Clearwater Crossing [Otome] (Open Dev)

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Kingv
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Clearwater Crossing [Otome] (Open Dev)

#1 Post by Kingv »

Image
GENRE
Romance | Life/Work/Date Sim | Modern Day

ImageSYNOPSIS
Welcome to Clearwater Crossing, a small seaside town full of rustic charm and southern hospitality. Abigail Bartlett and her family have called this town home for the last 100 years. It’s where she grew up and plans to settle down one day. Now that she’s finished with college Abby begins making plans to start her own graphic design company near the boardwalk. Clearwater Crossing has always been considered a historic area but over the years it has begun to lose money as well as residents. Where once the shops were vintage and charming, now they’ve begun to fall in a state of disrepair; many of the once bustling shops have been boarded up and left abandoned. Fearing that things will only get worse the towns people struggle with trying to hold on to the peaceful life they once knew.

A big urban development company, The Monolith Property Group, moves in with an offer that seems too good to be true. They want to buy out the remaining business owners then tear down the shops to build a mall in hopes to boost the economy and bring in a younger generation of buyers. With no money coming in, the town is on the cusp of accepting their offer. Outraged over their disregard for small business owners Abby wants to petitions the city to recognize the area as a historical landmark. Calling her bluff the Mayor offers her a challenge: She has one year to fix the buildings and find tenants who’ll be willing to open up businesses. Faced with such a huge responsibility Abby isn’t sure if she has what it takes and begins questioning if it was wise to get involved at all.

The goal of the game is to find tenants, make upgrades to the property and earn income before time runs out…or not. Whether Abby chooses to help the town improve or focus on her own career influences her role in the story and how others interact with her. You're free to play the story however you like.

ImageGAME FEATURES
• One year timeline in game(Fall, Winter, Spring, Summer)
• Seasonal outfits for all main characters
• Shopping and Inventory systems
• Get income from tenants or do freelance jobs to earn money
• Monthly festivals, birthdays and events to attend for each character
• Dynamic Environments: World evolves based on your actions
• Multiple date locations
• Romantic, Jealousy and Friendship endings available
• Unlockable Achievements
• Stat and Event based game play


Story Breakdown:
Week 1(Fall 1-7):Intro to story and game play mechanics. Meet base cast.
Week 2(Fall 8-15): Meet more characters.
Week 3(Winter 1-14):
Week 4( Winter 8-15):
Week 5(Spring 1-7):
Week 6(Spring 8-15):
Week 7(Summer 1-7):
Week 8(Summer 8-15):
CAST
Image
Abigail 'Abby' Bartlett AGE: 22
Abby has recently returned to her hometown Clearwater Crossing to be near her family and start her career as a graphic designer after graduating from college. She lives at the inn, Bartlett Manor, which her family still operated. Impulsive and highly optimistic, she often bites off more than she can chew in life.

Image
Remy LeCroix AGE: 27
Personality: focused, self reliant, indifferent
Remy currently works as the mayors' aide in the town hall building. He is very dedicated to his job as well as the Mayor. Although Remy is seen as a model citizen he is often the subject of many unsavory rumors floating around town.

Image
Kristian Edwards AGE: 22
Personality: friendly, laid back, fashion forward
Kristian is originally from the west coast but moved across the country to start a new life. He's very much into technology and is a manager at TechnoBUG.

Image
Orion Orrico AGE:24
Personality: Happy, Upbeat, Extrovert
Orion works as a lifeguard during the warm months but seemingly disappears as soon as it starts to get cold each year. Friendly, outgoing and caring he's oblivious to his popularity with the ladies and doesn't seem to mind the mob that follows him around at work. Orion has some big goals he wants to achieve in his life and always tries his best to bring out the hidden potential in others.

Image
Joriah Weston AGE: 21
Personality: quiet, soft spoken, polite, old fashioned
Joriah works at Pine Ridge Farm on the outskirts of town near the mountains. To supplement his income he often rents out cabins and does guided tours.

Image
Giovanni Leone AGE: 38
Personality: suave, self-assured
Giovanni is a representative of The Monolith Property Group and crosses paths with Abby soon after she returns home. Although he works on behalf of the company attempting to demolish the area, he often acts in ways that go against that goal.

------MINOR CHARACTERS------
Image
Dorian Bartlett AGE: 27
Dorian is Abbys' older brother and the newest mayor of the town. He's very idealistic and thinks that it needs to be more modern in hopes of boosting the economy. Encourages tearing down the old shopping district to build a mall.

Image
Millie Bartlett AGE: 45
Abby and Dorian's' mother. She spends her days working at the inn and wants the best for both her children.

Image
Willow Lourdes AGE: 21
Willow is a longtime friend of Abby. She works at the bookstore downtown...if you can even call it that. She spends the majority of her time slacking off and finding creative ways to terrorize customers. She'd secretly love to get fired just to get a break from her mundane life.

Image
Cypress Lourdes AGE: 17
Willow's little sister. She works at the diner in hopes of saving up for college. Hardworking and highly responsible, Willow often jokes that she acts more like a grandma than a teenager.

Image
Leah Rhodes AGE: 19
Leah works at the beach with Orion. Being a former swim team captain she's used to pushing others to be the best and takes her job very seriously.

Travis DeWolfe AGE: 22
Travis works at the TechnoBUG with Kristian. He's new to his job but doesn't seem to care much about making a good impression...

Percival Richardson AGE: 26
Percy works at the clothing store. He seems to know a great deal about everyone in town, no doubt because of his mother Ms. Pearlene, the town's biggest gossip.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
ImageGAME STATUS
I just work on it a tiny bit at a time, learning as I go since I have no prior experience using Ren’Py for coding, although I have done sprites, GUI design and backgrounds for other visual novels. This won't be a very long game, perhaps six hours of playtime per route, and will be a free release.
Since this is just in the beginning planning stages some information is subject to change. Most of the art consists of rough character sketches at this time. I’m holding off on the coding for now since I’m not ready to tackle that beast, and have been mostly focusing mapping out the story and art. I'm feeling rather lost so any feedback or suggestions are appreciated. Since I'm new to everything I'll run this thread as having an open development so I can get feedback as I go along rather than towards the end of development. It think it'll help me make a more cohesive story that way. I have a small wishlist of features I think would make the game great so I need to do some additional research and gather tutorials in order to implement them.

GAME PROGRESS
Script: 60%
Word Count: 40,208
Sprites: 50%
CGs: 1% (2/40 done)
Backgrounds: 5%
Programming: 35%
GUI: 100%
Music: 75%

USER FEEDBACK
Here are a few feedback question regarding the game. If anyone would like to answer them it would be really helpful and help with future progress. More will be added later as progress is made.

1.Are there any characters that stand out to you so far? If so, why? (Could be design, personality or anything else.)

2.What type of events would you be interested in seeing in the game?

3. In terms of game play would you like the users choices to directly effect Abbys' personality? For example if she was very negative and sarcastic characters you talk with would respond based on how she acted. Was already implementing something along these lines and didn't realize it. ><
Last edited by Kingv on Tue Nov 11, 2014 11:12 pm, edited 29 times in total.

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Re: Clearwater Crossing (Open Dev)

#2 Post by Misfile »

This looks like it will be a very interesting game if you can do everything that you have layed out here.

Though I have to ask, why did you call it open dev? (It may just be the programmer in me who works mostly on open source projects causing this question)

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Re: Clearwater Crossing (Open Dev)

#3 Post by Kingv »

Misfile wrote:This looks like it will be a very interesting game if you can do everything that you have layed out here.

Though I have to ask, why did you call it open dev? (It may just be the programmer in me who works mostly on open source projects causing this question)
Thanks! I'm not trying to do anything too complex I think, so it should make figuring out the coding go a little smoother. If anything I can always scale things back and still tell a compelling story. I'm citing it as being an open development mostly because everything on here will be open for public opinion. I'll occasionally be asking for feedback on art, story and maybe even code and responses gained by others will help me shape the game and I also plan on posting my developmental processes here. I guess you could say this thread could lean more so on the side of being full of spoiler information, but since I'll also be posting back end stuff that's why it's tagged as such. Hope that all makes sense. I'm not much of a programmer so I'm guessing that would be enough to say that's what it is.

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Re: Clearwater Crossing (Open Dev)[GxB][Otome]

#4 Post by gekiganwing »

I'm curious just what sort of actions the main character can take that might lead to saving the town. This is a noble cause... but having seen some small towns that don't seem to have a future, I really wonder what can be done.

I would not mind seeing the character Abigail in a game with BxG (or even GxG) pairings.

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Re: Clearwater Crossing (Open Dev)[GxB][Otome]

#5 Post by Kingv »

gekiganwing wrote:I'm curious just what sort of actions the main character can take that might lead to saving the town. This is a noble cause... but having seen some small towns that don't seem to have a future, I really wonder what can be done.

I would not mind seeing the character Abigail in a game with BxG (or even GxG) pairings.
Abbys' main objective is to find people willing to open up businesses in the area and start raising money to fix things up. One way that may happen is by talking to others you discover something they're passionate about, let's say cooking for example. By talking to them and encouraging their love for cooking they just might decide to open up a restaurant in the building. Or you might come across some random people passing through and convince them to move to the area. I'm still brainstorming other ways to help the town improve. I'm from a small town that's been declining over the years so I know the feeling of watching things spin on a downward spiral. I'm glad you're enjoying the main character. If I have time I'd love to add more pairings to the game other than GxB.

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Re: Clearwater Crossing (Open Dev)[GxB][Otome]

#6 Post by Kingv »

Here are a few mock designs done in Photoshop for the Start screen and interface. My overall feel for the GUI is going to be old/vintage yet somewhat modern to fit in with the whole theme of the town restoration. Everything is one big work in progress and will more than likely be changed in the future.

For the start screen I worked in basically one shade for now and plan to throw some color in there eventually. I'm even thinking of changing the logo some.

The mock interface design is pretty basic. There's a small calender that shows the day and date. Each season will be 15 days long to make the game shorter. To the left of the calender is the time of day indicator. So far I'm just doing day and night. Below that is the season. I have no idea what could go in the circle to the right...maybe a button that links to the world map? It would be a way to get rid of the Map button that's in the right hand corner so I'd have more space.

Then there's the text box. Only innovation it has is two boxes that would contain links to her phone and email. My idea is that sometimes obtainable characters would give the MC a call or send a text to say hello, talk or ask a question. The email icon would do the same, but it would also be a way for her to gather clients for her business since she's a freelancer. So it's really just more ways for her to stay connected to people she meets. My only grip with the text box right now is that it's starting to look heavy. Most of the sprites are blocked out. Maybe placing the sprites above the box and having them almost framed by it could work...I'm starting to ramble, must be time for bed. Any suggestions or comments are welcome.
Attachments
mockScreenWIP.jpg
startWIP.jpg

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Re: Clearwater Crossing[GxB][Otome](Open Dev)

#7 Post by Kingv »

I feel bad about posting so much...but I really wanted to share what I've been up to. I'm sure someone is curious about the game. Made some more changes to the logo. Just add pictures and changed the font but I think it fits in more with an otome game. I'm going to keep fiddling with it til something I like sticks. Also created a mock design for the map interface. Please excuse the messiness of it all. It just to give you a general idea of how everything is set up.

And I also made a little progress regarding coding. So far I've been following some tutorials and messing around so I haven't actually plugged any of the script into the game. Although it's starting to make a little more sense I'm still not a fan of programming at all!

Code: Select all

The game contains 50 screens of dialogue.
These screens contain a total of 524 words,
for an average of 10.5 words per screen.
The game contains 5 menus.
And more outfits for some of the cast. Here are Abbys' Spring, Summer and Fall clothing. I'm more used to working with fantasy based design so doing a game where the characters and reality based is more difficult than I imagined and coming up with ideas is on the slow side. So I've been basing clothing off of stuff I own or would wear. I have boring fashion sense I'm afraid. Outfits I want to include would be seasonal outfits, pajamas, swimwear and exercise outfits for some characters.
Remy also has a new coat for his Fall attire.
Attachments
abbyOutfitsWIP.jpg
remyOutfitWIP.jpg
mapWIP.jpg
logoMisc.jpg

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Re: Clearwater Crossing[GxB][Otome](Open Dev)

#8 Post by Aedin »

I really love the idea of this. It doesn't seem like it'll be like most otomes. I will be watching this very closely.

My only gripe is Abby's breasts. The cleavage line looks like it comes up too far for the size of her breasts. She doesn't have giant balloons attached to her chest, so it seems weird. I don't know exactly, they just looked off to me. Other than that, everything is absolutely beautiful.
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Re: Clearwater Crossing[GxB][Otome](Open Dev)

#9 Post by Ricocchi »

Wow..concept is interesting, and I really like the main character design.

the simulation of earning money, seasonal event caught my attention, though, I wanna ask further detail about the 'dynamic enviroment'
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Re: Clearwater Crossing[GxB][Otome](Open Dev)

#10 Post by Kingv »

Aedin wrote:I really love the idea of this. It doesn't seem like it'll be like most otomes. I will be watching this very closely.

My only gripe is Abby's breasts. The cleavage line looks like it comes up too far for the size of her breasts. She doesn't have giant balloons attached to her chest, so it seems weird. I don't know exactly, they just looked off to me. Other than that, everything is absolutely beautiful.
Thank you! It's pretty basic in story terms, but I wanted to add in a few game play twist to make it more innovative.

I see what you mean about her breast. I made a few adjustment.Do you think the new version looks more natural? I did it pretty quickly so some of the lines are off. I'm glad you're linking how everything is turning out none the less.
Ricocchi wrote:Wow..concept is interesting, and I really like the main character design.

the simulation of earning money, seasonal event caught my attention, though, I wanna ask further detail about the 'dynamic enviroment'
Thank you, I appreciate you stopping by and supporting the game! My ideas regarding having a dynamic environment will be most prevalent in the buildings Abby renovates as well as her bedroom. The four stats that are in the game so far are Charisma, Handiness, Logic and Creativity. When you visit the buildings at first they are very run down looking and in need of serious repair. As your Handiness increases Abby will be able to structurally fix the shops and the buildings will begin to look better; they won't have things like big holes, collapsed walls or boarded up windows anymore. When you increase your Creativity she will be able to make them look more physically appealing. So over time she'll paint them and do landscaping to make the property more beautiful. Every time her stats reach a certain milestone the in game backgrounds will change to reflect it. The same principle will be used for her room so that it will appear differently each time her skills increase.
Attachments
boobTest.png
Last edited by Kingv on Mon Sep 17, 2012 12:40 am, edited 1 time in total.

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Re: Clearwater Crossing[GxB][Otome](Open Dev)

#11 Post by Aedin »

The new version looks much better. I really like the idea of the dynamic environment. Sounds really interesting.
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Re: Clearwater Crossing[GxB][Otome](Open Dev)

#12 Post by ixWishing »

Ahh.
This perked my interest!
I can't wait for more updates!

P.S. Have you abandoned the Lunar Lotus Festival Sim date / VN? ;o
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Re: Clearwater Crossing[GxB][Otome](Open Dev)

#13 Post by KittyKatStar »

I love the dynamic environment idea. =D

Also, Abby's design looks great. It's nice to see a cute freckled redhead.
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Re: Clearwater Crossing[GxB][Otome](Open Dev)

#14 Post by Kingv »

Aedin wrote:The new version looks much better. I really like the idea of the dynamic environment. Sounds really interesting.
Thanks for your help. I'm going to clean the new version up some and modify the sprite base. I'm happy to know that the dynamic environment idea is gaining interest.
ixWishing wrote:Ahh.
This perked my interest!
I can't wait for more updates!

P.S. Have you abandoned the Lunar Lotus Festival Sim date / VN? ;o
That's great! I'll be sure to post updates as they are made. ^^

I don't have any plans to abandon my Lunar Lotus Festival Sim at all. I've already put in almost two years of work on it and am over halfway done. The game is rather large and Flash is a huge memory hog so it tends to slow down my PC. Right now I have about 2 gigs of space left on my hard drive which isn't enough to run Flash without it crashing my computer. So until I buy myself a new external drive I can't really make updates to it. LLF is my main game and I plan to focus on Clearwater Crossing fully once it's done. I'm just tinkering with CC for the time being until I'm able to work on my other game.
KittyKatStar wrote:I love the dynamic environment idea. =D

Also, Abby's design looks great. It's nice to see a cute freckled redhead.
I think having dynamic environments will be a unique aspect of the game. It always adds a little something extra when you can see the effects of the decisions you make physically effect your surroundings.
And I have to agree with you, Abby is rather cute!

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Re: Clearwater Crossing[GxB][Otome](Open Dev)

#15 Post by Kingv »

Just a small update today of an in-game screenshot. Worked a little on Abbys' bedroom. I used a file from a project that went unused for most of it. This is her rooms default state when you start the game. As certain skills increase her room will start to change and eventually look much better. So all the pink will eventually change to another color and the whole atmosphere will become more mature. Also played around with time of day lighting effects. The top one is afternoon and the small ones on the bottom are day and night lighting. . I'm so proud I made Ren'Py actually do something that looks like a game. *pats self on back*

The circle to the right of where the date is located will be used for weather indication. So if it's raining, windy, or snowing in game you'll have a nice little icon there to let you know what's going on. I think this would be pretty cool as a notice of special events. Such as if it's snowing that's the only time you're able to go sledding with a guy. Or you my only be able to trigger certain events at night when it's raining. It's really just another way to see extra scenes and unlock CGs.

Here's some progress on the coding end.

Code: Select all

The game contains 220 screens of dialogue.
These screens contain a total of 3,450 words,
for an average of 15.7 words per screen.
The game contains 3 menus.
Attachments
abbysRoom.jpg

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