colorless day

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denzil
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colorless day

#1 Post by denzil »

Everything faded into grey. Everyone continues their lives without the ability to change them. And the sun cannot break trough clouds with its light...

colorless day tells three short stories from a such world.
in silence, last dance, unkept promise are stories that colorless day is made of. Each of the stories takes place in different place and with different people. But enough about what colorless day is, you can easily download it and find out for yourselves.
I would like to thank to everyone who participated in the whole thing and who invested their time in this project.
denzil

You can download it here
Last edited by denzil on Fri Nov 21, 2008 5:45 am, edited 1 time in total.
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dizzcity
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#2 Post by dizzcity »

Um... links don't seem to be working. I tried all three - Windows, Linux and the zip. It says the file isn't found. Is it just me, or does someone else have the same problem?

-Dizzy-
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denzil
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#3 Post by denzil »

dizzcity wrote:Um... links don't seem to be working. I tried all three - Windows, Linux and the zip. It says the file isn't found. Is it just me, or does someone else have the same problem?

-Dizzy-
Sorry, I thought I fixed all those problems...
Links here work: http://denzil.ic.cz/

Edit: Fixed
Last edited by denzil on Sun Oct 22, 2006 1:18 am, edited 1 time in total.
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#4 Post by DaFool »

edit: nevermind, ok so far.

Congratulations!

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#5 Post by mikey »

Congratulations!

*Yaaaaawn* it's so early in the morning! And it's Sunday ^_^. I should still be sleeping.

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#6 Post by denzil »

mikey wrote:Congratulations!
Thanks.
mikey wrote:*Yaaaaawn* it's so early in the morning! And it's Sunday ^_^. I should still be sleeping.
Don't tell me you got up so early because of the release :?
Next time I release in the evening.
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#7 Post by dizzcity »

Congrats!

Preliminary Comments (immediately after one play-through):

It's... interesting. I'm still having mixed feelings about it and a sense of disorientation, as if I'm not quite sure what to make of it, or how to experience it properly.

Art:

Haha, speaking as part of the creative community and not as a user, I found it very enjoyable to spot who did what pieces of art. :) The three art styles of the characters are so distinct that it's very clear which artist was responsible. (And the girl in the first story really DID look like Nagato... with a bit of child Yukina's hair)

However, speaking critically, I would say that some of the art styles tended to clash with one another. I speak primarily about the first story, since it's most noticeable there. The BG shot of the town/school combined with the blurry people in front seemed rather strange. The difference between modified-from-real-photos and drawn-from-scratch was too obvious and glaring in black and white. (Perhaps colour might have looked better, but I don't know). And both of them clashed with the CG event that BCS drew (girl with book). The girl sprite on top of the damaged street background looked okay though.

The second story obviously had very clear art coordination between background and sprite, and it shows. The third story had art styles that were close enough to blend fairly well. I didn't notice many obvious discrepancies.

Music

Music-wise, I found the first melody of the first story disturbing (as it was probably meant to be). Still, it sort of discouraged me slightly from wanting to continue. Maybe a slightly more attractive opening piece would have been better. (But then again, I'm not very partial to the gloom-and-doom kind of story anyway, so maybe it's just a matter of taste. Someone who likes that kind of mood might fully enjoy such a weird melody as the opening piece). The second story's music was barely adequate, but I think it should have been stronger. I get the feeling it was almost-but-not-quite ballroom dance music. That's just the sense I get. Something is slightly off. You can tell it's meant to be a dance piece like a waltz or something, but there's just a little niggly thing (which I can't identify) that keeps it from being all right. The music for the third story was the best. I felt it perfectly suited the story and theme.


Direction and layout:

First, I fully appreciate how you structured this to be an anthology. It's a great idea, and something I'd like to try myself one of these days. I would suggest removing the dual-language descriptors for everything in the Main Menu, though. I found it redundant to have Czech labels for the English stories, and English labels for the Czech stories. Maybe a clearer separation between the two languages (like a boundary box) could be better, too.

I also liked the flashing poems on the left-side, though there was one passage which faded out a bit too fast. I can't remember the exact words, but I know it was the longest passage. I managed to read all the others in time, but that one was just a little too long for the timespan given. You might want to adjust that.

Now, as for plot, theme and translation:

First, the translations were quite well done. :) There were a couple of things which I found a little awkward, but I guess that's part of the problem when trying to translate from one language to another. I know what it's like, so I can understand the difficulty. You went for more of a word-for-word translation rather than a meaning-for-meaning one, didn't you? It comes out - not so much in the grammar or word choice, but in the style of expression. Fluency might be the best way to put it. The meaning still gets across well, but it's not as 'fluent' (i.e. doesn't "flow" as well) as when a native English speaker would have written it. Maybe a meaning-for-meaning translation might prove to be interesting. We could then compare and contrast the two. But that's just side speculation. I think the translation is good as it is.

Story-wise, I liked the third one the best, because of the sudden open ending. :) The first was metaphorical (is anyone else reminded of "The Little Match Girl"?), the second was very much trying to capture the mood of the moment, but the third was drama. And I like drama. :) I got a clearer sense of the story in Unkept Promise than I did in the other two. The way you left the last line just hanging there without a real explanation lets the reader imagine what they want, and that's always attractive to people like me. Did she turn into a "body without a soul"? Was she not there at all? Is she dead? Did something stop the protagonist from getting past the top of the hill? Is the tree itself gone? Who knows? But it's fun to speculate. :D

The Last Dance was... weak, I felt. I don't know. I'm still trying to find a word to articulate how I felt when I read it. I think it was either the usage of second-person, or the ineffectiveness of the narration, but it just didn't have much power in it. It's like... neither here nor there. The transition between present and past wasn't... strong enough? clear enough? (Argh - What's the word to describe it?) No... rhythm, maybe. It just didn't all come together well for me. Maybe the use of a repeated symbol or phrase might have strengthened it. (It's hard to explain without using examples, but the only examples I have are from my own writing).

The first story was nice. There are, of course, a lot of things left unexplained. (What happened in the past? Why are they going to school? What are they afraid of? Why doesn't the boy go home to sleep?) It starts off normally but get increasingly weirder. The sequence with the girl in the damaged street is the only part that counts, really. Their coming together, sleeping together, and going off into the sea together is the central point of the story for me. I'm SO reminded of "The Little Match Girl", by Hans Christian Andersen. Did the ending mean that they died? Did they find happiness together? What does the shift of scene from city to ocean represent? Is it freedom? Is it beauty? The end of loneliness and monotony, perhaps. Who knows? :)


Overall, it's a interesting piece. I wouldn't want to play it over and over again, but it's good for display purposes as an example of an artistic work. (IMHO this is an example of a work by an Artiste, not an Entertainer, for those of you who were following the other thread.)

<End of Preliminary Comments>

-Dizzy-
A smart man follows the rules, a dumb man breaks them. A great man bends the rules and thus creates them.
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#8 Post by mikey »

denzil wrote:Don't tell me you got up so early because of the release :?
Next time I release in the evening.
Of course I did ^_^. Ah, not really, my darling has a day shift at the hospital today, and when she leaves in the morning I can't sleep anymore :oops:

dizzcity (ad translation) >> To be honest, I've often completely changed the type of sentence and the style of the narrative as well, even adding and removing lines and deliberately avoiding common phrases that sort of automatically came to mind. It's actually very far from word-by-word - of course there may be some grammar issues (I asked the guys to correct things if they found something to be particularly strange), but the atmosphere was my main concern. The original is profound emotion, wrapped in an artistic shell, and I wanted this to transpire first and foremost. Otherwise, point taken. My peace of mind is that denzil accepted them, so I take it that it represents the stories with all the unexplained and open elements - there were several sentences that I needed to have explained as to what they meant, and we also elaborated on a few key lines because of this together.

As for the stories, it's not a secret that it's exactly these types of stories that aren't my kind of thing. But I actually really enjoyed translating them - maybe because I don't have the subconscious motivation to be "creative" and modify the work with the translation. And I really had a great time working on it, it was a different sort of creativity.

---

As for my own "impartial" views, I obviously liked the Dance story the best, it was the most down-to-earth one. And I also have to say that the music fitted quite well - it had a nice melody, which is what I like. To be fair though, the other songs also fitted somehow, for the other stories I think that melodies would just distract - the ballroom was nice I thought, because it was a simple situation and an emotional moment, which is when melodies are best, and this one really gave it a sense of the moment.

I was also particularly happy with the composition of the girl and the cherry tree - it's such a nice scene, plain, but it captures the romantic mood.

Anyway, I had no idea this would develop into such a collaborative effort, to say it once again, it was really a great feeling seeing what started as one story that denzil sent me and I asked him whether I could translate it - and never mind that poems aren't my thing, because I've really grown to like this project for all the efforts that have been put into it, and I'm really happy it's made it all the way.

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#9 Post by Boch »

Didn't follow the development thread, but just want to comment a bit after playing it yesterday. Hope you don't mind...

First off, I know they're supposed to be short stories, but maybe it was... a little too short??

I felt connected the most to the first story with the Yuki lookalike (even the uniform is the same, a parody?) because it had enough length to hook me in. Made it seem like it was like one of those "unreal dream world" plots.

The 2nd story (last dance?) was on the shorter side like the 3rd story. Personally, I'm not into the whole ballroom dancing story thing so no comments because it would be a one-sided opinion.

3rd story starts off with a guy running for an appointment. The ending was abrupt but I can guess what really happened to the girl. :cry:

One particular music track was a little loud, and distracting, the 1st and 3rd story used that same music if I'm not mistaken. I turned off the music on my second read for a quiet experience.

Overall though, it was good. All 3 stories made me depressed for a day, so you should be happy about that :)
Just one more try...

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#10 Post by denzil »

Thanks for comments. Sorry it took so long to reply.
dizzcity wrote:...
That was a quite long comment...
>>Art - first story
I know it's not perfect, but I was quite satisfied with it.
>>Music
I actully liked music for the second story most.
dizzcity wrote:I wouldn't want to play it over and over again
Haven't watched the thread, but I never expected this to be played over and over again. Anyway I'm glad you found it interesting.
Boch wrote:Hope you don't mind...
Actually I'm happy for comments. :)
Boch wrote:a little too short??
I know it's short but I'm not sure if I could make it longer. I don't say it's not possible, but I have difficulties when writing long stories and the quality would probably go down.
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#11 Post by F.I.A »

Firstly, congratulation on making your second VN, albeit a collaborative work.

Well, as the other has said, the game is practically short. At first, I thought that each of the stories relates to one another in a way(Like, same world, different individual and such), but guess not.

While story 2 and 3 give a good start-to-end plot, I think story 1 is rather lacking. It seems like the content is rather rushed. that it lacks narrative of what actually happened. I have to rewind it times to times trying to understand what happened, but sometimes even that will not help.

Then again, gloomy stories are not really my thing as well, so forgive me if I fam harsh.
Last edited by F.I.A on Wed Oct 25, 2006 6:32 am, edited 1 time in total.
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#12 Post by DaFool »

I think it's his second VN... (not counting his translations / ports) the first one was Katherine.

but anyways, short works are the trend, maybe?

Guest

#13 Post by Guest »

Could somone please upload the windows version up on to rapidshare for me please. For some odd reason everytime i try to download it always fails.

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#14 Post by casper »

That was me wasnt log in.

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#15 Post by dizzcity »

A smart man follows the rules, a dumb man breaks them. A great man bends the rules and thus creates them.
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Writer and director of Working Woman (NaNoRenO March 2010)
Writer and director of Wedding Vows (finished 2009).
Creator of Lakeside Sunset (finished 2006).

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