Lemma Soft Forums

MR MOREAU: Polite and calm to a fault, he cannot imagine a life without rules and regulations. He acts as a mentor to Anneliese, and she has come to depend on him.

SIE: A mysterious being who is clearly not of this world, his motivations are not always clear. He constantly seeks amusement and sees Anneliese as the pitiful heroine of a tragedy.

8129: An android who is in charge of Mr Moreau and Anneliese, before they are brought to judgement by the Council.

THE COUNCIL: The group at the head of the Ministry in charge of maintaining order among its populace; nobody has ever actually seen them. (Oh yes, the generic, all-powerful, mystery tyrants.)

JEREMIE: (past) Anneliese's new neighbour who has moved in under extremely bizarre circumstances, which seem to suggest that he either has connections within the Ministry or with the newly-formed anti-Ministry rebel group. He is idealistic and rushes into things without thinking them through.

HELENA: (past) Shy and soft-spoken, she is Anneliese's cousin and has been living with the family for only a few months, essentially having been abandoned. She often disappears from the house for long periods of time, doing who knows what.

I made one pretty major change to the game, after mulling over it for the longest time. Instead of having the entire game be set in the "present", a fairly large portion will now be set in the "past". A kind of spoiler-y explanation of how the game will function: act one will introduce the player to the premise and characters in the "present", act two will be a "past" based on Anneliese's latent memories, act three will be back in the "present". (Actions in act two and three will very directly affect the ending.)

The reason for this is because I was sitting around, doing some serious thinking. "What the hell is up with this VN? Is there even a plot? How is gameplay going to work?" I realised that I had the "past" very nicely mapped out in pretty extreme detail, and thought that it would be a shame if it were revealed only in tiny bits and pieces, as I originally intended to do. This new outline of the game will definitely allow for a more thorough exploration of the "past" and, I swear, it won't be done in a really derpy "time travel" way.

Updated main menu and character sprites!


Progress as of September 20, 2012...


NEARING COMPLETION, GUYS. Re: the writing, I'll be adding more dialogue options so it's not a really pathetic one choice per thousand words type of thing. Re: the art, I'll probably be doing some minimal CGs (maybe five per character TOPS). I'll likely release this game by November. SO EXCITE.

Thanks for reading this far! I'll add more details and updates as I go along, and further ranty commentaries will go here on my devblog.

_________________
dA. ♥ Umbrella Cookie. ♥ tumblr.
currently working on Yesterday Again.

I'm not entire sure what you mean. I did a couple of web searches ("bioware personality creation" and then "...character creation"), but the most relevant result I could find was a wiki page on MC customization in Dragon Age Origins. Do you want the player to alter your MC's appearance before the game begins? Or do you want players to determine the main character's morality and personality through actions?



If the player and/or the main character have very little knowledge at the beginning, that's fair. You can present an alien world this way, one in which we get to discover the setting through the MC's eyes. If one or both is left in the dark for an extended period of time... that might not be much fun. So, how much of the story should be spelled out, and how much should be ambiguous? Ultimately, it's your decision.

I'm going to enjoy it... Absolutely nothing wrong with a good mindscrew.

_________________
I'm going to get off my soap-box now, and let you get back to your day.

Academy Daze- Demo pending
Knights of Chaos: Ghost- Coding underway
DevBlog: http://www.renaigames.net
Troubleshooter Tales: Childhood's End (story) http://www.knightschaos.com

I was wondering what happened to this game, ahaha. It's great to see you're back!

The personality molding thing sounds cool. It sounds like a lot of work, but it'd be interesting to see how you use it. And I don't think there's anything wrong with choices based on previous decisions. That's like the game 999, have you ever played it? You play knowing nothing, and everything is revealed if you get the true ending. The other endings give you insight to the other characters, but you only finally learn what's going on with the true ending.

_________________
deviantART | SmackJeeves | Sketch blog

I wasn't quite sure how to word it succinctly and clearly (obviously, I failed in both, lol); but, yes, I want players to be able to determine the main character's personality through the choices they make, and have it become an almost organic part of the game. I guess something like: the player will not be given to choice to pick actions that would conflict with the profile of the MC (personality / morality), for example.

Thank you for your advice; I'm really fumbling around in the dark (this is like a failed pun here) with making this game, since it's my first VN whose mechanics and plot I'm actually putting thought into. ;P


Oh YES, I am making a conscious effort to make the "true ending" as M. Night Shyamalan as possible (in a fantastic "Sixth Sense" sort of way, of course) lololol.


No, no, I swear I was working on "YA" all this time! So I was never gone to begin with! :'D

Oooh, "999" sounds fantastic and looks like it would give me ideas for my game as well. (And the ever-reliable Wikipedia says there's even a novel; now, that's exciting. Why must I have so many final assessments and exams to do now QQ?) Thanks for your suggestion!

_________________
dA. ♥ Umbrella Cookie. ♥ tumblr.
currently working on Yesterday Again.

Interesting concept (I always love a good gamble).

I'm sorry if this is just an otaku nit-pick, but are you sure you want to name your character 8059? It's a rather popular set of numbers that refer to a fandom pairing in Katekyo Hitman Reborn, which could put ideas that aren't supposed to be there in the minds of potential players (me, for example OTL). Just bringing it up since it seems you were most likely not aware of this number association.

_________________
tumblr | twitter | I believe in you!

Glad to see you working on this some more! I was going to comment on the 8059 thing, but it seems Reikun beat me to the punch. XD I think your personality model and whatnot is fine. The fun in a game, especially one with a strong plotline like this, is figuring things out and learning things as the story goes on. If the player makes some bad decisions as a result of their lack of knowledge, they just have to reload a save or start over. It's a game, after all. Plus, most people who play VNs get lazy and end up consulting a walkthrough, anyway, so then that lack of knowledge doesn't matter so much. XD So just keep doing what you're doing. I really liked what I saw of this game when I played the demo waaaay back when, so I can't wait to see it finished.

_________________
1/2 of Cyanide Tea | BCM | Ristorante Amore | The Elevator | @Twitter

I've been MIA for a while. Basically, I shelved away "Yesterday Again" to focus on some other things (explanation here for those who might be interested because reasons). BUT LOOK WHO'S BACK HURRAH. With some changes! See main post for details (more ranty, in-depth commentary at my devblog).


Spiffy main menu that unlocks the image with each successful playthrough and an extras section!


New character sprites (for the last, last time, I swear)! Click until absolute fullview so that the lineart is super crispy and neat.

The game contains 757 screens of dialogue.
These screens contain a total of 13,891 words,
for an average of 18.4 words per screen.
The game contains 15 menus.



OH YOU GUYS. Thanks for letting me know; I was kind-of not-really into the KHR fandom a while back, and maybe that set of numbers just kind of stuck into my mind! I've decided to go with your advice and rename her to 8129, lol.

_________________
dA. ♥ Umbrella Cookie. ♥ tumblr.
currently working on Yesterday Again.

YOU KNOW WHAT, THE WHOLE WORLD NEEDS TO KNOW THAT I HAVE FINISHED THE SPRITES (FINALLY). More detailed blog post about all my feels here.


(L to R) 8129, Helena, Jeremie, Mr Moreau, Sie

The game contains 806 screens of dialogue.
These screens contain a total of 14,781 words,
for an average of 18.3 words per screen.
The game contains 14 menus.

Please let me know if there are any super glaring anatomical issues or odd-looking bits, because I am just really bad at critiquing my own work. (EDIT: Oh wait, forgot to colour in Helena's lips. Well... You know, that sort of small thing, it's almost negligible. I'VE STILL OFFICIALLY FINISHED THE SPRITES OK.)

_________________
dA. ♥ Umbrella Cookie. ♥ tumblr.
currently working on Yesterday Again.

I just stumbled on this thread,and I must say I like it!
Plots revolving around mystery and lost memories,swapping between present and past is thrilling to play! The choice you're giving the players to determine the main character's morality and personality by what they choose is epic. You actually feel that your choices do affect the MC and the game.
Art is gorgeous. The main menu is adorable,plus the fact that the images unlock whenever you finish a path is effin awesome! The sprites are great. Two things I noticed that looked kinda weird/funny though is that :
+ You might wanna recolor the guy's lips a more natural pastel color,cause to me they look like they're wearing lipgloss ΧD
+ Sie's right arm (right as you see him) looks a tack too long from the other
Skipping those,I'm really looking foward to play the game.Wish you luck!
Cheers!

_________________

ATTENTION : Due to IRL issues that need my ultimost attention and presence, my hours on the internet will be extremely cut down. Therefore, I cannot continue to proofread. I'm truly sorry to all that I offered/agreed to help, but this is more important as it is something that cannot be taken lightly.