No Other Medicine [Friendship][TyranoBuilder Game Jam]

[parttimestorier]

Download for free, for Windows or Mac, on itch.io.

No Other Medicine is a short visual novel (roughly half an hour) created for the 2017 TyranoBuilder Spring Game Jam, with the theme of "fresh starts". It’s about the potential beginning of a new friendship between Jess, a lonely and awkward PhD student, and Sybil, a snarky and sarcastic former student of the same university. It’s mostly linear with a few dialogue choices, and contains a small amount of strong language and references to violence. I hope you enjoy it!

This is the first VN I’ve ever created! I enlisted the help of Mikomi Kisomi for the sprite and CG art, and otherwise I just did my best to find fitting creative commons resources. One of my biggest challenges, which I could probably use some constructive criticism on, was the pacing. I tried to focus on dialogue instead of too much description, which I thought would work well for this kind of short, character-focused VN. However, that might have ended up making it seem rushed (which might also be partially because I was trying to condense the story into a manageable length for my first game jam). So if you give it a try, let me know what you think!

I promise not to take criticism as badly as my characters do.

[Zelan]

I really enjoyed this VN! The characters were likable, and I felt like I was able to get a good sense of their personalities even with such a limited scope in terms of the game's length. I also felt like I was able to connect with the characters on a more personal level because I plan on going into English as well (although I don't know if I'll be going as far as a master's degree).

Sybil Fitch the Scissor Bitch has a nice ring to it. How did you come up with that?

I sort of wish that I had read Measure for Measure before reading this VN, though. It's nice to have that context, even though I didn't actually have to know anything about the play itself to enjoy this. I'm curious - did you study the play yourself, and get the idea from it, or was it just a line that you knew and figured would apply?

[parttimestorier]

Thanks for reading, Zelan! I'm glad you enjoyed it. If you do think about going to graduate school, don't be too scared off by how I portrayed it in this VN - there are plenty of good things about it too, especially if you have nice professors.

I can't actually remember exactly how I came up with that name! I really like the name Sybil and had been wanting to give it to a character for a while, and I guess maybe I noticed that it sounded quite similar to her weapon and then made it rhyme.

There isn't too much about Measure for Measure that's especially relevant to the story - it's just a play I think is really interesting that doesn't tend to get studied as much as some of Shakespeare's other works, and I really liked that quote from it. I was actually a TA for a class that did study it, so I gave Jess that same job.

[Ertal77]

I've just finished playing No Other Medicine and man, how close to home it felt! But that's the idea, right? Putting the characters in a place where some of us will feel identified.

Apart from the topic, I like the characters, because they are realistic and clever, and I must say I really love the way they meet So unexpected! With their first dialogue I thought I would have the same boring, cliché boy-meets-girl, and then booum! Plot twist! Hats off also on how realistic the dialogues feel.

[parttimestorier]

Thanks Ertal! I'm really glad you enjoyed reading it. It's especially nice to hear that the dialogue is realistic, since that's something I worried about a bit. They both kind of have monologues near the end and I'm not sure if they really sounded like real people anymore, but I am happier with the rest of it.

[parttimestorier]

Update: I'm very happy to announce that I was chosen as one of the bronze finalists in the TyranoBuilder Spring Game Jam! The rest of the winners are listed here if you want to check them out as well. Now that the judging is over, I've made a small update that fixes a typo I took a long time to notice, and replaces one BGM track that didn't quite fit the mood with another that I hope works a bit better. Thanks to everyone who's read my little VN so far, and I hope any new people enjoy it!

[Ertal77]

Congratulations!