Hello, thank you so much for enjoying TFN! This storyline is left open-ended on purpose to connect it and finish the whole arc inside Moonlight Castle.
You definitely brought a lot of good points and I agree many of the issues stem from having to squish the story together to fit the word count. I did mention this before, but I thought 20k was the actual limit and my word doc told me 19.9k (which strangely turned to 18k in post). So... there's that, but if you enjoyed the story, that's the most important thing!
First thing I wanna say is never feel bad for sharing your thoughts. As a creator, I go crazy for these in-depth analyses. It gives me that outside opinion I can't have because I'm too stuck in my own creations and you know how it is, maintaining a clear vision gets hard.
Overall everything you've said it's true. This is a spin-off so the missing context is meant to be in the main game, the whole story is Patrice trying to get over his first love and failing, that's it.
I will say, I learned about mouth guards near the end of writing the script so I shoved a random line in, without thinking too much. I'll have to go back in and fix it. Makes no sense.
Liam and Patrice are childhood friends so this is their usual banter. Also you're correct about that being weird, which is why Patrice mentions in passing that Liam ended up ghosting him after the break up. Patrice doesn't want to see him that way either. You don't have that friend who just... throws sexual jokes around/flirts but doesn't actually mean it?
I do understand your overall desire between wanting to learn more about Nia and less about Liam, this is just how it came out with the pre-existing knowledge of the main game already in place. I see now that it takes away a portion of the entertaining from the story.
I think love is a very subjective experience so... I want to believe, through Patrice's POV, that he did harbor genuine love and feelings for him but it was messy and they let their lack of experience carry them away. The only reason the end is abrupt was the word limit. I had in mind to add an additional scene at the end and readjust the overall speed.
Anyway, thank you so much for reading! I appreciated your feedback a lot.
I asked Raykyu to translate this VN to me because I felt like it deserved to be read, but being Polish was heavily penalizing it, thankfully I had the perfect guy for the job! Be kind to me, this reading experience has been basically a game of telephone so my review might not be as accurate as it should be. It's a combination of hearing it from Raykyu and my own gut feeling.
So... I'd say try to go easier on the words you want to use, it gave me the impression to be very flowery and very descriptive, sometimes there are metaphors that provide unnecessary information you could've easily skipped.
I liked the atmosphere and imagery you were going for, even through Raykyu's vague description I could easily picture what was happening and follow the story just fine. I would've liked to learn more, but you go VEEEERY easy on the sharing world-building department and that's a shame. Also terminology was a bit too on the nose, but thats me nitpicking.
Art is amazing, sprites (almost all of them. The MC looks a bit jarring. That evil sprite doesn't work at all with the vibe), music; everything blends together nicely. Really enjoyable even if I would've liked to see the plot progress more. It's a bit on the slow side.
I'm guessing this is a WIP and you're planning to write more? Cause the ending isn't as satisfying, especially the death one. It gives you nothing. And the other one feels a bit abrupt on the LETS MAKE OUT NOW. Imo there wasn't enough build-up and bonding to make that part feel justified. BUUUT the bath scene was very nice and tasteful. It just needed more bonding time before the uwu part, that's all. Goob job on writing this one!
Thank you for the review! It might've been a good idea to cut one of the gym scenes to have more space later. At the time, I didn't think about it. I hope you enjoyed yourself regardless!
Thank you so much for your review! You've been pretty spot on in a lot of things. I'm starting to see how certain elements aren't clear enough without the main game added on top.
I understand your desire of wanting them explored, my brain prioritized the main conflict instead with the idea that the other elements were going to be addressed somewhere else.
I hope that didn't take away from the overall experience too much!
Thank you so much for reading! Yeah, the ending is missing a scene that I couldn't write because of the word limitation. I'll eventually add that in when the jam ends
I think we talked enough on Discord about this VN so I'm not going to re-type everything again. It's definitely an ambitious first try that didn't exactly land. It needed more cooking time, the concept and ideas were interesting, but not executed properly.
Awww thank you so much for the review! I personally really liked it and it's nice being able to read what people have to say about the game. I will answer to a couple of things since you pointed them, like, Joel "Using" his talent on Clyde's D3. I agree with you, I should've mentioned something with Nia on D4, but I opted for not doing that because of information overload. We'll eventually go back to this anyway.
For the repeated knowledge I did that for two reasons - reminder for readers, cuz there's a lot of stuff the game discusses and to let other characters who don't know learn about it. Unless it comes from a character that should know about it already then I apologize. With 7 routes that have their own pacing some inconsistencies can slip.
Also haha Liam's route is indeed the only route I recommend doing last (or not before Ryan's/Patrice's), but it can't be helped, people are curious! I love both Ryan and Liam, idk if you've read the latest update, but their scenes are especially touching.
Thank you so much for the nice words. Dylan will be updated second to last in this cycle due to specific assets needed for his route. I did say that not all routes will develop romance, but I don't think I specifically said which one so, who knows, crossing fingers!
Ah, I see. Now I understand where you're coming from. You remember my old train wreck. Painful, but I understand. I learned the hard way that first impressions are super important. If I had known I would've waited to release in the first place.
Oh yeah. I remember that it was giving affection, but I don't think it mattered much in the grand scheme of things. It was great to type Tyson and see Dave freak the fuck out lmao.
