Lemma Soft Forums

Oh, I'm adoring this game. This is so well put together. The storyline has me really hit the right emotional notes. So far, I either smile, feel for the characters, or laugh through out at their antics. The art is great, with beautiful yet subdued tones in the backgrounds that don't take away from the characters' own art at all.

The animations are timed well. Really the only thing that I can think of is perhaps more pose variety for the characters for the long play-through. I actually like the set up on the board, but the text was a bit small and hard to read. Though, that may just be my computer's screen resolution. (I have Windows XP Professional, but an even older monitor.) Also, perhaps a cg could have been shown when she received the letter, as this seemed an important event, or also when the knight allowed her to be tested.

Over all, though, the missions and the chibi selves of the characters seemed almost like a little toss in of humor, while taking away a bit of the seriousness. How ever, I think this was a nice relief, as it gave the game a little more variety. I enjoyed this game and it had a polished feel. My favorite character was Kerr on my play through, as he was realistically awkward towards Auralee, while warming up to her over time. Still, I read that it was made with a nano deadline in mind, and as such, this was really a very well put together work. Nice job. <=

*Edit: I did catch an error, though. When I started up the game for the first time it mentioned choices to update directX. How ever, when I clicked to update directX, it came up with the following. I am not sure if it was an error with your game or just with my version of Ren'Py, though.

I saved the log and trace back.

log: Traceback:

@PugDoll I'm glad you enjoyed it!
The game itself was written in a month, but the art was done on and off during a good part of a year; I honestly didn't think about adding a CG for the letter or the test moment... good catches! I'll keep that in mind for next time to see which moments to prioritise
I wanted to get more poses done, but in the end I didn't find the time to do them; I agree it would have been better, though ^^;

I didn't do the mission board, but i can see how you may have found the text too small.

About the error, I think it's a Ren'Py problem, so i don't really know how to deal with it >>; I'll let the experts chip in and give a better reply :'D

@Everybody I'm glad you guys enjoyed the game! It makes us really happy ^___^
And I'm glad to know people would be interested in a sequel, since we have wanted to make one since the day Kitty finished writing the game xD So it's definitely a thing we want to do in the future!

Thanks a lot for playing and I hope you'll enjoy the art book once I finish it

I've finished this game! Although I can't figure out what I need to be doing to get different endings. I was incredibly impressed. I wouldn't have even complained about paying a lil to experience a game that nice and professional. =) What I liked the most was absolutely the way the friendships were written. Their interactions and banter were funny, cute, and really made all of them likable. At first, I thought I'd hate Kerr and that I'd have to focus all my attention on him to make him start acting nice, but he charmed me thoroughly by the end as well!! I went in knowing and appreciating that the game would focus on friendships, but I liked both boys so much that I really wished The visuals were stunning. I noticed the characters stuck to one pose each, which normally would make them feel stagnant, but the animations did a lot to add emotion to their sprites. Their expressions were all cute and well drawn. I liked everyone's design as well, especially the main character. I liked the menus, the borders, the text (I think it's very cool you included dyslexic-friendly text!), the placement of everything... The chapter titles were very cool. The backgrounds were gorgeous and very immersive. I especially liked the painterly feeling of the caves.

Elaborating on the CGs, as I've said before, I've been a fan of Deji's art for a long time (I've followed her art on dA for as long as I can remember!), and the art in this game was a huge treat. I'd even say it was better than some commercial VN art out there...! As a side note, I quite liked the little SD illustrations/animations. I know it's a huge task to draw a ton of CGs, so it was neat to have some of those supplemented with SDs instead. There's nothing more I hate than when something cool is happening in a VN and there's no visuals to go with it. I start reading and I immediately think, "Yeah!! Bring on the cool picture! Oh... there is none." There were still a few instances of that here, but it's understandable and overall you guys did a super solid job of clearly showing AND telling us what was happening =)

I can see why some people thought the missions section of the game was too glossed over, but I understood why those things would have been a bit tedious or even sidetrack-y to go into great detail on, so I didn't mind the way the missions were summarized. Plus, it gave me a sense of, "Oh, these characters are passing time and going on missions and getting to know each other," better than a time skip would have.

The world building was very interesting and easy to follow. Sometimes with fantasy worlds, it can be easy to lose the readers in too much terminology nonsense, but I didn't have a problem with that here. I wanted to know more about the relationships and communities amongst the different dragonkind and heavenkind, but the suggestions of culture and structure were interesting enough!

Small thing: I enjoyed the role reversal here. I have a huge passion for lady knights, so the fact that both Aura and her mom are/were/aspired to be/whatever, knights, and it wasn't a "SO WEIRD 4 A GIRL" type deal made me really happy. I also liked Aura's very domestic, good chef of a dad. I wanted to see him!!

The story itself was extremely solid and I enjoyed it from start to finish. I thought Aura's character growth was handled very well. The way she started out as a bright-eyed rookie and was super cool.

I liked the idea of the voice acting, but I have to admit I turned it off pretty early in the game. I felt like it would have been better as more in certain spots (fully voice acting selective scenes?) or none at all. The random HEY!! and YEAH!!!s just kind of startled me, but that's a nitpicky thing on my part!! I think it's a cool idea though and props to the actors!

Oh yeah, one last thing: the battles were really cool!!! I especially liked the scene where The music and SFX were well integrated and not too distracting. I have a history of muting visual novel BGM because it annoys me pretty quickly, but I didn't have to do that for this game =) The ending credits were cute too! I loved seeing all the sketches and concept art. I can't wait for the art book!

@Cafechan: Thanks for that lovely review! I'm glad you enjoyed the game >w<

Cafechan wrote:

Aura could have kissed them at the end. LOL I understand that wasn't the point/focus of the game, that was just my own selfish emotion. I really wanted to kiss those cute dragon boys, darn it.

Cafechan wrote:

My favorite one was the of Aura and Kerr fighting. That scene in general made me dokidoki. I thought he was gonna kiss her neck. Hahaha.

GOD, I STRUGGLED WITH THAT CG SO MUCH I BANNED KITTY FROM WRITING THAT KIND OF SCENE EVER AGAIN XDDD

Cafechan wrote: I liked the idea of the voice acting, but I have to admit I turned it off pretty early in the game. I felt like it would have been better as more in certain spots (fully voice acting selective scenes?) or none at all. The random HEY!! and YEAH!!!s just kind of startled me, but that's a nitpicky thing on my part!! I think it's a cool idea though and props to the actors!

I support this! I'd like to do that in an eventual sequel if possible; we actually discussed it when we ere making the game last year :3

Thanks a lot again for your review!
Also personal mental note: design Aura's dad for the art book xD

Deji wrote:@Cafechan: Thanks for that lovely review! I'm glad you enjoyed the game >w<

No problem! Playing it was my pleasure!

Also I'm replaying it now and Edit: YES... YES....

CONGRATS ON THIS RELEASE GUYS!!!!!!!!!! WOW!! You all should be proud because this is such a lovely game!!! I already gushed on twitter so it's time for my serious comments! (spoiler: it's mostly just more gushing)

First, things I really liked! (everything under a spoiler in case I rant too much) Some minor issues: Also Ilmari's ending is the best Really excited for any future stories set in Ishtera!! Congrats again on the release!!

I just played through Kerr's route!

What a beautiful game!! The GUI, the artwork (I LOVE Deji's artwork nyomnyomnyom T_T*) and the characters and story - so good! I loved it! Lovely world, it was very immersive. Great choice of music and sounds, though I think the default voice level is a bit loud so I was startled by Aura's giggle at first XD;
Thank you so much for producing this bit of sweetness!! I'll definitely play through the other routes too.

@Cafechan:
GOOD. XD

@Reikun:
Thank you very much!! ^w^ I'm so glad you liked it DD

Reikun wrote:

2) The CG where Auralee and Ilmari are sitting together for the first time in Berri is a little confusing because it looks like the blanket is going over his hair as your eyes follow the blanket from right to left, but then it's under his hair??

Oops you're right o_o; Thanks for pointing it out, I didn't notice it Dx I'll be more careful in the future ^^;;;

@rufiangel:
Glad you liked it! <3
I think the voice volume starts at max in the game, you can always lower it in the settings :'D

rufiangel wrote:I was kind of sad to see how it ended but I guess it makes sense. But no kissy CG? O_O Whyyyyy lol. Though reading it was plenty sweet enough admittedly!

I'll let Kitty address the writing/story issues~ :'3

We have already broke the 1000 downloads (currently at 1300+) and we're STUPIDLY HAPPY to have reached so many people so far ;O; We hope to keep reaching more people and hopefully making them smile even a bit with our little game

Also thanks a lot guys, again, for taking the time to write back your impressions!
Please keep them coming! And remember to include critiques and issues with art, pacing, writing, etc., so we can keep those things in mind for later works and improve! ^___^ (I MEAN THIS. TEAR US APART IF YOU MAY. WE NEED THIS TO IMPROVE!)

This is one of those games that the friendship ending was satisfying and kinda realistic. Good job! =) It was also interesting to know why Kerr got so turned off with Aura touching her at the start...who would have thought eh :3

I was wondering, how do you get the first CG on the second page?

@Hachiko: Thanks!

Hachiko wrote:I was wondering, how do you get the first CG on the second page?

That one shows up when you follow Kerr's route.
To get there do the following:

PugDoll wrote: *Edit: I did catch an error, though. When I started up the game for the first time it mentioned choices to update directX. How ever, when I clicked to update directX, it came up with the following. I am not sure if it was an error with your game or just with my version of Ren'Py, though.

You can work around this by running lib/windows-i686/dxwebsetup.exe, where you should find lib in the same directory as the .exe.

Cafechan wrote: The story itself was extremely solid and I enjoyed it from start to finish. I thought Aura's character growth was handled very well. The way she started out as a bright-eyed rookie and

ended with the realization that the system was not all it was cracked up to be, but didn't allow it to make her cynical and instead decided to take her own noble path

was super cool.

Aw, thank you. I know I tend to write pretty optimistic/cheerful characters (maybe *too* naive/optimistic/cheerful) but I think it's nice to see a character that can overcome obstacles and still maintain that perspective. It's not easy to stay upbeat sometimes.

Reikun wrote: Some minor issues:

1) Aurelee's injuries during the fight with Dervishi weren't really addressed. I half-expected her to faint from blood loss when they were walking away from the battlefield afterwards, but she was just sad about her knight dream.
?

Deji and I realized we both flubbed with how Auralee was all casual around dragons when heavenkind are supposed to worship them (it's actually an optional thing, some heavenkind fear them, revere them, ignore them and only worship sun/moon, we weren't able to show the range though with limited characters). I guess she's just that laidback, I think she got it from her mom. XD (And props to the dad, who made dinner for the dragons.)

Again thanks everyone for all the feedback, I'll do my best to improve and make my writing tighter for the next projects. ^o^

I LOVED IT SO HARDCORE. I wanna see the artbook SO HARDCORE. This pulls all my heartstrings and make me dokidoki SO HARDCORE.

It was very lovely. Any release date set for the artbook release yet, or is it still vaguely weekish?

Oh danged! I've been waiting for this for a while! ♥
I'll be sure to play it on Friday night, since I'll be busy until then ;A;
I shall recommend this to my friends! ^^

ohmygoshhh this is free?! I CANT BELIEVE ET
THIS ART. THIS STOREI ADSAJFOAFNAIOAFOSAFJSA //DIES

IM TOTALLY NOT SCREAMING INSIDE MY HEAD BECAUSE SOMETHING LIKE THIS IS FREE
imsohappyimsohappyiloveyousomuchoknookmaybeOKIDO