Children of Cosmos [BxG][Supernatural][Romance]

[GengaJupite]

"We are all stardust…"

Hi, everyone! GengaJupite here, representing the amateur production group Starfall Studios. With our first VN under way, we're now sharing its production to the public and would love to hear any feedback you have to offer! I've posted here in the Ideas section mainly because our workflow has been shaky with some recent staff reorganizations. Hopefully we'll be seeing a live production post in the WIP section soon, so have a look here while we prepare!

Premise
Every hundred and fifty years, a spectacular meteor shower takes place in the skies all around the globe. An old legend tells that should one of these shooting stars make it all the way to the surface, a single wish shall be granted to whoever touches it first. Of course, the stars rarely make it to the earth's surface intact, but there is one place in which they are known to fall more frequently.
Leo Hearst is a high school student living in Turena, a town in the thick of all the beauty nature has to offer. He lives alone in an apartment paid for by his parents who work very demanding jobs in a nearby city. Like everyone in Turena he has heard of the meteor shower legend, but he considers it nothing more than a fairy tale for children. As summer approaches and the school year comes to a close, Leo makes the acquaintance of five girls he has never seen before, each of whom catches his attention for being more than a little out of the ordinary. Over time, as he slowly comes to learn more about them, his skepticism and disbelief are turned upside down as he discovers that these girls may not quite be what they seem.

While utilizing tropes that VN enthusiasts are familiar with, we hope to create something that is entertaining and unique to the high school romance genre.

Characters
We have yet to design all the characters, though I will share those that have completed concept art. Note that because these are conceptual sketches, many of their personalities are not perfectly represented by the depicted artwork.

Leonardo (Leo) Hearst: The sixteen-year-old protagonist of the story. He is a fairly logical thinker who sometimes allows his curiosity to get the better of him. His day-to-day life is nothing special until he becomes involved with five mysterious girls.



Ashe: A strange but very polite girl who lives in the forest. She loves to learn new things and maintain the natural beauty of Turena, but a strange illness prevents her from performing to the best of her abilities.



Luci: A jumpy girl that secretly follows Leo around. Something about her personality seems off, as if she's holding back or hiding a secret she does not want to keep.



Mara: A mean-spirited girl who picks on Leo at every opportunity despite the fact that they are practically strangers. Her piercing eyes and the dark spots on her neck are almost as intimidating and off-putting as her personality.



Rena: An upbeat, energetic girl who is never seen without a pair of animal ears on her head. She can be a bit overbearing with her onslaught of seemingly random questions, but her friendly attitude is charming, if not somewhat childish.

Syrene: Merely a name that gets brought up from time to time. Leo isn't sure if he has even met her or not, but the mystery surrounding her has sparked his interest.

Yuuji Nakamura: Leo's closest friend in Turena. He's a goofball that somehow manages to excel in everything school-related. Where Leo is more of the straight man, Yuuji is the foil that keeps him on his toes.

Ami D'Amour: Yuuji's childhood friend. She is the one that keeps Leo and Yuuji grounded when they get out of hand. Though usually kind and composed, as a member of the student council, she is strict when it comes to upholding the rules but easily gets flustered when she takes on too many jobs.

A number of supporting characters will also help progress aspects of the story.
Louis Undra-Wiser (Mr. U): Leo and Yuuji's homeroom teacher and club advisor
Shida Goodwin: A master's student researching some kind of nature-related things around Turena
Lyra and Orion Hearst: Leo's parents
Carina Hearst: Leo's younger sister

Staff
Director: GengaJupite
Lead Editor: Ed Malus
Programmer: Droory

Writing Team:
GengaJupite
Droory
CreationsGoneAwry
Kinmoku2

Concept Art: Minute Kiwi
Character Art: Now Recruiting!
Background Art: Now Recruiting!
CG Artist: Now Recruiting!
GUI: Now Recruiting!

Music: GengaJupite
[Sample 1] [Sample2] [Sample 3]

If you have any interest in joining the team, please feel free to check out our recruitment thread here.

Stats
While these numbers are not exact, they represent a rough estimate of where we are looking to go with Children of Cosmos. As ambitious as it may seem for our first VN, each of our writers is/was active in the fanfiction community, all four having written at least one story of over 100k words.

Total Word Count: 620k-830k words
Per Route: 112k-154k words
Common Route: 60k words

Current Production Stats [September 30/16]:
Common Route Completion: 75%
Individual Heroine Routes: 0%
Sprites: 5%
Backgrounds: 10%
CGs: 0%

All feedback is welcome and if you have any interest in joining the team, please check out our recruitment thread! Thanks for taking the time to read all this and we hope to see you in the future!

[gekiganwing]

Leo Hearst is a high school student living in Turena, a town in the thick of all the beauty nature has to offer. He lives alone in an apartment paid for by his parents who work very demanding jobs in a nearby city.

Does Leo have any other family living in the same town? Would it be feasible for him to live with friends and their family?

I'm curious how the character copes with living alone. Does he find it challenging to be responsible for himself?

While utilizing tropes that VN enthusiasts are familiar with, we hope to create something that is entertaining and unique to the high school romance genre.

Tropes are just story elements and concepts. They are neither good nor bad. Cliches have negative connotations, but in my opinion, they can be used creatively. (I searched for the phrase "trope versus cliche" and found a brief article on the topic.)

Yuuji Nakamura: Leo's closest friend in Turena. He's a goofball that somehow manages to excel in everything school-related. Where Leo is more of the straight man, Yuuji is the foil that keeps him on his toes.

I'm curious to see how you'll portray the main character's platonic friend. What role will he take in the story? Is there a chance that he will be a competent rival for a relationship, or that he will have a significant other?

Ami D'Amour: Yuuji's childhood friend. She is the one that keeps Leo and Yuuji grounded when they get out of hand. Though usually kind and composed, as a member of the student council, she is strict when it comes to upholding the rules but easily gets flustered when she takes on too many jobs.

What's it like to be active on a student council? How many obligations does she have?

As ambitious as it may seem for our first VN, each of our writers is/was active in the fanfiction community, all four having written at least one story of over 100k words.

That is encouraging. It's good to know that people in your group have experience creating fiction. Have you or they collaborated with other people?

What We Need
A reliable and enthusiastic artist, able to work in the anime style and consistently produce quality designs.

The way that I see it, your character drawings are 2D sprites. They're somewhat realistic, cute, and worksafe. They don't have much resemblance to characters from Astro Boy or Revolutionary Girl Utena or Ultimate Survivor Kaiji.

[GengaJupite]

Hey, thanks for the response! I'll answer your questions as best I can.

Does Leo have any other family living in the same town? Would it be feasible for him to live with friends and their family?

I'm curious how the character copes with living alone. Does he find it challenging to be responsible for himself?

No, as far as necessary information regarding Leo goes, his only family are his parents and younger sister living in a different city. When he first entered his high school, he did not know anyone, and therefore had no friends or other family to live with.
The story starts in his second year of being on his own, and he has grown fairly accustomed to it. His family will come visit from time to time, and the most challenging thing is balancing budgets with the monthly funds his parents send him.

Tropes are just story elements and concepts. They are neither good nor bad. Cliches have negative connotations, but in my opinion, they can be used creatively. (I searched for the phrase "trope versus cliche" and found a brief article on the topic.)

Interesting article. And yes, where I was going with that was that we're hoping to create something familiar in the genre while playing with certain elements to make it more unique. For example, our characters are similar to certain archetypes, but their stories and personalities are rounded out so that there isn't a specific, say, tsundere or ojou-sama character.

I'm curious to see how you'll portray the main character's platonic friend. What role will he take in the story? Is there a chance that he will be a competent rival for a relationship, or that he will have a significant other?

Yuuji's role is mostly as a wingman to Leo. He does have his own sidestory that occurs simultaneously with Leo's, and it will have effects on Leo throughout. As far as his relationships go, our team is still tossing around ideas, though there are some things we're set on (that I can't reveal right now).

What's it like to be active on a student council? How many obligations does she have?

Ami will be slightly less present in the story than Yuuji, though only slightly. Her main job on the student council is to keep track of club-related things (e.g. budgets, events, etc.), so much of her activity is keeping up-to-date with all of that. We haven't discussed how many obligations she has specifically, though her club activities on top of final exams (the story opens in the last few weeks of school leading into summer break) keep her busy. She will still be busy throughout the summer, as clubs and teams in the story will still have events and practices throughout, meaning that she needs to stay active with them.

That is encouraging. It's good to know that people in your group have experience creating fiction. Have you or they collaborated with other people?

Our collaboration experience varies, though we have all collaborated with at least one of each other at some point to varying degrees. Personally, I collaborate fairly often in my day-to-day life (I go to school for music composition), and while I can't speak for each member's personal life, I'm about 90% sure they're all familiar with working on voluntary creative projects with others.

The way that I see it, your character drawings are 2D sprites. They're somewhat realistic, cute, and worksafe. They don't have much resemblance to characters from Astro Boy or Revolutionary Girl Utena or Ultimate Survivor Kaiji.

Yes, I was simply making a general note that the style we are looking for is not western, and that the sprites would showcase that we are also not going for anything dark, fanservicy, or overtly unrealistic. That doesn't necessarily mean that the story will lack dark elements, any fanservice, or a degree of surrealism, but for the most part we are hoping to create something that could be conceivable if this were a real thing on Earth as we know it, and the characters should reflect that.