The Stellar Cause [ gxb ] [ dark fantasy romance ] [ otome ]

[Emilily]

[ s t o r y ]

Legends and myths spoke of two Zodiacs
with completely different origins.

Annabella is a normal human girl who is superstitious of the existence of many mythical beings. Mostly so, the descendants of the two Zodiacs. A legend-believer, she strives to find the possessors of the descendants of the Zodiac… sooner rather than later, of course.

Nelina is the descendent of the Jade Emperor. As such, she has one goal, and she’ll do anything and everything to achieve it: defeat the evil forces of the Cat and Ophiuchus to prevent potential chaos and war that may shake the world to its roots.

Ceroli is the girl chosen by the stars, given the ability to read one’s emotions. The spirits of the stars shall guide her through, but the rest is up to her. She and Nelina share the same goal, but work separately, not knowing of one another’s existence.

But, as many wise humans say…  
“Legends can only speak so much.”

[ a b o u t / p r e m i s e ]

Structured like that of Norn9, The Stellar Cause is a rather dark and highly fantasy otome game where there will be 3 protagonists with different personalities, and each protagonist can pursue four bachelors (making a total of 12 pursuable characters), who happen to be descendants of the Zodiac. The game will consist of a mix between the 12 signs of the Zodiac (Leo, Scorpio, Aries, etc.) and the Chinese Zodiac (Dog, Horse, Rabbit, etc.).

If the story is confusing, then here is a more in-depth explanation: originally, legends and myths told humans separate stories of each type of Zodiac. In other words, they remained separated and followed their own path and destiny. But then, Ophiuchus and the Cat banded together against the Zodiacs, forcing them together and breaking the legends / myths. Because of this, a severe war would break out if they strayed too far from the path they were fated to follow.

I came up with this story a few months back because as much as I like the stories about the Zodiac and Chinese Zodiac out there, I wanted to combine them together. I happen to be quite passionate about the Zodiacs, if I do say so myself. Since this is such a large project and quite ambitious of me, I might work on a smaller project first, probably about the 7 sins or the cardinal sins if that is how you normally refer them. Of course, it's going to be dark and fantasy to an extent as well.

[ c h a r a c t e r s ]
These characters are not official, and are always subject to change

main protagonists

1. Anabella, superstitious and passionate.
2. Nelina, ambitious and tenacious.
3. Ceroli, selfless and sincere.

pursuable ~ [ Anabella / Nelina / Ceroli ]

1. Knox, prideful and competitive. (Leo)
2. Aron, snarky and deceptive. (Rat)
3. Unya, sharp-tongued and meticulous. (Scorpio)
4. Lucius, flirtatious and seductive. (Virgo)
5. Equis, witty and intelligent. (Snake)
6. Yin, split-personality and mysterious. (Gemini 1)
7. Yang, laid-back and calm. (Gemini 2)
8. Xander, cheerful and lovable. (Dragon)
9. Allen, kind and prudent. (Dog)
10. Vine, charismatic and dark. (Ophiuchus)*
11. Nico, disquiet and sensitive. (Sheep)
12. Devus, closed-book and enigmatic. (Libra)

*His route will be unlocked through certain still-unknown conditions.

side / supporting

1. Ophelia, quiet and apathetic. (Cat)
2. Aliciana, tender and empathetic. (Rabbit)
3. Cleo, forceful and royal. (Tiger)
4. Enri, audacious and strong-willed. (Ox)
5. Kira, curious and bold. (Sagittarius)
6. Momo, generous and hospitable. (Teorus)
7. Ryne, knowledgeable and blunt. (Aquarius)
8. Sara, adventurous and fun. (Aries)
9. Ren, moody and bitter. (Cancer)

notes : The ones bearing the spirit of the Monkey is deceased along with his sisters (both were older than him), the bearer of the Rooster and the Pig. The bearers of Pisces (who, like Yin and Yang, are twins) had a tragic past; they are also deceased in the beginning of the game.

[ f e a t u r e s ]
These features are not official, and are always subject to change.

- Play as three protagonists of your choice to complete all the routes.
- A total of 12 pursuable characters; a mix of the 12 (13) signs of the Zodiac and the Chinese Zodiac.
- If you're bored with one character, a love triangle route will be inserted, so you can switch routes as you go along (much like Ozmafia).
- Around 530 000 words total.
- Around 60+ CGs.
- Free to play, hopefully; may turn commercial.

[ r e c r u i t m e n t ]

Although this game is still in very early stages of development, I would be happy to accept any help you are willing to offer, even if it is just a little bit. There are some small roles that would help me in the long-run if you were willing to take on the role. Right now, all of this is volunteer work, and I can not pay you, especially because this is initially planned to be a free to play game. I will properly credit you for your work, though, both on Lemma and on other social media sites this may be featured on! In the event that this game turns commercial, the only payment agreement I could offer now is giving you the entirety of the game for free.

1. Idea bouncer - Helping me come up with unique ideas for each of the plots and different character backstories. This, though not extremely big, will help me make this game so much better, as I want to be able to make this a game where everybody can enjoy each and every route without having to worry about excessive repetition.
2. Concept artist - This role just involves making colored sketches of all the characters listed above (excluding those from the notes section). These sketches can be brief and fast; they do not have to be meticulously shaded in or anything of the sort. The concepts would look something like this.

If you are interested, feel free to send me a direct message or PM here, or send me an email to lily_flairing@yahoo.com!

[ f e e d b a c k / q u e s t i o n s ]

(1) Does the story and premise sound interesting to you, to a certain extent? Which aspects of it really strike out to you? Which aspects don't?
(2) Which type of character do you tend to "lean towards"? Which character here within this game seems to stand out to you the most? Why?
(3) Do you think it would be a good idea to make the antagonist (Vine) a route? Initially, I decided not to, but I would like to know your opinion.
(4) What do you think about having multiple main protagonists (such as how it is done in Norn9)? Do you think it's a good idea or not, taking into the amount of pursuable characters there are?
(5) Do you think that Anabella pursuing Aron, Unya, Equis, and Allen; Nelina pursuing Knox, Lucius, Yang, and Xander; and Ceroli pursuing Yin, Vine, Nico, and Devus are good matches? If not, do you have any suggestions of changes to make?
(6) Do you have any questions or comments about the idea?
(7) Do you have any advice for a first-time visual novel project leader/manager?

[Zelan]

(1) Does the story and premise sound interesting to you, to a certain extent? Which aspects of it really strike out to you? Which aspects don't?
I like the idea of having 3 main protagonists that I switch between. That's something that I don't see often but that I really like.
I guess the only thing that I'm not a huge fan of is the mixing of the two different zodiacs, since I feel it could get confusing, but it doesn't seem like you're going to change that now.
(2) Which type of character do you tend to "lean towards"? Which character here within this game seems to stand out to you the most? Why?
I lean towards any character who is interesting and well-developed. If you mean romanceable characters, I'll admit that I have a bit of a soft spot for tsunderes, but I don't like it when they're overdone. Right now, everyone's description is so short that none of them really stand out to me.
(3) Do you think it would be a good idea to make the antagonist (Vine) a route? Initially, I decided not to, but I would like to know your opinion.
It depends on whether you could make it work, and how it was written. For example, some antagonists are only antagonists because their perspective is different from the perspective of the main characters (e.g. both sides are trying to solve the same problem but in radically different ways). In situations like these, the line can sometimes be blurred in terms of who is 'good' and who is 'evil.' This could open up the possibility of two different endings where Vine or Ceroli convinces the other to change sides.
If the divide between good and evil is more clear-cut in your story, a romance route would be harder to pull off, but still doable depending on Vine's character.
There IS also the possibility of making it a romance route that only has bad endings, but some people don't like this and it would also b unfair if only one protagonist had this.
(4) What do you think about having multiple main protagonists (such as how it is done in Norn9)? Do you think it's a good idea or not, taking into the amount of pursuable characters there are?
I've seen other projects with a lot of pursuable characters, but none which have divided them like yours. I think that actually makes a lot of sense. Having each relationship always have the same protagonist would get repetitive eventually, I think.
(5) Do you think that Anabella pursuing Aron, Unya, Equis, and Allen; Nelina pursuing Knox, Lucius, Yang, and Xander; and Ceroli pursuing Yin, Vine, Nico, and Devus are good matches? If not, do you have any suggestions of changes to make?
Again, there really isn't enough information for me to make any sort of judgement call on that. I guess my piece of advice when making the pairings would be to make sure that no two routes are too similar.
(6) Do you have any questions or comments about the idea?
Not at the moment.
(7) Do you have any advice for a first-time visual novel project leader/manager?
You probably won't want to her this, but this project is HUGE. Something that most people on here will tell you is to try and finish a smaller project first so that you can gain some experience in what goes into making a visual novel. So many ambitious and amazing projects are dropped because the creators go in over their heads. And I would hate to see that because I actually like your idea a lot, despite some of my criticisms.

[gekiganwing]

Which type of character do you tend to "lean towards"?

It's fine to describe your characters with just a few words. I think readers will benefit by getting an easy-to-understand impression of who they are, and what they want.

When you have time, talk in detail about your characters. Provide information about their goals, conflicts, and so on. What do they think about other characters? Who are they when nobody's watching? What makes them relatable people?

What do you think about having multiple main protagonists (such as how it is done in Norn9)?

One of the reasons why I bought Norn9 was because of its premise: multiple protagonists with love interests who do not intersect. I figured this would keep the story's romance polygons relatively small. I like the notion of a story in which the protagonist has few potential love interests.

Do you think it would be a good idea to make the antagonist (Vine) a route? Initially, I decided not to, but I would like to know your opinion.

Think about what you want to accomplish with a protagonist - antagonist relationship. Does she try to redeem Vine? (If so, is there a chance that she will not succeed?) Does the route represent the protagonist being tempted by evil? (If so, will she choose to join his side?)

You probably won't want to hear this, but this project is HUGE. Something that most people on here will tell you is to try and finish a smaller project first so that you can gain some experience in what goes into making a visual novel. So many ambitious and amazing projects are dropped because the creators go in over their heads. And I would hate to see that because I actually like your idea a lot, despite some of my criticisms.

If you browse through the Ideas and Works in Progress subforums, you'll find an awful lot of projects that never got past the planning stages. Most of them were quietly abandoned -- there are only a few which were canceled due to cease-and-desist notifications or conflicts between team members.

I think you will benefit by reading the Why So Many Unfinished Visual Novels discussion thread. Then think about it. Ask yourself questions such as "Do I care about this story enough that I will overcome perfectionism / procrastination, and finish it?" or perhaps "Is this the right time for me to create a story with this large a scope?"

[Emilily]

@Zelan :
(1) In the common route, the two Zodiacs will be explained and how they mingled, their origin, etc. Hopefully by then, you will not be so confused. I promise that it won't end up as confusing as it originally looks. I'm relieved to hear that you like the idea of having three different protagonists to play as. I find one character pursuing twelve is a bit much, as I learned from Brothers Conflict and Diabolik Lovers.

(2) At the moment, none of the character backstories are developed, so that may be the primary reason why the descriptions are so short. I'll keep your words in mind though, and I'll also try and make the characters not too overdone but not too bland as well. I want to be able to find the "sweet spot".

(3) You bring up a good point there. I'll make sure to try my best. If it proves too much of a challenge or even impossible though, I guess I will drop him and make either Ren or Ryne romanceable with Ceroli instead. However, if I can come up with something like you mentioned, I'll just keep him as an unlockable extra route to play.

(4) Referring back to (1), I can understand how you feel there. Brothers Conflict was on the verge, and Diabolik Lovers was sort of repetitive and thus boring. My goal is to bring unique storylines, so that everybody can enjoy it, as I have mentioned in the first post.

(5) I see what you're saying there. I'll see what I can do.

(6) Alright; please let me know if questions or comments happen to come up though.

(7) If you read the premise, then I said I was going to try to finish a shorter project: one about the 7 deadly sins, or if you so prefer to call it: the cardinal sins. That way, instead of 12 pursuable characters, there are 7 (or 8, possibly), and less side characters as well. Plus, instead of 30 000 to 40 000 words per route (for this game), the routes for the cardinal-sins game would most likely have about 10 000 to 20 000 words per route. For this project, I have also received a suggestion of making this into three separate games as well, so that is definitely on my radar. I am pretty passionate about this story, so I plan to go through with it. Though with awareness that it is a huge project, it might have to become commercial.


@gekiganwing :
I have read through the thread you linked, and I'll make sure to think about the questions. Though, as I have mentioned before, I have not developed their backstories, conflicts and whatnot yet. Anyways, thank you for posting though; the questions you provided will help me think, I'm sure of that!

[Zelan]

(7) If you read the premise, then I said I was going to try to finish a shorter project: one about the 7 deadly sins, or if you so prefer to call it: the cardinal sins. That way, instead of 12 pursuable characters, there are 7 (or 8, possibly), and less side characters as well. Plus, instead of 30 000 to 40 000 words per route (for this game), the routes for the cardinal-sins game would most likely have about 10 000 to 20 000 words per route. For this project, I have also received a suggestion of making this into three separate games as well, so that is definitely on my radar. I am pretty passionate about this story, so I plan to go through with it. Though with awareness that it is a huge project, it might have to become commercial.

Ah, sorry about that, I must have missed it. 7 is still quite a few, but with such short routes it'll at least be more manageable for a first project. c: Good luck!