Moonlight Walks Released

[TheOnlyOneKunobi]

Daisuki da!!!
I love it!!!
So much fluff! I really enjoyed it. Very sweet and cute. I liked ending 3 the best (25 min- guess I'm a slow reader ;_; )

The only thing that I thought was kind of distracting was the fact that you still see a full moon when you go back to see Mary and she isn't there

Maybe she was on the other side of the island?

But seriously, this was my first Ren'Ai game. I found it nestled in the folders of my brother's computer and spent about an hour completing it all the way through and it got me hooked on Ren'Ai. Mary was cute and it was a nice romantic setting jus' how I like's it!

[Megaman Z]

Daisuki da!!!
I love it!!!
So much fluff! I really enjoyed it. Very sweet and cute. I liked ending 3 the best (25 min- guess I'm a slow reader ;_; )

The only thing that I thought was kind of distracting was the fact that you still see a full moon when you go back to see Mary and she isn't there

Maybe she was on the other side of the island?

But seriously, this was my first Ren'Ai game. I found it nestled in the folders of my brother's computer and spent about an hour completing it all the way through and it got me hooked on Ren'Ai. Mary was cute and it was a nice romantic setting jus' how I like's it!

other side of the island? that's a possibility, but not likely. maybe the spirit was laid to rest over the month. I dunno myself, as the only one who has a remote idea is PyTom himself.

[PyTom]

The short answer is, I screwed up by including the full moon in that picture. I forgot to remove it. Perhaps in MW-Special Edition.

In that ending, the whole point was that without knowing when you can see Mary again, you probably won't find her. So the POV character searches and searches... but eventually gives up.

[ShiraiJunichi]

other side of the island? that's a possibility, but not likely. maybe the spirit was laid to rest over the month

Actually, it isn't a possibility. Unless of course, PyTom put the story in some alternate universe where you can see a full moon for two weeks straight ^_^

But it was a very minor problem- it's still a superb game.

But seriously, this was my first Ren'Ai game. I found it nestled in the folders of my brother's computer and spent about an hour completing it all the way through and it got me hooked on Ren'Ai.

So, is your brother a Ren'Ai fan too? Is he a member of the forums?

[Megaman Z]

hey, Kunobi suggested that, not me.

*erects a steel barrier blocking this tangent*


(woo-hoo! 500 posts! Alice-class fan!)

[TheOnlyOneKunobi]

other side of the island? that's a possibility, but not likely. maybe the spirit was laid to rest over the month

Actually, it isn't a possibility. Unless of course, PyTom put the story in some alternate universe where you can see a full moon for two weeks straight ^_^

But it was a very minor problem- it's still a superb game.

But seriously, this was my first Ren'Ai game. I found it nestled in the folders of my brother's computer and spent about an hour completing it all the way through and it got me hooked on Ren'Ai.

So, is your brother a Ren'Ai fan too? Is he a member of the forums?

I'm the only proper Ren'Ai fan, I think he found moonlight on the Mega Tokyo forum. But I'm the only one who's working on a game or a Lemma forum user.

[PyTom]

Note: This post reveals most of the backstory to MW. Don't read it unless you've beaten all endings to the game. (Or at least 3 and 4.)

[quote=MMZ]maybe the spirit was laid to rest over the month.[/quote]

That wouldn't be possible. Mary is only... extant... on the nights of the full moon. So it really wouldn't be possible to lay her to rest on any other night.

I actually did a little bit of research and math for MW. I derived the name Mary Harper from two names found in 1790 census records, from one of the Carolinas. (Don't recall which.)

Although it didn't really come up, I figure that it's set on one of the islands off the cost of North Carolina. This is probably a legacy of when the island was originally supposed to be Roanoke, and the heroine was supposed to be Virgina Dare. The general outline of MW came to me within a day or so of reading Marvel 1602.

Mary's dress was inspired by a period wedding dress, but it was originally from the Ohio area, and perhaps about 30 years later. I would need to find it again to be sure.

Mary died in a plague that hit the island in 1790. She was ten at the time... her dream of being a bride is what kept her here. So far, she has wandered for between 2804 and 2826 nights, or over 7 years her time. She ages 1 day per moon... so she's 17. (I don't know what she does during the hours when it's not night, but she does seem to age then. I guess she sleeps.)

In ending 3, she gets married, fulfilling the condition that's keeping her on earth. So then she vanishes. The whole thing about a common law marriage is BS, but Mary believes it, and that's what matters. In ending 3, the POV character eventually marries one of the librarians.

In ending 4, Mary decides that she wants to be with the POV character more than she wants to stay on earth, and so she steps into the light with him, to face what lies on the other side together.

Ending 4 was what motivated me to make the game. Ending 3 was a fairly late addition to the game, motivated by me asking what would happen in the player wanted to make a different choice.

[mikey]

OMG, excellent! I mean the way the age is calculated... It just shows that every game has so much background... You can't always see it without explanation though. So every time fragments like this are uncovered in between the posts it's a great time to be a ren'ai fan.

BTW, I have gained much popularity with MW by letting my students translate it into Slovak (instead of some ready-made articles about the sightseeings of London ). I found that the language and story were accessible for any age and it proved right. Most of the attributes I received in regard to the story were "nice" and "cute", but meant in a good way.

[PyTom]

OMG, excellent! I mean the way the age is calculated... It just shows that every game has so much background... You can't always see it without explanation though. So every time fragments like this are uncovered in between the posts it's a great time to be a ren'ai fan.

Hm... I think that most of this (with the exception of the Roanoke/Virginia Dare/Marvel 1602 stuff) was actually in the game, but wasn't really laid out for the reader. This was intentional, as I didn't want the backstory to get in the way of the... um... frontstory.

That's something I have to fight against. Being more of an engineer-scientist and less of a creative type, complex backstories appeal to me, even if they get in the way of the actual story.

BTW, I have gained much popularity with MW by letting my students translate it into Slovak (instead of some ready-made articles about the sightseeings of London ). I found that the language and story were accessible for any age and it proved right. Most of the attributes I received in regard to the story were "nice" and "cute", but meant in a good way.

What, in some sort of English class? Bully!

Seriously, though... I'm glad they liked it. If there's a full-fledged Slovak translation floating around, I'd be glad to make a release using it.

[mikey]

Unfortunately, they write on printed out papers, so it will have to be re-written and put into ren'py script, which is almost the same as translating it again. Anyway, I'll keep this option open of course. We even found one typo, but I thought I'd remember it and didn't write it down. *duh* I simply wanted to say it was a good decision to share the script because well, you never know and it can have more uses.

[musical74]

I thought it was well done and well thought out. Mary is very realistic, and the fact that she enjoys talking to the player helps a lot. I thought ending three was QUITE funny Keep up the good work, PyTom, and hope to see more games

[denzil]

I just played version 1.1. Didn't noticed any differences in story but its quite long time since I played it. On the other hand the gallery is nice.

[PyTom]

Hm... looks like someone played a game of guess-the-url to find the MW 1.1 release. Well, there's no need for that anymore... let me get on with the release announcement.

I've just officially released Moonlight Walks 1.1. It can be downloaded from:

http://www.bishoujo.us/moonlight/

This is the second release of Moonlight Walks. It improves the quality of the starfield graphics (which looked terrible on my LCD monitor) and fixes some minor problems with the script. It also adds in a new image gallery, which is unlocked as people play through the game. Along with the windows installer and cross-platform zip, this release adds in binary distributions for Mac OS X and Linux x86. Finally, it updates the version of Ren'Py in MW to 5.3.3, which adds in such features as volume control, text speed control, and auto-forward mode.

That being said, the story of Moonlight Walks wasn't changed at all. There are the same four endings, achieved in the same way. So if you've already played the game, there's little reason to download 1.1 and play it again.

This release takes place exactly one year after the original MW release. In that time, as best as I can tell, Moonlight Walks has been downloaded 3137 times, from countries ranging from Armenia to Vietnam. It's been mentioned on websites ranging from Wikipedia (where it's used to illustrate the Renai game article) to people's personal blogs. I'm guessing that thousands of people have played it... not bad for an story that hit me in the shower one morning, that I couldn't not tell.

[clubanimon]

*waves a lil yay Tom flag*

I'll play throught it, personaly I think its a great way to get a feel from ren'py after having a bit of a hiatus from it. I only gor 3 of the endings it seems, le gasp!

[n9261andvari]

Nice game. I like the story too pretty romantic but kinda sad at some parts. I managed to get all endings and my fav would have to be the ending "Into the Light". I kinda forgot the number though...I was never good with numbers...anyways great job with the game PyTom. I also loved your Renpy Demo with Eileen. (^_^) Hope her dreams come true.