Yandere in 100 Words (creepy romantic short stories)

[Amy]

Yandere: A character who loves to the point of insanity.

...My first visual novel ^^; not counting the completely random ones that will never see the light of day.

This is a collection of the 100-word short stories that Kat and I have been posting on Tumblr. They all have a serious tone, and quite a few of them have been called "creepy".

Features:
- 27 x 100-word short stories (of which 3 are new and never posted elsewhere)
- Fancy text effects
- 3 loops of public domain classical music recordings (baroque, if you’re fussy about these things - they all happen to be composed by Bach) that can be changed in-story using the 3 hearts on the left.

There aren't any illustrations, but there's a range of background images to match the stories.

Kat and I also make the Yandere Squared webcomic together. Please stop by if you like random 4-panel comedy :3

Downloads:

Windows

Macintosh

Linux

Please tell me what you think!

(Yandere fans from Tumblr might recognise the hearts in the title screen background from YANDERE.ttf.)

[fleet]

Please edit the link for Yandre Squared. It says kttp instead of http.
Very respectfully,
fleet

[ShippoK]

I was never much of a poetic person, but I greatly enjoyed each and ever story on here, I felt even inspired through out the whole thing.

The music sets the tone very well as you read these disturbing little stories, so do the backgrounds. My favorite would probably be the (-Accident) sense it's so subtle.

I'm already watching the website for some more.

Great work on your first Ren'py Novel.

[specialtantei]

Well...time to critique~!

I was tend to love this kind of disturbing stories, and yours are no exception. I really liked the way you guys experimented through various sides of yandere characters using the 100 words limit. I found only two of them a bit out of tone, but in general, all were great. My favourites were Accident and Diamon (the first one for the subtleness and the second for the creepiness.
As for the visuals, they were fitting. No spirtes or complicated art is needed in this knd of literature, so kudos for that! The text effects were wonderfully placed, and the music was fitting. So, my grade is a 7.5/10 (I guess I'm being picky, still ).
PS: I loved the last effect. Yandere game ftw.

[Amy]

Please edit the link for Yandre Squared. It says kttp instead of http.
Very respectfully,
fleet

aaahhhhhh *dies of carelessness*
Thank you. ^^;

I was never much of a poetic person, but I greatly enjoyed each and ever story on here, I felt even inspired through out the whole thing.

The music sets the tone very well as you read these disturbing little stories, so do the backgrounds. My favorite would probably be the (-Accident) sense it's so subtle.

I'm already watching the website for some more.

Great work on your first Ren'py Novel.

Thanks :3 I'm glad you liked them!
It seems like in the sea of extreme and graphic yandere floating around (*looks at Mirai Nikki*) there are still plenty of people who like subtlety, huh. I could try doing more of those ^^
(The music took me about 24 hours in total to pick out /aaahh)

Well...time to critique~!

I was tend to love this kind of disturbing stories, and yours are no exception. I really liked the way you guys experimented through various sides of yandere characters using the 100 words limit. I found only two of them a bit out of tone, but in general, all were great. My favourites were Accident and Diamon (the first one for the subtleness and the second for the creepiness.
As for the visuals, they were fitting. No spirtes or complicated art is needed in this knd of literature, so kudos for that! The text effects were wonderfully placed, and the music was fitting. So, my grade is a 7.5/10 (I guess I'm being picky, still ).
PS: I loved the last effect. Yandere game ftw.

Thank you!
The 100-word limit is nice sometimes, because it forces us to distill our stories into the purest and most condensed representation of our ideas :3
Out of interest, which stories seemed out of tone?
(Ah, that ending thing. That was fun to do >:3 and fun to watch my friends play. Glad you liked that, too ^^)

[CheeryMoya]

Boy do I love this. It's quiet, eerie, and so unnerving. The subtlety of all the stories is really great like... someone's putting their arm around you ever so slowly and by the time you notice them it's too late ಠ_ಠ

The minimalism of the game also worked to your advantage here. Choice of 3 songs to play, simple backgrounds to convey setting, and no sprites or named characters to add vagueness. I hope you don't mind that I inserted some of my OTPs in place of the characters here >_> I can tell you put effort into coordinating the text effects to be perfect. I think the only qualm I have is that none of the GUI was changed, though it really isn't necessary since it's pretty short. Still, a mainly black screen with pink buttons isn't the best of combos.

Are you planning to make any more games after this? I know you guys have the y2blog to run but I'd love to see a larger game from you two O:

[RunicV]

This was quite an adorable VN to read!

I loved the male yandere characters.

My favourite was Chocolate, the way he describes her is so loving and kind. Most of the stories didn't really appear loving, more of just obsessive and possessive, and it felt like you lampshaded that in Obsession. Most of the stories felt a bit too rushed, so maybe lengthening the word limit might help next time. Another one that stood out to me was Expression. I felt like it was the most yandere of the group! I loved the way he kills her family, and not her instead. Although I went Q_Q for the family that got dragged into it. D: Spell was also good, and a nice twist.

One thing to note, in the first few stories, usage of "forever". It seemed a bit repetitive after a while, and I sadly didn't get creeped out, and got a bit annoyed when I saw it used again. At the end, when I went to quit, it was a nice touch to add the yandere thing. I was actually expecting it XD. But the ending page didn't seem that scary or frightening to me, so maybe you could've worked on that? IDK, scribble the words "dont leave" over and over and show it at as an end page? IDK LOL

Things to point out:
-good use of text effects and colours
-make the stories less rushed (lengthen the word limit?)
-more loving yanderes, and less obsessive
-more descriptive murders? I wasn't that creeped out by the hurting and bleeding part
-music is nice, having more than one choice is good
-interface and GUI are nice and simple, keep it that way
-words in title screen are a bit awkard to read
-more descriptions! Yanderes spend a lot of time admiring their loves!
-love the balance of subtle yandereness, although Accident was too subtle

Suggestion: I read this all in one shot, so it was a bit annoying to keep selecting more stories. Maybe you could have a "Next" button at the end of every story for those who want to read all like me?

Good job on your first release! Hope to see more yandere stories. All in all, it was a cute read.

[Amy]

@CheeryMoya
Thank you! :3 That's a really nice analogy, especially in the context of yandere, heh.
Ah, I should have known these would become OTP fuel XD I always think that people's imaginations can do more than any writing could, so the things I write end up being mostly atmospheric and sparse. >.>

...I thought about making a custom interface, but... Even those music buttons took me 3 hours of poking around to figure out how to make them work ^^; so I thought I'd leave it for the next project...which will probably not appear for a very long time because REAL LIFE.
I don't know, would it have been better to make everything monochrome?

We were thinking of making a longer original story, with actual branching and...probably no conventional good endings if I write it ^^; A lot of my attempts at happy endings get a "not sure whether to laugh or cry" response. Kat says she'll draw the character sprites as soon as she has time, which won't be for another half a year, the way things are going.

@RunicV
Thank you! Gasp, first critical comment XD
Eh, sorry about that. I can write obsession but not really affection, so the loving stories mostly come from Kat... ^^; Pacing is always hard to handle in strict word limits, so I'll try, perhaps, to distill the ideas further until they can comfortably work in 100 words. (Or start a Yandere in 200 Words series, or something. XD)

The stories were meant to be standalone, so I was worried it would seem repetitive if I made them into a collection - and it seems like I was right, huh >.>
I kept telling people it wasn't that creepy, but they kept disagreeing ^^; It was meant to be... Hmm. Cold and elegant and morbidly fascinating? Like iced black tea with almost no sugar? /fail
So I toned down the creepiness - for example, there used to be red writing on the title screen etc., but I removed them in favour of monochrome. The ending is probably the most overtly creepy part, and it was included as a fun little bonus, so... ^^;

OK, so maybe I sacrifice everything for atmosphere >.>;; because I only remember using descriptions when they build the tone, like in Cage. Probably not the best balance of priorities...

It's interesting to see the kinds of stories different people like. There's a place for heavy yandere, visceral and graphic like Mirai Nikki or Higurashi. There's a place for light yandere, with no body count but just as moving when done well, like in Shuffle. It seems that the first kind appeals to a larger demographic, maybe because violence is almost expected in entertainment nowadays?
(There's also a place for entirely implied yandere, but that doesn't seem to show up a lot in anime. I have this theory that on average, visual media like anime tend to be more overt, while writing tends to be more subtle - and visual novels can span everything in between. This one obviously leans towards the writing side.)

A next button! How did I not think of that D:
Maybe I'll re-release this sometime... Perhaps after we've written another 10 or so stories. Then we can improveify all the things :3

[saguaro]

It's nice to see a micro-flash collection in this format. (And the "Do you want to leave?" setup is awesome, btw.)

I like the use of pacing in text speed/placement/effects, but would prefer less clicking overall. Combining lines or using text tags so there are less clicks per screen could help.

If you want to continue sharing stories this way I see nothing wrong with eschewing the traditional VN look of sprites, bgs, etc. and just focusing on the writing with a format similar to this where the images/audio are used to enhance the mood without being obtrusive. I would echo CheeryMoya's suggestion on GUI. I'd rather see something like this wrapped in a nice GUI with some font magic than the usual kinetic VN format, especially if you want to focus on the writing instead of interactivity.

[Amy]

It's nice to see a micro-flash collection in this format. (And the "Do you want to leave?" setup is awesome, btw.)

I like the use of pacing in text speed/placement/effects, but would prefer less clicking overall. Combining lines or using text tags so there are less clicks per screen could help.

If you want to continue sharing stories this way I see nothing wrong with eschewing the traditional VN look of sprites, bgs, etc. and just focusing on the writing with a format similar to this where the images/audio are used to enhance the mood without being obtrusive. I would echo CheeryMoya's suggestion on GUI. I'd rather see something like this wrapped in a nice GUI with some font magic than the usual kinetic VN format, especially if you want to focus on the writing instead of interactivity.

Thank you!

Yeah, I was wondering if I should automate the text display on each page, so the reader only has to click at the end of the page. It would be useful to have an arrow to indicate the end of the page, too.

Time to study GUIs >.>;;

[tiya_nofurita]

Looks interesting. I'll drop by some feedback once I've played it.

[Coren]

I've only realized how unhealthy my fetish for (mostly female) yandere are after I read this. It was so mindblowing.

I loved the music box one.

[Amy]

Looks interesting. I'll drop by some feedback once I've played it.

Thank you :3

I've only realized how unhealthy my fetish for (mostly female) yandere are after I read this. It was so mindblowing.

I loved the music box one.

Oh my, what in the world could be unhealthy about it? >.> [Looks at pile of yandere stories, 100-word or otherwise]
Thank you, that one's my favourite (as you know). ^^

[tiya_nofurita]

So finally I have read some of the story provided. My thoughts ? I'm not really into poem, but the story beautifully written and creepy as well . Maybe on the next project you can try to costumize your GUI into a better look (yours is kinda...plain. but this is your first VN afterall and I understand that)
The music is fits the story, I like it ^^

p.s : Are you yandere type IRL ? no offense, just kidding :p

[KochiyaChii]

Can't be downloaded D: