Siren's Ballad [Mystery/Horror] [linear]

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Loreen
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Re: Siren's Ballad [Mystery/Horror] [linear]

#16 Post by Loreen »

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Update 31/03/2017

Hello everyone on yet another Update Friday! :)

This time we make it short - the art department progress got slower since kairek is off on her holiday. However she comes back tomorrow, so with new energy and enthusiasm - she will go back to work!

Even though Dorthy won the poll last week, there was one guy who got the same amount of votes, last of which was unfortunately too late to consider, so we called it his loss.
But, the honorable 2nd place definitely goes to:

Vito!

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Vito, the happy-go-lucky member of the mermaid crew got black and white design, inspired by not so fishy mammal - an orca.
The whole design was to be somehow simple, yet distinct and majestic in a way.
Silver accessories are completed with unique head tiara.

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We all know kairek designs our lovely costumes. However, in the story, Brandon is the one who is responsible for artistic designs. After they were recruited, the bartenders-slash-mermaids were asked for measurements to have their mermaid tails made. These silicone pieces of art were manufactured according to Brandon's designs.
However, some say the head tiara is Vito’s own suggestion, which probably says a lot about his sassy and a bit self-centered character.

For next week, with kairek back, we plan a bigger update both on art and story side, so keep tuned :)
- Waji


Thank you for following our development.
If you have any remarks, comments or advice please don't hesitate to share. Feedback is extremely appreciated.

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Last edited by Loreen on Wed Jul 26, 2017 3:06 pm, edited 3 times in total.

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Re: Siren's Ballad [Mystery/Horror] [linear]

#17 Post by Loreen »

@Zelan
Thank you, the bar background was really challenging (fixed and changed things few times) but also fun to design <3

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Re: Siren's Ballad [Mystery/Horror] [linear]

#18 Post by Abbie »

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Hi everyone! ~<3
We are once again back with some updates on our VN!

The main topic of this week’s work was - THE LEAFLET!

Some of our friends - Razuri, Ulvar and Amaltheren are attending Polymanga 2017 on 13-17 April in Switzerland and they agreed to distribute some Siren’s Ballad leaflets for us!
Thus, kairek designed a lovely flyer for us.

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To be honest, I spend sooo much time trying to think of a nice introductory text for our tumblr and this lemma post, that in the end we only buffed it a bit and edited to fit the leaflet. I couldn’t think of anything more catching than the sentences already made T.T
However you can find some unexpected costume spoilers in the leaflet - Cassie’s and Caren’s mermaid attires :)
We also included some new preview screenshots there.

If by chance you are attending Polymanga, come say hi to our friends in Artist’s Village, Razuri, Ulvar and Amaltheren at Hiraeth publisher booth :)
Not to mention you definitely should check out their awesome art beforehand, on their websites:
http://Razuri-chan.deviantart.com/
http://littleulvar.deviantart.com/
http://amaltheren.deviantart.com/

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kairek is also working hard on last (but not least!) character from our main cast - Mr Brandon Grenville himself! kairek already identifies with him, since I mentioned his artistic view concerning mermaid costumes mirrors her ideas, so I am hoping for a fantastic outcome.
Well, the sketch says it for itself.

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Brandon is an easy-going person, even though he is responsible for the whole bar, and does a good job with that, he never fitted the role of “the evil superior boss one should be afraid of”.
One may say that’s manager’s weakness - treating his subordinates as colleagues. Fortunately the mermaids don’t take advantage of that mostly because of their shared trust and respect for Brandon’s work :)

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We are also working on some basic “timing” for the VN, finding the best places to put the CGs.
As for writing, I recently got a need to readjust and detail my scenes’ continuity to work with the flow of the story. I try not to overthink stuff and not to change everything the day after it is written….. but then again if I think something really doesn’t work the way it should, it must be changed ^^ So yeah, writing is hard :)
Another thing I find hard is, as kairek declared, “understanding some of those people never saw a dictionary in their life”.
Though probably not 100% true (c’mon, the mermaids have graduated high school or something at least!) I get the idea their language can’t be too official and not too stiff.

We’ll see if I understood the concept when editors put their hands on the scenario :)
- waji


Thank you for following our development.
If you have any remarks, comments or advice please don't hesitate to share. Feedback is extremely appreciated.
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Last edited by Abbie on Wed Jul 26, 2017 11:05 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Siren's Ballad [Mystery/Horror] [linear]

#19 Post by Zelan »

I don't know if it's too late to change the flyer, but "horror linear" should be "linear horror" instead. It's an odd grammar rule that I don't really know how to explain. It's not a huge deal if you can't change it but you'll want to know for future reference. c:

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Re: Siren's Ballad [Mystery/Horror] [linear]

#20 Post by Glitterbark »

Oh, I can! When you string adjectives together in English, the proper order roughly goes as follows: Opinion, size, age, shape, color, origin, material, purpose. In this case, I'd classify "linear" as being organized somewhere around the 'shape' category (I'm not totally confident about that assessment), and 'horror' as a purpose word. For example - You'd say an 'amazing old Australian horror game", and a "enormous old linear Australian church". If that sounds weird to you, just link up the adjectives directly. "Linear horror" sounds good. "Horror linear" does not.

Anyway. To actually comment on the game itself - I love horror, and the premise is one I've never seen before... but thinking about it, it's really fitting! Mermaids are seen as being beautiful. Twisting that into the premise for a horror game is really interesting. Also, the UI and character design is really nice. I'm looking forward to this release!
WIP: Image

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Re: Siren's Ballad [Mystery/Horror] [linear]

#21 Post by Abbie »

@Zelan
Damn! that one sneak in.. I will fix it for future reprints, had to sent them to print-house asap this time >w<;;; thank you for noticing! You're pure gold, thank you for amazing support!

@FoxTrotMuffin
Thank you for explanation!

and even bigger thanks for inspiring words - nothing motivates more then cheers like this. We're trying our best to keep up!
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Re: Siren's Ballad [Mystery/Horror] [linear]

#22 Post by Abbie »

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Hello everyone, it’s Update Day~!

First of all, I would like to wish you a happy Easter, which will be there soon! If you’re not celebrating it, I hope that you at least get a day off at work/school, so you can have a nice rest ;>

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Today we would like to update you on our progress with backgrounds.

With a few base backgrounds so far (the Bar, swimming pool, dormitory rooms and living room) we carefully work on the rest of them - for them to fit in the color palette and general “feel” of the story. Loreen bases her sketches on the descriptions I (waji :)) made, then we discuss them in the whole three-person team.
I even created a BEAUTIFUL map of the area, on which I marked the places for each background for Loreen to have some basic understanding how it works…. Not sharing the map though, I worry it may contain too many spoilers :) *

Loreen got a new software for drawing - Paint Clip Studio - and she decided to test it for one of the backgrounds we want to boast about today - the employee-only area at at Siren’s Ballad.
PCS seems to have a nice tools for doing the proper perspective, but for colors Loreen goes back to Photoshop.

The employee-only area still needs some work, but it’s final shape can be already seen on this pre-rendered piece :)

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This is one of the most important places for our heroes - the employee-only area at Siren’s Ballad. This is where they wait just before the mermaid show, the doors on left side are for locker rooms while the stairs in the back of the scene lead to the ramp over the Ballad’s aquarium. And the ramp is from where they dive into the aquarium from, during the performance!
When having a break during their bartender duty, they come here to chat, eat dinner or simply relax. This messy room is also the main storage room for the bar, thus all the cardboxes and cupboards. In the most visible one - there are some spare mermaid costumes displayed.
And finally - behind the mysterious curtain ther
And finally - behind the mysterious curtain there is a glass see-through wall to the inside of the aquarium. It usually is closed, used mostly in the maintenance hours for safety measures.

Or for employees who chill out there after closing hours to look at fish :)

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As we all know, Cassie Rider is our protagonist. But have you wondered about her range of emotions?

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From neutral through happy or tired to scared - some of these emotions will obviously be used more frequently than the others.
Even though faces with different emotions weren’t that hard to design for kairek, there was a struggle with recurring thought of redrawing the body for each of the emotions.
Well, I saw only the final sprites, and different emotions with the same body look just fine, so she must be overreacting :P [that's just mean Waji :v - kairek]

Let us know what you think about Cassie’s expressions and the new background!
waji

* or it actually is not that beautiful and I worry you’ll start hating the whole project because of this crappy map :P No one said writer needs to be good at map-making...

Thank you for following our development.
If you have any remarks, comments or advice please don't hesitate to share. Feedback is extremely appreciated.
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Last edited by Abbie on Wed Jul 26, 2017 11:08 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Siren's Ballad [Mystery/Horror] [linear]

#23 Post by Abbie »

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Hello everyone~!
Since we don’t really have any revolutionary progress to report you about, we decided to request you for some in-depth comments about the content shared so far. 8)

It would be awesome if you took a few minutes of your time and answer the following questions! :D

1. We know that for you Siren’s Ballad exists mostly there, on lemma, but what is your basic, preferred source for gathering info about projects like that? (fe. Facebook, itch.io, twitter, mail list)?
2.Would you like to see more of step-by-step or timelapsed art pieces - backgrounds, sprites (without additional comment)?
3.Since you got to know some details about the story and characters - do you wish us to elaborate on any certain theme, topic or character?

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Last edited by Abbie on Wed Jul 26, 2017 11:08 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Siren's Ballad [Mystery/Horror] [linear]

#24 Post by Zelan »

1. We know that for you Siren’s Ballad exists mostly there, on lemma, but what is your basic, preferred source for gathering info about projects like that? (fe. Facebook, itch.io, twitter, mail list)?:
Lemma has always been where I find out most of my visual novel news, so I'm absolutely fine with everything being released here. However, I've recently been using Tumblr more frequently, but I use it more to follow projects I found from here than to find new projects.

2.Would you like to see more of step-by-step or timelapsed art pieces - backgrounds, sprites (without additional comment)?:
Yes! I love step-by-step art things.

3.Since you got to know some details about the story and characters - do you wish us to elaborate on any certain theme, topic or character?: Any of them would be great, whatever you're willing and able to tell us. c:

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Re: Siren's Ballad [Mystery/Horror] [linear]

#25 Post by Abbie »

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Hello everyone~!

unfortunately Waji is sick, so this time let me wrap up our progress by myself <3

Loreen managed to finish a background that was still a wip two weeks ago - she did some marvelous work and contributed even more than planned! Thanks to that Waji will be able to squish in an extra scene in the second part of the game... but shhhh, it's a spoiler! :wink:

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Speaking for myself - I'm still stuck on sprites. Good news is that I'm done with the first sprite turn, just a few extra expressions left... and then we can move on to extra poses or hand positions. Once sprites are done we can focus on more fancy tasks like CG and start working on a trailer, but for now bringing characters to life is our priority!

I would like to say special thanks to Zelan, who is extremely supportive for our project - you keep us going, friend!

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Last edited by Abbie on Wed Jul 26, 2017 11:10 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Siren's Ballad [Mystery/Horror] [linear]

#26 Post by Zelan »

Aww, I hope Waji feels better soon!

Wow, the WIP background was already awesome, but the finished version looks even nicer! I love the aquarium. Will there be version of the background with the curtain closed and open?

I'm sure the sprites are looking fantastic! I can't wait to see the finalized ones. c:

Oh, thank you! ^_^ I'm glad my comments are helpful to you.

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Re: Siren's Ballad [Mystery/Horror] [linear]

#27 Post by Abbie »

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Hello!

Abbie here, let me give some short summary about our progress!

My PC had some major problems this week, I had to reinstal whole operating system. Lucky for us no game files got corrupted (we make backup anyway).
Waji feels better! She's still recovering and is pretty busy with her day work.
Loreen almost finished all art dump i gave her, she's extra quick.. kinda jelous about her skill :)

We managed to meet up and discuss some ideas we have for our project over tasty coffee.
Many matters connected directly to the story development therefore I can't share details without Waji approval, but other half were focused on technical aspect and organising.
It's pretty hard to make sure everyone has variety of tasks to focus on. Having 'only one job' might eventually lead to burnout and it's not something we would like to see any of us suffer.

I'm confident that any of us can make her own job right, but we will just end with bag full of parts that needs to be put together into working machine. To progress we need to know what 'traps' await further ahead and the earlier we will fix them - the better. We agreed making prototypes should have higher priority then finishing majority of artworks or script. This will be high priority for us soon, but we would like to end some loose ends before moving on like... finishing poor Brandon sprite. he's neglected for far too long :,D

Cheers my friends and see you next week!

Thank you for following our development.
If you have any remarks, comments or advice please don't hesitate to share. Feedback is extremely appreciated.

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Re: Siren's Ballad [Mystery/Horror] [linear]

#28 Post by Abbie »

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Hello everyone!
First of all, despite the ominous undertone of previous messages, we are all well and in fairly good health :P

We are sorry for the lack of the updates in the weeks since our last post.
Even though some of us worked on professional VN teams before it is our first project where we are on our own. And that led to TOOOOOTAL underestimation of the time needed for some parts.

In the end we probably started full-blown marketing-like posts waaay too early for the amount of content we already had, and the content we still needed to create.
While working on the project, it also evolved. Siren’s Ballad was meant to be a very small VN to try if we can do it at all.
But when we determined the amount of basic content needed, number of backgrounds and sprites, we realized that it is still much enough to deserve a longer scenario which we agreed on, making the very small VN just a regular VN.

And the daily work interrupts too, the main person responsible is me of course – with no real “writing days/weeks” but writing the scenario in the meantime, evenings after work or halves of free days, it totally killed the deadline in the writing part.
Currently the graphic part is on hold, until I sort out at least 80-90% of the polish scenario. Until then kairek and Loreen work on the other projects – no need to rush on their side when writer is slowing the whole stuff :) When the writing will be almost done, kairek and Loreen will come back to finish the art part of the game and start with programming, while I finish polish version and start the English translation.

Not to mention the need for other crucial things like editor involvement or getting the music and sound effects…… but it seems it is a bit longer way to that than we planned so let’s not concentrate on that now :)

To sum up the above excuse-like post: We just wanna tell you we are still here! :D

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We will try to make more updates in the future, but unfortunately not weekly; we are afraid we would show ALL the graphic content with the weekly pace, long before the release of the game.
We will definitely update you on our key milestones.

Also, we are still monitoring the topic daily if any new post with questions of feedback appears; we would be delighted if you shared your thoughts with us!

Yours –
Waji
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