Anodos [Surreal Science-Fantasy][Questionable Meats][Nervous Gizmos]

[ethandirks]

Project Intro

Ascend increasingly surreal floors on your quest to escape the psychedelic tower of Anodos. Will you make it to the top?

In this visual novel, you find yourself trapped inside a bizarre interdimensional tower –– with no explanation why. Just one thing is certain: the only way out is up. Each floor introduces new friends, challenges, and clues about what's actually going on. It's significantly more art-heavy than traditional VNs, with hundreds of multi-layered, animated scenes –– and is inspired by the worldbuilding of Adventure Time, Hylics, and Moebius.

Title: Anodos
Genre: Surreal science-fantasy
Engine: Custom-built, browser-based
Team: Art/code/story by me, Ethan. Music by Land Loaf.
Website: https://anodos.world
VNDB: https://vndb.org/r92140
Steam: https://store.steampowered.com/app/2087 ... ce=SteamDB

Screenshots

Poppa Gummy and Spoon discussing meat:


Creepy eyeball goddess:


Cimarron having a bad day:


Space David just chillin:


My Intentions

I'd like to use this thread to keep myself accountable, along with keeping y'all updated on the status of things. Please feel free to share any thoughts you have; I'm always open to feedback and critique!

To start the discussion, I have a question about mobile VNs. I'll be releasing a free demo on the web (it'll work on any device: computer, tablet, phone, etc), and was wondering –– what do you think about playing mobile VNs in portrait mode? I like the idea of being able to play with one hand. It's kinda cool and trendy too. But I'm not sure if it's worth the additional dev time. Thoughts?

[Voz]

Questionable Meats is what got me to click and everything else got me to stay.

The bright colors, the surreal imagery, the scifi HUD - all of it is so visually striking in a pleasantly uncomfortable sort of way. The amount of effort put into the art and animation is obvious and so well done. Even from what little is shown in the video, it's enough to be mesmerizing. I'm woefully confused but in a way that makes me want to keep digging. ( I saw the Adventure Time inspiration and honestly yeah I was getting really hard The Midnight Gospel vibes. )

Personally I don't like playing much of anything on my phone so I'm not the best to answer about a portrait v. landscape presentation. Though I'll agree that the ability to play with one hand as opposed to holding the phone sideways with both is appealing. If not just ergonomic lol

I wish you and your team the best of luck! You have a great thing here. Keep motivated and keep up the good work!

[ethandirks]

Questionable Meats is what got me to click and everything else got me to stay.

The bright colors, the surreal imagery, the scifi HUD - all of it is so visually striking in a pleasantly uncomfortable sort of way. The amount of effort put into the art and animation is obvious and so well done. Even from what little is shown in the video, it's enough to be mesmerizing. I'm woefully confused but in a way that makes me want to keep digging. ( I saw the Adventure Time inspiration and honestly yeah I was getting really hard The Midnight Gospel vibes. )

Personally I don't like playing much of anything on my phone so I'm not the best to answer about a portrait v. landscape presentation. Though I'll agree that the ability to play with one hand as opposed to holding the phone sideways with both is appealing. If not just ergonomic lol

I wish you and your team the best of luck! You have a great thing here. Keep motivated and keep up the good work!

Hey Voz! Thanks so much for your comment. It's easy to feel like I'm designing this game alone in a vacuum, so it's great to hear that all the effort isn't going unnoticed.

As you noted, the teaser trailer doesn't reveal much about the story/characters just yet –– woefully confused + intrigued is the exact vibe I'm going for at this moment

I'm now thinking about holding off portrait mode for the demo release (as it probably will take an additional month of dev time to dynamically update background positioning, rework the UI, and deal with all the new bugs that pop up). I'm not expecting many people to play it on mobile anyway, but we'll let Google Analytics be the judge of that!

Thanks again for the motivating words. At this moment it's just me (no team), so sometimes its hard to stay accountable. But I'll keep at it. Peace!