Forever Alone: Nerds the Gathering [Nerdy Valentine 2/14/14]

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Omnificent
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Re: Forever Alone: Nerds the Gathering [DEMO UP 10/8/11]

#76 Post by Omnificent »

Rewritten Ennui: All grammatical quirks are intentional, I swear! :P Lack of punctuation is pretty much my way of conveying an almost chatspeak flavor to certain points in the vernacular. Damn that lovable Jeff I'm glad that a lot of people enjoy all the characters, and I am also curious as to how the popularity numbers will shift once the full game is released.

Greyscale + color, can do. I hope to find some way to streamline my CGing process at some point down the line, but I fear that it's pretty much going to come down to photographing pen-sketches then painstakingly mouse-tracing them. The things I want to ask for for Christmas!

Nejisa: Glad it made enough of an impression to stay in your thoughts. :P I'm starting to think Matthew's going to be the main source of comic relief in this here venture.
I'd say 'Whichever one you'd prefer me to be', but I already let on in my drawing thread that I'm of the bro persuasion so there you go.

So, progress?

I have ~29000 words in my document and a more or less full plot outline for every route but Douglas' (I suspect he'll be finished last). I'm working on getting together something interesting for our preexisting demo to see if it's viable for the full game. I also have, uh

Image

Image

Yessir, Omni knows where to properly allocate CGs.
Forever Alone: Nerds the Gathering - A brotome game. (Nerdy Valentine's Day Card and small status update 2/14/14)
Night at the Hospital - Maiden voyage of Team Snugglebunny
Skylessia: Tale of the Boon - Epic fantasy whatsit, currently on hiatus.
Viking Pipsqueak Productions Blog (under construction)

I occasionally frequently draw other people's characters. Now offering delinquentization, medievalization, and cyborgification. Hit me up in PM if you want sprites for your KN or non-ren'ai VN.

EVEN IF THE TENDONS OF MY THUMBS TEAR INTO NOTHINGNESS, EVEN IF I GO NEARSIGHTED FROM STARING TOO HARD AT THE SCREEN, EVEN IF MY BODY IS CLOSE TO COLLAPSE FROM THE 72 HOURS I HAVE GONE WITHOUT FOOD! I WILL DEFEAT YOU!

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Re: Forever Alone: Nerds the Gathering [DEMO UP 10/8/11]

#77 Post by Nejisa »

Omnificent wrote:...
I'd say 'Whichever one you'd prefer me to be', but I already let on in my drawing thread that I'm of the bro persuasion so there you go
...
You´re my new fucking God XD.
Last edited by Nejisa on Tue Feb 21, 2012 11:14 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Forever Alone: Nerds the Gathering [DEMO UP 10/8/11]

#78 Post by RemnantDream »

I'm surprised I haven't commented on this yet.

This game.. is just love. The humour is just amazing and your art is gorgeous.

Greg is my favourite by far. Although, I'm really not curious to see his eyes. Dunno why, usually the eyes are one of the things I'll like most. I think once(if) I see his eyes, it'll just be ..meh. A huge fuss over nothing.

Oh, by the waaayyy.. I have a friend who is just like Greg. His hair is red and floppy and covers his eyes. He listens to metal music. He rarely speaks, but when he does it's hilarious. So yeah.. Kinda weird how similar they are.

Anyhoe, good luck with this :D

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Re: Forever Alone: Nerds the Gathering [DEMO UP 10/8/11]

#79 Post by leon »

This is hilarious. I just love all the comparisements and references Michelle and others are making.

Michelle was surprised to hear that Greg listens to heavy metal? I think his looks might give this up. I totally expected heavy metal, without reading the char descriptions...

I haven't noticed / payed attention to grammar, but I think omitting punctuation for the sake of style is not a good idea. I don't think most people will notice / appreciate the style, but it makes reading harder regardless. Perhaps punctuations (commas and full stops) could be replaced with delays in text display...

I kind of expected a nerdier/geekier font, maybe a green on black console font. :)

Hope to see it finished soon.

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Re: Forever Alone: Nerds the Gathering [DEMO UP 10/8/11]

#80 Post by gekiganwing »

This demo had been collecting dust on my computer. Finally gave it a try yesterday. Overall, I'm amused.

My only real concern is that the pacing seemed awfully fast. There was a lot of amusing dialogue, but it all seemed to go by very quickly. I wanted the characters to stay on topic a bit more, so that I could understand *why* they were making all their obscure jokes. (Keep in mind that I've read a few VNs which dwell on a slice of life scene for ages. I'm used to slow pacing.)

In the next demo or version, I recommend providing more details about who these people are, why they attend their club, and how they get along. But at the same time, it would be good to see how they are through their actions, rather than through exposition. I admit this is easier said than done...

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Re: Forever Alone: Nerds the Gathering [DEMO UP 10/8/11]

#81 Post by Omnificent »

leon: lol yeah, Mike mostly didn't expect it from Greg because she didn't think such a quiet guy would listen to such loud music. She clearly hasn't hung out with enough metalheads.

I've been trying to get a nerdier font, though a lot of digital-looking fonts are also more difficult to read. If you've got any suggestions I'm definitely open to them, particularly as GUI-customization is not my forte.

gekiganwing: Yeah, admittedly the demo just kind of throws you in there (I've never been a fan of the coincidentally-run-into-everyone-on-day-1 thing, but that makes introductions more difficult than they might be otherwise). The full game will definitely go into more detail about their backgrounds and relationships and all that.


I am still working on this, it goes without saying. :P 39,153 words, with a fair bit of progress on Douglas route. It's going to be interesting how people's opinions of Douglas shift as they get through his route, to say the least.

I don't have an estimated release date at this point, but I am going to put up notices as I finish each route. I believe Jeff route is the closest, but the others may yet surprise me.
Forever Alone: Nerds the Gathering - A brotome game. (Nerdy Valentine's Day Card and small status update 2/14/14)
Night at the Hospital - Maiden voyage of Team Snugglebunny
Skylessia: Tale of the Boon - Epic fantasy whatsit, currently on hiatus.
Viking Pipsqueak Productions Blog (under construction)

I occasionally frequently draw other people's characters. Now offering delinquentization, medievalization, and cyborgification. Hit me up in PM if you want sprites for your KN or non-ren'ai VN.

EVEN IF THE TENDONS OF MY THUMBS TEAR INTO NOTHINGNESS, EVEN IF I GO NEARSIGHTED FROM STARING TOO HARD AT THE SCREEN, EVEN IF MY BODY IS CLOSE TO COLLAPSE FROM THE 72 HOURS I HAVE GONE WITHOUT FOOD! I WILL DEFEAT YOU!

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Re: Forever Alone: Nerds the Gathering [DEMO UP 10/8/11]

#82 Post by Kura »

Maybe a pixel font? Some of them are pretty readable and still fairly nerdy.

Edit: Actually, scratch that, that website doesn't really have good ones. D: But you get the idea.
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Complete Chasing the Sun [a meditation on light] :: In Progress RESET [guilt, love, existentialism, and video games]

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Re: Forever Alone: Nerds the Gathering [DEMO UP 10/8/11]

#83 Post by leon »

I was thinking of something like this with "green on black" http://linux.koolsolutions.com/wp-conte ... 3/boot.png
For the font you can check this http://keithdevens.com/wiki/ProgrammerFonts or search for "programming fonts".

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Re: Forever Alone: Nerds the Gathering [DEMO UP 10/8/11]

#84 Post by Omnificent »

Kura and leon: I'm afraid I haven't had much time to screw around with fonts, but once the script is done and I start getting into the technical nitty-gritty I will definitely be coming back to interface concerns.

Speaking of the script! Not only is this project not-dead, I have hit 60000 words, making this far and away the longest thing I have ever written (prize before that went to a 15000 word short story). We'll see if I end up breaching 100000, but I'm pretty sure I've at least hit the halfway mark by now.

Here are a few things in celebration:

1. Unfortunately, there will not be a beach episode in the game. So instead I am bringing the beach episode to the thread. So much fanservice

Image

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2. Some fun facts about the characters and who they're based off:

-Mike bears a resemblance to several girls I've known, most notably a girl who was the president of Anime Club senior year of college and one of my housemates. A lot of the way she phrases things is pretty much down to what I think is funny, and her experiences draw somewhat on my own.

-Kurt looks exactly like: my dad, one of my fellow Geology majors from college, one of my friends from college but palette-swapped, and my old roommate's older brother. Personality/background-wise, he is like my first friend from high school mixed with bits and pieces of my DnD buddies, the officials of the Anime and Gaming Clubs from freshman year of college, my occasional tendency to troll, and all the chill people who left the online communities I frequented behind.

-Douglas has the same hairstyle that both an online acquaintance of mine and one of the underclassmen I knew in college used to have. His personality and interests are based off the guy I palette-swapped for Kurt's appearance, one of my DnD buddies/fellow visual novel aficionados (though Douglas does not share aficionadohood for visual novels), a Physics major friend, one of the guys I stole his hair from, a kid I knew in middle school, my thing for robotics/AI, and a whole host of people I've encountered in my years as a member of various forums.

-Jeff looks like two of the not-me token Asian friends in my college social group. His interest in rhythm games and ancient weaponry is from me, his interest in cosplay from one of the girls Mike was based off, his interest in moe from some more of my token Asian friends, his liking for puns and silly humor from me, one of my token Asian friends, and the Physics major, and his interest in
from me, 4chan, the aforementioned token Asian friends, and one of the guys Greg resembles.

-Speaking of Greg, he is about the size of me relative to the rest of my friends but has the hair color of the guy I palette-swapped for Kurt and the general appearance of my metalhead friend. The long curly-wavy hair is also a tribute to all the curly-haired nerds I know. His personality is a cross between that of my metalhead friend and that of the most stoic of my token Asian friends, mixed with an ample amount of classic nerd rage and inspiration from artists on Youtube, Newgrounds, and various forums. His habit of sneaking up on people and scaring the shit out of them is, again, from Kurt palette-swap.

-Facially, Matthew looks somewhat like one of the friends Douglas is based off of. Dress-sense-wise, the Kurt palette-swap. Personality-wise, he is like my best friend from high school, my best friend online, a kid from my college's debate team, a guy who played Magic with us sometimes, every reviewer who's ever written a smartass article, goons from Something Awful, some Youtubers, and some of my own complexes/neuroses from both
and
.

So in short, everyone is a little bit of a Frankenstein of self-insert plus a bunch of people I know both personally and by extension, at least originally. And to some extent, all of them are based off stereotypical otome game archetypes, except that the archetypes they match up to are almost all completely switched around from what you would expect at first glance.
Forever Alone: Nerds the Gathering - A brotome game. (Nerdy Valentine's Day Card and small status update 2/14/14)
Night at the Hospital - Maiden voyage of Team Snugglebunny
Skylessia: Tale of the Boon - Epic fantasy whatsit, currently on hiatus.
Viking Pipsqueak Productions Blog (under construction)

I occasionally frequently draw other people's characters. Now offering delinquentization, medievalization, and cyborgification. Hit me up in PM if you want sprites for your KN or non-ren'ai VN.

EVEN IF THE TENDONS OF MY THUMBS TEAR INTO NOTHINGNESS, EVEN IF I GO NEARSIGHTED FROM STARING TOO HARD AT THE SCREEN, EVEN IF MY BODY IS CLOSE TO COLLAPSE FROM THE 72 HOURS I HAVE GONE WITHOUT FOOD! I WILL DEFEAT YOU!

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Re: Forever Alone: Nerds the Gathering [DEMO UP 10/8/11]

#85 Post by Nejisa »

Omnificent wrote:Kura and leon: I'm afraid I haven't had much time to screw around with fonts, but once the script is done and I start getting into the technical nitty-gritty I will definitely be coming back to interface concerns.
Good luck with that. I tried to do some work on that and it is more difficult that i thought :?
Omnificent wrote:Speaking of the script! Not only is this project not-dead, I have hit 60000 words, making this far and away the longest thing I have ever written (prize before that went to a 15000 word short story). We'll see if I end up breaching 100000, but I'm pretty sure I've at least hit the halfway mark by now.
Congrats!! Im so happy to know that it will be a very worth and long game~~ :mrgreen:
Omnificent wrote:...1. Unfortunately, there will not be a beach episode in the game. So instead I am bringing the beach episode to the thread. So much fanservice...
Why??? T_T
When i first saw the post and i look at the attached photos i almost had a heartattack XD It woul be sooooo~~~ funny, hahaha i can even imagine it in my head X3
The scenes: LOLLLLLLLLLL Mathew is definetely my favorite XDDD If you finally decide to include the scene im sure it will be very, very funny :lol:

PS: YAY! Fanservice~~ :twisted:
Omnificent wrote:2. Some fun facts about the characters and who they're based off: ...
Im not surprised to read that your characters are a mixing of many people you have know untill now, because it is the same here. I was thinking of doing the same thing in my own post :lol:
It was very interesting to read, really. Btw, the reference to your dad killed me XD

Im very looking forward to this game, so much~~~
I wish you good luck :P
Last edited by Nejisa on Sun Feb 19, 2012 9:43 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Forever Alone: Nerds the Gathering [Halfwrittenpalooza 2

#86 Post by gekiganwing »

Glad to hear this project is alive and active! Looking forward to the next demo, or a full version.

From what I've read and recall, I'm not sure if FA:NtG can be described as a bromance. Wikipedia has a serious article about the term, and the Urban Dictionary talks about it casually. Maybe your interpretation varies... or maybe the rest of the game focuses on the guys and their relationships with each other.

Also, one search for "bromance game" later, I found an article on the topic on 7-bit Arcade. Each mainstream game discussed in the article -- Gears of War, Kane and Lynch, and Double Dragon -- includes two men who are at least implicitly hetero. Most of their in-game interactions are with the other guy.

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Re: Forever Alone: Nerds the Gathering [DEMO UP 10/8/11]

#87 Post by CheeryMoya »

Omnificent wrote:1. Unfortunately, there will not be a beach episode in the game. So instead I am bringing the beach episode to the thread. So much fanservice
HOW DARE YOU DENY US FANSERVICE IN THE GAME Nah, all these extra doodles and pics you do as supplementary material to the game are good enough for me :3 It was totes sweet to see everyone in their swim gear. I love how Kurt's ripped bod sparkles *_* And methinks that you are getting better with drawing hands. Comparing the sprites to these pictures, I say there's a huge increase in the quality of your art. Maybe you should take the time to go back and redraw them again, or at least edit the hands. It'd do the game great injustice if you didn't :'C

And I liked that wall of text with all the inspirations for these wonderful bros :D 'Twas a fun read.

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Re: Forever Alone: Nerds the Gathering [Halfwrittenpalooza 2

#88 Post by leon »

Kura and leon: I'm afraid I haven't had much time to screw around with fonts, but once the script is done and I start getting into the technical nitty-gritty I will definitely be coming back to interface concerns.
I mentioned the whole font thing as a joke (the green console font at least). And GUI is one of the few things I can offer critique on.

I think it's best to finilize the GUI at the very end of developement, when all the other elements are in place.

It's great to see this is moving ahead. Keep up the good work.

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Re: Forever Alone: Nerds the Gathering [Halfwrittenpalooza 2

#89 Post by Applegate »

It'd do the game great injustice if you didn't :'C
He's already despairing over the code, don't make him despair over the art as well. :P

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Re: Forever Alone: Nerds the Gathering [Halfwrittenpalooza 2

#90 Post by gekiganwing »

It's been a little over a month. If I may ask, how is game development going? I don't mean to be a pest, but I'm curious as to how FA:NtG is progressing.

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