'Lunar Folly' is a romantic story about trad-thoughts, prejudice, and classic werewolves acting as a plot device and also a metaphor for 'the other' in society. It's good to see a proper 'werewolf' story in this 'my wolf' game jam about folklore. Of course that means that it's a human based story, in order to actually have the transformation part of the werewolf bit make sense. I think what makes this rendition stand out from other werewolf stories the pure indulgence and appreciation of the werewolf form and transformation. Most other stories are going to either downplay that part by making the werewolf this monstruous and unpleasant experience, or going the anime wolf-boy route with some sharp teeth and wolf ears. This one gets right into what makes werewolves appealing, large fuzzy cuddly men with just a hint of danger with those sharp teeth.
The story follows Mitch as he is 'hunting/tracking' the rumors of a werewolf in the forest. He finds one! Turns out that werewolves aren't monsters, they just guys who transform and look like that (course they could also kill, but isn't that true of humans too?). Mitch is conflicted, because his world has opened up, and he's tempted to want to be a werewolf too since society has left him feeling suffocated and trapped in his trad-relationship with his childhood friend (who is also a woman non-conforming to society). As he attempts to run away, turns out that part of that is a lie, and the werewolf is actually one of the villagers who likes to transform in secret and there isn't some kind of roaming free pack of gay werewolf men (oh yeah, Mitch is gay). Of course, his fiancé finds out, and is rightfully upset because she's getting the short end of the stick not just from Mitch, but also the whole village and her family all kinda resent her for not being 'a good house wife who needs to get back in the kitchen'. They make up because, and plan to call off the wedding proper (I don't know if this solves her problem, but at least they'll stop having to put on a front so other folks will be nice to them). Course, free from his husbandry duties, Mitch is free to be who he really is and get transformed into a werewolf for some hot werewolf transformation sex (or not if you're monetizing a live read recording).
Honestly, it's a great story, and I jest in pointing out some of the uncomfortable circumstances, but the extra friction in the story makes the release of tension and pure indulgence all the more satisfying. The art is once again really great, love the stylization, and the humans don't look too bad. Course the cg scenes also get a big thumbs up from me, very hot and something that I don't see all that often. The writing is adequate and gets the right amount of emotion in the dialog to stress certain scenes. I do feel like it can get a tad anachronistic when some words and phrases pop up, examples like being called a 'dude' or 'throw me under the bus', when I'm pretty sure the established setting is some kind of late middle-age period and hasn't reached the industrial period where buses exist. I think there's one moment where a character label wasn't attributed right, but it happened during the sexy scene, so I imagine it's easily overlooked.
I really liked the folklore aspect of this entry. It highlighted the traditions of folklore, but also highlighted some of the negative effects of folklore as well, how they could perpetuate false or harmful stories, establish traditions where the original context has been far removed, or even use it as justification for prejudice types of thinking. I haven't even mentioned all the allusion to a werewolf as a metaphor for being gay and how having to keep it hidden to please your family/society and only letting it come out makes the person feel 'more alive'. It's a new twist on a classic trope for the werewolf story genre, and I think it do anything bright and flashy, it still left an impact with it's strong narrative choices, and grounding the emotional arc in realism. It could've been easy to do a "runs away to start a new life" ending, but having to stay and deal with the problems I think is a more interesting choice, even if we're only left to speculate on how that might play out.
I'm really glad that chmron picked up on a lot of comments from last May Wolf to "let the hot guys have sex". Not that the rest of the visual novel also wasn't a nice experience, with all it's twists and turns, but I mean, c'mon, hot werewolf sex. I really have any notes for how this could be executed any better (aside from a few slight clean ups), I think you achieved what you set out to make. The scope was kept in check, I could easily see this appealing to a nice chunk of the audience. Maybe it feels a bit melodramatic in certain parts, but that's totally works for this kind of story where 'society' is the root cause of your problems. What more can I say, this is good.