Lemma Soft Forums

This is my entry for the citizens for a global solution contest that has been announced...
It is about the persecution of Falun Gong in China.

I haven't had much time for testing as... I totally ran out of time... so it probably still contains a few minor bugs and mistakes... that's why i am posting it in works in progress... however the deadline of the contest is due in a few hours so i probably have to submit it like this...

Oh and to make this clear... the contest asked for a "branching story" (as they put it ) that involves things like human rights and crimes against humanity... so don't expect any cute anime girls or anything like that...

Windows: http://www.no-neets.de/downloads/choice-win32.zip
Linux: http://www.no-neets.de/downloads/choice ... 86.tar.bz2
Mac: http://www.no-neets.de/downloads/choice-mac.zip

Man, that's pretty serious stuff in here indeed... I was grasped from the start. Those choices of yours mean a lot to me ! Thank you for this.

Oh, shit, I just now remembered this.

Playing it now.

Der Tor, this is still beautiful. If you send me the script again, I will proofread it and tweak it for you again.

I wish to re-release this with some digital paintings. What say you?

Even though they are not photographs, I honestly believe that I can make them evocative and powerful. I will base them roughly on the images that you've used, and I want to spread the word about There Is Always A Choice.

Come on... let's polish this diamond in the rough... you Got It Out There, now it's time to yell about it from the treetops and the hills!

常に選択され!
Towanisentakusare!
There is always a choice!

Der Tor, do you care for this? Is there anything you would change on her?



I know I got it a bit wobbly and uneven, I'll fix that before inking... I wanted something humanistic where the race was clear but I can take it more into anime or Western style, if it fits.

Example referenced painting.

I enjoyed the original game, and I'm looking forward to the version with the digital paintings. I liked the character of Liu, and the choices were impactful and interesting. The game also did a really good job of teaching the history to someone who didn't know about Falun Gong or the human rights violations of its followers (me). I'm pretty outraged about what happened, and since I'm sure that's the effect you were going for, you did a good job with it. I'm a lot more affected by this than by most visual novels I've read-- cute anime girls this is not.

However, when I was playing it I noticed something that might have been a bug. I got a bad ending and was playing through again (spoilers just to be safe)


I don't know if this was intentional or not, but if the game is themed around choices, then taking away the choice to doesn't work very well for that-- I can sort of understand why it might be gone, but the game didn't show me a reason it would be. I also felt some of the choices when you were looking for Liu weren't very clear, and whether or not you found her depended on luck (in that even when I was trying to find her, it took me several tries)-- but that's the case in real life a lot of the time, too, so I don't have a problem with that.

Lastly, if you're still looking to polish this, would you like someone to help you edit the text? I noticed quite a few spelling and grammar mistakes. It's totally understandable because you said yourself that you're not a native English speaker, but the fact is that if the spelling and grammar is off, some people can get distracted from the message of the thing. This is powerful stuff, and I want people to be able to pay full attention to the content! I would love to take a look over this and help edit it, if you would let me.

I hope I'm not sounding like an ass, or like I'm overly critical. This is a really, really good VN-- but it has the potential to be an excellent VN, and I really want it to get there. :3

That's alright, Mrs. Abject, I've got this one. This was the first project I tried to join here, actually. I did the proofreading when Der Tor sent me an incomplete script, and I'm going to finish that job since I committed to it at the outset—I offered to do the art and Der Tor politely turned me down at the time, but now we're going to re-release it with a different look, correctly sized and stylized backgrounds, character sprite overlays (non-animated) and better English.

It was this game that inspired me to take mine more seriously, so... thanks Der Tor.

I actually wanted to keep her imperfections, but transfering to style, I was unable to keep it because of personal aesthetics... I did try to keep some things, I may go back and try to get her chin, temples, and where her bridge of her nose meets the bridge of her forehead especially because I think those details make this character.

Plus side: the sprites will now be transparent, consistent in palette and look and lighting.

Negative side: did not get it as accurate as I would have liked, even allowing for Western realism... also, I think I may have leaned too far toward Japanese features instead of Chinese. DERP. Sorry about that, it wasn't intentional. I'll try and fix it.



If you look closely, you'll notice that her eyes are smaller and rounder and she has a squarish jaw from the front, but I drew from left to right and it screwed me up for the rest...

I am sorry and I did not mean to step on your toes at all-- I just really enjoy editing and thought you were only doing visuals. I'm sure the project will turn out wonderfully, and I look forward to playing it again in the new version.

I take no offense.

I'm not sure when this will be out, but please look forward to it when it's done.

sorry for my late reply... i only now saw the new replies...

First off when i did the curent version with the photos, i had very limited time as the deadline for the contest was pressing.
So i had to take whatever photos i had and naturally there aren't any photos that happened to fit exactly the scenes.

Only the photos of Liu where shot specifically for the game, all the other photos are actual Footage mainly from from the persecution or from public executions. But even Liu's photos as you can see where done in a hurry and poorly done with a static web cam. So i had to make do with what i had, and had to use the photos that where available, even though they of course almost never exactly fitted the scene in which they where used.

What i am trying to get at, is that the advantage of using paintings, is that with paintings one does not have those limitations... one can freely paint whatever the scene needs... So if you just make the same photos into paintings, you would unnecessarily impose the same restrictions i had with using real photos on yourself, even though with paintings you wouldn't have to.

My suggestion would be that you can use the photos as a reference, but keep in mind that the photos where chosen out of necessity - with paintings you can get way closer to what the scene actually needs.
And also Liu doesn't HAVE to look like the girl whose photos i used... she of course CAN look like her... but i only used her photos cause she had a web cam and was willing to participate...


Your painting still looks awesome though
Even though you didn't change much of the look or the feeling, it already fits way better than the photo...
I would already like to use it in the current version... may i?

@ Mrs. Abject:

Thank you for offering your help... it would be great if you could correct some of the spelling and grammar... my english really isn't good enough in that regard... i think if more people would look through it, it would only be better...

I hope JinzouTamashii won't object, but i think collaborating is the key to getting things done... So i thought i just make a quick wiki and post the script there... so anyone can look through and improve it... http://choice-game.wikispaces.com

regarding the "bug" you found... this is not a bug, but rather intentional... It was meant to show that the policeman will keep up his "good cop" farce and won't stop trying to persuade you

Der Tor, you are the project leader so it's always you call. I am happy to work with Mrs. Abject. In fact, that will let me focus on replaying the game multiple times and thinking more about the palette, composition, themes, focus, and color theory.

In other words, it will take some of the pressure off me and then I can just go through it one final time as something like an editor instead of a proofreader.

It's a shame nobody uses the wiki i set up... as i think it was principally a good idea using a wiki to collaborate on a script...

Ah well... the contest is finished and i haven't received any e-mail... I never expected the game to win the contest, but i at least expected an e-mail telling me that the game DIDN'T win and announcing WHO won...

But anyway... the contest should officially be over so I think now is a good time to at least announce the version with the photos as completed...
So if any of you guys made any changes to the script, now would be a good time to show me. Otherwise i am gonna announce it as it is... except of course that i still want to at least replace the last photo with JinzouTamashii's awesome painting...