itch.io

Thank you for reading! I agree, the silhouettes and patterned sprites were initially placeholders, but I grew to like it and would keep the aesthetics for the full game (though I would have them properly designed and drawn by then).

Did you have trouble reading the text?

This is so atmospheric. I like the moody interface, the handdrawn feel… Great great use of limited assets, you set the tone just right. Normally I’d say this size of text at the bottom of the screen while the center pane shows largely nothing feels weird, but the emptiness works very well here. And when the art shows, it’s so very, very good! The writing is done very well too. There’s music in it, beautifully poetic, and surreal. This is one of my favorite entries so far. Thank you for your work! I’m keeping this to show my friends.

My only criticism is the hover effect on the menu buttons are really really subtle, so coupled with how small they are, it can be difficult to make out which button is being hovered on. For a longer game, I would prefer a clearer visual cue (but this one is short enough it doesn’t feel bad). It would be nice to have an option to enlarge the text.

This is so atmospheric. I like the moody interface, the handdrawn feel… Great great use of limited assets, you set the tone just right. Normally I’d say this size of text at the bottom of the screen while the center pane shows largely nothing feels weird, but the emptiness works very well here. And when the art shows, it’s so very, very good! The writing is done very well too. There’s music in it, beautifully poetic, and surreal. This is one of my favorite entries so far. Thank you for your work! I’m keeping this to show my friends.

My only criticism is the hover effect on the menu buttons are really really subtle, so coupled with how small they are, it can be difficult to make out which button is being hovered on. For a longer game, I would prefer a clearer visual cue (but this one is short enough it doesn’t feel bad). It would be nice to have an option to enlarge the text.

This is wonderful! I must admit I don’t really get where it goes initially, but the slow zoom out draws you in and you can’t stop watching. Excellent work all around (like anything you have released, truly).

This is wonderful! I must admit I don’t really get where it goes initially, but the slow zoom out draws you in and you can’t stop watching. Excellent work all around (like anything you have released, truly).

I like how stylized the character arts and backgrounds are. The main menu is somehow very small compared to the size of the screen. Is this intended? There’s also a flicker of the dialogue box right after I start the game, though it’s very minor. The history zoom doesn’t work for me but I’m happy of the thought. I really appreciate the complete suite of VN features, which don’t always come with an Unity game.

I like how the choice menu appears and disappears. The narrator name seems to go outside the box at times, though?

Hmm. Interesting. An awkward opening, no one seems to know what’s going on…I’m torn. I think I personally would like an extra line or two in the beginning to set the scene, but this confusion is apt to the story. I must admit I have no idea what’s going on the first 15 minutes of this, and then. Oh. OH.

That was a good one. Great use of lighting too.

I like the how stylized the character arts and backgrounds are. The main menu is somehow very small compared to the size of the screen. Is this intended? There’s also a flicker of the dialogue box right after I start the game, though it’s very minor. The history zoom doesn’t work for me but I’m happy of the thought. I really appreciate the complete suite of VN features, which don’t always come with an Unity game.

I like how the choice menu appears and disappears. The narrator name seems to go outside the box at times, though?

Hmm. Interesting. An awkward opening, no one seems to know what’s going on…I’m torn. I think I personally would like an extra line or two in the beginning to set the scene, but this confusion is apt to the story. I must admit I have no idea what’s going on the first 15 minutes of this, and then. Oh. OH.

That was a good one. Great use of lighting too.

Thank you for your kind words! As you might have probably guessed, the diagonal framing on the opening scene was done very late in the jam. I had already done typesetting and had other things to do, so I decided to just…live with the out-of-bounds text for time being. The flowers are higanbana/spider lily, correct. Do you have difficulty in reading the text too? I’m taking everyone’s feedbacks regarding color balance and blurriness.

Thank you for your kind words. Yes, I’m testing hues again. It appears that some colors look quite differently on the screen I use to develop this. I plan to include a colour picker too so the players can adjust it on their monitors just in case (once I know how to do this in Light.VN)

Good job on that title screen, the moon is really striking. Default sound volume is a bit high. The opening sequence with the eyes is cool. As for the script, the infodumps about the settings peppered in Runa’s dialogues are not very natural, but totally understandable considering this is a jam game. Considering you use both NVL and ADV textboxes, the descriptions the characters are unlikely to voice out could be in the NVL mode.

MyCasket, though :cry: What a name for a grocery store. I kinda expect the game to end after the charm is returned. That would be kind of eerie (also nice that it still works even after we know what the twist is…right on the title!). Minimalist, atmospheric ambience works very well here.

I’ll admit I have a bit of a mood whiplash but the “today is the 25th” joke and the sudden chibi sprites got me to laugh. Ok the stream ending is a nice one. Not what I expected but a nice one. The pan up to the moon before closing is a nice touch. I’ll see how this goes as you finetune the details!

Good job on that title screen, the moon is really striking. Default sound volume is a bit high. The opening sequence with the eyes is cool. As for the script, the infodumps about the settings peppered in Runa’s dialogues are not very natural, but totally understandable considering this is a jam game. Considering you use both NVL and ADV textboxes, the descriptions the characters are unlikely to voice out could be in the NVL mode.

MyCasket, though :cry: What a name for a grocery store. I kinda expect the game to end after the charm is returned. That would be kind of eerie (also nice that it still works even after we know what the twist is…right on the title!). Minimalist, atmospheric ambience works very well here.

I’ll admit I have a bit of a mood whiplash but the “today is the 25th” joke and the sudden chibi sprites got me to laugh. Ok the stream ending is a nice one. Not what I expected but a nice one. The pan up to the moon before closing is a nice touch. I’ll see how this goes as you finetune the details!

This is a very clever use of a limited range of assets, which is to say a good design for a jam game. I like the one-letter Quick Menu that expands into a full menu title when hovered, it’s a good way to keep things compact while still giving enough information.

The narration at the beginning could totally use some extra space between the lines (and a different font to match the game). There seems to be some flickering. I don’t get what causes it (maybe you should use cg0 so the image gets faded in from zero alpha instead of 255->0->255?). The characters are lively and expressive. A nice little game with more ending variety than I thought from the setting. Good job!

This is a very clever use of a limited range of assets, which is to say a good design for a jam game. I like the one-letter Quick Menu that expands into a full menu title when hovered, it’s a good way to keep things compact while still giving enough information.

The narration at the beginning could totally use some extra space between the lines (and a different font to match the game). There seems to be some flickering. I don’t get what causes it (maybe you should use cg0 so the image gets faded in from zero alpha instead of 255->0->255?). The characters are lively and expressive. A nice little game with more ending variety than I thought from the setting. Good job!

I’ve been wanting to play this since you posted on Discord and I finally have time to do so!!! This is so late, I’m sorry >.< I love the UI and scene transitions, your page is so charming, the use of colors amazing, and the silhouette characters are nicely drawn. The title card for each chapter is simple and effective (page turning SFX is nice), it’s like playing a picture book. I hope more comments and downloads will help you out of itch.io’s false positive quarantine.

There are crashes I suspect is caused by leftover code from a heavily skinned template. You may also want to give proofreading another go when you have time, but I can tell how much heart goes into this. The first panorama of The Candytown is so cute (I’m kinda hoping it would stop scrolling when I talk with Edelweiss, though. Talking with a scrolling background gives me nausea, I’m sorry!

I like the plot. It has potentials and I’m sure it’ll be very nice when the game gets all polished up (and the pesky warning goes away). Congrats for such a beautiful entry!

I’ve been wanting to play this since you posted on Discord and I finally have time to do so!!! This is so late, I’m sorry >.< I love the UI and scene transitions, your page is so charming, the use of colors amazing, and the silhouette characters are nicely drawn. The title card for each chapter is simple and effective (page turning SFX is nice), it’s like playing a picture book. I hope more comments and downloads will help you out of itch.io’s false positive quarantine.

There are crashes I suspect is caused by leftover code from a heavily skinned template. You may also want to give proofreading another go when you have time, but I can tell how much heart goes into this. The first panorama of The Candytown is so cute (I’m kinda hoping it would stop scrolling when I talk with Edelweiss, though. Talking with a scrolling background gives me nausea, I’m sorry!

I like the plot. It has potentials and I’m sure it’ll be very nice when the game gets all polished up (and the pesky warning goes away). Congrats for such a beautiful entry!

Yeah, I’m still struggling with color balance so hopefully next time I’ll have figured it out. Sorry for the eyestrain and thank you for pulling it through!

I’m glad you like the moments. I had to cut a lot of things for Spooktober scope knife chop chop so I’m happy folks don’t find it too jarring after all.

Thank you for reading! I’m glad you could enjoy the story :D I’m really happy with how this came out too, managed to fit quite a lot in time for Spooktober.

I like this? The color palettes are so cozy and I like seeing the little capsules hop around. It’s somewhat soothing to just go around reading and…do nothing watching things move.

I hereby grant Balloon Co. [gaming division] permission to include my comment and screen name in a future update, represented by the discerning grandma in the rightmost column of the sixth row.

I look forward to another visit to the museum.

-Requ

I’ve always liked your animated UI design since Hear Me Hear You. Feels so lively. The art style on this is also very bold and distinct. Flat sprites against shaded backgrounds? So good.

Thank you for making sure the text is still easily read even in such a stylized presentation! I was initially worried it would be warped to match the TV. Nice job writing all those shows.

All in all, an interesting entry.

What you want to make?

I want to make a tribute to 2000s doujin Visual Novels with charming, if stilted, fan translations. It’s going to be melancholic, faux-philosophical in nature, and sort of non-sequitur between cultures and languages lost in translation.

What text (i.e. any media, fiction or not) that you want to draw from?

Many 2000s-2010s VNs, but mainly ef ~a fairy tale of the two~ (and its anime adaptation), Buddhist texts and discourses about reincarnation, and the many stories in the world about various roles in the afterlife.

What mediums or tools you want to use and why?

Visual novel, because I want to explore abstract atmospheric compositions to accompany the text, and it’s more doable than full-blown animation.

Why are you scared of participating?

It’s been a long time since I write ‘properly’ and the narrative in my head is too grand and pretentious, then I just have to overcomplicate things by choosing to also learn a whole new engine, and fitting this to Spooktober deadline.

This is interesting. What a concept, like a scrapbook or a scrapyard of half-finished dreams.

I think starting on this thesis will be interesting. “How can we take $2,000 and make a $20,000 visual novel.” It doesn’t have to be a detailed itemized breakdown, but you can tell us how you budget and end up spending. You can also tell us what helps in keeping cost down or what works in your team’s favor on that aspect (e.g someone already know how to do things/have the software license ready).

How does the budget dictate your scoping, and what you do to make sure the scope is reasonable.

Basically, this post, but more ramble per step? 🤣

On technical aspects, I’d really enjoy you writing about your cool shaders, how you design them, and how to utilize them to go a long long way with a couple sprites.

Oh, this is a cool one. I think this is one of the most frequent questions in Ren’py Discord too.

Thank you!

Hello. I plan to release my demo for Spooktober and do the full game afterwards, just in time for this jam.

Is it alright if I submit the demo first, then update the build throughout the jam duration? Or is it better to get the whole thing done and submit it near the end of the jam? Thank you.

I like this idea! I like looking at past jams to find inspiration from what people make

Since I have not been able to gain access to the Discord server (still on #entrance-en) do you have links to the EN version of Light.VN template? The one I downloaded was still in Japanese, and I couldn’t find a list of basic files I need for a base game decoupled from the engine files.

Hi. I missed the Decker Fantasy Jam because of Life(tm) and I’m wondering where I can go to find news about upcoming jams and such?

I am toying around with Light.VN, and while I really like a lot of the features, I miss Renpy’s ease of making text buttons (just text, no background image). As of now, the engine seems to be very image-heavy, which is not always appealing for rapid prototyping.

I realize this will be an extra workload, but will we get devlogs for technologies, processes, and design decisions employed on this Visual Novel too? I find this kind of post educational and it’s always a pleasure to read how people approach their games.

Thank you very much!

Hi, this is really stunning! Is this available for use in commercial projects? Or is it strictly non-commercial? Thanks!

This is really useful, thank you!

Thank you!

I finally got around to making a page https://ifdb.org/viewgame?id=picinmzu2qmpje7m

I hope this brings you some eyes!

After talking with my friends, we have decided that we would do the original release plan (which means I cannot submit the game here because the game is only free via community copies). However, I did the write-up here and here, which may be interesting for people of this jam. Bring out your ghosts, people. They may come to live all-anew :)

https://avenueq.itch.io/the-butterfly-dreams Feel free to grab the community copies!

I just want to say thank you not just for updating this nifty tool but also explaining what was wrong with my modal screen. Encountered this bug a couple days ago and racking my brains for possible causes.

Best wishes for your project!

A great resource, but being a long and historied institution means sometimes the community misses newer games from outsiders that might have been significant.

Have you registered this to ifdb.org? Please consider to do so if you haven’t! This is such a fresh new take on a parser game and I wish more people would see it.