Zelan's Idea Dump

[Zelan]

There's no assets for anything because I'm not an artist or composer and I haven't recruited anyone or written anything- these are all just kind of on the table for now.

Table of Contents:
The Dove's Nest - BxG, Mystery
Seven Wishes - GxB?, Fantasy
Cat Thing - Comedy?, Friendship, BxG???
Airplane Thing - Genres????????
The Art of Making Time - GxG/B/(X?), Fantasy
Questions

[Zelan]

1. The Dove's Nest (Working Title)

This is basically what I have so far. Warning for language.

(What, does nobody else do initial brainstorms like this? With lots of all-caps and profanity?)

[Zelan]

2. Seven Wishes (Working Title)

So this one is cool I guess. You're a chick and you meet a genie. But not like an Aladdin genie, he just looks like a dude. (What I'm imagining right now is a dude who looks like Pit from Kid Icarus but without the wings but who knows.) And in this world genies grant seven wishes because of reasons.

The idea here is that wish-granting is actually pretty complicated. I haven't figured out all of the specifics yet, but there'll be a lot of traveling on different planes in order to grant said wishes. However, for some reason, traveling through this plane has become dangerous and some genies have actually died trying to grant wishes. (I'm thinking that the cause might be overuse/misuse but, again, I don't have all of the specifics down yet.) The MC, for one reason or another, decides to help the genies with their predicament. (This is the part I'm having the most trouble with because how the eff do you fix a metaphysical plane like WHAT)

It'll probably be GxB with the only romanceable character being your genie, but that's not set in stone, it's just the original idea.

If you guys want it, here's another profane initial brainstorm, but it's a lot shorter because this one wasn't as thought out as the first one at the time.

[Zelan]

3. Cat Thing (Needs A Title)

This one is literally my freaking cats. Like the ones I own.

I have no life.

My cats (Rocky, Isabel/Izzy, and Holly) are looking for a specific cat toy (haven't figured out why yet). Izzy's a Brit and Holly's an Aussie because of reasons. (IT DOESN'T MATTER THAT THEY WERE FOUND IN PHILLY OR WHEREVER I'M GIVING THEM ACCENTS BECAUSE EFF YOU.)

I'm planning for this one to be more about character relationships than anything else - the plot will be pretty simple and basically an excuse for the cats to have conversations with one another and bond and all that jazz. It'll be a pretty fluffy, happy story overall. Human interaction will probably be limited or entirely nonexistent.

At the moment, I don't plan for there to be any romance. While none of my cats are actually related (that we know of), they are 1) all spayed/neutered and 2) more like siblings than anything else. If there is any, it'll probably be between Rocky and Holly. The reasoning for this is that we got Rocky and Izzy at the same time, so we really think of the two of them as siblings. Holly we got later, so she's not as closely related. However, Izzy and Holly do NOT get along very well when left alone most of the time - Rocky's almost like a mediator in that respect. In short, the only pairing that really makes sense to me is Rocky and Holly.

izzy can have that Siamese who walks around the neighborhood or something I don't effing know guys

The sort of cute/clever idea that I had for this that might make it unique or cool or whatever is the "voice acting." I was thinking of trying to record my cats' meows and other such sounds and implementing them as one might implement partial voice acting (a happy sound, a sad sound, etc.) However, there are a few MAJOR problems with this:

1) I have no recording equipment besides the built-in microphone on my computer. I've been thinking about buying a Blue Snowball since it's fairly cheap and pretty good quality, but mind you that I said FAIRLY so I would have to save up for a bit.

2) They're CATS. It's not like I'll be able to sit down with a microphone and be like, "Okay, Rocky, let me hear your best happy meow!" There are some things that I can do to get them to make certain sounds (for instance, Izzy starts meowing it up once you pull the milk out), but other sounds could be problematic.

3) Speaking of problematic sounds, if I want growls or hisses, I would have to deliberately antagonize them. This problem has its own subset of problems:
-That would border on animal abuse - certainly not as bad as physical harm or neglecting food, but I'd still rather not do that if I can avoid it
-Even if that didn't bother me, there would be a definite risk of me or anyone helping me being scratched or bitten

4) Rocky and Holly both purr really weirdly and quietly. If I tried to record them purring, it probably wouldn't work too well.

5) Holly, as a matter of fact, doesn't make much noise, like, AT ALL. If I did go through with this, she would definitely be the hardest to record.

All of those problems could probably be remedied if I looked long enough for stock cat sounds, but that would defeat the purpose of having the story be about my cats.

The last little thing that I wanted to mention is that it would be cool if there was a clickable map of the house for when the cats are deciding where to go (think the one in Cute Demon Crashers!) as oppose to just a list of choices, but since I've never programmed anything in Ren'Py I'd probably need lots of time and/or help to get that figured out, not to mention more art/another artist.

[Zelan]

4. Airplane Thing (Needs A Title)

I actually think this one is pretty cool. You would play as a teenager (I'm thinking a girl - that's not certain, but I'll use female pronouns for now) who's about to take a trip somewhere on one of those small older biplanes. She and the pilot would be the only ones on the plane. The plane crashes somewhere fairly removed from civilization, and the main character finds herself in a strange world where she is face-to-face with the one and only Amelia Earheart. Amelia explains that her being here means that she must have died in a plane crash and her body hasn't been found - yet.

The idea here is built off of the belief (which I think is shared among several religions?) that the dead body must be laid to rest in some way before the spirits/souls can move on. This particular place, Amelia has come to understand, is where souls come when they've died specifically from a plane crash. As many of you probably know, Amelia Earheart's plane has never been found, which is why she's still here. However, she has seen many people come and go as their bodies are found, which is how she keeps up with the goings-on in the modern world.

I am planning for there to be other characters as well, but I'm going to have to (at some point) look up people who have gone down in airplanes and never been found. I will also probably include mentions of people whose bodies were found, but they wouldn't be characters with sprites or dialogue.

My idea was that the choices that the player makes before taking the plane trip affect if/how quickly her body is found. I haven't quite figured out the logistics of this yet, though, but my thoughts are that it would have something to do with communication. This idea would need a lot more thinking about the plot before the plane ride for it to work. My basic idea was a falling-out with a friend right before the trip and then choices having to do with whether the MC makes up with her friend before leaving, but beyond that I got nothing.

My mom (don't laugh at me please) had a different idea: you play from two perspectives - the aforementioned main character and the head of the search party looking for the plane. Instead of the choices that you make as the main character affecting the body being found, the choices that you make as the leader of the search party would decide her fate. While I was impressed by this idea and think that it's pretty creative, there are a couple issues here:
1) Writing two perspectives. This isn't a HUGE concern as I think I could pull it off, but I would probably be most concerned about the cuts between perspectives being awkward.
2) Choices being arbitrary. Seeing as the player would be making choices as the leader of a search party, most of them would probably be something like "left or right," which is sort of like luck-of-the-draw. I was thinking that the best thing to do to alleviate this would be to give hints about location before the main character dies (e.g. she's looking at the plane's navigational instruments or talking to the pilot), but if a player wasn't expecting to have to remember that information it could make the game frustrating.
While this idea would leave me more brain room to focus on the plot after the MC dies, it would require a different way of writing that I'm not entirely sure is what I wanted to do with this concept, although I think it definitely has potential.

[Zelan]

5. The Art of Making Time

This last one is definitely the least thought-out since it's the newest, but since it has a smaller scope, simpler plot, and more lighthearted tone than all of the others it would probably actually be the best one to tackle for a first game.

You play as a girl (I really like my female protags, don't I? Makes sense, I guess) in a fantasy setting. She's a witch or magician or something like that who is frustrated with the lack of time that she has - both every day to get her daily tasks done and in life in general. However, she's heard rumors of the fabled recipe for making time. This recipe, however, is supposed to be very well hidden and difficult to obtain. The main character recruits three of her friends to assist her on her journey for MORE TIME, DAMMIT!

All three of the characters who go with her on the quest would be romanceable. I'm thinking that at least one would be female and one would be male, but as for the last one I'm not sure if I would make the character a binary or non-binary gender. The issue here is that I've never written an agender character before, not even as a minor character, so it would be hard enough to write even a non-romanceable major character who was agender. I don't even personally know anyone agender, so I would definitely need help with said character. I don't just want to be lazy and give all of the characters binary genders (that only puts off the practice that I would need), but if I want this to be my first game it might be more realistic to do that.

The other (much smaller) issue with an agender character is the pronouns. (Please don't freak out here and jump to conclusions about me - read the whole paragraph first. I don't want any misunderstandings or arguments.) When it comes to they/them/their pronouns, I don't like them, specifically because they, them and their are PLURAL pronouns, not singular pronouns. I'm not rude enough to lecture people who prefer they pronouns about this - I'm sure they get enough people who refuse to acknowledge them as agender altogether - but every time I have to use "they" to refer to a single person my inner Grammar Nazi cringes a little. Of course, it's the English language's fault for not having them in the first place, but it does create a dilemma. The fix here seems to be simple - use other agender pronouns, since some have now been invented. (I'm partial to ey/em/eir myself; they are pronounced like they/them/their but without the 'th's.) However, I don't know how common other sets of agender pronouns are and whether using them would confuse readers.

Moving on from that whole thing, I've got a somewhat defined beginning and ending but absolutely no plot in between and no character development whatsoever. Those things are both pretty important and I kind of need them if I'm going to make this VN.

I'm also not entirely sure if I want the cast all human. Since it's a fantasy setting, there's room for some other races and lore development, but I'm not sure if I want to really get into that in what's meant to be a smaller project.

[Zelan]

GOOD JOB YOU FINISHED READING ALL OF THE DESCRIPTIONS!
now if you could answer a few questions that would be pretty cool

General Questions:
1. Which one is your favorite?
2. Which one is your least favorite?
3. Do any of these ideas remind you of something else you've played?
4. Is this way too effing long?
5. Should I break these into separate threads in the Ideas forum? (I didn't realize before typing it up that it would be so long >.> I guess I've been thinking about these more than I thought I had.)

The Dove's Nest Questions:
1. Which girl is your favorite?
2. What do you expect to see in a murder mystery?
3. Any other questions or comments? (I know this one's pretty vague; there are actually a lot of other things I've thought about for this one that didn't really make it into that initial brainstorm, so there's probably a lot I can answer for you.)

Seven Wishes Questions:
1. What do you think about the concept of the genies moving through another plane to grant wishes?
2. Any ideas on why the planes have become unsafe?
3. What would you like to see in the supporting cast of characters? All genies, all humans, an even mix, an uneven mix?
4. Should there be more romance options besides the main character's genie?
5. Main character name ideas?
6. Any other questions or comments?

Cat Thing Questions:
1. Title ideas?
2. What are your thoughts on my sound dilemma? (i.e. should I cut out "voice acting" entirely, use stock sounds, persevere through the difficulties of recording, etc.)
3. Any other questions or comments?

Airplane Thing Questions:
1. Title ideas?
2. Main character name ideas?
3. What's your stance on the idea of one vs. two perspectives and whether/how the second perspective should be incorporated?
4. Are there any famous people who have died in a plane crash that you would like to be included?
5. Any other questions or comments?

The Art of Making Time Questions:
1. About my agender dilemmas - what are your thoughts?
2. Genders aside, what sort of characters would you like to see here? (Like I said, I really have no ideas about personalities yet, and I'm not sure about races, either.)
3. Any other questions or comments?

[gekiganwing]

The Dove's Nest Questions:
1. Which girl is your favorite?
2. What do you expect to see in a murder mystery?
3. Any other questions or comments?

1. Natasha is age 38. In my opinion, there aren't many male x female visual novels which have a woman over thirty as a relevant character *and* a focus on plot.

2. A murder mystery story needs a crime which could have been committed by several people. When the truth is revealed, the reader should think that it's plausible.

3. How much of the story involves a brothel?

The Art of Making Time Questions:
1. About my agender dilemmas - what are your thoughts?
2. Genders aside, what sort of characters would you like to see here? (Like I said, I really have no ideas about personalities yet, and I'm not sure about races, either.)
3. Any other questions or comments?

1. In a fantasy world, you can include characters such as shapeshifters and gender benders. There might be magic which can alter a person's body.

2. I think that major characters should include people that your protagonist knows at the beginning of the story, and also people that she meets along the way. If there is a non-human group which exists in your fictional world, make sure that the reader sees at least one of them.

3. In a fantasy world, you can have magic which stops, reverses, or otherwise alters time. It might be a well-kept secret. It might have a major drawback.

Alternately, time alternation magic could be a myth. Your characters might travel for days, find a sage hidden in a hidden mansion, ask how to make more time... and get the answer "Seize the day." How will they react?

[Zelan]

1. Natasha is age 38. In my opinion, there aren't many male x female visual novels which have a woman over thirty as a relevant character *and* a focus on plot.

I'm glad you like what little I have of her. ^_^ I think she and Dawn are probably my two favorites.

2. A murder mystery story needs a crime which could have been committed by several people. When the truth is revealed, the reader should think that it's plausible.

Yeah, that's definitely important and I'm going to need to come up with more characters for this one. While all of the girls are going to be suspects initially (as with any crime), I'm going to try to make it so that they can be cleared pretty early on. There is one other character that I have who will be a suspect for longer, but he also ends up being innocent.

This one is probably the largest project so despite begin the first in this list it'll probably be one of the last ones that I actually start working on.

3. How much of the story involves a brothel?

Pretty much all of it.

I realize now that I didn't make this clear at all, but the story takes place in a future where prostitution has been made legal in the U.S. (under a lot of regulations by the government). In fact, brothels have become fairly common. It's even expanded to the point where there are brothels which employ many different genders, although the owner of The Dove's Nest has chosen to run a "traditional" brothel. The five love interests all work there as prostitutes.

The main character was raised in a family with negative beliefs about prostitutes. While he doesn't outright hate them like some members of his family (who may or may not actually show up in the VN), he believes that they've made the wrong life choices and this sometimes becomes painfully apparent when he talks with them. Throughout the story he revises his opinion somewhat.

Despite the setting, I'm not planning for there to be any sexual content at the moment. Due to subject matter, though, it'll probably still be at least 16+.

1. In a fantasy world, you can include characters such as shapeshifters and gender benders. There might be magic which can alter a person's body.

That's a good point! The setting does make the concept of being agender a lot more flexible for me to write.

2. I think that major characters should include people that your protagonist knows at the beginning of the story, and also people that she meets along the way. If there is a non-human group which exists in your fictional world, make sure that the reader sees at least one of them.

Noted, I'll keep this in mind when I start outlining and fleshing out characters.

3. In a fantasy world, you can have magic which stops, reverses, or otherwise alters time. It might be a well-kept secret. It might have a major drawback.

Alternately, time alternation magic could be a myth. Your characters might travel for days, find a sage hidden in a hidden mansion, ask how to make more time... and get the answer "Seize the day." How will they react?

[robovelociraptor]

I answered almost all of them. I won't be offended if you don't respond to all of them.

GENERAL:

1. Which one is your favorite?

I'm stuck between "The Art of Making Time" and "The Dove's Nest."

2. Which one is your least favorite?

Maybe Cat Thing, but not because I actually dislike it, it's just that I like the other ideas more.

3. Do any of these ideas remind you of something else you've played?

No. Granted, I haven't played a lot of VNs.

4. Is this way too effing long?

I suppose it does look a bit overwhelming, but you have a table of contents, and this is a VN forum, anyway.

5. Should I break these into separate threads in the Ideas forum?

It's fine. You could try putting the genres next to the names in the table of contents so people can just read about ones that they're more likely to be interested in.



THE DOVE'S NEST:

1. Which girl is your favorite?

Natasha, probably. I like motherly characters a lot I guess. haha

2. What do you expect to see in a murder mystery?

In a good one, I expect to see a complex case, with, as gekiganwing said, many possible suspects. Similar to cases from Phoenix Wright, the mystery should unravel at a reasonable pace and the perpetrator should be proven through the evidence they've left behind and through witnesses'/conspirators'/people that knew them's words.

3. Any other questions or comments?

You listed talents at the bottom, do you plan to implement (if you end up making the game) stat raising into the game as a way to progress through the story?



SEVEN WISHES:

1. What do you think about the concept of the genies moving through another plane to grant wishes?

I think that this is an interesting idea! I'm curious to see how this will develop.

2. Any ideas on why the planes have become unsafe?

Maybe something to do with paradoxes or evil genies?

3. What would you like to see in the supporting cast of characters? All genies, all humans, an even mix, an uneven mix?

I'm thinking there should be more humans, but maybe a few genies.

4. Should there be more romance options besides the main character's genie?

Maybe an evil Jinn/Genie? Other than that I think having one romance option is fine.

5. Main character name ideas?

Malia, Zera, Kayra? (IDK, my taste in names is different strange.)

6. Any other questions or comments?

What is the setting for this? The Middle East? If so, it would be interesting to read about different customs, cultures, and maybe even politics there. (I'm thinking that it could be like the Modern Middle East, but with variations that would fit with there being genies and whatnot. Also, perhaps not as violent. haha)



CAT THING:

2. What are your thoughts on my sound dilemma?

You should probably just use stock, cats don't all sound the same, but I think they sound pretty similar. I would just be careful not to overdo the sounds. Hearing "meow" every line could get annoying real fast.



AIRPLANE THING:

3. What's your stance on the idea of one vs. two perspectives and whether/how the second perspective should be incorporated?

I think this is a good idea. Switching perspectives can work well in a VN, I recently started reading a demo in the beta testing section that switched perspectives at the end of each chapter, basically you replayed at least part of the chapter as the other character. This wouldn't be the exact same for this game, but the second POV could just be set during the same time. (First chapter/act could only be one POV since it's likely the search team doesn't know yet.)

4. Any other questions or comments?

You have two #4's for this set of questions.



THE ART OF MAKING TIME:

2. Genders aside, what sort of characters would you like to see here?

I like it when their are a lot of races in a fantasy world, so maybe things like elves, orcs, or maybe you could create your own fictional race(s)?

[Zelan]

I answered almost all of them. I won't be offended if you don't respond to all of them.

GENERAL:

1. Which one is your favorite?

I'm stuck between "The Art of Making Time" and "The Dove's Nest."

Dove's Nest is my favorite too! ^_^

2. Which one is your least favorite?

Maybe Cat Thing, but not because I actually dislike it, it's just that I like the other ideas more.

I can understand that, since that one is kind of personal. c:

5. Should I break these into separate threads in the Ideas forum?

It's fine. You could try putting the genres next to the names in the table of contents so people can just read about ones that they're more likely to be interested in.

Oh, that's a really good idea! I think I'll do that.



THE DOVE'S NEST:

1. Which girl is your favorite?

Natasha, probably. I like motherly characters a lot I guess. haha

Another Natasha fan! ^_^ I do too.

2. What do you expect to see in a murder mystery?

In a good one, I expect to see a complex case, with, as gekiganwing said, many possible suspects. Similar to cases from Phoenix Wright, the mystery should unravel at a reasonable pace and the perpetrator should be proven through the evidence they've left behind and through witnesses'/conspirators'/people that knew them's words.

Ahhhh, I really need to play Phoenix Wright! Thanks for the advice, though. ^_^

3. Any other questions or comments?

You listed talents at the bottom, do you plan to implement (if you end up making the game) stat raising into the game as a way to progress through the story?

No, the talents are notes for myself that have to do with the personalities of the girls. If I do end up adding any gameplay elements (which I probably won't), it would probably be something like point-and-click that would tie in well with the mystery genre.

SEVEN WISHES:

1. What do you think about the concept of the genies moving through another plane to grant wishes?

I think that this is an interesting idea! I'm curious to see how this will develop.

Thank you! ^_^

2. Any ideas on why the planes have become unsafe?

Maybe something to do with paradoxes or evil genies?

Hmm, I'm not sure paradoxes would work since I don't plan on there bring any time travel elements. Evil genies is something that I didn't think of before, though! I'll definitely consider that idea, it has a lot of potential.

4. Should there be more romance options besides the main character's genie?

Maybe an evil Jinn/Genie? Other than that I think having one romance option is fine.

I like giving choices to the players, but I've also always thought of this story as only having one romance option, so that's where I'm not sure how to compromise. Can't please 'em all, I suppose. *shrugs* An evil love interest would make things more interesting, though.

5. Main character name ideas?

Malia, Zera, Kayra? (IDK, my taste in names is different strange.)

I like those! I'll keep them in mind. c:

6. Any other questions or comments?

What is the setting for this? The Middle East? If so, it would be interesting to read about different customs, cultures, and maybe even politics there. (I'm thinking that it could be like the Modern Middle East, but with variations that would fit with there being genies and whatnot. Also, perhaps not as violent. haha)

As cool as modern and urban fantasy are, I haven't read or written much of either genre, so I've always leaned towards completely made-up settings. This one could be a long time in coming, though, so maybe by that time I'll have enough confidence in my skills to set it in a place like you've described. ^_^



CAT THING:

2. What are your thoughts on my sound dilemma?

You should probably just use stock, cats don't all sound the same, but I think they sound pretty similar. I would just be careful not to overdo the sounds. Hearing "meow" every line could get annoying real fast.

Annoyance is a good point. I actually tend to dislike partial voice acting; I'd either like to read for myself or else have all of it read for me, and it's usually a little jarring when the voice acting says something different from the writing. I figured it would me a little different since animal sounds function more like sound effects than voice acting (hence the quotation marks), but you definitely bring up a good point.


AIRPLANE THING:

3. What's your stance on the idea of one vs. two perspectives and whether/how the second perspective should be incorporated?

I think this is a good idea. Switching perspectives can work well in a VN, I recently started reading a demo in the beta testing section that switched perspectives at the end of each chapter, basically you replayed at least part of the chapter as the other character. This wouldn't be the exact same for this game, but the second POV could just be set during the same time. (First chapter/act could only be one POV since it's likely the search team doesn't know yet.)

Thanks for your input! I do love reading the same scene through the eyes of different characters (which is why I'm a huge fan of parallel novels). It probably wouldn't work exactly like that since the search party and the main character would never be in the same scene together, but it could still add something interesting to the VN.

4. Any other questions or comments?

You have two #4's for this set of questions.

shhh i fixed it no one needs to know now



THE ART OF MAKING TIME:

2. Genders aside, what sort of characters would you like to see here?

I like it when their are a lot of races in a fantasy world, so maybe things like elves, orcs, or maybe you could create your own fictional race(s)?

Fictional races is what I'm leaning towards, but it would probably be difficult to do that without some inspiration from pre-existing races. I like seeing that, too, though, it does a lot for the world building. c:

Thank you for taking the time to read and respond! And sorry that this reply is so late. cx