Taleweaver wrote:What are your criteria for publishing a game? You say you want to work together with the "best"... in terms of what? Writing? Presentation? Replay value? Uniqueness and "breaking the mold"? Gameplay beyond story choices? What makes up "the best" for you?
That is a good question and a complicated one to answer...
Technically it's all the things you've mentioned and more.
We have a team of experienced personnel constantly scouting and reviewing indie titles as they are released.
We use the knowledge about the current state of affairs acquired, along with our heavy list of criteria to decide which visual novels are fit for publishing with vNovel. A main part of this criteria is the quality of the story, but things like the quality of the existing art, and traget audience, as well as popularity, and level of interactivity are also taken into account.
We are also very strict on whether the interactive elements of the story game are closely tied to the story itself. Traditional dating sims or RPG games (with stats, etc.) are not acceptable for publication with us. We welcome interactivity, but only as long as it's seamless and doesn't interfere with the story. This is also the reason why we drop most UI elements (unless they are required to tell the story). The core quality of the visual novel, the
story comes first, and above all. We accept no compensation for it. This purist approach allows us to separate the best visual novels from the rest (even quality mix-/ date sim or RPG games).
Occasionally we will agree to convert a game into a visual novel (as in the case of The Flower Shop) if the story is outstanding.
Taleweaver wrote:Maybe that also explains why you never approached me... ^_^
We generally do not contact the authors of the works we scout. It is up to the author to contact us and submit their application for publishing review. Only you know when you're ready.
In the worst case we'll give you confidential proper feedback on what you need to improve for your next production to successfully release it with us in a commercial context.
I hope this answers your question.
Best Regards,
Becky