Moon • Rabbit [NaNo'18] [Mystery, Drama]

[Nay]

Moon • Rabbit
itch.io

Echobo is a small village on the edge of the sea. So close to the ocean is it that a glass dome surrounds the village, to protect it from the tide...
After generations of rabbits passing away or leaving, only 10 villagers remain. They coexist with each other peacefully year after year.
That is, until a twist of murder shatters the peace of these soft rabbits' lives... but why? And by whom?

-


Main Character: Mac



Our main character. Young adolescent. She's loud, annoying, rambunctious, and she loves having fun. A typical child.
Daughter of Yata and sister to Gale.

Other Villagers:




Sofia: A shy and soft-spoken girl. Daughter of Iyong and sister to Mirel.
Kalciel: A very good friend. Grandson of Onya, nephew to Luca.
Gale: The good big brother. Son of Yata and brother to Mac.



Onya: Ornery old rabbit with a poisonous tongue. Kalciel's grandmother.
Luca: Clumsy and artistic. Loves painting. Aunt to Kalciel.
Yata: Stern, stoic, but there's a soft side to him. Father to Gale and Mac.



Mirel: No-nonsense fashionable big sister. Sofia's sister and Iyong's daughter.
Fiero: Hot-headed old rabbit who prides himself on keeping the time. Father to Iyong and subsequently, Mirel and Sofia's grandfather.
Iyong: A gentle mother who is prone to gossip. Mother to Sofia and Mirel. Fiero's daughter.



--


Goals:

I'm determined to finish at the very least, the script for this as well as the coding, even if it takes me longer than a month to finish the art assets. The plot is not actually fully fleshed out at the moment but oh well, I'd like to just jump into creating anything even if it isn't the best.
This will be my 2nd foray into Ren'py, but I might switch over to TyranoBuilder in the making of.
I've always loved visual novels, especially ones that make you think!! Combining my favorite genres, mystery and cute animal people, is kind of my thing. Or at least I want to make it my thing. I hope to make a visual novel that people can enjoy ^^

Game will be made 100% by myself, with the exception of music which I will be looking for on royalty-free sites.


--


Progress:

Outline: 100%
Script: 80%
Art: 80%
Coding/GUI: 80%

Current Word Count:

The game contains 1,278 dialogue blocks, containing 14,208 words and 74,156
characters, for an average of 11.1 words and 58 characters per block.

The game contains 8 menus, 0 images, and 23 screens.


--

initial sketches (because i like keeping these why not)

[Zelan]

I'm glad to see you making something for NaNo!! Good luck with this, it looks really cute. ^_^

[Avior]

The art looks really cute so far! There's not a lot of plot to go on yet but it looks like it'll be an interesting game so I'll definitely be following your progress! Best of luck!

[Nay]

Hey, thanks guys. I've been fleshing out the plot since last night and I'm rather excited about it ^^ I think it'll be good.


Will post again soon with updated plot summaries!

[Nay]

3/9: nine days have passed. I've finished most of the outline, started writing tidbits of the script, and generally have a good idea of what needs to be done.

Some thoughts. WRITING MYSTERY IS HARD!!! All the details of the murder have to connect with the environment, but I can't make the murderer good enough to get away with it; they have to slip up in there in order for it to be solvable. Figuring out the logistics of the murder has been fun but also head breaking. If something does not work, I have to think of a way to make it work, which ends up making the murder more elaborate. I've been muttering aloud about murder and how to best get away with it for about a week... I feel like I must be on some sort of list by now.

On the flipside, it is extremely satisfying to have something click into place that makes the mystery work. I'm trying to make it so it's not too easy to solve, but perhaps it will be anyway. I haven't seriously written anything for a while so this has been extremely fun for me to explore characters, the story lore, and everything else. I really love it!! I just wonder if I will have the strength to power through the script by (at least) week 3.





(I'll probably have to go back and edit Kalciel and Gale since they ended up looking too cute...)

When I work fast, I can draw about 3 different poses in 2 hours. Typically it's 3+ hours though. And I just have a lot of art assets to complete. 10 characters with some characters having more than one pose, plus CGs?! I'm pretty sure I will not be able to finish all the CGs within the month of NaNo. I honestly do not even have them planned...

Most of my time has been dominated by the writing aspect tbh. Tomorrow I will have to really start on writing whole and complete sections of the script, what I have atm is just below 3k words. I see some vns have like 50k words (not NaNo, but still) and I just say what the heck.

Oh, I should also edit the plot summary, but maybe I will do that tomorrow...

[Zelan]

Some thoughts. WRITING MYSTERY IS HARD!!! All the details of the murder have to connect with the environment, but I can't make the murderer good enough to get away with it; they have to slip up in there in order for it to be solvable. Figuring out the logistics of the murder has been fun but also head breaking. If something does not work, I have to think of a way to make it work, which ends up making the murder more elaborate. I've been muttering aloud about murder and how to best get away with it for about a week... I feel like I must be on some sort of list by now.

A small tip (maybe?): The murderer doesn't have to slip up during the murder and leave clues behind. It could be a perfect murder in that respect. But if someone investigates the murder, the murderer could slip up after the fact and give themself away. A really simple example:

Investigator: Were you the one who murdered that dude?
Totally Not The Murderer: I am shocked at this accusation!! I would never stab anyone through the heart with a toothpick.
Investigator: ... I never said anything about the murder weapon being a toothpick.

And there you go, TNTM has blown their cover. c: It partially depends if you want the mystery focus to be more on investigating forensic evidence or questioning witnesses. For a large-scale mystery game, a lot of the popular franchises balance between both, but for a small-scale NaNo game, it's fine to use one or the other.

[Nay]

A small tip (maybe?): The murderer doesn't have to slip up during the murder and leave clues behind. It could be a perfect murder in that respect. But if someone investigates the murder, the murderer could slip up after the fact and give themself away. A really simple example:

Investigator: Were you the one who murdered that dude?
Totally Not The Murderer: I am shocked at this accusation!! I would never stab anyone through the heart with a toothpick.
Investigator: ... I never said anything about the murder weapon being a toothpick.

And there you go, TNTM has blown their cover. c: It partially depends if you want the mystery focus to be more on investigating forensic evidence or questioning witnesses. For a large-scale mystery game, a lot of the popular franchises balance between both, but for a small-scale NaNo game, it's fine to use one or the other.

Oh yeah, that's true! Hmm, well... I'll just focus mostly on evidence-based deduction for now. Although I think I will include some testimony-based evidence as well since they go hand in hand anyway. Mostly the plot favors an evidence-based deduction rather than testimony since in this village, everybody is very familiar with each other and trust each other.

Thanks for the tip

[Nay]

Working a little more on the mystery aspects and tweaking the details. I'm also about 3/5's of the script through. I think it'll end up at around or maybe below 10k words. Not bad!! I also just don't have the strength to make it longer.
I really like how the story is progressing so far... I'm often lacking the details while writing, but I'm trying my best to make it coherent. It is a story about family and home. And murder.

Here are some sprites~


I want to redo Kalciel and Gale's sprites a bit but, if I don't have time, the ones I have now are fine too. I'm actually feeling pretty satisfied with my progress so far...

Things like title screen, CGs, and logo will come last, so my first post remains unattractive and sketchy.

[Zelan]

Luca is very cute, I love that hair! <3

[Nay]

Luca is very cute, I love that hair! <3

Woo! Thanks Zelan <3

[Nay]

Guuyys I got a fair amount of work done, from finishing up the outline of the story (finally!) to implementing 1/3 of the script into the engine, finishing sprites, and bgs/cgs -- I've still got to finish up writing the script, more cgs, the logo & music/sound effects, but the project is looking feasible within the remaining time period if I really hustle.



The last sprites the villagers, showing off Fiero, Mirel, Iyong~





Some screenshots. (I dunno if I'll change the gui for NaNo, maybe I'll use a premade one but most likely I'll just customize it after the month is up)

I've also edited the OP with a better summary of the characters. I want to change the tagline to something more fitting but right now

There's a small population of 10 rabbits on the edge of the sea, their houses enclosed in a dome of glass. They coexist with each other within their simple lives until their peace is shattered one day by a twist of murder; what happened, and how, and why?

is still correct, still vague, and I don't want to give too many details away So for now it stays.

Honestly, I might have been a bit ambitious with this for NaNo, but it's also really fun to have something to constantly work on~

If anyone would like to beta-read what I have of my script, give me opinions about it, or are just curious about the plot please give me a pm! I actually don't have too many people to bounce ideas off of and while I've asked a few, I think my story might suffer from lack of feedback. Please don't be shy!

[timepatches]

I really like the concept and the art for this so far!
If you need beta readers I'd be happy to help ;w;

[Kagiprojects]

It sounds very interesting. You made me curious about the story behind it. Can't wait to find out. Good luck!

[Nay]

I really like the concept and the art for this so far!
If you need beta readers I'd be happy to help ;w;

Thank you so much, I will be sending a pm your way~

It sounds very interesting. You made me curious about the story behind it. Can't wait to find out. Good luck!

Thank you, I hope the story will be interesting for you!!

[Bika-chan]

This looks very cute! I'm a sucker for all things rabbits, so I'll definitely be looking forward to this game! ^_^