A Simple Love Story [BxG|Romance|Slice of Life] [Short]

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chocojax
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A Simple Love Story [BxG|Romance|Slice of Life] [Short]

#1 Post by chocojax »

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Image

A Simple Love Story
[WEBSITE] | [DOWNLOAD]

----- A b o u t -----

genres: romance, slice of life
length: short (approx. 10 minutes for one route)
warnings: Emily's route has suggestive themes

A young man named Michael happens to meet two of his classmates: Aceline and Emily,
adding some spice to his mundane, everyday life.

Contains approximately 6,500 words, 2 endings, 3 CGs, 9 piano tracks and a simple love story.
Extras includes a CG gallery, sketches, other art and a music box.


----- C h a r a c t e r s -----

Image

----- S c r e e n s h o t s -----

Image Image Image
Image Image Image

----- D o w n l o a d -----

(v1.0 released on 9/18/2013)

A Simple Love Story v1.0 [Windows]

A Simple Love Story v1.0 [Mac]

A Simple Love Story v1.0 [Linux]


----- C r e d i t s -----

Artist, Writer and Programmer:
chocojax (http://www.chocojax.spacenote.net)

Soundtrack Artists:
Frithjof Brauer (http://www.mpia.de/homes/brauer/jazz.html)
Paolo Pavan (http://www.paolopavan.info)
Paolo di Sabatino (http://www.paolodisabatino.it)

Sound Effects:
SoundJay (http://www.soundjay.com)

Beta-Testers: Applegate, Kinjo, Maelstrom-Fenrir

Other Cool People: CheeryMoya, Leon Zavsek

"A Simple Love Story" was produced by spaceNote
(http://www.spacenote.net)

Thank you!

.
** If you can, please post your thoughts in this thread (or PM it to me, or e-mail to admin@spacenote.net). It'll help me out a lot with future games, so I'd appreciate it!
Last edited by chocojax on Sun Sep 22, 2013 1:47 am, edited 2 times in total.

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Applegate
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Re: A Simple Love Story [BxG|Romance|Slice of Life] [Short]

#2 Post by Applegate »

First.

I liked this. In a long while I haven't had an EVN I'd read from start to finish, so that's a refreshing change of pace.

What (or rather, who) I liked most was Emily. Perhaps that's because, deep down, I really enjoy people who are able to speak their mind and act eccentric without care, considering how much my homeland focuses on behaving "normally". Maybe I also don't like demure girls, like Aceline.

I really enjoyed her route, although her closed eyes grinning sprite just looked like she had a headache. Her head bobbling was a bit distracting.

The calculus class segment seemed a bit pointless, considering he glossed over it. I'm not sure how to do it different, but personally I'd go for a black screen and then a quick tell, since that seems to be the way to go about "and then time passed" segments. In my mind, anyway.

That it looks better than anything I've made just makes me go \(-___________-;)/. Well done, chocotto panicku~

(I'm super glad my joke made it in, even if it's lame. :'D)

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Re: A Simple Love Story [BxG|Romance|Slice of Life] [Short]

#3 Post by Googaboga »

Congrats on the release :mrgreen:. I'll play it later today and give a proper response then.
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Re: A Simple Love Story [BxG|Romance|Slice of Life] [Short]

#4 Post by Hazel-Bun »

Yeah, glad to see this completed! I'll download and play (most likely) on the weekend ^^

Just wanted to come back and say I really enjoyed this game! It was short, sweet and a good job overall!
Last edited by Hazel-Bun on Sat Oct 05, 2013 5:53 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: A Simple Love Story [BxG|Romance|Slice of Life] [Short]

#5 Post by MaiMai »

Congrats on the release!! Definitely gonna give this a play. (also why am I not following you on Tumblr)
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Re: A Simple Love Story [BxG|Romance|Slice of Life] [Short]

#6 Post by chocojax »

@Applegate: Thanks for the review! I've already told you my response, but I'll do it again anyway.
"What (or rather, who) I liked most was Emily. Perhaps that's because, deep down, I really enjoy people who are able to speak their mind and act eccentric without care, considering how much my homeland focuses on behaving "normally". Maybe I also don't like demure girls, like Aceline."
Haha, glad you liked one of them, at least. I feel like I like both of them equally, but that's only because I gave birth to them, in a way. :P

"I really enjoyed her route, although her closed eyes grinning sprite just looked like she had a headache. Her head bobbling was a bit distracting."
Oh, was it? Since they only had one pose, I didn't want them to look entirely static. Though, I should've done poses > more outfits, haha.

"The calculus class segment seemed a bit pointless, considering he glossed over it. I'm not sure how to do it different, but personally I'd go for a black screen and then a quick tell, since that seems to be the way to go about "and then time passed" segments. In my mind, anyway."
Yeah, that sounds a lot better. It did feel strange to me, although I didn't have any ideas of how to do a better transition. (I also wanted to reuse the classroom BG, so there's that...)

"(I'm super glad my joke made it in, even if it's lame. :'D)"
It was the best joke in the entire VN, loool.
@Googaboga, Hazel-Bun, MaiMai: Thanks! I do hope you guys will enjoy reading it. :'D

(@MaiMai: i dunno man, but i'm apparently not following you either??)

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Re: A Simple Love Story [BxG|Romance|Slice of Life] [Short]

#7 Post by Didules »

Congratulations on the release!
This is indeed a very cute game, although it is so short! I was surprised: I finished everything in 20 minutes :o But it was fun so I guess I'm okay with that ^^
Both routes were really cute, I don't know what else to say... Oh, right, I guess you got a lot of this but the art is amazing as ever! I really like the first CG, the girls seem to be having fun, that's nice! As Applegate said, Emily was moving her head a bit too much, since I read fast it felt as if she was on vibrate mode! The backgrounds were nice (although the pond one really made me laugh because of the ducks!)
Oh, the french aprt really made me laugh too!
I hope to see another game from you soon!
Thank you for the game!

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Re: A Simple Love Story [BxG|Romance|Slice of Life] [Short]

#8 Post by scorlight »

looks cute :D I'll try it
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Re: A Simple Love Story [BxG|Romance|Slice of Life] [Short]

#9 Post by chocojax »

@Didules: Thanks! I'm glad you enjoyed it. (I should probably update the estimated time length, haha.)
(About the moving heads) I'll keep that in mind for my future VNs. In honesty, I should've made poses instead of extra outfits+moveable head.
I'm quite happy you thought the backgrounds are nice, since it's the first time I finished attempts at VN backgrounds. (Ducks are always a nice touch to everything!)
Pfft, I hope you liked the French part. I had to ask a friend of mine to translate for me. :9
You're welcome! Thanks for reading it. :>

@scorlight: I hope you like it! :V

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Re: A Simple Love Story [BxG|Romance|Slice of Life] [Short]

#10 Post by Genod »

This was a fun little VN. I enjoyed the half hour or so that I put into playing both routes.
Michael seems the weakest part of it, to me. I know protagonists in these kinds of games are supposed to be a bit bland, but I do have to wonder what Emily saw in him prior to the story beginning; given his super-aloofness. Besides that, the only thing I remember about his past is that he apparently once hit a girl and Emily doesn't shed any light on her attraction either from what I remember.
I liked that there was original art for everything, especially the backgrounds given that most re-use free resources for that. The GUI in particular is really nicely done! The sprites are lovely too, with Aceline's being particularly adorable. And yes maybe the head-bobbing was a bit weird, although I didn't really find it distracting personally. It seemed an economical way of mixing things up without overexerting yourself on drawing whole new poses for everyone.

Anyway, nice work :)

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Re: A Simple Love Story [BxG|Romance|Slice of Life] [Short]

#11 Post by chocojax »

@Genod: I'm glad you enjoyed it!
"Michael seems the weakest part of it, to me. I know protagonists in these kinds of games are supposed to be a bit bland, but I do have to wonder what Emily saw in him prior to the story beginning; given his super-aloofness."
Yeah, he is. I didn't notice too much until one of my friends pointed it out to me earlier. I believe it's because I had set personalities for Emily and Aceline (since, as you probably know, they're characters I made up from a few years ago) whereas Michael was made up on the spot. I should've put more time into planning, but I was pretty excited to start, so... :P
I will (consciously) keep this in mind for my next work, though. Hopefully the main character won't be so "what kind of person is this?".

"Besides that, the only thing I remember about his past is that he apparently once hit a girl"
Wwwell, that was only included since I thought it was funny. (A lot of stuff I left in 'cause I thought it was funny, if you couldn't tell.)

"Emily doesn't shed any light on her attraction either from what I remember."
Right, my friend from earlier also brought this up. I should've thought about+written about why they both ended up liking him, as well as why he ended up liking the both of them too.
"I liked that there was original art for everything, especially the backgrounds given that most re-use free resources for that. The GUI in particular is really nicely done! The sprites are lovely too, with Aceline's being particularly adorable."
Thanks! I made this VN mainly to 1) finish something and 2) push myself to do things that I didn't do before, such as drawing backgrounds. So, I'm glad you liked them (even though the backgrounds were really derpy, haha).

"And yes maybe the head-bobbing was a bit weird, although I didn't really find it distracting personally. It seemed an economical way of mixing things up without overexerting yourself on drawing whole new poses for everyone."
Right. It seems like a few people are so-so about it, whereas some others find it distracting. (I personally feel neutral about it, especially since I got the idea from Umineko.) It was a nice alternative to drawing extra poses though, haha.

Thanks for your comments! :>>

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Re: A Simple Love Story [BxG|Romance|Slice of Life] [Short]

#12 Post by NinjaNick »

From what I can see the screen shots look great and I am loving the art! Downloading the game right now :P

Will reply again on my review

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Re: A Simple Love Story [BxG|Romance|Slice of Life] [Short]

#13 Post by philip »

A very nice story! Well done, seems like the ones I like are always too short, darn it.
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Re: A Simple Love Story [BxG|Romance|Slice of Life] [Short]

#14 Post by NinjaNick »

I just finished playing both stories and it was very enjoyable! I only wish it was a little longer but the title pointed that out to me :P Please add on to the story or make more games I loved it! I also prefer the Emily choice since they actually get to kiss while Aceline, and Michael just go on a date. By the way the art is fantastic if you drew it, I am very impressed.

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Re: A Simple Love Story [BxG|Romance|Slice of Life] [Short]

#15 Post by chocojax »

@philip: Thanks! I'm glad you liked it. :>

@NinjaNick: I'm glad you enjoyed it! (I'm sure the title pointed out a lot of things to people, haha.)

"Please add on to the story or make more games I loved it!"
I'm planning on making more VNs in the future! If I do get a lot better at writing, I'd love to fix up some parts of the story (and possibly add more to it) in the future.
"I also prefer the Emily choice since they actually get to kiss while Aceline, and Michael just go on a date."
Yeah, same here. When I thought about the endings, Emily seemed more likely to be the one MC'd get a kiss from, whereas Aceline is much to innocent (pfpgt) in my own mind. Soooo.
"By the way the art is fantastic if you drew it, I am very impressed."
Haha, thanks!

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