Silent Nights - Nightmare into Darkness (VN)

[soloflareinteractive]

Hello everyone

I'm a new user to the forums (and the Ren'py visual novel engine).

I've been working on a paranormal survival horror series known as 'Silent Nights - Nightmare into Darkness'.

I have just released the first 7 chapters on itch.io and also have a demo for you to play @ http://soloflareinteractive.itch.io/silentnightsnid

Glad to be part of the community.

Many Thanks

[Bto3]

Hey there! I went ahead and played your game courtesy of the download keys in the other thread, and in hopes that you do continue making games, I wanted to give you some feedback!

I'm going to go ahead and put my feedback under spoiler text so I don't have to worry about spoiling anyone

So, first and foremost, I do like your premise and your use of stock images was honestly a lot better than I was expecting! I can tell you put a lot of work into putting the images together, and I do feel they work well!

Now, as for the writing itself, the plot isn't bad, it has potential, and zombie apocalypses are a fun thing to explore, but the entire first chapter was extremely confusing as to who was narrating (seriously, who was narrating??), and the writing style shifted between a normal narrative and "script style" with asterisks for seemingly no reason. The script could do with a lot of editing and it would do you well to get an editor!

I did enjoy the characters though, and I hope you do make another game to explore them further and tie back chapters 2-6 to chapter 1. I genuinely feel this could be a good little game to play!

If you would like a more in depth critique, I can totally do that for you but I've forgotten a lot of the details now.

[soloflareinteractive]

Hey there! I went ahead and played your game courtesy of the download keys in the other thread, and in hopes that you do continue making games, I wanted to give you some feedback!

I'm going to go ahead and put my feedback under spoiler text so I don't have to worry about spoiling anyone

So, first and foremost, I do like your premise and your use of stock images was honestly a lot better than I was expecting! I can tell you put a lot of work into putting the images together, and I do feel they work well!

Now, as for the writing itself, the plot isn't bad, it has potential, and zombie apocalypses are a fun thing to explore, but the entire first chapter was extremely confusing as to who was narrating (seriously, who was narrating??), and the writing style shifted between a normal narrative and "script style" with asterisks for seemingly no reason. The script could do with a lot of editing and it would do you well to get an editor!

I did enjoy the characters though, and I hope you do make another game to explore them further and tie back chapters 2-6 to chapter 1. I genuinely feel this could be a good little game to play!

If you would like a more in depth critique, I can totally do that for you but I've forgotten a lot of the details now.

Hello Bto3,

And thank you so much for your valuable feedback. It is much appreciated because it is what helps us improve our future seasons.

I totally agree with everything you have said, and would appreciate a detailed review/feedback if you can please.

By the way, season 2 is actually already in production, and one thing I can definitely tell you is that improvements are being made to ensure it surpasses the first season. I also got some nice surprises in there too . .

Considering this is my first visual novel, I feel delighted to be part of the community and hope to keep improving and bringing you the best in VN entertainment.

The second season will most definitely expand on the first, and I agree, the narrative should have indicated that Catherine was the one narrating. If I remember, I think I left it out to introduce her in the second chapter.

Once again, thanks for your feedback, and look out for the season 2 teaser!

Chapter 8 is already looking pretty awesome.


Soloflare Interactive Ltd

[Bto3]

Detailed feedback below! I might've missed a couple things, but hopefully it's a bit more thorough!

Any questions I ask are mostly rhetorical, and for you to think about rather than giving me an answer. I would honestly rather get the answer in the next game release, rather than as a spoiler now

You could do with fleshing out your characters a bit more, but namely, B and his girlfriend. They could have any kind of relationship, ranging from friends with benefits to a romantic couple, onwards to the possibility that they've been together for quite awhile and want to be together for the long run, whether that includes marriage or not. When you introduced B, you wrote him to be protective (to me) in Chapter 1, but in later chapters we didn't get to really see him at all (which can be justified since 2-7 were before everything went wrong), until his girlfriend tells him she's pregnant and his only reaction is "_____!"

Please, PLEASE flesh out their relationship. Pregnancy affects couples in so many different ways, whether the pregnancy was planned or not. From the picture you chose, she seems pleased about the pregnancy. Why is that? Why is she happy? Is he happy? Is he unsure, unhappy? Why? There's a ton of exploration to be done here, ESPECIALLY considering that she's pregnant just prior to a zombie apocalypse! Does she survive? How do they plan to survive approximately 9 months of pregnancy in this hell? How do you raise a child in this mess?

I think I have the most to say about them precisely because so little was said about them.

I suggest cutting down on the use of ellipsis [...]. The constant usage makes the story almost tiring to read, and unless in chapter 1, Catherine was speaking aloud, it wasn't necessary. If she's thinking about everything that's going on, why would she trail off or be out of breath in her thoughts? You can use ellipsis to show hesitation, perhaps, in her acknowledging or moving her thought process forward, but there were SO MANY of them! You could've replaced them with commas or merged sentences or any number of things and it would've worked better, IMO.

You need a consistent writing format! The story changed writing styles several times and whether that was from having different writers or what, it was jarring. Compare chapter 1 to chapter 7 and take note of all the differences in writing style. This will help a lot!

You don't need to use asterisks to represent actions when you write something like, "She bit her lip." That, as a line, is perfectly acceptable. If you choose to use asterisks in your game at all, choose what to use them for once and be consistent. If you want to have ALL character thoughts within the 3rd person narrative be in asterisks, do that! Though also, you can make italics/bold/underline in Ren'Py by using:

Code: Select all

 
italics: {i}word{/i}
bold: {b}word{/b}
underline: {u}word{/u}

My programming skills are limited, but when you do a title screen for the new chapters, you don't need to repeat the title in the textbox. If you're doing that so that the screenreader can pick it up, I think there's a way to program that in so the general audience DOESN'T see it, but those who have opted to have the story read to them can have the title read to them.

Now, that's a lot of things you can improve upon above, and I don't want to leave you with a textwall of "this is what needs to be worked on" because that's not terribly encouraging, so onto the positives!

As I mentioned before, your graphics look good! Stock images are tricky to pull off, but you honestly did a really good job putting them together. Your design for the poster/ch7 of the story works REALLY well.

While I'd like to see your characters better fleshed out, they were engaging and kept me interested as the story went along. I still, having completed the game, want to learn more about them! You might consider writing character bios out and putting in likes and dislikes and things like that, but that depends on the story you want to tell. I'm someone that cares a LOT more about the characters than the plot in most cases (for instance, I watched a really half assed anime a few years ago and it's one of my favorites, not because the plot was worth mentioning, but because the characters were so good). You might be someone that prefers plot over characters and that's totally fine! There are a lot of people that prefer that kind of storytelling over a character driven story. It came across to me that the characters themselves mattered, hence all my questions about B and his girlfriend, but again, there are plenty of awesome, plot driven stories out there, so think about what story you want to tell with Silent Nights.

Lastly, as far as zombie plots go, I enjoyed this one!

Some general tips:
-- Read more visual novels! That'll help you get a grip on some different writing styles and figure out what you want to do with SN.
-- Get an editor! Editors are wonderful, wonderful people and for the most part, they want to take your story and improve it! Listen to them and your writing will improve too.
-- Don't give up! With every scene you write, you'll get better. With every game you program, you'll get better. It's daunting, but worthwhile.

If you'd like to discuss further, you're welcome to PM me. I don't want to clutter up this thread, or keep bumping this, with a one on one conversation. I'm hoping others will give you feedback too, so you get more voices than just mine.

Good luck on chapter 8 and onwards!

[soloflareinteractive]

Wow! Thank you so much for the amazing feedback.

I truly appreciate it.

Some of the awkwardness you mentioned is actually down to the fact that this is a one man Job. So I did the script, programming & art myself.

The decision to use stock photographs is one that even surprises me, because with the right direction, it can work very very well.

So I guess maybe my mind began drifting towards different paradigms lol

An editor is definitely needed. Most definitely. I will be putting up an advert for one soon.

The writing will be much more improved for the second season, and given the amazing feedback you have provided, the first season will be reworked for all those who already have access to it.

What that means is that you will receive a remastered version of the first season for free!

The second season will have:

- An improved and more elaborate script that explores the backgrounds of each character. This is already being done.

- Improved narrative & character labelling.

- New graphical styles, improvements & even guest appearances.

- 'The Silent Pack'. I'm already in the process of merging the first and second seasons into one big combo pack. This version is a special edition that will be available alongside the standard PC, MAC & Linux distributions of each season. It will cost a little bit more, but nothing senseless lol

So we can expect:

1) Season 1 remastered Standalone ($1.99 for new comers. Free to those who already have access. Please let me know if you need your own specific Key.)

2) Season 2 Standalone ($1.99)

3) The Silent Pack special edition ($ ?)


By the way, anyone who provides feedback gets featured in the credits section, so I'll PM you about that

Once again, Thanks a lot!

[soloflareinteractive]

Season 2 Update

Teaser Image for season 2:

Working hard on the art direction + Script.


More Information soon.


Thanks

[soloflareinteractive]

Hey guys,


I'll soon be releasing the teaser for season 2, which is shaping up to be a huge improvement over season 1 (thanks for all your feedback).

In response to your questions, yes 'Friday part 2' will make it into the second season.


Season 1 has now been fully remastered, and will go live very shortly.

Thanks

[soloflareinteractive]

Ok,

Here are a few statistics from the unfinished special edition that I'm working on.

I estimate that by the time I'm done, the special edition will be at about 11,000 words and 250 images.

I'd like to say thanks for all the feedback, it has brought about many improvements (and surprises) for season 2.

A lot of work is going into the narrative, dialogue, characters, and art.

Keep an eye out for any free keys that might be laying about

Thanks

[soloflareinteractive]

This is to inform you that the Silent Nights - Nightmare into Darkness (Remastered) is now available for download.

This version includes changes to the script to make it more readable and less jarring (Including modifications to the narrative).

Default text speed and background music volume have been altered as well.

I have also attached a teaser of season 2, which will bring about many welcome improvements in all areas.

Thanks