#it was supposed to be a vn sprite

[dianadeadwing]

Continuing to work on anime girl Tina Ruth Belcher in procreate.

[ID:

Messy digital full color portrait sketch of Tina from Bob’s Burgers in an anime inspired style. It is unfinished with soft overlapping pastel colored lines made with a round brush on a blue gray background.

/end ID]

[odysseys-blood]

its sad how many games would be fine as stand alone vns but bc everyone wants to make a quick buck theyre gachas solely for that stupid ass reason

[gogopri]

Visual Novels, Sprite Crops, and You

Ridiculously specific thing I'm thinking about (and this is in really broad strokes and will segue later) but something I've noticed is that English Visual Novels tend to have their character sprites cut off around the knees more than I usually see in Japanese VNs, where they'll cut off around the hips or waist (unless characters are supposed to be explicitly standing further away.)

(Screenshots from Hustle Cat, Dream Daddy, and Growing Up's Steam pages)

(Screenshots from Little Busters, Aokana, and White Album's Steam pages)

Obviously this is a huge oversimplification. I've seen lots of EVNs that have sprite crop at the hips or thighs and vice versa.

But I think there's interesting presentation benefits to both methods.

If you crop at the knees, you can see more of the character designs, and probably fit more characters onscreen without it feeling as cramped. That would be useful for third person games, where you'll probably have more than one character on-screen for most of the game, if you decide your main character should have their own sprite when they talk.

The hips method, on the other hand, could make the speaking character feel closer to the camera/an invisible first-person protagonist. I think that could promote a more "intimate" feeling, which could be desirable in romance games.

It also never hurts to experiment with visuals that zoom in and out on the sprites, with varying crops.

(Screenshots from Muv-Luv's VNDB page)

For example, I think Muv-Luv looks fantastic. It positions the characters on a sort of 3D plane, and I remember it having small camera pans. It's useful for immersion, even before it begins showing action sequences. I know it's taxing to direct, but I've always wished more VNs looked like Muv-Luv. It's also a game from 2003, which makes it doubly impressive.

I've heard minori titles like Supipara and eden*, or Type-Moon titles like Mahoutsukai no Yoru or the Tsukihime remake are also a cut above the rest in how "cinematic" they feel, but I have less familiarity with those games (although I'm planning to play them in the future). I'm also running low on space in the post to add many more pictures, and expressing the focus on "movement" in more cinematic VNs is difficult to do with still images.

I don't really have a point to end on, these are just some assorted visual novel thoughts.

[ebi-hime]

My short, sweet BL VN, My Confounding Cat is Criminally Cute*, has been released on Steam here and Itchio here! Yay \o/ Criminal Cat is a linear visual novel without any choices or branches. It follows a grumpy wizard, Aster, who lives a reclusive life deep in the woods and runs an apothecary to get by. Aster is taciturn by nature, and he swears he isn’t lonely! He’s perfectly fine keeping to himself, thank you very much…

Until a black cat tumbles down his chimney one day, and throws his whole life into disarray!

After taking the black cat in, Aster soon discovers this clumsy kitten is no ordinary feline. He is, in actuality, a young man called Blaise, who has been cursed by a witch to assume the form of a cat during the day – but why? What did Blaise do to get cursed, and can Aster help him?

It’s a huge pain, but Aster will (reluctantly) do his best. He’ll never be able to get rid of Blaise if he can’t, and all Aster really wants is a quiet life. It’s not like he’s going to fall for his catboy companion or anything, right?

…Right?

Criminal Cat is a pretty sweet story, and it doesn’t contain any explicit content. The steamiest thing you’ll find here are a handful of kiss scenes (well, how else are you supposed to break a curse?!) The adorable art is by Ekkoberry, who handled the character sprites, CGs, and the UI! I usually work with multiple artists per project, so having one person manage all of the art-related tasks was a pretty new experience for me. I’m really happy with how this VN turned out: I think it looks very cute and cohesive! I hope you enjoy it if you do check it out! I put a lot of love into this story, and I hope it shows! - ebi x * And I apologise for the very extra light novel tier title haha, I thought it fit since the story takes place in a fantasy world!!! It's all a bit of fun, I promise!!!

[tehawesomestkitteh]

another wip from backlog finished

was supposed to be sprites for a short VN fangame/story. ultimately scrapped cuz alr busy with a different one

[aeroplanestouchthesky]

Besides red text, another neat thing about Umineko as a VN is that it's quite clear that Clair's design supposed to be proto-Beatrice from the get-go since she uses the same sprite poses. Even without the voice acting clearly being done by the same person, the visuals alone form the connection immediately .

This feature doesn't necessarily work in all media. Her manga version, for example, can seem like we're seeing an entirely other young woman. Since the manga allows for unique pose depiction in every frame, there are no "Beato poses" to relate a _purposefully_ disguised character to another.

And so the "limitations" of the VN become a strength no other format can wield in the same way

[perfectlovevn]

If no one could give you the love you craved...

Then you would create someone who could.

Wouldn't that be fun?

Game is now complete. Have fun.

You were always obsessed with a specific love... not one advertised in romance novels or movies, but a love that consumes and corrupts... One of obsession and possession. No matter what you did, you could never find that love...

So you decided... why not make this perfect love instead?

A game that was suppose to be made for the Yandere Jam 2023, but I didn't have enough time to finish, so now I'm going to try to finish it by the end of the summer at latest.

Game will include:

Nameable MC (Default Name, Eris) who is incredibly manipulative

Choose your own Nickname

Too many references to yandere vns (in terms of names and nickname combos)

Milo, the to-be yandere that changes appearance, personality and dialogue based on decisions.

Everything in greyscale so I don't die of coloring

Three Choices

Eight Different Endings + A Secret Ending

Maybe Extras if I can figure out how to code it in which will include some basic side stories

Future Progress:

Extra Scenes Writing: 90%

Extra Scenes Sprites: 30%

Extra Scenes Coding: 30%

Extra Scenes Music: 0%

Milo Didn't Like that: 0%

Game Warnings:

Includes:

Bullying

Manipulation (on both Milo and Eris's part)

Blackmail

Violence/Blood

Stalking

Drugging (creation of and using of)

Possessive/ Obsessiveness

Yandere Behavior (And a yandere of course)

A Cruel MC

and others that will be added to the list afterwards

I'll try to give progress updates at least once a week so people know that I'm working on it. We'll see how it goes.

Feel free to send asks!

I'll figure out tags as we go as well. Have fun!

Tags:

#characterprofile

#about PreMilo

#about ManipulationMilo

#about ViolenceMilo

#about eris

#milo asks

#perfectlove dev logs

#Milo fanart

#C4 Draws

[declawedwildcat]

ok gonna ramble my actual thoughts about yesterday's new screencap just to get it all out of my head onto a plate

As unlikely as it is that this is anything more than the artists playing around with making fighting game alt palettes of the characters, I want to pretend that the red-eyed Kuras is a timeline where he drank from the seaspring. We learn from Mhin that Ais hasn't forced anyone to drink yet, but maybe when things start heating up towards faction warfare he takes any power he can get his hands on, even from those he considered friends. Or, conversely, Kuras is just tired of his whole cycle, this endless quest for redemption, the divinity and power and mistakes. His resentment outweighs his trepidation about the seaspring, and he decides to try and get rid of it the only way that seems powerful enough to finally free him.

Of course this then also comes with the insinuation that people who join the groupmind get a thematically recolored evil-twin version of their everyday outfit courtesy of Ais, which is pretty hilarious 😌

it's definitely a strange choice for a placeholder though imo, generally a placeholder should be something that's eye-catchingly obvious so that even someone who's not familiar with what's supposed to be there can immediately catch it at a glance if it gets left in and let whoever is in charge of changing it out know. That's why you often see that eye-searing shade of magenta on placeholder assets. I would think a simple in-engine color layer (like the accidental green Leander) would be more useful for that purpose since black and white would blend with the normal sprites when left on "skip", so this feels like either an inside joke the team put in for their own amusement, or it's just staged for the screenshot lol

But! all theoreticals and wishlists aside, what this actually shows us is two things:

Kuras has a short hair asset, so he could potentially get a haircut at some point in the story. Of course, as anon pointed out this could be just part of how the model is divided, but in my experience modular parts don't usually have covered-up lineart at their division points, they just extend past the point that should be covered to fill any seams. It's a tiny detail, but to me that says they intend to have both hair variations accessible for them to use on finished sprites (whether this is one or not). I haven't worked on a professionally-produced VN though, so maybe their pipeline is different and I'm completely wrong!

Assuming this is not MCR Kuras being introduced here, that means we're seeing a different character's introduction, one that warrants a sprite but doesn't have one yet. Someone's monster form could make sense for MC to vaguely recognize without being able to immediately place them, but having anyone wander around the middle of the Wick in that state seems fairly unlikely. A smaller side character who happens to get an appearance? Or perhaps meeting Elyon? 👀

[crowroboros]

Anymore chase insight?

I'm going to do the same thing I did with Carl part 2 where I just throw out random thoughts.

I wonder how his arachnophobia came to be, if there was any inciting incident at all. I suppose it could just be a natural fear he has, though he lives in Echo so I wonder if there was anything paranormal at play to spark that. Perhaps he saw 88883 or something. That's very unlikely though and definitely isn't the original intention behind it. Again it is probably just some random phobia he developed. I also wonder just how intense his arachnophobia is in terms of any spider imagery. In person it is obvious very very intense, but I don't have it or any fear that is adjacent to it so I can't comment on how it works when seeing a picture or anything like that; could he play Ocarina of Time or Twilight Princess? Is Gohma too much or is it fair game cause she's fictional? If the 3D model makes her too spider-like then is Gohma in LoZ1 or in Link's Awakening any better cause it's just sprite work?

Maybe I'm a boring, rock-like personality having, "never-speaks-at-a-party" wallflower, "just-kind-of-there", not very interesting person but I never really saw Chase's blandness as inherently being a bad thing. I never really understood why in-universe people got on his ass about being "uninteresting". I also just don't agree with the sentiment of him being boring, but again maybe I just fit the criteria.

If I remember right, I think Chase's family has been living in Echo for a fucking while so I wonder if any of his ancestors will appear in TSR. I'm not caught up on that VN so maybe they already have and I'm unaware, but I haven't been seeing any posts about it so I assume they haven't.

It's 100% because he's an anthropomorphic otter and it would probably look much worse on a human but I don't think Chase's attempt at a goatee is that bad looking. Dare I say he actually rocks it pretty well.

Chase was actually how I discovered Echo VN and FVNs as a whole. You know those memes where someone sneaks Goku into an image where he isn't meant to be? I saw one of those but with Chase and I was so confused and intrigued that I worked tirelessly to find out what this fucking otter was.

[thelikesoffinn]

Heeeey as with visual novels you play, have you tried 'Dave the Villainess'? It looks great but I don't want zo spend money on something that's not good 🤧

Hello there!

I assume you mean 'Save the Villainess' - part of me really hopes you're actually talking about a VN with dude called Dave who is a villainess, that sounds amazing - and in that case: You don't have to spend money just yet! It's just a demo as of right now and it's free, so nothing is stopping you!

Apart from that: Yes, I've tried it annnnd...I didn't like it. At all.

Positives first - Art is nice enough, music is lovely and general concept is great. In fact, both art and concept are what drew me to this one in the first place, because it's basically a playable isekai manhwa and I love those!

BUT...it's just bad.

The Dialogue is...woof. I wanted to give them the benefit of the doubt because I really really like the concept but - respectfully - blegh. I've played the entire Demo twice - benefit of the doubt, as I said - but just...no. Especially certain parts (Two words: Cushions. Wainscoting.) just felt so...forced and out of place.

That is also the reason why the MC doesn't fit her description. Like lady you're supposed to be intelligent and witty stop talking about the fucking cushions and get your head in the game alright? Please? 😭

Also - and I feel really bad for saying this - but the animation is just...just stop. Please. It's messy and makes the whole game seem so shoddy, even though it really isn't. Sure, I didn't like the dialogue, but that doesn't mean the game is bad. I just didn't like it. The animation however, makes it look cheap and try-hard at the same time, which is such a shame. (It doesn't run well either. It's really laggy and I assume the animation has something to do with it.)

But let's be more specific on the animation, because that's what bothered me the most:

Everything in the background moves. (WHY is the curtain rattling? And if it has to be rattling, why is it so out of sync with the rest of the scene?) It's so...overdone and really doesn't need to be. Usually it's best if you choose a few focus points that DO move and the rest remains still because it's just too much otherwise. It makes things seem really unstable and erratic.

Then the sprites - they blink, "breathe", their hair shakes, their jewellery shimmies...once again, all out of sink. (Not even earrings are sinked up. The MC's left earring will randomly jump and then the right jumps just the same but a few seconds later. And brooches and necklaces just shake like they're about to explode for no reason at all.)

Their expressions are a mess, too. Not as in "oh the art is bad", the art is great, but they all seem to have... twitchy faces. Not only do they blink and occasionally change expressions, no, their expressions flit between *current emotion* and *default* for some reason? And their eyebrows are being worked hard, because they keep frowning for a milisecond before returning to their current expression.

There's so much zooming and panning too, which is fine on occasion but get's so bothersome after a while. Like stoooopppp zooming in for every second line, I don't need a close up of the MC's face for no reason at all right now!

Nothing seems really fluid either. Maybe that's the style they picked, maybe it has to to with the intense lag of the game - I don't know. But it's awkward.

Now, it IS just a demo. A lot can and will change. And I usually wouldn't be one to say anything bad about a demo exactly because of that. BUT - it's their kickstarter demo. This is the demo they want to raise money with and, much as it pains me to say, it's not a good look.

As always, that is my opinion and yours might be entirely different. So I'd suggest you go check it out for yourself - it's free and who knows, maybe you'll see something in it that I don't!

[ggren-mainz]

Umineko - question arcs playthrough -> ep 1 - 1

All parts and episodes

Inspired by some other people I saw do a playthrough of higurashi, I will now do my own but of umineko! The people (nobody) have asked and I will demand!

Context: I just finished higurashi, loved it, and I'm now playing umineko. The only spoiler I know is the femdom Beatrice x sissy beta Battler CG.

Had to go on a YouTube playthrough cause i didn't screenshot everything I wanna talk about :/. Anyways I'm playing with the 07th mod (booing sounds) because I refuse to play with any sprites other than the ryukishii ones, and I like NDV mode better. Sad cause umineko project looks good but oh well.

When playing higurashi I didn't use the voice acting cause I had already played 2 games when I found out about the mod and I read way faster than they talk, and also it annoyed me idk why, but for umineko I started knowing I'll use it. I actually play with steam link many times and the sound isn't broadcasted quite often so I just open a YouTube playthrough of it in the bg for the voices + music lmao.

Anyways the voice acting on Beatrice is actually so good, amazing intro.

Saw this amazing phrase only to be later betrayed with

This. Horrible how am I supposed to play a games with adults??? I only play my vns when they're all under the age of consent!

This is so funny cause in English it just reads like it's mocking you. But yeah objectively I knew Rudolf was a weird name for the Japanese but damn it did not hit me till they said it and it sounded like the most out of place thing ever.

Helll yeaaa, the sigma thinking. This is a future president thinking, keep it going Battler!

Yep this is deeefiiiniittlyyy not a sign and foreshadowing at all. Nope, nothing bad is gonna happen!

Also I'm really curious about this part. Feel like its gonna be important soon. Oh well this is all for now, will update later ;P

next part

[northern-passage]

Hello! I have a few questions as someone who takes great inspiration from brilliant works of interaction fiction and similar methods of storytelling. I hope you don’t mind me asking!

1. If there something that draws you to the current format of interactive fiction storytelling rather than something such as a visual novel? Do you enjoy it more, is it less costly, easier for you, etc…?

2. What are some of the most prevalent difficulties in writing within the medium?

3. What do you wish you knew before you began writing interactive fiction?

Keep up the incredible work, I always love seeing what you post and create <3

ohhh these are fun questions :-) thank you!

question 1: i actually tried to do a visual novel first! but it is a LOT of work. i managed to do some sprites and a few backgrounds before i gave up. if i was to try and do it again i'd have to pay another artist to join me which just isn't feasible for me right now. i suppose the things i like about IF could be applied to VNs too, but i like what interactive fiction adds to whatever narrative you're trying to tell. the medium itself is a part of the story, if that makes sense. it can't exist without the main character who can't exist without a player to guide them. i like giving the player choices & i like taking them away. i like how vast the genre is, and i like seeing how other people use the mechanics and code to pull off some really interesting & unique stories.

question 2: hmmm i think what gets hard for me is just fatigue... when you write big branching narratives, you have to write a lot of tedious shit, hahaha. like currently with blood choke i've been working on the same conversation for about 3 weeks. there are dozens of variations of it, depending on who the mc is, what choices they've made, and how the other character feels about them, and whether or not the mc went with her or went with someone else means the conversation has to be shuffled around elsewhere in the chapter, and it's all extremely extremely tedious. it feels like you're writing so much, but it's literally just one conversation, one scene in the entire chapter. but you have to write it about 20 times. so it's easy in IF to run out of steam very quickly. i definitely think that's what happened with me with tnp, i hit a huge block after writing all of the combat variations in ch2, i was just so exhausted & knowing that i would have to write even more complex scenes at the end of the chapter accounting for all of it was very demoralizing. BUT i feel like my long break has helped quite a bit and i am excited to get back into tnp next month 😈

question 3: this one is tough... i'm not really sure, to be honest. i've been here for a while now and i feel pretty comfortable for the most part. i was a reader & a lurker before i started writing so i got to see a lot of the way other readers treat writers before i became one, which was helpful for me. i think if i could go back i'd tell myself that this was going to be a way bigger project than i anticipated. and also tell myself that this is my hobby and i should be having fun, not stressing or worrying about making money or pleasing other people. of course i want people to like my work and i appreciate their support, but that shouldn’t be the only reason why i'm writing… i’m writing because i want to.

[hummingbird-games]

Dev Diaries

November 2, 2024

Let this be the last time I write this update so I can friggin POST IT!! 🤣

Since we last chat, a few things have happened, so here's a recap:

You can preview Langston and Ryan's game 2 routes!!! (Happy Anniversary to my first game child)

HSD artist is wrapping up on the requested sprites for the next update. That goes live.... Sunday February 2, 2025!

I finished the first draft of Ryan's route. Yeah. Wild. The hardest part of writing (for him) is over. Also I like opening up the document and staring at it to make sure it's real and not just a figment of my imagination. Langston bby we're coming for you next!!

We're on Bluesky?! Yeah lol I meant to say something sooner. I have no idea how I'll treat that platform yet, but we're there!

Loved VN

Now setting aside the bullet points for a moment, we'll touched briefly on the #LovedVN project. There's been a sliiiiiight delay art wise on that front, and honestly, it's anyone's guess if it'll come out this year--I opened the project file a few days ago, and marveled at how much is still not done. That's on me and my bony shoulders. Like I haven't even commissioned the key art yet! 😔

Future Projects

There's an idea I'm holding close to my chest only because it's still more abstract than concrete, and I won't be working on it until Loved is finished and playable. There is also a different project that almost saw the light of day, and I wanna talk about it.

The Josei After Dark game jam came and went and I seriously entertained submitting something. The Afro Jam also came and went, and this was supposed to be a two-for one idea...I recruited my sibling for the character sprite. I sat down and made 4 music tracks because I knew there was a specific sound I wanted, and I did not have specific sound money. I had a placeholder UI with the intention of either recruiting someone after the jams or finally rolling up my sleeves and adding bare bones UI design to my developer toolbox.

Well. We didn't make either deadline LOL! I decided to shelve it. But tbh, I had too much fun writing this script to keep it out of sight.

placeholder bg + placeholder UI teehee

Not so secret thing about me, stories typically come to me when I can't find it in the media I consume. And because HBG projects are free to play for the foreseen future, I'm the prominent player I'm trying to impress, so I make games for me and then hope other people like them too.

This project is called Oh, Boy. It's another bite size game with seven endings!! I had to make a guide for because as I was playtesting I was getting confused and missing my own endings! Anyhoo, I have plans for this one, so more details to come in a future dev diaries or a regular post!

And that's all folks! Gemini out 🫶🏾

am I wild to drop this at the VERY end?? under the cut?? no, not at all

[norbezjones]

Yancy At The End Of The World: Who Is Beck?

It’s another character intro for my now-released aroace zombie game—you can play it here or here!  Last time we talked about Yancy At The End Of The World!, we went over Laz, and today, we’re introducing Beck!

Beck was the popular kid in high school, on the top of the food chain and shoving those xe deemed unworthy back down the ladder.  Nowadays, xe has been humbled majorly, and is trying to be a better person as an adult than xe was as a kid.  Xe does papercraft art as a way to destress, and also helped create the art server Nekoni hosts.

Beck was designed by octopubbi/geckoz and is voiced by Lunar Star Sam, who has a very lovely voice that instantly captivated me when I heard their audition.  Beck’s art is also done by Crow Caller—oh yeah, I suppose I haven’t been talking about that in these posts, huh?  Let me make up for that.

Mack’s art is done by Shade_Reverie.  Mack is a skilled traditional artist, and Shade had the skills to bring his art to life. I'm very happy with the final results, and that Shade agreed to come on board!

Artemis's art is done by DollhouseIRL. I worked with her on her first VN, Purple Prose For Purple Hearts, drawing sprites for the character Lucia and offering support behind-the-scenes. When I saw DollhouseIRL's art, I knew it would be perfect for Artemis, and I asked her if she would draw for the character. I'm delighted she said yes!

Beck’s art is done by Crow Caller.  Crow makes these papercraft creatures that are in a very unique style—I know about them because I watch his YouTube channel, where she primarily does book reviews but also shares his “paper children”.  When I figured out that Beck did papercraft, I immediately knew who to reach out to, and I was delighted when Crow agreed to join the team!

That’s all for today.  Thanks for reading!

[dragon-reblogs-and-rambles]

One down 7 to go hoooooooooooo boy

fun fact this is the first time i got 100% achievements on a game please ignore the Visual Novel tag I am a very pro gamer I swear

anyway some quick rambles:

I've been slowly making my way through this game rather than rushing through so some of my thoughts on the early sections are lost to time,

the main thing about this is that it takes a while to get to the good part but also without the slice of life elements i think it would be a significantly worse game so probably slowly going through rather than binging all at once is the right call

also the steam release has "updated" sprites (you can turn off) and i have a rant on why those sprites are actually worse in my opinion even tho they are technically drawn better but that could be its own post

(would you believe me if i told you these two sprites are supposed to be conveying the exact same emotion, according to the game these are the same sprite)

(or what about mion being banned from showing emotion beyond default anime expressions, not like she's a super playful energetic character or anything)

you can turn these out so it's not an issue but if we have to have redraws for rereleases can they be like.... good, when all a visual novel has is a couple dozen sprites per character they need to be good at showing emotion

oh yeah also its very obvious they only have like 7 songs total for this game ost lol there is only one good song in the ost btw, from a quick google serch looks like every version of the vn has a different ost lol

what else was i gunna sayy uhhhhhh

oh right yeah one thing is that going into the VN knowing the twist from the anime i think did make the experience slightly less good in some places i kinda do wish i could go in 100% blind but i know it would not hold my attention otherwise

(spoiler talk) knowing about the Hinamizawa Syndrome ahead of time def made it some some suspenseful scenes had me going "Keichi you ass your literally just tripping balls" like on one hand scenes where i notice a logical explanation with the context of knowing the twist is a sign of good writing but because i did not get my first experience with the VN idk i feel like i was missing out

regardless ill probs slowly go through the rest of the VN cuz i liked it overall, i already bought the next 3 games (first was free) so i guess i have to cuz i hate having a backlog

oh yeah the first chapter of the VN is free and its 10+ hours so if you like sorta kinda are intrested cuz of the anime you dont have anything to loose i wouldnt say its a strong reccomened yet but its more a "i enjoyed it and didnt feel like my time was waisted"

[icedmetaltea]

Ended up suddenly getting a wave of inspiration and getting back into making that VN game!

Remaking the sprites AGAIN cause I realized how shite they looked, can't post that here cause I don't trust tumblr with my art anymore but oh well, they certainly look a bit better and less bare bones imo

Thinking of giving them new outfits in each part, it'd make it a teeny bit more natural, but that would involve a lot more drawing... on top of plotting everything out in twine and trying to make it all hook together in renpy... hmm....

Getting some ideas for part 2... thing is I'm not sure how to go about that. Like what do I release part 1 and then part 2 later, but will the saves be affected???

Also wanna make a couple sections have clickable elements on the pics to make it a bit less boring cause there's one part where you have to go back and forth till you get to one particular location and if you were just supposed to do that through text that'd get monotonous verrrrry quickly lol

Also thinking of trying to implement a simple puzzle mechanic! This isn't supposed to be an actual "detective" game but I do think it'd add a lil bit of fun :> ENRICHMENT