Lemma Soft Forums

Many thanks to Auro_Cyanide for the beautiful logo!

Demo finally released!



Windows: http://www.megaupload.com/?d=QAJSOLIO

Mac: http://www.megaupload.com/?d=QON0DTQ4

Linux: http://www.megaupload.com/?d=OXI3K15J

The demo is just over 37,000 words in length, with three full demo endings, and one bad end. It should take somewhere around one and a half to two hours to complete one playthrough. Quite a bit of the game changes depending on your choices, so I encourage you to play through it again if you like it.

A few notes on the current demo:

1. The default menu doesn't fit in the screen properly, and the return button gets covered up because of this. You can still exit it with the escape key, however. The only time it leaves you stuck is if you accidentally go into the loading screen from the title when you don't mean to. This should be fixed in the final version, once I have a custom menu.
2. I tried to include as many art assets as possible, but a couple things are still missing, such as a few sprite poses. It shouldn't really take away from the game.
3. Everything in this is colored with a mouse. I'm so, so sorry.
4. The age rating for the demo is probably somewhere around 15+, due to some strong language, and a bit of violence.

Finally: Critique, critique, critique! I want you all to tear this thing apart. Tell me everything I should improve. I want the full version to be as likable as possible.

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The World is Made of Paper is a modern fantasy, psychological whosawhatsit that also happens to be a visual novel. It's an idea that I've wanted to get down for ages, and I think ren'py may be the key to making it actually happen.

Hurrah!

I don't really want to bore you too much with introductory ramblings, so I'm just going to get straight to the stuff people actually care about.



Being a bored college dropout with nothing better to do, Dion Nagi had read a lot of books in the past few years. Far, far too many of them.

Contrary to popular belief, this is not a healthy practice. At least not for a young man already prone to over analyzing things.

After a certain point, the lines between reality and fiction started to blur, and it became increasingly easy to interpret even the events of his own life as if they were written in a book. Everything from the people he knew, to the problems he suffered from, started to seem like nothing more than plot devices intent on bringing him to a meaningful conclusion.

Dion didn't really mind this, however. To him, that part was really nothing more than a new way of looking at the world. No, what really made him snap was, in fact, the most simple of book related thoughts.

"What is the genre of my life?"

It didn't take long for him to realize the answer: he was living in an underdog story. He was the kid left at the bottom rung with nowhere to go but up. It would be sappy, heartwarming, and incredibly cheesy.

He hated that kind of story.

So he did the only thing he could think to do. He left his home, his town, his job, his belongings, and just about everything even closely related to his life as it was. He did everything it took to throw away the novel he had already started.

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Stuck in an unknown town without gas, a place to stay, or any immediate goal to speak of, Dion found himself starting a new story. A story that he realized began with him being a complete and total idiot.

Hit with a car on the way to find a gas station, his story continued. A story that seemed to want nothing more than to kill him at every given moment.

A story that, upon him waking up in the hospital with a head injury, started to get a bit weird.

Over time, Dion's reality started to fall apart around him, and the more he attempted to take control his life, the stranger it seemed to get.

In his attempt to simply start a new life, he found himself looking at much, much more.

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When given the opportunity to change the world at it's very core, would he be willing to take it?

How would he do it?

What would he turn it into?

And what will he do when he realizes he's not the only one who can?


(Character profiles and screenshots in the following posts)

(More coming with new updates)

As of last lint:

The game contains 3,685 screens of dialogue.
These screens contain a total of 56,617 words,
for an average of 15.4 words per screen.
The game contains 45 menus.



11/16/10 - Added Remiel's character profile
11/26/10 - Changed text box and added The Muse's profile
1/05/11 - Prettied up the topic a bit.
3/12/11 - Demo added
9/06/11 - Alternate outfit examples posted here: http://lemmasoft.renai.us/forums/viewto ... 0&start=30
9/17/11 - 50,000 words passed, new screenshot posted.
11/30/11 - New character art: http://lemmasoft.renai.us/forums/viewto ... 88#p170088

lolfourposts

I didn't want to put this in the main posts, because it's just a small personal concern: I still admittedly don't like the way the screenshot with the characters in it looks. I'm assuming it's because the edges are too rough on the sprites, but I can't, for the life of me, get them to look any less like that without changing the drawing style of them completely. >_< Does anyone have any suggestions?

Of course, it could also very well just be me staring at it for too long when testing.

What do you use to ink your sprites? I think by hardening your lines will solve the problem of having rough spots.
It looks quite good though, honestly.

\Nish/ wrote:What do you use to ink your sprites?

I don't. I scan my sketches and darken them in Photoshop. I realize this is probably a bad idea, but I'm absolutely terrible at inking. >_<

Also, I kind of like the sketchy effect it gives. I have considered outlining them in photoshop instead of with inks, but I only have a mouse. I'm capable of coloring with it, but making clean outlines is pretty tough. I guess I could give it a shot, though.

But thank you! I'm glad it at least looks good in general. ^^;

I have few words for how much I love the premise of a main character who sees the world as a novel. The characters seem awesome, too. I'm really excited for this--go go go!

As for your sketchy outlines... you could try tracing around the edges using a darkening brush, if Photoshop has one. Or using a layer mask, maybe...? That way you don't need to worry about actually changing the lines when you trace since you can't be that precise with a mouse, but you can still go around the edges by hand to a degree.

Also, so much truth in the statement that reading too much can be bad for you. I have a character who's suffering from those effects too...

Kura wrote:I have few words for how much I love the premise of a main character who sees the world as a novel. The characters seem awesome, too. I'm really excited for this--go go go!

As for your sketchy outlines... you could try tracing around the edges using a darkening brush, if Photoshop has one. Or using a layer mask, maybe...? That way you don't need to worry about actually changing the lines when you trace since you can't be that precise with a mouse, but you can still go around the edges by hand to a degree.

Also, so much truth in the statement that reading too much can be bad for you. I have a character who's suffering from those effects too...

Yay! Thank you! I'm really glad you like the idea. I'm trying to get the demo done as soon as possible. Unfortunately, backgrounds slow me down a lot.

For fixing the outlines, that's actually an interesting idea. I'm going to have to try that.

And really? I'm kind of intrigued.

I see, the sketch-effect does make the characters having a unique feeling to them.
Or, you could just harden the outline of the character, instead of hardening everything. Don't know how that will effect the style though, you should probably keep the way it is if you think the current style fits better to the story and mood you're setting.

But thank you! I'm glad it at least looks good in general. ^^;

Not a problem. I think I'll be following this, the story sounds interesting.

Alright, seeing as I only have one more major scene to write for the demo, this is probably a good time for me to start recruiting proofreaders. The version that I'll send to you will probably wind up being somewhere around 35,000 words, which is rather long for a demo, but I can try to pay you all back with... um... the power of love? Hopefully that's good enough. You'll also get credit, of course, but that part's kind of a given.

Updated with a new character!

I'm already in love with the plot. Keep up the great work!!

Ah, the premise is really cool~! And from me, who rarely place non-romance stuff, I think that kinda means something ^^
And you named your character Remiel o: I lovelovelove that name <3

Thank you so much, both of you! I hope I can live up to expectations with the story. @_@

Also, yes, Remiel is an awesome name. I'm glad to see I'm not alone in thinking that.

Unfortunately, I hit another little writers block this week, so completing the script has been taking me a little more time than I expected it to. Until then, though, I've still been getting art assets done, so all around progress is being made. Hurray.

Oh man. I am really loving Remiel's design.