OELVN: State of the Community

[Recca Phoenix]

I think the beauty of non-commercial games is that many of them choose to focus more on story than gameplay.
I have to use Meine Liebe as an example here again..... it was typical of the commercial ren'ai games I've played in that it focused far too much on stats-building (i.e. a week planner) and "dates," which recycle the same situations over and over again, with very few scenes between "you" and your love interest(s). The endings were hard to get too because of the numbers issue. Because the commercial games like these are focusing on length and gameplay, they've lost a compelling story.
What I tried to do in Drawn to You was make a game that still had a definite story even if you got a "bad" ending. It was written more like a "choose-your-own-adventure" novel than a video game.
Sure, having a "life sim" is entertaining for a while but it just gets monotonous. I'm going to sound like some kind of academic analyst here, but....the games like Meine Liebe don't let you "be yourself." Even though they seem highly open-ended, this doesn't always result in a good ending of any type (think Way of the Samurai 2) and there isn't really anything to do besides finding an FAQ to tell you what exact numbers you need to get Mr. X's good ending. I personally would much rather have some base story to go from, with the ability to change the flow of things.
Rambling again >_< oh well ^^;;;;
Erm, anyway, the picture is a diagram to illustrate the kind of approach I like to take in game-making.
I like to use the "tree" model, where you have decisions and branches throughout the story. In other words, player decisions determine not just the ending but the FLOW of the story. I like to use this model.
Meine Liebe would be the "stick" model, where the base story and gameplay is set, and you will see or not see certain events according to variables like your statistics numbers. The endings are also determined by this, but the main storyline is the same every time.
Some other fan-made games I've played follow the "sort of a tree" (for lack of a better title) model, where you probably meet all the love interests first before making any decisions OR where you have a set story for a while, but your decisions don't do anything until near the end. Basically, this model refers to games where the story flows the same way but has minor changes later depending on player decisions.
To each his/her own, but I just wanted to give my opinion. ^_^

[PrettySammy09]

Hmm, I really like your diagrams, Recca. I think I mostly follow the "sort-of tree" method in which the set events of the game are set up until a certain point, in which they vear off according to character.

[EwanG]

Well, you can now check out the Alpha version of my contribution to the future of OELVNs. More info at the Camp Handiba Development Thread...

[DaFool]

Some wisdom I finally learned regarding VN making

Well, for two unfinished projects on my belt, and no project yet which I've written / directed

*Geomancer Chronicles - epic adventure
*Hardcastle and Cromwell - an epic action adventure

The problem wasn't the 'epic' part, it was the 'adventure' part. Basically, adventure means travelling places and visiting sights and sounds. The problems with adventures in VN are the following
1.) Expensive on resources. (If you went to 20 places, you'd have to portray those 20 places, especially if you spent significant time on them.)
2.) Never-ending. (Like a good -- or bad -- road trip sort of movie, things just happen one after another, and you can't really tell which is the 'climax' event... until the 90 minutes are up. But in a VN, it can technically go on forever)

I also thought about how I only recently was able to complete a story. Even though I've been doing creative writing since grade school, I never really finished anything... always abandoning the writing several chapters through. I've always focused on action and only recently focused on characters. Action is resource-intensive. But with characters, I realized that even merely portraying their interactions can still make a decent story. So I start with characters everytime now... it has really aided my writing and virtually made writing blocks nonexistent. Basically, the story finishes when I've finished describing all the conflicts within each character, for all characters.

I like the soap opera approach. It forces you to set limits just like Nanoreno... here's the stage, here's the sprites, now act! [/b]

[monele]

Mmm... it's true that we haven't that many "one room" experiences... or something like sitcoms. Maybe something to think about ^^.

[mikey]

I've actually been looking into one-room games, and I have at least two concepts noted down. I also thought about the fact that a one-room game can have relatively quality art, because there's more time... ?

[monele]

Well it's either about the effiency where less bgs means more game.... or, yes, more time spent on that bg and the characters (more expressions/poses/outfits).

[DaFool]

Isn't the standard 2 rooms, though?

(Nettestadt Troll is technically 2 'giant' rooms / locales: the town and the cottage, except there are different views, i.e. inside/outside. Monele, technically Magibou is a one-room game...everything centered around the shop... technically, we could have gotten away with not illustrating the surrounding areas.)

I heard from my father who respects British mystery filmmaking, and he commented about how great this movie he watched where it was just one apartment -- an upstairs and a downstairs, while the conversations kept you on the edge of your seat for 2 hours

[monele]

Monele, technically Magibou is a one-room game...everything centered around the shop... technically, we could have gotten away with not illustrating the surrounding areas.)

Well mm... I might be wrong but I don't think it gives the impression it's in one room though... Maybe you, as the protagonist, don't get to travel much, but I think there is at least a sense of "the surroundings"... . As for MagBou 2, there will be more moving around so it won't hold anymore .

Actually I was referring to that kind of movies yes. It doesn't have to be *one* room, but the fact a place is rather small and/or closed (a train?) makes for efficiency... and an interesting story if well done. It does work better with thrillers and mysteries though, I guess.