itch.io

this was very fun and sweet, well done too! <3

this game has so many fun little touches and the dolls themselves are gorgeous. beautiful work <3

Ah! thank you for reading, and thank you for asking these questions! It's great to have insight into how readers interpret what we wrote and what we ended up leaving out.

There are answers to your questions in my head that I guess did not come through in the text... most notably the details about Garbage Doll's becoming. I really regretted not having the space to do more than hint at the backstory and the origins of Garbage and Neon's relationship, and maybe a prequel would be in order. But  might never make one, so if you're curious about what I was trying to put in the subtext [spoilers ahead]:

Garbage and Neon were involved for a while, when both of them were more human. They were girlfriends who did hypnokink stuff. Neon, who wanted a doll, had talked to Garbage (when lucid) about turning her into one, and Garbage, who was having like a rough family life, trouble with school etc, transitioning, found the idea attractive but had not officially decided. Then Garbage attempted suicide, and Neon decided to save her by making her a doll. It's not right to hypnotize women into dollhood, and Neon could get in trouble with the other witches. However, I think she didn't actually hypnotize Garbage at that moment and instead took advantage of the fact that Garbage was vulnerable and already conditioned to go along with whatever Neon wanted. Garbage doesn't actually have a clear memory of what happened.  

This sort of reflects other Empty Spaces stuff we've read. Many witches are benevolent and seem to live to provide their dolls with whatever they need to feel fulfilled as dolls. Some are flat out evil and abuse their dolls (and some dolls seem to want that).  I wanted something in between for Neon Cat... she's kind of self centered, she thinks she knows best, she does what she wants, her dolls are there for her to use. She does care about them, but once she feels like she's failed them she shuts down and avoids thinking about it. 

(I think in other ES stories the witches often also use real magic. It's not really codified and it's often not the focus of the stories.)

But yeah, I couldn't figure out how to get all of that in at the time since it only really came up during the climax and I didn't want to slow things down too much. Oh well!

Oh, and about the scissors: Garbage Doll needed specifically a witch's scissors to cut the magical stitches on its mouth which is why it didn't buy a cheap pair from the store. The scissors in the medicine cabinet are, after all, the ones Neon used to repair Garbage Doll when they were living together.  (Also, you can't order a hat and wand online, or perhaps you can? But Neon Cat went to a local magic supply shop to get replacements.)

But yeah! Thanks again for reading! Glad you liked the art :)

this had a gripping story and really lovely cgs! adorable characters, beautiful fantasy forest setting, coming of age stuff, tender emotions. oh, my heart. i did not really know what i was in for when i started but im really glad i read it.  

hey this was really cool! enjoyed it

i've heard a lot of good things about this game, but i'm not able to play it because my eyes are not good enough. i found the text impossible to read even with glasses. :c

thank you so much!

thank you 💜 glad you enjoyed

glad i finally read this! one of my favorites from the jam.

nice! i really liked the corrupted photos.

when i've lost data it's usually been writing. apart from when it happened to a major project i was still working on, it's usually felt freeing. a fresh start.

if anything really important is lost, i just have to try to remake it.

tears are indeed the cum of the heart <3

thanks! this was delightful.

beautifully put together. love the feel of this, wanted to stay in it longer. 

so good!!

really great visuals. beautiful presentation. a lot of nice backgrounds, colors, dithering. story really nice! short and sweet. i love vera!! best snail girl so good!! 

she... she drewww... she drew them togetherrrrrr *sob*

music seemed nice too! i will have to play again because the first time i played i had accidentally loaded the game twice so the menu music in the background was actually drowning out whatever music was playing in game. once i realized this i played through again real quick without a second instance of the game in the background (and chose a few different choices.)

10/10 recommend

the art is really hot

great mech poem! i read it thinking about the pilot in bug grinder (noise jam game i worked on) and their similarities and differences.

wow, really interesting! cool narrative, lots of nice little touches. i liked how glitched out the text got.

great story. loved the side by side narration. glorious music. angels! *shakes fist*

horrifying. thank you.

these are great! i wish i would have added them to noise girl but maybe i will put some of them in an update :)

thank you for screaming at me

i loved it

great work on this one. i love the soundtrack with the owowows. hope to see more from you!

wow this was great! i loved the ending, with all of the character development

crying

we loved it so much, so so so much,

 and we humbly submit our drawing of gutterbrides adorable characters

thank you. this is so good to hear :)

Here i drew them lol

cute! would love to play the full game, will follow you and hope for the best.

love this game! beautiful beautiful. we drew mabel

Yeah the dolls are human size! I needed them to be trapped in there and there's no good explanation for why the lid is too heavy for them, if i had more time i might go back and rework that! 

And don't worry, in the second chapter garbage doll is able to clean up for the most part it, just takes some effort.

Thanks for reading!

we love this toxic yuri vn full of soft toys and our favorite purples, pinks, and blues. love stories about dolls, love stories about anxiety, love stories about spiraling. colors. 

in spite of the elements of unreality, this felt very real.

here's a drawing of a scene that i imagined, in my own head.

excited to see more from you

esp if toys 

this was great! really toxic, so many twists and turns, beautiful ui, loved the jester, loved the princess, loved ester, loved that ester and jester rhyme. loved the, um, finger scene. really cool, im going to tell all my friends to read it. congratulations

i am back to inform everyone reading this comment section that this is a great game to read on your phone!

here is a picture i drew of ellie thinking about maintenance.

a gorgeous game <3 i know i already mentioned, but i knew so very little about idol culture before i started reading, and it was still really accessible and engaging in that regard.  and now i feel like i've learned something. all idol-fan relationships are like this, probably ;)

here's my fan art, which you've already seen. i thought i would post it in your comments as well, for when the jam server goes away. 

they were fun to draw. but difficult! very difficult

still thinking about how simultaneously attractive and repulsive i find maddy. i like her so much...why she gotta be like that...

anyway here are maddy and christine for your comment section, since the discord server isn't forever

seriously the art in this game is so good, the entire vibe is so good.

i loved the girls so much that i had to draw all of them. they might die every time, but they will live forever in my heart

(since the discord server with my comments and fanart is going away at some point i wanted to say something more here)

i've been wanting to read this for a while, glad i finally got the time. i love the whole premise, love the art style and feel in general. i love that i get to be a toy. i named it Darling because of course you love the toy. one must love the toy. well done to you and quazi, i would love to know if you make more games.

we really liked this game! 

the design was awesome fun. 

appreciated the references to early 2000s culture, loved remembering myspace and lj and how everyone was drinking starbucks back then

and here is our fan art :)

i liked it and it made me blush