Whats up,
So, I played the first 30 minutes of the visual novel and I can tell a lot of work has gone into this project. I really hope you guys continue on producing this kind of art because there isn't enough of this.
However, I feel like the introduction and the dialogue has some issues. The main character spends most of the introduction naval gazing and describing inconsequential scenery. He feels like a blank slate most of the time and his interactions with other people feel hollow. Furthermore, some of the other characters are introduced via montage, this is just straight up exposition.
Like I said, I can appreciate the amount of work that has gone into this project and I wish ya'll the best for this.
Hi! Thank you for comment, critique like that is much appreciated.
Could you tell me what do you mean when you say that MC's interactions feel hollow? I have a guess, but I'd like to be sure.
About a sizeable amount of descriptions of surroundings and introspection, I intended the game to have a slower, relaxed pace to reflect the peaceful setting and more introverted nature of Nordic people, and be more realistic/lifelike than an average furry visual novel. I've heard a lot of good feedback about it, but I understand that it might be off-putting for people who prefer more action.
I agree that introducing the characters via montage might feel forced. This was the case for two characters, so I could show events that happened before the camp. I haven't heard bad feedback about it yet, but I might try thinking of a better way of doing that in some future update.
- Keo
Oh man, I wasn't expecting a reply back.
By hollow, I mainly mean that nothing seems to be added by any of the interactions the MC has. Given, I haven't played through the whole vn yet, and I'm mostly speaking about the first thirty minutes to hour of gameplay. On the bus, the MC gives a whole exposition about his first noticing of Mikko in vivid detail, even though in a previous sentence, he remarks he "came to Norway to cut myself from it, not to keep thinking about it." The MC basically tells and doesn't show the audience that there is something troubling Mikko, and further interactions on the bus and at the lunch table don't provide much insight into that plot point- just his shyness which we already garnered from the MC's memories.
Furthermore, the interaction with Lake in the hallway is a little weird. Weird in the sense that the MC describes him as 'timid but intense', but reading his dialogue doesn't hint at any intensity. I'm not sure if this was sarcasm on the MC's part, but it just kinda left me confused. The interaction didn't hint at anything wrong, yet the MC reports that he looked 'taken aback', without any physical or other descriptors.
I feel like if the introduction to these characters weren't as heavily put into flashbacks, the interactions with the MC would feel more weighty because we would be shown the characters and not told. I'm noticing a trend in that a lot of the character's quirks or personality traits are just told to us and not expressed through dialogue or descriptions. The characters have their own wants and needs, like Mikko being shy and with something bothering him, or Lake with withholding a question, but the MC doesn't seem to want anything other than cute boys. Which, given by how goddamn cute they are is definitely a worthy goal. I really like Lake.
Thanks for being open to criticism, I really respect that you are willing to listen to feedback. Thanks again.
This is really helpful, thank you a lot for that! There's a lot I have to remember about when writing, and being a beginner I sometimes I forget about even the basic stuff and revert to overly simplistic style. You're definitely right, I tend to tell instead of showing and I have to remind myself more often to avoid that. I hope that I will have enough time to go through the beginning of the vn to correct that and possibly rewrite some parts for the December update (it will be a pretty important one!)
-Keo