I started Viatica around a month ago and read up to almost the end of Chapter 11 in basically one sitting (although I did get up a few times lol) and only got round to finishing it today. I've laughed and cried (and I'm about to cry again while writing this) and wished death upon certain characters (and the music box ending made that wish come true :D), and I just have to say that this story, your story, is absolutely phenomenal. Through your writing, I grew so attached to these characters and regret none of my choices (except not talking to Heron more in the earlier chapters when I had the chance lol). Even so, however, I think the lack of ability to save was very fitting (even though the lack of save files wasn't a storytelling choice) because it made every choice more important and it prevented me from exploring every option to find out the answer I liked the best. I love how we were given the clear choice on whether we wanted nsfw content and that the sfw options were so lovely and cute and it didn't feel like we were missing out on the plot (because we weren't!) so I happily enjoyed a predominantly fluffy route with Lion. Character deaths were, without spoilers, impactful. I cried (and am about to cry again just thinking about it) because, just...wow. This is the first text only IF I've played on itch, and it was brilliant that even the way I treated the (technically) side characters had a huge impact (or so I assume, since I've only gotten one ending for now), but it seems to me that every choice holds weight, and I really like that. I am so grateful for the message of hope, even echoed in the journal entries, and it was definitely a message that I personally needed (guess who might actually cry this time) and it is definitely a message the world needs given how messed up things are right now. I just want to say thank you, because this story is a gift that I am glad that I decided to open it up and try it out. I'm definitely going to check out Cantata and the April Fools chapters when I have the time, but I'm still deciding on whether or not I want to try and get another ending, considering how satisfying the ending I just got was. We'll see, I guess. By the way, I also found a few grammatical errors/typos near the end and took some screenshots just in case you wanted to see, but I haven't attached them just in case you don't. Anyways, I want to end again with a thank you. Thank you for sharing this fantastic story with all of us, and thank you for the hope that came with it.
Thank you so much for your kind words! I’m happy to hear that you enjoyed the softer options in the romance scenes and chose the fluffy route with Lion. I appreciate that you gave my story a try, even returning to it after a break! Thank you! 🥰
And please feel free to add your screenshots here. I appreciate you asking first. I do try to make my IFs as close to final draft and error-free as I possibly can before publishing, but I do miss some things, and I’d like to correct that. 😊
Oop I'm so sorry it took me so long to respond! I finally sat down to actually annotate the screenshots so you don't have to hunt the photo for them so here they are :D (spoilers obviously if you're reading this but haven't played the game, so go play it now)
(unsure if this last one was intentional or not, but if it wasn't then the error here was the lack of punctuation just in case that didn't make sense)
Oh lol I just noticed a mistake in my own og comment, meant to write that this was my first text only IF since before this I've only played visual novels...ah well, might as well edit that now :3