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Donut Holes's itch.io pageResults
| Criteria | Rank | Score* | Raw Score |
| Implementation of Theme | #4 | 4.462 | 4.462 |
| Story | #5 | 4.154 | 4.154 |
| Presentation | #10 | 4.103 | 4.103 |
| Creativity | #15 | 3.897 | 3.897 |
Ranked from 39 ratings. Score is adjusted from raw score by the median number of ratings per game in the jam.
Team Members
CuriousCritters: NoteYote MakoOtter ForsetiFox ZumaPuma
Name of Wolf/Wolves
JJ
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Comments
32nd VN I wI'll read and rate from this May Wolf 2024 FVN JAM! Here we go!
Edit 1: A wholesome, cute game. Fuck that otter.
A nice and tight short story.
The custom assets were great! The fetish isn't really my vice, but the sprites are well done and I can appreciate the quality and effort. The music is fitting and well-placed. The pacing solid. The deeper conversation about taking classes to make yourself "marketable" rather than doing what you want was a punch to the gut. Oof.
I don't have much bad to say about this. I think giving the "antagonists" of the story a little more love would've made them feel more unique. And I wish the UI would have been given some extra flair, but that's fluff.
Overall just a well-rounded and enjoyable read.
It was so satisfying having the good ending, and also the expanding theme was so well implemented (expanding business, expanding wolf!)
You made me crave for donuts now… 🍩
There's no possible way I could give this an unbiased review, so I won't take up space with any critique.
I'm so incredibly flattered that your team took some time to add some references to my work in your story. I'm rapidly discovering that, as an artist, there's no greater honor than to have other artists show reverence to your projects in their work.
You've made my day. Thank you 💖
There's not a single word that is not useful in this. The character development, the characterization and exposition were perfectly controlled, I was really impressed.
And so, it doesn't take much time to love this wolf and even the MC (The MC has a personnality, it's rare enough to be noted), we want to see them succeed.
The sprites are beautiful. Colorful and full of life, they convey perfectly the emotions of the writing.
This one is maybe my favourite amongst the entries I've read so far
I love this fun little story! It is paced rather well, doesn't go off on any unnecessary tangents, is simple and straightforward in a good way.
I honestly expected more doughnut puns embedded throughout, but we at least got a few!
I also liked the sly little MH reference you hid in there! I love how you handled it too- if you are unfamiliar, you wouldn't think twice about it!
The artwork fit extremely well, though one simple addition I would suggest is to have a custom name font in a balloon/comic font style to more closely match the logo. I could easily imagine this with a complete custom UI if you decide to update the game further, but just that one change would go a long way in unifying the theme.
Also unnecessary, but just musing, I would like to see an epilogue. I didn't want it to end so soon! Maybe even just a reference in a future project or something, because I hope to see more from your team!
Keep up the good work!
Thank you! We probably could have used a few more donut puns, but I'm not great at coming up with that sort of wordplay. Custom UIs and more distinctive fonts are the sort of things we'll definitely be looking into in our future projects, either individually or as a team. Not a one of us knew anything about how to use Renpy though when we started, so the priority was getting the code working at all, while our artist had a lot of spite variations to make.
This one was a learning experience for all of us, and we're thrilled that people have liked the result.
The donut puns thing wasn't criticism at all, just an observation! : )
I'm right there with you on Ren'Py - I didn't touch it until after the first week of the jam, so I understand totally. You did quite well to have branching story paths in there already if you're just starting! I always try to offer a suggestion or two, but it was hard for yours, because it was so good already!
This is one of the best entries in the Jam. In describing Cockhole’s 9:22 I used the term “impeccable simplicity”, and I feel the same way about this one. Donuts Holes is, ironically, pretty free of fat, making for a straight story that even has room for some choices and an alternate path. There’s not much that could have been added to improve this one, but this time, that’s a compliment.
Thank you! I'm glad you enjoyed it. Probably the only thing I'd liked to have added would have been slightly more distinct dialogue for the endings to distinguish a bit for players who made some of the right choices but not all of them, instead of only two endings. The month got away from us though, and it was better to have two fully finished paths.
This story was incredibly adorable!! It's super well written, the team did a great job with the artwork and backgrounds (I loved the small touches of detail with the balloons and chalk drawings being added), and the pacing was done really well, too! Definitely my favorite one so far, though I have a lot more to get through, I really enjoyed reading through this one. Congrats to everyone on this team, I really loved it! ♡♡♡
Thanks! For a while it felt like our ambitions had gotten a bit ahead of us, especially in the number of sprite variations that we needed, but it came together in time. Since none of us have experience with this kind of project, it's very cheering to discover we've put together something that people have enjoyed. The feedback means a lot to us!
Congrats on making your very first VN! I had a blast playing Donut Holes!
The pacing was great. Every dialogue felt like flowing flawlessly with zero moments wasted. The smut was well-placed and served as a good conclusion to the story. Everything felt natural.
The art style gives the project a distinct personality. The best part is you managed to use the visual elements to reinforce the storytelling (the truck and the belly!). That's pretty rare to see among all the entries I have read so far. The UI could do some improvement, but the state of the game as it is, is already satisfactory.
Overall it's a good read. 10/10 would date JJ.
Thanks for the kind words and feedback.
You're not wrong about the UI - this was the first time any of us had used Renpy and none of us had the programming experience or expertise to help our programmer, while on the art side of things our artist found his work cut out for him making so many sprite variations. The stuff we learned over the month will definitely allow us to be a bit more confident in future projects.
And we're thrilled that you liked our donut-making wolf!
If you're planning to make something bigger (heh) as a team, I'll definitely suggest investing more time in learning the coding side. Renpy is good for basic things but beyond very basic customization, it can get frustrating real quick. Having the artist know bits and pieces about it is also helpful since they will know exactly what kind of asset is required.
It's getting very technical here, but for example, I can see you have the whole JJ's full body sprites variants, and then there are resized versions. You can simplify things by using layered images. Your workflow will be more streamlined.
Spoilers follow, etc etc,.
Theme: Expansion of the business and the physical form. Very evident. Yay!
Story: Enjoyable quick romp, equal parts romance and business, with a hint of living up to expectations. The porny fakeout on the second day was perhaps too obvious that it wasn't porn, by merit of where it fell in the narrative. I wonder if it would have felt more effective if it was on the third day, where they'd gotten even further closer still.
Enjoyed the classic Ghost-esque donut sculpting scene. A classic setup.
You know what you're setting out to do, and you follow that to the natural conclusion, a fun one at that. I didn't test for making things worse, but who wants to. That's not as funny.
His expansion rate is a bit unbelievable, as it the fact he started off that skinny, but I can quickly look past those given they were your means of implementing the theme in part.
Overall enjoyable quick smutty romp though!
Presentation: The arms on the non-expanded sprite feel out of place, which makes sense, as they tie in the most at the largest frame. I think it would have been nicer if they started off smaller. The head also felt maybe a bit too small for the sprite at the end, but that may just be me (who is not an artist).
The music for the smut scene felt a bit out of place (and didn't start immediately), and I was a bit gutted we didn't see the backside, although I was pleased with the cg you put together. I also may have wanted one more view of the foodtruck, facing out the customers, if only to mix it up a little, but that wasn't a major thing.
Creativity: In a way you went outside of the box against the majority of this jam by directly embracing the theme in a more literal sense, while also tying it into a more figurative sense.
Overall thoughts: Enjoyable, sweet, cute art! No major gripes. Well done!
Thanks for the detailed thoughts! This is the first time anyone on the team has worked on a VN, so it’s good to get detailed feedback about what worked and what didn’t.
The fakeout on the second day was, perhaps, not ideal… but the process of making and filling jam donuts lent itself so well to one and there wasn’t any other place in the three days where it could really fit in. I probably should have cut it, but when a hole needs to be filled with sticky goo it’s hard not to make at least some sex comparisons.
Hehehe. I didn't hate it, I was just like "this is a very obvious fakeout moment".
This one was a lot of fun to read, I tore through it! Goofy, light-hearted, just a lot of fun. I'm not sure it was your intention, but beyond "Expanding" JJ's size I interpreted the food truck as an "Expansion" of his fathers' bakery, if you did this on purpose GREAT JOB.
If you didn't LIE ABOUT IT. As such, I thought you applied the theme really well!
I liked the sprites, too, they just vibe with the story really well! You also wrote the cake-pop lion so hateable and even though he's on screen for just a few scenes he makes me think of that annoying foodie hipster we all know.
The story was simple and straight forward, but fun! I think you applied theme well (on purpose or otherwise), and you picked good music to go with your scenes. All in all? A fast, fun, silly slice of life about donuts. Great work! I hope you make more VN's in the future.
EDIT: Thank you for embracing the Hole jokes. Also cute Minotaur Hotel ref, KHENBISH SUPREMACY.
Aww, thanks! I’m glad you enjoyed it. The idea of an inexperienced wolf expanding his family business was actually the original idea – with the expanding wolf belly a joke that we all liked enough that MakoOtter ended up having to make a lot of extra sprites. When it comes to the music, we had the advantage that ForsetiFox composed it all during the Jam specifically for the project, so it was made to go well with the story from the start.
And yeah, we can all agree that Khenbish is the best. I snuck quite a few references to characters from other VNs with culinary talents in there, and I’m glad to see at least one got noticed!
I love a big wolf, and JJ is a big sweetheart. What a cute and fun story!
Thanks! Who wouldn't want a big wolf to make them delicious donuts?
It's what we like to see: a well-flowing story that uses a lot of classic tools (the three-act structure, the food/sex thematic intersection) to a great effect. There's a tangible sense of specificity to Donut Holes, too, both in how it considers the furgonomics of making donuts and how it portrays running a food truck in general.
The cartoony art style fits the vibe perfectly, and the character designs feel purposeful in their use of color & animal characteristics. Although the interpretation of the game jam's theme is not the most creative one, I like the effort & care put into its visual implementation – the thinnest variant feels almost unbalanced in how lanky it is, which really makes the later sprites pop. Simply a solid, thoroughly enjoyable package.
Thank you very much! As a group it took us a while to settle on a story concept/theme to go along with the expansion theme. The idea of a wolf baker who literally expands throughout the VN was the silliest of the ideas that were bounced around… but we all ended up wanting to do it anyway! It meant some extra programming and a lot more sprites were needed, but it came together in time.