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Trembling Essence: A horror game/dating sim visual novel which focuses on survival.

Bee · 2023-04-18T04:12:03Z

Hello and welcome to my devlog! You can call me Bee, I am a new indie developer and solo game creator. A game that I'm still working on is called Trembling Essence! A demo is now available for those interested in playing! Since I'm still understanding how to post here appropriately, if you would like to see the previous updates to my recent game development post, you can read it here and here ! Also, I'm mainly active on my tumblr if you would like to see more things such as me answering questions from my ask box to random drawings based off my game. My ask box is still open so if you're interested in asking any questions about the game/Noah, there's even an anonymous mode if that makes you more comfortable! :] Game development Trembling Essence update: I wanted to start it off with this new CG out of a few I finished, he's so happy to see the player(Y/N) can't you tell? :] So in good news, the missing half of Day 3 has been finished in terms of all the writing! It took some time to finish because I had to go through and revise a lot that was originally written from the new/old routes. When I went over everything again, I decided to rewrite a few things and then I went over and adjusted it one final time. This is mainly because a good portion of the routes and dialog had way too much romance going on and I don't want the player(Y/N) to feel side swiped by it all happening so suddenly if that makes sense. This isn't to say all of it will be archived, just moved around in the story on top of what's already in place in terms of spending time with Noah so it isn't overwhelming. :] Introducing the kitchen! I don't want to spoil too much of everything but I'm still working on the last few missing sprites, backgrounds, and a few more CG's. The kitchen will be remade though since what you're visually seeing doesn't really match up with the dialog. :] Lastly here's a new place for the player(Y/N) to explore a bit! The background being used for it is just a placeholder right now but here's a sneak peek of it. There were two specific new routes that were impossible to activate based on how close you are with Noah that's been fixed! In addition, some backgrounds that weren't suppose to show up are now fixed. Once I finish testing/fixing up more of the missing half of Day 3 I'll begin the attempt at rolling in the Day/Night setting, which I'm really excited for. :] I think that's everything I have to report so far so thank you guys for all of your support on everything that's been going on so far, I really appreciate it! :]

A topic by Bee created Apr 18, 2023 Views: 1,853 Replies: 46

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Bee16 days ago(+1)

Trembling Essence:

💙Background + poll results💙

Hello hello and welcome new followers! :]

Firstly I just want to say a very big thank you to everyone that participated in the poll I did last week, I was really surprised but happy with the results and responses! This will help me a lot moving forward! :,] If you missed it and would like to say which route you preferred feel free to comment!

Anywho, this week mainly focused on art practicing again but I did work on the game and managed to get my bearings even more!

Here is the new background for the start of the game:

This took a long time to draw up since I sketched out the background instead of looking at references this time. Once I got a basic idea of how I wanted it to look it felt.. too empty and flat. At first I couldn't figure out why until I added more shrubbery and grass. After that I started adding the trees and then added a few more to give it depth and adjusted some of the coloring. So far the immersive symbolism I'm going for is slowly coming together! Since it just finished raining where you're located I tried to give the background the illusion of looking tolerably humid but slowly getting colder over time with a hint of decay in the distance. This is a better look of the dreary foreboding atmosphere compared to the "fairy-forest" from last week. >:,] It took a while but I also added a parallax effect here and optimized the images to save space. I kept getting an error when it came to the middle ground so I had to find and fix the problem which delayed things. I don't have a video to show it in action but maybe next time. I do want it to be known again that these automatically happen and don't follow the cursor. :,,]

Here's a sneak peek of the new choices you can do when you're in this area now. >;]

This part required a lot of brainstorming before I figured out how I wanted the explorative part to go. This was originally going to go a different way completely but a particular day caused me to just scrap it and start everything over. I have a very solid idea on how I want all of this to go better than ever so I can't wait to show some of the new areas! I didn't expect this background to take as long as it did to draw up but hopefully next week I'll have more done!

Progress doodle layout:

Since certain endings are being changed I thought it would be cool to animate a progress layout to visually show how everything is going! It shouldn't take too long to finish this section up since I already have a foundation laid out.

Noah's sprite sheet update:

As far as Noah sprite sheets goes, it's still in sketch mode and I haven't messed with them yet since I've been practicing. :,,]

There are some old drawing prompts I wrote down and sketches that I'm still doodling up behind the scenes so hopefully I can get to them at some point with some attached lore. :,]

Q&A / Ask box is still open:

If you have any questions about Trembling Essence/Noah feel free to ask here please. This makes it easier for me to see and answer accordingly! I would really like to hear from you guys!

Thank you to those who have sent in asks after everything got reset! I'll try to get to them when I can along with the ones that come to mind that got deleted. I just need time to answer since I like to respond with doodles/drawings as practice. :]

Overall that's everything I have to share so far, thank you guys for your continued encouragement and support through all of this, I wholeheartedly appreciate it! :,,]

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Digital Daydream13 days ago(+1)

What facial expression and body language would Noah respond with to the player wordlessly pinning him down against something and leaning in close? Would his eyes be slightly wider only in that situation? Would he stare directly or avert his eyes (thank you for already having given him a sprite like that), or even his face altogether?

Sorry I'd rather not use tumblr. Usually I wouldn't make contact at all, but this devlog post tempted me to ask. ¬///¬ If it's any compromise, you could copy/paste the above question and any response to both here and your tumblr so others still see it easily.

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Bee12 days ago(+1)

Hello there! Also no worries about Tumblr, I had no idea that you need an account to send in questions to the inbox so going forward I'll adjust my game development posts to reflect that in the Q&A section. :]

I can just copy/paste the question and block out your name if you would like to keep this anonymous!

This was a thoughtful ask to answer! :]

If the player(Y/N) suddenly did this to Noah, his facial expression and body language would all depend on how close of a relationship the both of you have with each other and what leads up to this. Noah likes his personal space but if he trusts you and there's a genuine connection going on, he'd be more relaxed/comfortable.

If the both of you are spending time together and being silly up until that unexpected moment he would be surprised at the sudden bold attempt. His eyes would slightly widen for a moment only to lessen as he fondly takes in the player(Y/N)'s features before closing his eyes and giving a sudden kiss. He'd then flirt with the player(Y/N) given their flustered expression only to let out a small laugh give a warm embrace. :,]

If the relationship is very distant and there isn't enough trust going on he'd quickly go on the defense and firmly tell the player(Y/N) to move and not to do that again.

In the [Extended Demo] there's a small yet similar situation where he does avert his eyes. The first time is when the player(Y/N) falls onto him after he tries to keep you from tripping backwards. He looks to the side while slowly pushing the player(Y/N) off since the situation is awkward, you're in his personal space and he doesn't fully trust you yet. The second time it happens leads to the player(Y/N) accidently stumbling into him against the hallway. This time he's bewildered at the unexpected interaction since the player(Y/N) is holding onto him. When the player(Y/N) looks up at him he averts his eyes a second time before asking the player(Y/N) to get off of him.

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Bee8 days ago

Trembling Essence:💙Background updates + script progress💙

Hi and welcome new followers!

A big thank you to the sudden influx of support I got this week, I wasn't expecting any of it and it was really encouraging! In between art practicing I managed to get more work done than expected! >:,]

Here is the new/updated CG's for the start of the game:

Since I've come a long way with shading I went back and fixed up the initial encounter you can get with Noah and changed out the background. It took longer than expected because some of his expressions didn't line up correctly but I'm happy with the overall foreboding theme I was aiming for. I even added a small parallax effect when he helps you up afterwards. :]

For the dialog I cleaned it up by removing certain parts that didn't add to the story or dragged the situation on for too long. I even fixed some of the conversations you can have with Noah in the beginning that was slightly misleading and confusing to read through. :[] As for the backgrounds I tried looking for more references after I finished redoing this CG, specifically ones that helped me with perspective. Sometimes I have a habit of drawing scenes too flat. In good news, the fog animations are optimized in them so it's easier for me to add! :,,]

The overall progress has increased quite a bit! Everything is going smoothly so far! I don't know when all of it will be finished but it shouldn't take too long.

Q&A / Ask box is open for itch.io now:

I had no idea that you need a Tumblr account to send in questions to the inbox so going forward I'll adjust my game development posts to reflect that in the Q&A section. If you have a question you would like to ask on itch.io if you don't have a Tumblr account, feel free to comment there as well! It will be answered there and on Tumblr :]

If you have any questions about Trembling Essence/Noah feel free to ask here please. This makes it easier for me to see and answer accordingly! I would really like to hear from you guys!

Overall, thank you to those who have sent in asks after everything got reset! I'm trying to get to them when I can including the ones I remember that got deleted. I just need time to answer since I like to respond with doodles/drawings as practice. :]

This is everything I have to share so far, thank you guys for your continued support through this process, I appreciate it! :,,]

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Bee8 hours ago

Trembling Essence:

💙Quality of life changes + choice progress + backgrounds💙

Hi and welcome to my devlog! :]

This week focused on quality of life changes with the story based on your choices at the start of the game. There was some art practicing again but I managed to get stuff done!

In my previous game development posts I kept talking about making parallax effects in the game! I can't upload the video on itch.io but here's the link to it on my tumblr! :]

Here's some quality life changes for certain effects in the game:

When I initially added an effect for losing HP it was suppose to light up the edges of your screen. Sometimes it can be hard to see if there's another effect happening on the screen so I went back and gave a small hue effect every time you lose HP instead of it only occurring on the edges of the screen. I don't have an example of this only because I have to go through the entire game to fix it, maybe next week I'll have it all done! :,]

Before:

After:

If the player(Y/N) is feeling very cold a icy effect will be shown around the screen to indicate this. I really loved the original way it looked but the new backgrounds can make it very hard to see now. To fix this I added a touch of white frost around the center of the screen so it'll be more noticeable. I also optimized this image so it takes up less space in the game! :]

Choice progress:

I have been going through and writing out what happens with each choice you make.

Without giving spoilers for this ending I want there to be a variety on what happens when you make a choice but I don't want there to be too much branching for this one in particular. It's pretty straightforward. When it comes to the dialog I found out a way to combine sentences together in a way that makes the pacing flow better. It's a little hard to visualize but when you get to the next statement sometimes it'll stay in the same line instead of dragging the dialog out. I also managed to catch a very early bug that caused the screen to go black if you skipped through the dialog, I am very happy I caught this versus finding this problem later into the game. :,,]

Almost half way there! I redid a few more backgrounds and added some animations to them. Since this game development post is getting very long I'll show more of them next week. :D

Q&A / Ask box is open:

If you have any questions about Trembling Essence/Noah feel free to ask here or on itch.io please. This makes it easier for me to see and answer accordingly! I would really like to hear from you guys!

I appreciate the asks I got recently these past couple of days! I'm trying to get to them when I can including the ones I remember that got deleted. I just need time to answer since I like to respond with doodles/drawings as practice. :]

I think that's everything I have to say right now, thank you guys very much for all of the positive support, I appreciate it! :,,]

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