[Demo!] The World is Made of Paper

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Omnificent
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Re: [Demo!] The World is Made of Paper

#46 Post by Omnificent »

I like the different art style to this game, though the lineart is noticeably jagged. What method are you using to draw/color the sprites?

From a writing perspective, I think you could afford to cut down on the adverbs. I tend to abuse them for flavor too, but they can be distracting and make a sentence less punchy, which is not something you want in a psychological mystery game. You also have a fair amount of 'they did X as/before they did X', which softens the impact of both actions.

I can't say Doc Devlin comes off as as insincere and unprofessional to me as the protagonist insists. He seems like a perfectly courteous medical professional,
at least until the end of the demo when he got his troll on.
Maybe having different expression/gesture sprites'll help with that, further down the line.

The pace of the demo really picked up towards the end, which combined with the sudden profusion of decision points made up for the slow start. If the introduction to Dion's odd psychology weren't needed, I'd almost say you could just start the story from waking up in the hospital bed.
I'm guessing that there's going to be two main paths, Stabilize-Reality-With-A-Crack-Team-of-Misfits and the Muse and Protagonist show?
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Re: [Demo!] The World is Made of Paper

#47 Post by Melinoe »

mysterialize wrote:Out of curiosity, what did you do the night of the gunshot? That's the major branching point in the demo, aside from the endings.
Ah, the night of the gunshot, I left the apartment building and
was greeted by the thugs. I'm guessing they're hallucinations or something...
That part was really creepy... O.o That, of course, was exactly what you were going for. :)

Also, the Muse is scary. :(

Oh, and then after I finished it, I went back and played through the other choices...
The Marianne part was interesting because the world was actually made of paper!!!!! :shock: (mind=blown)
Speaking of Marianne,
was she the person with Dion in the ending where he lost his grip on reality? Or is that some random speculation?
I ask too many questions...
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Re: [Demo!] The World is Made of Paper

#48 Post by mysterialize »

Got it. I'll take a knife to the adverbs, and keep an eye out for them in the future. Thank you so much for pointing that problem out. I'll also try to spice up a few of the "X and then X" sentences, too.

The art in the demo was all sketched on paper, then colored with a mouse, which is probably why it looks so jagged. I just recently got a tablet, so I've been trying to clean up some of the sprites and such recently. I'll probably post some new screenshots for comment soon.

As for the doctor, part of it is supposed to be the Dion is flat out paranoid, if not a little oversensitive about people. He takes offense to things that a lot of people would wave off as friendly teasing. He's really just bad with people. Though, the fact that this isn't clearly stated in some way is probably a problem. I'll try to bring a bit more attention to it, so his behavior toward Jacob makes more sense.

As for paths, I plan to have a rather large number of them. Each character has their own stories and intentions, and you can change the course of things depending on what Dion wants to do. I don't have a completely certain ending count, but I promise more than two.

@Melinoe:

Nice, I think you're the first person to report doing that on the first run through, actually. I won't say anything about
the thug
, but it will be fully addressed in the full version. No worries.

I'm also really glad to hear that I succeeded in making things creepy.

As for the ending:
It's not Marianne. That's actually a major character who otherwise doesn't show up in the demo. I'll probably put some kind of character teaser on the topic for him soon.

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Re: [Demo!] The World is Made of Paper

#49 Post by Arivien »

This is a really good start to a VN.

While the art style is not to my taste, it's good, and the characters are likeable as well.
I played through, and got, I think, a very uninteresting ending.
That doctor is such a troll.
Are any of the endings actually "complete"?
Maybe I'll play again when I get some time to find the other ones.
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Re: [Demo!] The World is Made of Paper

#50 Post by mysterialize »

Thank you! All of the demo endings are cliffhangers of some sort, but yeah, you did get the most laid back and straightforward of them. The other two at least end on more dramatic notes than it. Don't worry, though, I have plenty of plans to give that particular course of action it's share of craziness.

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Re: [Demo!] The World is Made of Paper

#51 Post by Arivien »

Alright, guess I'll give it another runthrough...

...that is, when I actually have the time!
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Re: [Demo!] The World is Made of Paper

#52 Post by mysterialize »

No rush. XD I'm happy enough that you find it worth a second runthrough at all. Hopefully it won't be disappointing.

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Re: [Demo!] The World is Made of Paper

#53 Post by mysterialize »

The World is Made of Paper is now over 50,000 words! Hurray!

However, because numbers about words aren't interesting to anyone other than the person responsible for said numbers about words, here's a new screenshot:

Image

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Re: [Demo!] The World is Made of Paper

#54 Post by Kura »

50,000 words? Awesome!

I'm psyched to see that progress on this has picked up again. Also, I want to know where Trevor gets his shirts.
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Re: [Demo!] The World is Made of Paper

#55 Post by Aiurax »

I like this. I'll try the demo soon :]
The demo was awesome. The characters are so mysterious. I'll be interested to see how it all pans out.
Last edited by Aiurax on Tue Oct 18, 2011 11:40 pm, edited 1 time in total.

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Re: [Demo!] The World is Made of Paper

#56 Post by Arcanum »

Oh, I just downloaded this. I can't quite put my feeling about this VN into words - I've just gone through my first playthrough and I'm way, wayyy past my sleeping time. At first I felt like in a noir, but by the end I started getting seriously creeped out. Everything is just falling bizarrely into place. The writing is fantastic, very compelling, and I just love how the art goes well with it. It's sketchy and dark and the expressions on teh characters' faces, jeez. I fear reading the rest of the topic in case I end up spoiling myself, but I just read that you're 50k into the novel and yesss. I'm just really curious about everything - I want to keep on playing but I haven't the faintest idea of how I'm going to wake up tomorrow. Or how I'm going to stand being curious about everything. Er.
(I guess I'll go spoil myself now… *unable to resist*)

Edit: Okay, I played through the game and got 3 endings (including the bad one). Can you enlighten me about how to get the 4th?
The endings I got were the loosing grip on reality one and the helping the doctor one. Though I did get the loosng grip on reality one by two way, one walking away and another one by punching Jacob… That was fun XD <- loved him, but still…!

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Re: [Demo!] The World is Made of Paper

#57 Post by mysterialize »

Thank you, all three of you! I'm really glad it was enjoyable. Progress is still being made, of course, only slightly held up by ohgodflu.

The topic actually doesn't spoil much, fortunately. I've been intentionally keeping things on the down-low.

As for the fourth ending, you get it by choosing "No" at the "Is this what I really want?" choice. Admittedly, I don't really like how the "ending" it leads to turned out, so I apologize if it's confusing, but yes, it is different once you leave the clinic.

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Re: [Demo!] The World is Made of Paper

#58 Post by mysterialize »

Sorry for the lack of progress or updates on this lately. My laptop died a horrible, horrible death, and various life related things, such as a sudden move to a new apartment, have kept me from even being able to touch it until now. Fortunately, now things have settled down, and I should be able to start work again on a new computer as soon as I'm able to transfer my backup of the game.

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Re: [Demo!] The World is Made of Paper

#59 Post by Auro-Cyanide »

I still haven't played the demo for this D: I've been meaning to for aaaaaaaaages now.

*rolls around* I really need to play it, maybe I can make some time this weekend and give some feedback :) I'm very interested in the concept for it.

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Re: [Demo!] The World is Made of Paper

#60 Post by mysterialize »

I have to admit, I'm a bit paranoid about people playing the demo as it is, mostly because I've since noticed some of the really stupid mistakes I made during it (The It's/Its confusions are flat out embarrassing), and I think I may reupload the demo with some of the problems fixed. That will have to wait until after this weekend though, sadly, so I won't necessarily stop you for that. So, uh... I guess, all and all, go ahead and play it? I don't know where I'm going with this.

Though, do all you can to critique it. I really want to hear what you have to say!

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