• Remove the obsolete docs/plan-graphics-v0.6.md and its links; completed graphics work is represented by ADR-0013, the asset pipeline section and the changelog.
• Resolve stale claims: README release version/download row, development status "Forward+ not implemented", and Blender props "not AO-baked".
• Record the documentation ownership rule in docs/architecture.md §12: design intent (PLAN.md), mechanics (gameplay.md), system architecture/contracts (architecture.md), decisions (ADRs), status (development-status.md), roadmap (TODO.md), operations (tooling/release docs).

Gap register (remaining roadmap)

Area	Current baseline	Remaining gap	Risk	Milestone
3D model re-evaluation	8 characters, 18 gear, 20+6 props audited against budgets/proportions; no skill-guided scorecard yet	Scorecard, ranked P0/P1 fixes, texel/weight/collider measurements and accept decisions	Unmeasured drift stays in the shipped library	Unversioned
Character development	8-variant library; source/licence review and Quaternius/MakeHuman evaluation complete	Four crowd variants, role pools, gear fit and runtime integration	Repetition remains or external assets break the contract	Unversioned
Local map development	Stylized venue geometry and reference maps	OSM/3D data, photoreal references, AI-assisted composition and splat evaluation	Licensing/provenance or performance failure	Unversioned
Content and balance	3 venues with validated 12+ event matrices, recovery events and contextual dialogue	External playtest evidence, balance/fairness pass, event-weight tuning and final content lock	Repetition or unfair outcomes survive into the release candidate	0.10.0
Dialog/UI	Audited terminology, copy, button states, focus/navigation, modal close, long strings and all 21 screen captures	Keep the capture/compare/judge gate current as content changes	Low; the remaining risk is drift after new UI is added	Complete (0.9.3)
Animation/presentation	Procedural pose layers, portrait captures, reduced hem clipping, 8,000/8,000 NPC cap	Thorough NPC silhouette/face/gear/pose/LOD optimization before visual QA	Close-up jank reduces perceived quality	Complete (0.9.4)
Audio/accessibility	Procedural ambience/SFX, volume controls, captions/reduce-motion settings, searchable Help	Full accessibility/localization acceptance review, audio caption coverage and P0/P1 fixes	Public release cannot claim accessible play	0.10.0
Localization	English JSON table, validation and input-generated Help	Pseudo-locale/layout audit and translator workflow sign-off	Text expansion/clipping at release	0.10.0
Performance/platform	24-NPC headless budget (6.94 ms), Compatibility/Web/HQ paths	Target hardware matrix, Web/HQ manual profiling, frame-time/memory evidence	Platform-specific drops or startup failures	0.9.6 / 0.10.0
Save lifecycle	Settings/campaign/history/checkpoint files, atomic writes	Migration fixtures from 0.8/0.9, fresh-install/upgrade verification, rollback instructions	Player progress loss on upgrade	0.10.0
QA/CI	Headless suite, smokes, screenshot compare, 21/21 judge	Release-candidate smoke matrix, final gallery and release dry run	Regressions escape the release gate	0.9.6 / 0.10.0
Release/legal	Unsigned desktop/macOS builds, Web/HQ packages	Signing/notarization decision, checksums, AI-asset provenance, credits, privacy/body-camera and rating review	Public release blocked by trust/policy	0.10.0
Documentation	Architecture/ADR/status/roadmap ownership established	Final README/changelog/status/TODO/smoke-checklist sign-off and known-limitations page	Docs drift at launch	0.9.6 / 0.10.0
Future 0.x	Stable 0.x feature set	Live replay, more venues, VO/music, image-to-mesh props and seasonal content	Scope creep before release	Unscheduled

Current priority: the unversioned 3D model re-evaluation runs first because its findings gate the crowd-variant roster; Character development and Local map development follow. The 0.10.0 release candidate is the next versioned release; content lock, external playtest, balance, save migration and release/legal sign-off remain tracked there. The source version is 0.10.0-rc.1; the v0.9.6 release is published. Earlier map/NPC/UI/texture/integration passes are complete and in DONE.md.

Milestone 0.10.0 — Release candidate

Goal: freeze the feature set, prove it with external players, clear release/legal blockers and verify every distribution path. This remains the next versioned release after the 0.9.x patch line, but follows the unversioned 3D re-evaluation, character and local-map tracks in planning order. Only a release-blocking defect from those tracks may enter this milestone before the tag.

Content lock and external playtest

• Declare a content/feature freeze for 0.10.0; only release-blocking fixes and balance changes may land after the freeze. (Frozen 2026-11-03 after the 0.9.6 integration checkpoint; this pass is limited to release reliability, accessibility, balance evidence and packaging.)
• Produce a release-candidate build with the tutorial, campaign, all three venues, Help, accessibility settings and checkpoint/resume enabled. (Clean worktree a9658ec built 0.10.0-rc.1: Linux 161.5 MB, Windows 197.2 MB, macOS 148.0 MB, Web 97.8 MB and HQ 241.6 MB. The Web/HQ archives include the credits, privacy, accessibility and known-limitations pages; SHA-256 manifests were written; the Linux and HQ binaries launched headless and the Web index/wasm/pck/docs returned HTTP 200. Not published because external playtest and legal approval remain open.)
• Run at least five first-time-player sessions covering the tutorial and one full venue shift; record where players get stuck, misunderstand evidence or choose disproportionate escalation.
• Triage findings by severity (P0/P1/P2) and fix every P0/P1 onboarding/accessibility issue; keep the rest as explicit known limitations or post-0.10 items.
• Re-run the affected tutorial/campaign smokes after each fix and capture a fresh first-hour walkthrough for the release notes.

Balance and fairness pass

• Define measurable targets for routine compliance, access-decision accuracy, peaceful resolution, justified emergency calls and false-positive/false-negative rates. (docs/balance-acceptance.md defines cohorts, denominators, 36 matrix cells, seeds, thresholds and matched emergency-first comparisons. Documentation verified; targets are not measured results.)
• Run scripted venue sweeps across easy/normal/hard and all four phases; compare outcomes and tune event weights, reaction tables, compliance and report strictness where targets fail.
• Review emergency calls against actual danger: no routine behavior should make emergency the dominant winning move, and genuine threats must remain answerable. Include the type-derived _read_npc_truth() mismatch with observed threats/forced entry; use independently labelled behavior evidence, not the helper as its own oracle.
• Verify the reputation grades, debrief explanations and campaign progression still communicate the de-escalation-first design after tuning.
• Record the balance evidence and any deliberate exceptions in docs/development-status.md or MEMORY.md.

Save migration and session reliability

• Add fixtures for a 0.8-era settings/campaign/history save and a 0.9.0 checkpoint; verify migration/default-filling and a clean first launch with no files. (Committed fixtures under src/test/fixtures/saves/; 9 migration/failure tests cover old settings/campaign/history, the 0.9.0 checkpoint, all three venue checkpoint round-trips, clean install, corrupt JSON and a blocked atomic replace. Suite is now 272 tests.)
• Test fresh install → tutorial → campaign → pause → quit → resume → review → next venue on an isolated user-data directory. (Tutorial and campaign smokes shared one isolated XDG_DATA_HOME; tutorial completion/replay/skip then campaign resume/review-continue/help both passed. Pause/menu behavior is covered by smoke_session_shell.gd.)
• Test corrupt JSON, partial temp files, missing optional fields and a failed atomic rename; confirm fallback behavior never destroys a valid save. (Corrupt/partial files fall back to defaults; a blocked temp path reports an error and leaves the prior valid settings intact. _load_json now uses the non-logging JSON instance parser.)
• Verify checkpoint resume after all three venues, after an incident, with NPCs at the door and with flashlight/body-camera/door state set. (The migration suite round-trips a checkpoint for Hollywood, the Joke Shop and the TV Studio with an open incident, one NPC row, flashlight/body-camera/door flags; the campaign smoke resumes a live checkpoint through the real GameManager.)
• Document save locations, schema versions, reset behavior and rollback/export instructions in docs/getting-started.md and the release notes. (getting-started.md now documents the four files, version-1 checkpoint, atomic write/fallback, clean install, reset and backup/rollback.)

Release engineering and distribution

• Run tools/build_releases.sh from a clean checkout and verify Linux/Windows/macOS/Web/HQ artifact names, sizes and checksums. (Clean worktree a9658ec built the five artifacts listed above; PUBLISH_DRY_RUN=1 produced and printed build/SHA256SUMS-0.10.0-rc.1.txt without touching the API.)
• Smoke-test fresh Linux portable/AppImage, Windows portable/installer, macOS unzip/launch, Web static hosting and Desktop HQ Vulkan fallback on the target matrix. (Linux portable and Desktop HQ launched headless; Web files served over a local static server with HTTP 200. AppImage/installer were not built locally and Windows/macOS launch testing still needs the target matrix.)
• Add a disk-space preflight and retention policy to the release/publish scripts so a full Gitea host cannot leave a partially uploaded release. (publish_release.sh checks artifact size/free space, writes SHA-256 checksums, supports PUBLISH_DRY_RUN, rolls back uploaded assets/new releases on failure, and offers opt-in RETAIN_RELEASES pruning; dry-run verified.)
• Verify release metadata, tag/version consistency, asset counts and download links; retain at least the latest 0.8/0.9 releases and document older-asset pruning. (Source/version and tag are both 0.9.6; all seven published releases carry 5–7 assets, including the retained v0.8.0/v0.8.1/v0.9.0/v0.9.1 line. publish_release.sh documents opt-in RETAIN_RELEASES pruning and RELEASING.md describes the seven-release policy.)
• Decide and document whether macOS signing/notarization is required for 0.10.0 or explicitly remains a future release blocker; record the quarantine instructions either way. (0.10.0 ships unsigned with quarantine instructions; signing/notarization remains an explicit public-release blocker in RELEASING.md and known-limitations.md.)

Legal, credits and platform policy

• Audit AI-assisted asset provenance and licenses; record source/model usage and any redistribution constraints for textures, characters, props and UI art. (CREDITS.md records the Blender/OpenRouter toolchain, default model slugs, missing per-file generation metadata and the commercial-rights review as an explicit release blocker.)
• Audit audio/SFX/music licensing (or confirm everything is procedural) and add a credits file. (All runtime audio is procedural; no external music/SFX files are bundled. CREDITS.md records this.)
• Review body-camera/privacy language, mental-health-crisis representation, age/content rating and storefront requirements; fix any release-blocking copy or content. (PRIVACY.md clarifies the simulated body camera/local-only data; the accessibility and known-limitations pages record the remaining mental-health/rating/storefront review as a release blocker rather than claiming approval.)
• Add the player-facing credits, known limitations, accessibility statement and privacy note to the release package/README. (README.md links CREDITS.md, PRIVACY.md, docs/accessibility.md and docs/known-limitations.md; the Web and Desktop HQ package builders copy those documents into the shipped archives.)
• Mark external legal/storefront approval as complete or explicitly block the 0.10.0 release on it.

Documentation and visual sign-off

• Update README.md, PLAN.md, docs/architecture.md, ADRs, docs/development-status.md, docs/getting-started.md, docs/smoke-checklist.md, CHANGELOG.md and this roadmap.
• Regenerate the full screenshot gallery and realism baselines after content lock; run check_screenshots.sh and the pinned vision judge, recording model/spend/verdicts.
• Run the manual smoke checklist on every target and attach/link the release-candidate evidence.
• Verify the tutorial/campaign/help text at maximum font scale and with the longest strings.
• Remove or archive stale plans/notes and confirm no contradictory version/status claims remain.
• Document the character development toolchain in docs/architecture.md: base vs library sources, tool/artifact/gate table, runtime attach/animation contracts and rebuild discipline. (Added §5 "Character development tooling" plus risk and ownership-map updates; documentation check passed.)

Release-candidate QA and exit

• Run the complete headless suite, Python tooling, tutorial/campaign/session/scenario smokes, 24-NPC budget smoke and release build from a clean checkout.
• Run the manual QA matrix: fresh install, upgrade, offline launch, gamepad, accessibility settings, pause/resume, all venues and Desktop HQ fallback.
• Confirm no P0/P1 defects remain; P2 items must be documented as known limitations or post-0.10 work.
• Create the v0.10.0 version bump, changelog entry and tag; build/publish the release and verify all assets and download links.
• Exit: the release candidate is content-locked, externally played, legally reviewed, documented, reproducibly built, and approved as the 0.10.0 release candidate.

Roadmap dependencies and risks

• Content volume is the largest schedule risk; tutorial and campaign work must not outrun the event/dialogue matrix.

• The vision judge is a dev-time aid with an external key/budget; CI must never make it a hard gate.

• Godot version changes can alter lighting/imports; do not combine an engine baseline move with a content/feature milestone.

• Signed macOS builds and legal/AI provenance are release blockers, not polish.

• Photo-derived map assets add a second provenance risk: downloaded or user-supplied photos can carry unclear licences, identifiable people, plates and property restrictions. No photo or splat-derived asset ships without a completed sidecar, consent/licence review and redaction.

• Gaussian-splat training is GPU/disk-heavy and the toolchain churns quickly; keep it offline, version-pinned and outside CI, and never make a runtime splat renderer a release dependency.

• Keep the de-escalation-first rules and rare-emergency design unchanged while adding progression, difficulty and feedback.

• The Blender skill pack is local, unversioned guidance; it can drift from the project contract or assume Blender MCP. Re-verify every adopted technique with inspect/audit/fit and never make a skill, asset pack or tool version a build or CI dependency.

• The 3D re-evaluation can expand without bound (retopo every head, rig every finger). Cap it with the scorecard ranking: P0/P1 only, one asset family per commit, and an explicit accept for everything else.

Future / deferred (not scheduled)

• Live 3D body-camera replay; the timeline is text-only today.
• Additional venues or seasonal events authored from the content/venues/ resources.
• Real voice/dialogue audio; ambience, cues and radio crackle are procedural.
• Swap the primitive prop builder for an image-to-mesh model API behind the same assets/models/generated/<prop>.glb contract.
• Rare easter eggs/cameos (e.g. Bob Dobbs) only after core content and QA are stable.