I acknowledge that this comment is going to be long and boring.
Your game is quite nice and story rich. Among things I have enjoyed, this one was one the most enjoyable ones, I felt like I was watching a anime, while I tried to play in-character of the kind of person I had in mind for the Hunter character, the variety of choices you layed out was fantastic.
I’m not a expert critic, but I enjoyed this enough to say that I appreciated your investment of time into this work, which in turn gave me a reason to explore this in my own time.
The world building is also very intriguing and despite my inability to guess the plot or connect clues, I could still follow along the story and get engrossed in it.
It makes me wonder what you had in mind for the character that we play as. What did you, the creator who lends us your creation’s vassal imagine the person to be like? Interesting.
Personally, I ship Warlock x Half-Vampire, Rival x Rivals Partner, and Hunter x Partner. But the Partner is very picky, the Half-Vampires affection is easier to brush up than the Partners. I acknowledge that my taste is predictable.
I found that the Hunter’s Partner is very stubborn in character and difficult to deal with. Considering the Partner’s mentality, which through out the game, worsens over time.
This persons mental world is probably a spiralling mess of swirling charcoal lines. This person also gets offended easily, as in the ‘Why don’t you take my side??’ Kind of offended.
And the Rival also seems very fragile, as if adorning the self in thorns while hurting both outsiders and oneself. The Rival seems to get hurt easily through subtle exchanges.
The Rivals Partner, the Rivals Partner seems to care about the Rival, but not enough to chase the Rival around like how the Rival chases the Rivals Partner around. This person makes me angry sometimes. Want to scream ‘Go chase your partner! can’t you see the fae hurts??’
The Half-Vampire. A little problematic. It’s surprising how easy this person’s affection is to raise, even when not perusing the romantic route. Just being friendly and showing understanding is fine. But while the story progresses, this person feels more like a time bomb than anything.
The Warlock, the warlock seems to have a crush on the Half-Vampire. Though this person wants to ‘Maintain distance’ everything about this person screams ‘I am projecting my loneliness onto others even though I don’t mean to.’
They are doing a bad job at ‘Not caring’ This person cares enough about others for the affection to drop every time the hunter takes actions that even hint towards distaste for the supernatural. And even when the Hunter hurts someone else’s feelings.
The Hunter. The Hunter that I imagined is a stoic, no nonsense, straight to the point character. Who acts playful sometimes thanks to the influence of their partner.
I wanted to portray the Hunter’s character as a sincere person who struggles with displaying emotions. But also a cunning strategist who understands others well. I like the trope of this type of Hunter x Unstable and cheerful Partner.
The Boss The boss seems like a cunning man. A hypocrite who cares, but not enough to be careful. He is the true definition of a ‘smiling tiger’.
The Boss’s Partner. The poor guy may seem poor, but this man i’m sure is also as cunning as the Boss, if not more. Seemingly easy-ish to get along with despite the cold personality, can get his favour by displaying care.
All in all, these two Bosses both seem fickle in trust and both seem two-faced.
While I was reading everything, I couldn’t help but think of that [僕は人狼] Boku wa Jinro music video, specially where the Half-Vampire takes the Hunter to visit the restaurant, it gave me the same feeling as the scene from 2:23 to 2:43
I don’t know if it was intentional, but I found that if the Hunter chooses anyone but his partner when discussing things with the Night Club Boss, the affection of a few other characters increase. Which is subtle, but it’s understandable because in this situation, choosing his own partner shows the Hunter’s preference which can lead others into thinking that the team lacks trust.
And the subtle decrease in people’s affection when the Hunter disagrees with them is also very entertaining. I’m not sure if small actions made by the hunter can affect the story in anyway? so far, it seems that some actions can.
And the professionalism part in the hunter’s skills is a little confusing. Other than arriving on time/early for work, investigating everything in the club, and taking the weapon secretly for self-defence, what else determines this quirk? Is there a use for it?
The cunning, traps, strategy and weapons thing too. How much do they affect the game play? So far it’s very entertaining.
The multiple POV parts are one of the best parts about this article. It’s like a Novel, which I haven’t seen much done before. The dedication put into this is admirable.
My words are shallow and doesn’t do much to help in your work, but I hope my appreciation gets through to you. Maybe I got sentimental today, and reading this made me feel better, or maybe this work intrigued me enough to feel moved.
Either way, I enjoyed every scene in this article and the characters are also very personalized, which makes them easy to get attached to, and also easy to doubt.
I can’t imagine how much a real person would struggle in these circumstances, where they are not moving omnipotently through the screen as a player, but a real living person faced with these challenges. Must be hard. All the best in your journey and thankyou.