KZ: A Holocaust Tale [VN][Historical Fiction][Drama][WWII] - Demo

[C Kitsune]

KZ: A Holocaust Tale

Itch.io Page and Download Demo Here:

https://c-kitsune.itch.io/kz-a-holocaust-tale-demo

Patreon Page (now defunct) Here:

https://www.patreon.com/m/crkitsune

Reddit Account:

https://www.reddit.com/user/C-Kitsune

Update (as of 05/21/2020):

This is an update post where i would like to announce that i have a Twitter account now, and you can follow me here:

Twitter Account:

https://twitter.com/CKitsune1

I also have a youtube channel where i posted the gameplay of my Visual Novel, and the video's link is here:

Youtube Account:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0ug-BWB26hE&t=611s

I also would like to announce that i am going to return the production of the game soon.
I will be posting WIPs of the sprites i'm making on Reddit, Twitter and Patreon.
I will be posting the backgrounds of the game, giving exclusive story points of the Visual Novel, files that are being used in the game and any request that any patron can make to me exclusively on Patreon, in hope of having anybody kind enough to become a patron of mine.
Also, i will be entering in contact with some let's play youtubers and negociate whether they agree to make a "let's play" video of my game or not.
Take the shot to go to itch.io and start a community topic on what the Demo can improve (or any topic you want, really).
Well, that's it for now.
I will be updating the status of the development of my Visual Novel for yall![/center]

Update (as of 07/07/2021):

I have just posted a Development log and released a new chapter for this Visual Novel! Check out my itch.io to get them!

Hello people

So

I'm currently developing a Visual Novel as a sole developer for a couple of months thus far. It's a WWII Visual Novel regarding the life of a jew who tries to survive in the Holocaust. I'm taking this subject as serious and cautious as i can, once it's a very delicate subject.

About

KZ: A Holocaust Tale is a Visual novel that has twelve chapters in it's totality, (the Demo has the first three chapters out of these twelve) following the new life of Benjamin Lewek, a Jewish Writer who is now living the Holocaust. Once he starts living in Lodz Ghetto, he will be meeting other, their stories, authority figures within the Ghetto that can have different kinds of interactions with the Protagonist, that can range from an unlikely humane treatment from both parties to death.

Plot

The story begins when two german guards knock Benjamin's House door, and when they meet, he is informed that his city is now occupied by the Third Reich and that things were going to change. Eventually, Benjamin is sent to the Lodz Ghetto, where he can, besides meeting people and living new experiences, even become one of the heads of a planned rebellion within the Ghetto.

KZ: A Holocaust Tale is a story of pain and suffering, light and hope, and the strenght and frailty of the bonds you make in the Ghetto. This novel is a tale that i intend to expand in a future remake if this would ever possible, where i would like to explore other stories with other characters, places and contexts where all of them happen at the time of war and also all of the involved characters in the novel would share one similiarity: having to face the Holocaust, where each character will act differently from each other in the situation they will find themselves in.

Details

As mentioned before, the Demo has the first three chapters (3/12), and the finished game will have 12 chapters.

Rated Mature for language, depiction of violence, execution, genocide and trauma.

(The patreon will be edited in a few days, once it needs to be updated as of 05/11/2020)

(I plan to create a Discord Server for the game, as well as a Twitter and Instagram account. I already have a Reddit account)

Screenshots









The Main Characters

(I'm afraid i won't show all the characters involved in the story here once that novel is still in development)



Benjamin Lewek
Benjamin is an intelligent and perceptive young writer who takes his and the other's situation very seriously, despite also respecting their boundaries and foreseeing certain outcomes of situations he finds himself in with his intuition. He also carries a strong sense of morality and justice, despite being helpless most of the time.



Official Marie
She is the commander of both the Jewish Police and the German Guard of the Ghetto, what makes her the head of authority in the Ghetto, below only to her boss, who is the Ghetto's Ruler. She often carries a pompous, arrogant, sarcastic and intimidating persona, despite having a more humane and emotional side buried by her (not literal) mask.

Credits

The entire project is a one-man work, which is me.

Final Considerations

What i really need and want for this project is to get a public of people who are willing to follow the game progress with me (either via discord, forums, twitter, reddit, whatever useful social media may be). If you could take a look at my Demo and give any feedback, i would really appreciate it!

Thank you guys for your attention!

[AlexNumbers]

I tried the demo, there will be no criticism, as it is clear that you need a parting word and some advice.

I would like to start with the plot. The provided scenes in the demo are quite good and give a normal push to continuation of the plot, however, they lack a backstory. For example, during a phone conversation with Benjamin's uncle, I did not empathize with any of the characters, because I do not know their past and how they relate to each other. It's the same in the scene where a girl is crying in the crowd. I, as a player, have no incentive to make the main character find a girl among the screaming and pushing crowd, in a real situation, many people would not even willingly be inclined to ignore the crying and take care of themselves. However, I really liked the scene where Benjamin meets his reader – this scene is very lively and special, also makes it clear that Benjamin is not a stub character.

About the chapters. I noticed that literally every scene in the demo is separated as a Chapter, although the actions are in the same place (if you look at it more broadly) and at the same time. There is no need to divide the scenes like this, this is a beginner's mistake, because of which the integrity of the plot suffers. It is better to link the scenes with some transitions, during which you can better reveal the character through a good and short monologue or another scene like a meeting with the reader of Benjamin.

I noticed that in sprites and CG, you try to use animation. At the same time, dots appear in the textbox, forcing the user to constantly click the go button. Instead of dots, it is better to put pauses in the script file with a timer for a few seconds. Then the player will not have to press the button several times.

Code: Select all

pause 0.5

or

Code: Select all

$ renpy.pause (2.0)

between your "show" strings

Also, most of the text appears in too small parts, forcing the player to click the buttons too often. It is better to combine sentences or divide them with the {w} or {p} tag during this combining.

That's all I can do for now. I know that you are developing it alone, and it is extremely difficult, so I respect this desire to work. I recommend reading more about the features of the Ren'py engine and experimenting with its functions – this will open up new opportunities for you to improve your novel.
I love the genre of historical drama, and there should be more of novels like this. Good luck

[C Kitsune]

I tried the demo, there will be no criticism, as it is clear that you need a parting word and some advice.

I would like to start with the plot. The provided scenes in the demo are quite good and give a normal push to continuation of the plot, however, they lack a backstory. For example, during a phone conversation with Benjamin's uncle, I did not empathize with any of the characters, because I do not know their past and how they relate to each other. It's the same in the scene where a girl is crying in the crowd. I, as a player, have no incentive to make the main character find a girl among the screaming and pushing crowd, in a real situation, many people would not even willingly be inclined to ignore the crying and take care of themselves. However, I really liked the scene where Benjamin meets his reader – this scene is very lively and special, also makes it clear that Benjamin is not a stub character.

About the chapters. I noticed that literally every scene in the demo is separated as a Chapter, although the actions are in the same place (if you look at it more broadly) and at the same time. There is no need to divide the scenes like this, this is a beginner's mistake, because of which the integrity of the plot suffers. It is better to link the scenes with some transitions, during which you can better reveal the character through a good and short monologue or another scene like a meeting with the reader of Benjamin.

I noticed that in sprites and CG, you try to use animation. At the same time, dots appear in the textbox, forcing the user to constantly click the go button. Instead of dots, it is better to put pauses in the script file with a timer for a few seconds. Then the player will not have to press the button several times.

Code: Select all

pause 0.5

or

Code: Select all

$ renpy.pause (2.0)

between your "show" strings

Also, most of the text appears in too small parts, forcing the player to click the buttons too often. It is better to combine sentences or divide them with the {w} or {p} tag during this combining.

That's all I can do for now. I know that you are developing it alone, and it is extremely difficult, so I respect this desire to work. I recommend reading more about the features of the Ren'py engine and experimenting with its functions – this will open up new opportunities for you to improve your novel.
I love the genre of historical drama, and there should be more of novels like this. Good luck

-----------------------------------------------------------

Hello

I read your comment and i appreciate it as a whole, However, i want to reply to some points you made:

"however, they lack a backstory. For example, during a phone conversation with Benjamin's uncle, I did not empathize with any of the characters, because I do not know their past and how they relate to each other."

1 - Well, in this part, Benjamin, after escaping from certain death and entering his house, there is a black screen with him monologuing: Where he briefly mentions the relation of his family with his uncle, i know that this wasn't a "show, don't tell" thing, but i don't think flashbacks or anything like that could work in such context. When they talk on the phone, i tried to make a conversation of two people who don't have the best relation, Benjamin doesn't like his uncle's attitude towards his family (he even angrily briefly mentions a time where his uncle threatened to hit him and his brother when they were kids, as something bad about someone is brought up in an argument sometimes) and Shimon also is alienated, selfish and hedonistic, despite also caring about them to the point of, at least, not wanting anything bad happening to them, despite the fact this caring side of him gets overwhelmed by his 3 negative traits i mentioned before. I tried to translate these nuances and charge into this conversation they have, that the player can feel they went through a lot together, despite the player not knowing any of their detailed backstory. I probably failed in this.

"It's the same in the scene where a girl is crying in the crowd. I, as a player, have no incentive to make the main character find a girl among the screaming and pushing crowd, in a real situation, many people would not even willingly be inclined to ignore the crying and take care of themselves."

2 - I understand your point in this one, however, despite the choice of leaving being the logical thing many people would make, the fact that altruism can still exist in some people and it can manifest in one way or another, makes the scene not that unbelievable as you put. Also, there is a choice of whether you want to help her or not, most people wouldn't help her if they were in Benjamin's shoes, but still.

"About the chapters. I noticed that literally every scene in the demo is separated as a Chapter, although the actions are in the same place (if you look at it more broadly) and at the same time."

3 - You're actively wrong on this one. The Chapters happen in different periods of time (The first one happens in sep. 1939, the second: nov. 1939, and the third and last: march 1940). However, it was my mistake to not put this information in the transictions that happen between the chapters, no wonder you got this wrong idea in first place. I'm sorry about that.

"I noticed that in sprites and CG, you try to use animation."

4 - Pseudo-Animation, for that matter; i can't barely even draw, and much less animate (trust me, i once tried to learn it). However, the idea of these moments is to give more dynamism to the characters in some scenes, something that doesn't really happen in other Visual Novels.

"At the same time, dots appear in the textbox, forcing the user to constantly click the go button. Instead of dots, it is better to put pauses in the script file with a timer for a few seconds. Then the player will not have to press the button several times.

Code: Select all

pause 0.5

or

Code: Select all

$ renpy.pause (2.0)

between your "show" strings"

5 - Does that mean that the first code example does is to make each selected sprite under this code, each one, last half a second? I admit i don't really know much about the Ren'py engine, but i really, really appreciate your tentative to help me with this information. If you could give me more tips like these ones, i would really love it.

"Also, most of the text appears in too small parts, forcing the player to click the buttons too often. It is better to combine sentences or divide them with the {w} or {p} tag during this combining."

6 - I'm sorry, but i have no idea on how to do this. Do you have any tutorial regarding this?

Well, this is it.

Thank you very much for your comment.

[AlexNumbers]

5 - Does that mean that the first code example does is to make each selected sprite under this code, each one, last half a second? I admit i don't really know much about the Ren'py engine, but i really, really appreciate your tentative to help me with this information. If you could give me more tips like these ones, i would really love it.

If you then show another sprite, then yes, it will appear in half a second, and you will not need to click, because you only need to click when a line of text ends. By performing the "show" or "pause" function, Ren'py automatically goes to another line.
I'll show you an example.

Code: Select all

scene bg day with dissolve
pause 2
show sprite smile with dissolve
character "text"
pause 1
show sprite smile closer with move #or ATL with zoom function, but this requires an understanding of ATL, which has a separate article in the documentation
character "text"
pause 2
show sprite grin much_closer with move
character "text"
pause 3
#...

And no "." or else.
That simply makes your sprite getting closer to the player with each text string. You can do this with your CGs or backgrounds
(Sometimes you may need to use $ renpy.pause () instead of pause ())

Code: Select all

show cg1 with dissolve
pause 3
show cg2 with dissolve
pause 2
show cg3 with dissolve
"text"

And this will show your CGs with a certain interval, during which the reader can view each CG and still not press the go button

6 - I'm sorry, but i have no idea on how to do this. Do you have any tutorial regarding this?

You can find info about these tags in Ren'Py Documentation: https://www.renpy.org/doc/html/text.html#text-tag-p
And also I tried to find some tutorials on English, but most of the tutorials I find are in Russian (also the YouTube ones). This one is about DDLC mods, still you can see some tips there: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gO9J7m_njRs

Code: Select all

character "Sentence!"
character "Sentence?"
character "Sentence..."

becomes

Code: Select all

character "Sentence!{w} Sentence?{p=0.5}Sentence..."

where {p=0.5} is a {p} tag with a timer to half a second.

[C Kitsune]

5 - Does that mean that the first code example does is to make each selected sprite under this code, each one, last half a second? I admit i don't really know much about the Ren'py engine, but i really, really appreciate your tentative to help me with this information. If you could give me more tips like these ones, i would really love it.

If you then show another sprite, then yes, it will appear in half a second, and you will not need to click, because you only need to click when a line of text ends. By performing the "show" or "pause" function, Ren'py automatically goes to another line.
I'll show you an example.

Code: Select all

scene bg day with dissolve
pause 2
show sprite smile with dissolve
character "text"
pause 1
show sprite smile closer with move #or ATL with zoom function, but this requires an understanding of ATL, which has a separate article in the documentation
character "text"
pause 2
show sprite grin much_closer with move
character "text"
pause 3
#...

And no "." or else.
That simply makes your sprite getting closer to the player with each text string. You can do this with your CGs or backgrounds
(Sometimes you may need to use $ renpy.pause () instead of pause ())

Code: Select all

show cg1 with dissolve
pause 3
show cg2 with dissolve
pause 2
show cg3 with dissolve
"text"

And this will show your CGs with a certain interval, during which the reader can view each CG and still not press the go button

6 - I'm sorry, but i have no idea on how to do this. Do you have any tutorial regarding this?

You can find info about these tags in Ren'Py Documentation: https://www.renpy.org/doc/html/text.html#text-tag-p
And also I tried to find some tutorials on English, but most of the tutorials I find are in Russian (also the YouTube ones). This one is about DDLC mods, still you can see some tips there: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gO9J7m_njRs

Code: Select all

character "Sentence!"
character "Sentence?"
character "Sentence..."

becomes

Code: Select all

character "Sentence!{w} Sentence?{p=0.5}Sentence..."

where {p=0.5} is a {p} tag with a timer to half a second.

Alex, i posted something in the forum of this site. If you could help me out there, i would appreciate it. Thank you.

[Andrew Baylis]

informative and difficult ..

[C Kitsune]

informative and difficult ..

What do you mean?