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A jam submission

Booty CallView game page

Game about Liam, who is having an affair
Submitted by Alex X (@AlexX_GameDev) — 12 hours, 5 minutes before the deadline
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Booty Call's itch.io page

Results

CriteriaRankScore*Raw Score
Enjoyment#192.9002.900
Presentation#233.0003.000
Overall#282.7502.750
Use of the Limitation#312.4002.400
Concept#342.7002.700

Ranked from 10 ratings. Score is adjusted from raw score by the median number of ratings per game in the jam.

Team members
Aleksa

Software used
Twine

Use of the limitation
Your life changes at the end of the game based on the choices that have been made. Sudden change in life made you realize that everything is temporary.

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Comments

Submitted(+1)

I’ve seen all three ending and i think that the neutral and good ending feel “rushed” compared to the worst ending. It’s like the talk with the wife comes as “Divorce? (Silence). Cool, bye.”, while there is so much detail in the scene with the lover.

I assume this is just because of time constraints, nothing more.

I am a bit perplexed with the art, because it looks like it was done in Microsoft Paint, but on the other hand that fact gives them so much personality that they become good. (I do not know if you actually used Paint, and i am just referring to the style, as it looks like a submission for Paint Jam; no disrespect intended — they are cool, is all i am trying to say.)

I have a problem with reading the text depending on the background’s color, but just on my main monitor. Once i switch to the secondary, I can read it perfectly well.  I tried to edit a screenshot to show you how i see it on my main monitor:

The violet look darker on that monitor and kind of blends with the background.

Developer

Thanks for reviewing the game. I wish I had more time to polish it, I will probable add text bubbles to fix the blending of the text (I had difficulties with changing text colors, all colors have a problem with at least one background I added). I focused most on the ending with the lover, as I thought players will more likely choose it on their first playthrough, The art is not my strong point. I used Clip paint studio, and tried painting  as much as I can with my skills, to make it in time and do it consistently (I have lot to improve on).

Submitted(+1)

The sound design of this was pretty good! I did notice the radio seemed to come on later than it should've though, and it would've been nice to have some background music to set the tone. I'm not a huge fan of visual novels but I must admit it was kind of fun ruining this guy's life and finding all the endings. I liked the visuals too, the composition of all the shots was really good! I will say though, that the use of limitation was kind of a streach.

Developer (1 edit)

I'm glad you liked the game, and thank you as well for the important criticism. Can you remember on which part of the story does the radio sound occur, so I can fix it up?

Submitted

Oh, replaying the game I realized I just misinterpreted the first few lines about the radio! It actually does start at the correct time.

Submitted(+1)

I am not used to visual novels (although I had heard of Twine!), but I gave this one a try yesterday!

  1. I was afraid because of the disclaimer, but it turned out things were handled rather reasonably; and I guess the overall tone is fitting with the noir theme, which can entail shady things.
  2. I think I parsed the whole narrative tree (except when I guessed the intermediate results would be the same); moral me took the most rightful ways possible first, and the game really lets the player have some options (unlike some of Quantic Dream’s ‘corridor’ patterns, sometimes XD Exaggerating a bit, I am mainly thinking of Indigo Prophecy). Some choices had influence, others apparently not, or conditionally, so the paths were not obvious the first time, which also feels right.
    Spoiler: I liked how you cannot get the good ending if you go see the girl. ;)
    Spoiler: I also liked how the bar scene can stand as a metaphor for karma*. XD
  3. Going to the balcony reminded me of the 1997 Blade Runner adventure game, although things get less poetic than the beautiful night city scenery, here. X)
  4. I expected the blue-eyed blonde (which is my type XD) from the cover/thumbnail to be shown, but it turns out she is the invisible woman. Not showing people (except the vagrant and the player character once) is an interesting method of having the player work his imagination. Also prevented visual obscenity (once again, as opposed to some (all??) David Cage’s games XD).
  5. I got the feeling the story revolved more around the marriage and company (and even the bar? XD) than with the mistress, which is a good thing. I felt the story’s connection to the constraint, and the noir vibe (through the night scenes). (I am quite prude and thus was uneasy with the sexual scene ‘soundtrack’, but once again, I thought it was still reasonable!) To be honest, I tend to favour having a gamepay-related twist involving the constraint, but seeing the genre of the game, that would be a bit unfair to ask for this here. X)
  6. I liked how everything was hand-drawn, it gives a very personal touch. (As a coincidence, I have seen things about AI-generated images very recently, including some salient debate on it, and took a pick at a video on Midjourney just about an hour ago. Also played the game jam game Escape From Mars which consists entirely of such images; I tend to favour effort and personality, so I was happy with your input.) Small criticism: just a few times, the text was less readable because of colour choice; I am thinking of the purple text on brown elements of the car, as can be seen in the second capture.
  7. Numerous sounds too! A few loops were less melodious than others, but I felt the sounds added to the atmosphere nicely. Did you use Freesound.org, or other websites, by the way? (I was not thinking of the ‘extracurricular activity’ sounds; I am not sure I want to know where these come from. XD)

Takeaway: a classic concept, but well done, with some logical karma-oriented yet not obvious decisions for the player, with a nice non-exaggerated noir story and ambience.

* Speaking of which: use the Karma ordering (on the bottom-left, ‘More options’), people! And check for genuine reviews. :)

Developer (2 edits)

I would like to thank you very much for your detailed and deep review of the game. 

I will try to share my take and experience while making this game, and as well answer to some of your questions.

My first idea for the narrative was that I wanted to make a story about a high ranking overly arrogant businessman loosing his position and becoming one of the lower class citizens that he so rudely pities. When I started writing the game in Twine, I came up with an idea of the wife and mistress, that message that Liam gets was meant to be a little hook, so players can look forward to what's to come.  I wanted to showcase as much as possible of Liam's character trough his interactions with side characters, but I didn't want for players to be stuck and just watch as the character they play as be an a**hole, so I gave them little choices, that are meant to be the subconscious mind working for Liam. I believe that no one in this world is meant to be just good or just bad, and that includes Liam.

The wife and mistress route:

I was quite surprised when you said you enjoyed the wife route more (now  I wish that I made more backgrounds and a little more effort in sound design with the wife). The wife route I wrote first, I wanted to show how the marriage was long gone. That's why the wife wasn't so emotionally invested, as well as Liam. We can see that Liam took the relationship as granted, and while writing that dialog I wrote two choices (one where Liam realizes that he will lose something important, and the one where he can be like he is now and let her go).  The mistress route is like an act of sexual urge, something that will bring Liam and the player pleasure and fun time, filled with dopamine. I had this girl in my head, the one on the cover picture (she's also my type hehe, good taste), and I wrote my sexual fantasy of her that I imagined at that moment. I wanted it to be as erotic as it can be, but I didn't want to be overly vulgar (I was a little bit afraid I could get banned from the jam if I went a bit overboard also). The disclaimer for the game was maybe a bit unsettling, but I wanted to be sure I won't break any rules, because there is an explicit description of sex, even if it wasn't vulgarly shown in player's face.

Art

I have to say I am very flattered when you said you liked my art. That's with what I was most struggling. I am not a good artist, especially with the digital stuff. I used real life photos on the internet and drawn over them, adding  some details of my own as lighting or a few objects. I wanted to make it simple as possible, as I wanted to save time, because of the short time schedule. I didn't draw people (and I really wanted to draw Roxi, believe me) because of the short time schedule, and I didn't want to screw it up and put some half drawn picture I was not proud of, but I am glad that It works this way too, and adds a little imagination to it.

Sound

You are right, I used the sounds from Freesound.org. You would be surprised what you can actually find there. There were audio tapes of sex, moaning, bj's and everything. Soo I used the girl sounds from there too haha. Wanted to put the real sex sounds with the sticky audio and everything, but I didn't want to exaggerate (cuz of jam and my game's main focus). I am quite new to programing so I don't know how to make one audio run over a few scenes, so it doesn't cut off, as it is heard in cafe scenes ( I definitely have room for improvement there). 

Bonus: I take you like Harley Quinn too? She was the reference for the cover photo. There is just something in quirky punk twin tailed blonds that I can't get over it. I have a major crush on her.


- Small edit: The reaction to the waiter spilling the drink impacts the ending greatly. If the player choses to part with wife or go with mistress, he will ether become homeless, or get a second chance due to his politeness with the waiter, and get a job at the cafe.  Also I unfortunately noticed the text was barely visible after I finished the backgrounds, I tried many colors, but I did not found the color that could work for all of the backgrounds, this one was the best one (sadly not quite good).  I didn't succeed in making the individual slides have different texts, due to lack of my programming skills.

Submitted(+1)

Interesting Story :)

Developer

Glad you like it

(+1)

interesting, simple story

Developer

♥️

Submitted(+1)

The cool and great!!! Awesome realization!

Developer

Thanks! : )