Trembling Essence:

💙Background + script updates💙

Hi hi and welcome to my devlog!

If you would like to play here's the link to my [Extended Demo!] :  https://zombeebunnie.itch.io/trembling-essence-extended-demo

This week mainly focused on art practice. I'm still getting back into the flow of working on the full game so this post might be very short. :]

Anywho, here are some of the backgrounds I drew up as practice.

I was going to use these in the beginning of the game but the immersive symbolism I was going for didn't match up to my liking. It just finished raining in the swamp where you're located at which leaves the area feeling tolerably cold but oddly humid with a hint of decay/mold in the air. I'm aiming for a dreary night theme that gives off a foreboding and a gloomy atmosphere. These give off a "fairy-forest" concept which I don't like all that much. Here's some reference examples of what I hope to bring next time:

I'm also in the process of creating a map for myself to make things easier to layout since certain endings are being changed. This due to specific areas taking place in the forest and not the swamp which have their own unique form of symbolism. I tried to convey this in the March 2023/[Extended Demo] but it's hard to tell the difference between the areas.

I can't guarantee this fully but if you choose to explore around the area there might be small parallax effects that move around automatically. It was something I wanted to try back in the [Extended Demo] but this would've pushed the update farther out into the year.

Lastly, happy belated birthday to Noah! His birthday is May 7th! :]

I wasn't able to draw a birthday doodle yet so enjoy this unrelated sneak peek practice sketch I did a few days ago. :,,]

My Q&A / Ask box has been reset!

Thank you to those who have sent in asks in the past, unfortunately they all disappeared except for 1 while I was gone. I have no idea what happened but I can only guess it just got reset.

If you have any questions about Trembling Essence/Noah feel free to ask or resend them in here please. This makes it easier for me to see and answer accordingly! I would really like to hear from you guys!

This is all I have done so far but I'm enjoying the process even if it's a bit small, Thank you guys for the patience and continued support and patience I really appreciate it. :,]

Thank you very much for the thoughtful comment! It's great knowing that you enjoyed the atmosphere that I'm aiming for. :]

Trembling Essence is a slow burn horror game/dating sim visual novel which focuses on survival. Your choices will lead to multiple endings that will help you learn not only about Noah and the swamp, but everything else surrounding it.
If you would like to play, here's a link for it: https://zombeebunnie.itch.io/trembling-essence-extended-demo 

There are currently:

• 12 Bad endings 
• 6 Neutral endings 
• 6 endings that continue the rest of the Day 3
• It now has a Endings Gallery and a day notifier once you enter the cabin with Noah!

You wake up lost within the swamplands that is surrounded by a large forest. The sense of time is lost on you and the moon is your only guiding light.  At some point you can choose to receive help from a man named Noah who resides in the swamp. He has vast knowledge that will aid you in your survival and if you choose to go with him, he'll take you back to his desolate cabin. He just wants to take care of you and keep you safe but there's a lot more to him than he lets on. It's up to you to make certain choices to survive to the end even if it means taking extreme risks. 

💙Script progress + Updates💙

If you would like to play here's the link to my [Extended Demo!] :  https://zombeebunnie.itch.io/trembling-essence-extended-demo

Hello and welcome new followers, long time no see! I was very busy most of this month, but I am back and ready to continue from where I left off on the game! This game development post might be a bit long but I tried to condense everything! :]

"How are things going so far?":

It's going slow and steady! I haven't been able to do too much these past few weeks, however, I wrote a few parts out before I got too busy and couldn't do anything else.

I want to be very careful when it comes to spoilers but, based on your choices, some of these areas will give off immersive cozy/homelike vibes that really express Noah and the player(Y/N)'s view towards each other. In the old 2023 script I was very new to writing so the small semi-hints of romance weren't the entire focus compared to the horror aspect but there's a better balance between both genres now and I'm still aiming for a meaningful slow burn versus it just being all over the place. :] I liked writing them a whole bunch which lead to a lot of these taking place in the mid/end of Day 4+, they just need to be placed in specific areas that call for it. With that being said, it felt really comfy adding key details about Noah and creating meaningful sections in the game. I was even going to draw out some of the unseen script/scenes but I believe the best thing to do is give deeper lore from the [Extended Demo] first. Even though my writing style has improved I still have to fix the multiple pacing issues I wrote last year.

"Playtester's advice":

I wanted to continue working through Noah's backstory but I kept having moments where I'd get sidetracked into wanting to fix up the start of the game again. Eventually, I talked to my play testers about it and they gave me a few encouraging pointers.

To help keep my process at ease, I will fix the beginning of the game when I take breaks from writing up Noah's backstory. :]

I talked about this during early 2024 but the start of the game that leads up to the cabin is still getting reworked. I was able to get some of it fixed for the [Extended Demo] but I wasn't done. Things are still up in the air but, I will say that I have a better view of everything than I did before. :] Another priority that needs fixing are the backgrounds! I've improved a lot on drawing and they need to be optimized. When you first start up the game, you wake up in a holed out tree in the swamp with the choice to leave this area and possibly end up in the forest. I was going for a very immersive form of symbolism that only a few noticed but, I believe I can do a better job about this. Unfortunately I don't have any new backgrounds to show right now but maybe next week I'll have some finished up! :]

"Art process/Noah's sprite sheets":

As far as Noah sprite sheet goes, it's still in sketch mode.

I didn't draw anything since I was gone so I need to do a few warm ups before I get to them. There are some old drawing prompts I wrote down and old sketches that I never got a chance to doodle so hopefully I can get to them at some point with some attached lore. :,]

My Q&A / Ask box has been reset!

Thank you to those who have sent in asks in the past, unfortunately they all disappeared except for 1 while I was gone. I have no idea what happened but I can only guess it just got reset.

If you have any questions about Trembling Essence/Noah feel free to ask or resend them in here please. This makes it easier for me to see and answer accordingly! I would really like to hear from you guys!

This is all I have to share so far, Thank you to everyone for the continued support and patience while I was gone! I was ready to accept the interest for this game to fade out and coming back to see that it didn't happen makes me happy, I really appreciate it. :,]

Hello and welcome to my devlog!  It'll be some time before there's another update for the '[Extended Demo]' so it will no longer be in the title of game development posts to avoid confusion. Also the next couple of game development posts for April might be a bit short and/or spread out. :]

Behind the scenes:

So far a lot of what's been going on has been brainstorming/going over the script with breaks in between!

I had a very long talk with one of my play testers and it was very fun! One hour ended up turning into several and it really helped me get a better idea of what I want to do for some of the routing/paths and the overall story in general. I believe that this entire month+(?) will just be overlooking the script and brainstorming more ideas/quality of life changes for the game!

My writing style has developed significantly and I'm trying my best to fix all of the multiple pacing issues in the story in a certain order. Noah's backstory is one of the focal points being thoroughly worked on since he expresses sections of his past throughout the game depending on your choices. I can't really share too much else because a lot of it has spoilers and happens later on in the game so right now I'm just writing everything down. So far, I'm still in the early writing stages and I would consider it about 20%(?) done.

I'm still in the process of creating Noah's reference sheets too but I think I'll end up ditching some of the sketches since angled faces/poses are still difficult for me to draw. :,]

Q&A / Ask box is still open:

If you have any questions about Trembling Essence/Noah feel free to ask here please. This makes it easier for me to see and answer accordingly! I would really like to hear from you guys!

Thank you to those who have sent in asks! I'll try to get to them when I can. I just need time to answer since I like to respond with doodles/drawings as practice. :]

Right now this is all I have to share so far, thank you to everyone for the continued support while I continue working on the game. :,]

Trembling Essence [Extended Demo]:

💙What happens now?💙

Hello and welcome to my devlog!

If you would like to play here's the link to my [Extended Demo!] :  https://zombeebunnie.itch.io/trembling-essence-extended-demo

Firstly, I just want to thank everyone that have been playing the updated [Extended Demo] with the Endings Gallery and Day 3 notifier! From this I was able to get a good amount of responses to help me with quality of life ideas going forward. :]

The game page has also been fixed to include the Windows and Mac logo downloads as I had no idea they weren't there until I was told. :,,]

Again, please let me know if you run into any bugs, glitches, misspellings, etc or if the Endings gallery doesn't show up for you correctly.

"So what happens now?"

As far as the [Extended Demo] goes, I do have plans on updating it with certain paths/routes HOWEVER, it will be some time before that happens. There's a lot of stuff that I need to rework and look over before I can add anything. Here's a peek from some of the old game development posts.

[Please remember that this is still a DEMO and anything is subject to change.]

The sections missing from the [Extended Demo] were from routes/paths I wrote during the late spring-summer of 2023. In the fall my writing style developed significantly which lead me to discover multiple pacing issues in the story that went unnoticed. Out of everything I wrote, the two full routes you get while playing were the only sections that were good enough for me to polish up and didn't contain spoilers. As for when the new routes/paths will be added to the [Extended Demo], I don't have an answer for this.

Right now I've been giving myself a break and mainly focusing on brainstorming things out.

In other news, I'm still in the process of creating Noah's reference sheets! There will be a total of three(?) which will have specific details for each one! It's taking some time to create since I'm still learning how to do angled faces/poses, here's the w.i.p sketch version below:

 /Ask box is still open:

Thank you to those who have sent in asks! I'll try to get to them when I can. I just need time to answer since I like to respond with doodles/drawings as practice. :]

If you have any questions about Trembling Essence/Noah feel free to ask here please. This makes it easier for me to see and answer accordingly! I would really like to hear from you guys!

This is all I have to share so far, Thank you to everyone for the continued support and encouraging words while I continue working on the game, I really appreciate it. :,]

Hello hello! Thank you very much for your kind words and theories towards the game/Noah, as for the errors I'll test some things out since this is such a unique situation and hopefully I'll be able figure out what happened to cause this.  Since this comment was mentioned on the March 2023 demo page and not the [Extended Demo] I unfortunately didn't see this but again, thank you for your continued support and brining this to my attention! :]

Hello and thank you very much for brining this to my attention, I had no idea this even happened. :,,]

It means a lot knowing how much the [Extended Demo] had a positive impact for you. I really can't say much due to spoilers/going over the script but I will say this, I'm happy the few dialog adjustments/sprite expressions were noticed in the form of a foreboding element! That CG you mentioned is one of my favorites that I drew since I was extremely new to perspective drawing and still developing my art style! :,]

Feel free to send in your asks whenever and if you ever get around to drawing fan art I'd like so see it! All I ask is that it's nothing Explicit/NSFW since that's not what I'm going for in my works! Overall, thank you so much for your meaningful words of support, I really do appreciate it! :]

https://zombeebunnie.itch.io/trembling-essence-extended-demo I've recently updated my [Extended Demo] for anyone that may have been interested in playing but couldn't download it at the time! 

It now has a Endings Gallery and a day notifier once you enter the cabin with Noah!

Trembling Essence is a slow burn horror game/dating sim visual novel which focuses on survival. Your choices will lead to multiple endings that will help you learn not only about Noah and the swamp, but everything else surrounding it.

There are currently:

• 12 Bad endings 
• 6 Neutral endings 
• 6 endings that continue the rest of the Day 3

You wake up lost within the swamplands that is surrounded by a large forest. The sense of time is lost on you and the moon is your only guiding light.  At some point you can choose to receive help from a man named Noah who resides in the swamp. He has vast knowledge that will aid you in your survival and if you choose to go with him, he'll take you back to his desolate cabin. He just wants to take care of you and keep you safe but there's a lot more to him than he lets on. It's up to you to make certain choices to survive to the end even if it means taking extreme risks. 

Trembling Essence [Extended Demo]:

💙Update out now!💙

Hello and welcome new followers! Just letting it be known that the [Extended Demo] has been updated and now includes a Endings Gallery and a Day 3 notifier when you enter the cabin with Noah! :]

Please let me know if you run into any bugs, glitches, misspellings, etc or if the Endings gallery shows up for you.

When you load up the game you just have to click on each tab to see your progress. If it's greyed out that means you haven't earned it yet and if you do, it'll have color and a "+" added to it! :]

This notification is meant to show what day it is in the game to resolve confusion. Once you enter the cabin with Noah it starts Day 3. In the future, this notification will pop up every time there's a new Day! :]

Q&A / Ask box is still open:

Thank you to those who have sent in asks! I'll try to get to them when I can. I just need time to answer since I like to respond with doodles/drawings as practice. :]

If you have any questions about Trembling Essence/Noah feel free to ask here please. This makes it easier for me to see and answer accordingly! I would really like to hear from you guys!

Thank you to everyone for the continued support and patience, I really appreciate it. :,]

I appreciate the time you took out to play through everything! :,]

Your views on Noah and their perspective towards the player(Y/N) are very thoughtful and I wish I could say more but spoilers and still going through the script! :,] I'm glad you enjoyed the animations I added which I'm hoping to do more of in the future especially during the window scenes and in some of the Bad Endings. :,]

I'm trying to aim for a couple of comfy aesthetic scenes and it's good knowing I'm hitting the mark with immersion. Thank you for your continued support, I have been taking breaks and just brainstorming but I'm hoping to get that one Valentine's Day sketch finished at some point since it has lore attached. Again, thank you so much for playing and support, I appreciate it! :]

Trembling Essence [Extended Demo]:

💙Quality of life progress finished💙

Hello and welcome to my devlog! I've been focused on the quality of life changes I discussed in my last two update posts. :]

Happy one month of the [Extended Demo] being released! Yay! Thank you to everyone that has been patient and supported this! :,]

Quality of life progress:

*Please note that these changes aren't in the [Extended Demo] yet! I'm in the process of updating which I'll announce in a future post! :]

Here's the finished endings collection gallery! I enjoyed the process and learned a lot from this. I can't wait to implement what I've learned in other places within the game! :,]

When you load up the game you just have to click on each tab to see your progress. If it's greyed out that means you haven't earned it yet and if you do, it'll have color and a "+" added to it! I also changed the hue's compared to how it looked last week. :]

I also discovered there's actually 12* Bad Endings and not 13. At some point during development a Bad Ending was turned into a Neutral Ending and I accidently forgot to change that. :S

The game page will be adjusted to indicate this now:

12 Bad endings 6 Neutral endings 6 endings that continue the rest of the Day 3

For those that are new or have been here for some time, entering the cabin with Noah starts Day 3 due to the player(Y/N) being lost in the terrain for 2 and a half days which Noah mentions. Sometimes this can get confusing since some consider it Day 1 while the game considers it Day 3.

I added a notification tab in the upper left corner and moved it slightly to the right so it wouldn't overlap the player(Y/N)'s HP bar. This is meant to show what day it is in the game to resolve confusion. Once you enter the cabin with Noah it starts Day 3. :]

Q&A / Ask box is open:

If you have any questions about Trembling Essence/Noah feel free to ask here please. This makes it easier for me to see and answer accordingly! I would really like to hear from you guys!

I really wanted some of the lore to be found through playing so I'm comfortable with doing this now that the [Extended Demo] has been out for a good while now!

If you've already sent in a ask, I did see it I just need time to answer since I like to respond with doodles/drawings as practice. :]

Outside of a couple of spelling errors I fixed, I can't think of anything else that needs to be added right now so that's all I have to share! Thank you for the continued support, I appreciate it. :,]

Trembling Essence [Extended Demo]:

💙Quality of life progress💙

Hi hi and welcome new followers! This week mainly focused on the quality of life changes I discussed in my last update post. :]

Quality of life progress:

*Please note that these changes aren't in the [Extended Demo] yet! I'm still working on this and I'll let it be known in a update post!

Now that it's week three of the [Extended Demo] being released, It's time to go over some changes to help the player out when going through the game!

It was a struggle but I managed to make a endings collection gallery! I'm still working on it and brainstorming how to make it easier for the player to navigate but hopefully it'll be done soon.

I added a 'Endings' button and separated the endings into different categories!

It looks wonky here but trust the process, I'm still fixing it up! :,]

The left section will be all the bad endings you can get which will be marked in RED when you get them!

The middle section will be the neutral endings that you can obtain within the cabin. These will be marked in BLUE. :]

To give a little bit more detail on this one, these are sections that were suppose to continue the story but ended very early since I still need to look over and redo some of these paths/routes.

For example: Choosing the "Go to sleep." choice here will always lead to a neutral ending regardless of how close you are with Noah.

The right section are all the endings you can achieve when you manage to find the two full routes that progress the rest of Day 3. They will be marked in GREEN!

With that out of the way here's another quality of life adjustment!

For those that are new or have been here for some time, entering the cabin with Noah starts Day 3 due to the player(Y/N) being lost in the terrain for 2 and a half days which Noah mentions. Sometimes this can get confusing since some consider it Day 1 while the game considers it Day 3.

I added a little notification tab in the upper left corner of the game to notify the player(Y/N) of what day it is in the game to resolve confusion. Once you enter the cabin with Noah it starts Day 3. I'm still fixing this too. :]

Q&A / Ask box is open:

If you have any questions about Trembling Essence/Noah feel free to ask here please. This makes it easier for me to see and answer accordingly! I would really like to hear from you guys!

I really wanted some of the lore to be found through playing so I'm more comfortable with doing this now that the [Extended Demo] has been out for a good while now!

If you've already sent in a ask, I did see it I just need time to answer since I like to respond with doodles/drawings and helps me practice. :]

For those who don't follow my Tumblr, here's a sneak peek of a drawing I've been working on. I was looking through old drawings for a skit and noticed I haven't drawn Noah with his sledgehammer in a while. Not sure when this will be finished. :[]

That's all I have to share right now! A very big thank you for the continued interest and support in what I'm working on, I will always appreciate it. :,]

Trembling Essence [Extended Demo]:

💙Quality of life changes + Q&A.💙

Hello and welcome new followers! To show my appreciation for all the support I've received again, here's one of the Valentines Day concept drawings finished! A big thank you to everyone that has continued supporting this through a like, re-blog, fanart, comment, tip jar, share, etc. The higher quality version is on my Tumblr since this one had to be adjusted in order for me to upload it. :,]

I wasn't expecting it to take as long as it did but I'm very happy with the result and how much I've been improving! I'm not too good at drawing angled faces so being able to get it to look just right made me very happy! :,]

• I still have this one to go so hopefully at some point I'll have it done!

Quality of life changes:

*Please note that these changes aren't in the [Extended Demo] yet! It'll be something for me to work on adding and I'll let it be known in a update post!

Now that it's been two weeks of the [Extended Demo] being released, It's time to go over some changes to help the player out when going through the game!

1. I noticed from comments and playthrough's that certain Bad endings/Neutral story progressions were difficult to find, especially the full afternoon route. I don't want players to feel burnt out from trying to search for everything.

I want to add a check-list menu that shows all the Bad/Neutral endings you can get while playing so it's easier to navigate the game.

2. For those that are new or have been here for some time, entering the cabin with Noah starts Day 3 due to the player(Y/N) being lost in the terrain for 2 and a half days which Noah mentions. Sometimes this can get confusing since some consider it Day 1 while the game considers it Day 3.

It's still up in the air about how I'm going to go on about this but I'm thinking about adding a little notification tab in the upper left corner of the game to notify the player(Y/N) of what day it is in the game to resolve confusion.

3. I talked about this last week but I didn't know until recently that the tags I use for Trembling Essence were very unorganized and hard to search through.

I went through and tried my best to re-organize all of the lore and art about Noah/game posts. I also cleaned up the #Trembling Essence tag since it was flooded with game development posts and not much else. I'm also working on a master post and plan on creating some reference sheets of Noah which will be placed under a different tag! :]

#Get to know: Noah : This will be filled with answered asks and lore dump. Sometimes(?) there's random dev-logs that have lore attached to them too.

 #TE Updates : This only includes dev-logs/updates about the game and development progress.

 #Trembling Essence : This tag is mainly used to post fan art / art and anything else in general that might belong here which includes lore posts. I really want searching through the tag to be enjoyable and not filled with a bunch of dev-logs.

Q&A / Ask box is open:

If you have any questions about Trembling Essence/Noah feel free to ask here please. This makes it easier for me to see and answer accordingly! I would really like to hear from you guys!

I really wanted some of the lore to be found through playing versus me just answering everything. :]

If you've already sent in a ask, I did see it I just need time to answer since I like to respond with doodles/drawings and helps me practice. :]

That's all I have to share right now! Thank you for the continued support, I wholeheartedly appreciate it. :,]

Hello and thank you for bringing this to my attention!

As far as choices go, to get the two full routes that continue the rest of Day 3, try to avoid losing too much closeness with Noah before you reach this section.

Once you get here, 2 out of the 5 choices will continue into the rest of Day 3 depending on what you do next. For the second full route, here's a very small hint, you have to be very sneaky. >;]  I'd highly recommend saving right here once you reach a high amount of closeness with Noah.

The first full route starts in the morning with the player(Y/N) being woken up by a noise.

The second full route starts in the afternoon with the player(Y/N) waking up normally. (This one might be a little tricky to find.)

As for the build, if the following screenshot looks like this within your game, that's from the March 2023 demo and won't have any full routes. A lot of CG's were updated and no longer in the [Extended Demo]:

 If you're still having trouble/issues please let me know! :]

Hello, It's good to know you enjoyed playing!

I don't have a timeline until launch though, this is something I'm going to explain in a Master Post but I have to go back and look over a lot of the script I wrote that didn't make it into the [Extended Demo] and no problem! :]

Thank you so much, I'm glad you like them! :,]

Also enjoy, I hope you have fun with finding the second full route! :D 

Thank you very much, I really appreciate it a whole bunch! I can't wait to upgrade some of the old swamp/forest scenery! :,]

Hello! He does have a canon voice however, the full game won't have any voice acting. I have some voice snippets as an answer to this which I'll need some time to edit into the game to make a video out of. :]

Thank you very much for your kind words of support! It's great knowing you enjoyed the content so far! :,]

Hello, it's nice seeing you again! :]

Thank you so much for playing this [Extended Demo]! I went through and even though I wasn't able to watch the entire video, it was nice seeing your choices through the different routes/dialog choices. I was surprised you got one of the hidden neutral endings first! I also noticed one of the full routes wasn't found in your playthrough so I went and added two more CG's on the front game page because of this as a hint! Again, thank you for giving my game a chance again and playing it! :,]

No problem! I'm very happy knowing it was well received, especially the atmospheric details making things even more immersive! :,]

Also late belated Valentines day to you, It  did end up being happy and joyful and I hope the same happened for you! Thank you for the jar of heart-shaped cookies!  :,] 

Trembling Essence [Extended Demo]:

💙Thank you!💙

Hello and welcome new followers to my Devlog, if you would like to play the [Extended Demo] here's a link! First off I just want to show my appreciation and gratitude for all the support I've been given this week with these two concept drawings. :,]

I don't show sketches as much as I used to since they can look really messy but maybe it's time to change that into the new year! :D

They were suppose to be colored up and uploaded as a Valentines Day surprise but, there was a lot of stuff going on which gave me art block so I didn't get a chance to finish them on time. I'm still sort of getting over it now though. :,]

A big thank you to everyone that has been patient and supported this through a comment, tip jar, likes, re-blog, fanart, share, etc.

I whole-heartedly appreciate the positive reception from the [Extended Demo] and it really makes me happy seeing familiar people and newcomers interested in what I'm creating. I'm still adjusting and need time to get to everything I might've missed.

If you have any questions about the game/Noah feel free to ask here or comment below. I would really like to hear from you guys!

If you've already sent in a ask, I did see it I just need time to answer since I like to respond with doodles/drawings and my art block isn't as bad as before. :]

I'm also going to try and re-organize all of the lore and art about Noah/the game posts on my Tumblr  since going through the tags don't have them ordered correctly. I didn't know about this until recently. :[

Game development Trembling Essence [Extended demo] update:

I've only been able to catch a few glimpses of playthroughs and wasn't able to watch them fully so I don't have too much to say right now but I did notice that one of the full routes out of the two in the [Extended Demo] weren't found so I'm going to post two more CG previews here and on the game page as a hint, hopefully this helps!

As far as any future updates go for the [Extended Demo], I don't have an answer yet! I want to see how things will continue to go and not rush anything. :]

Anywho, that's all I have to share right now. Once again, thank you to everyone's kind words and continued support, especially those that have been here since the beginning and have been very patient and understanding! I wholeheartedly appreciate it. :,]

Yay, I'm happy to know you enjoyed this! As far as the next release, it'll be something I'll discuss in a future master post! :,] 

To answer a bit of your question, Noah hints at how he feels about some of the weather through varying dialog at times in the extended demo. Here's a old post where I explained it further on my Tumblr! I'll eventually redo this but mainly just the images as everything else is fairly the same! :]

I just need to re-organize all of the old lore posts on my tumblr again. Thanks for playing! :,]

I hope you have a awesome time playing! :,]

You're never too early! >:]

I hope you have a good time playing and thanks for noticing the inspiration in the bars, it took a long while for me to figure out how to get it to work right.  At the time I thought they were a common thing to see in games and didn't know that wasn't the case.  :,] 

Thank you for checking out what I made, have fun! :]

TREMBLING ESSENCE [EXTENDED DEMO]: 

💙OUT NOW!💙

You wake up lost within the swamplands that is surrounded by a large forest. The sense of time is lost on you and the moon is your only guiding light.  At some point you can choose to receive help from a man named Noah who resides in the swamp. He has vast knowledge that will aid you in your survival and if you choose to go with him, he'll take you back to his desolate cabin. He just wants to take care of you and keep you safe but there's a lot more to him than he lets on. It's up to you to make certain choices to survive to the end even if it means taking extreme risks. 

Trembling Essence is a slow burn horror game/dating sim visual novel which focuses on survival. Your choices will lead to multiple endings that will help you learn not only about Noah and the swamp, but everything else surrounding it.

If you would like to play here's the link to my [Extended Demo!] :  https://zombeebunnie.itch.io/trembling-essence-extended-demo

A very special thank you to everyone that's been following this project of mine and being supportive! It means a lot to me! :]

Thank you so much I really appreciate it a whole bunch! I've been practicing with drawing backgrounds and plan on redoing some of the very old versions so it's great hearing that I nailed the gloomy weather/environment! :,] 

You wake up lost within the swamplands that is surrounded by a large forest. The sense of time is lost on you and the moon is your only guiding light.  At some point you can choose to receive help from a man named Noah who resides in the swamp. He has vast knowledge that will aid you in your survival and if you choose to go with him, he'll take you back to his desolate cabin. He just wants to take care of you and keep you safe but there's a lot more to him than he lets on. It's up to you to make certain choices to survive to the end even if it means taking extreme risks. 

Trembling Essence is a slow burn horror game/dating sim visual novel which focuses on survival. Your choices will lead to multiple endings that will help you learn not only about Noah and the swamp, but everything else surrounding it.

If you would like to play here's the link to my [Extended Demo!] :  https://zombeebunnie.itch.io/trembling-essence-extended-demo

TREMBLING ESSENCE [EXTENDED DEMO]: 

💙Mini Update💙

Hi guys and welcome new followers! I am here with a mini update! :]

Since there's 3 days left until the [Extended Demo] is uploaded on my itch.io page, I want to share a few game development things that weren't written in the Surprise update post. This was done to keep it from being too long winded. :]

If you would still like to play the old March 2023 demo just for fun here's the link! :]

There were a lot of quality of life changes.

For starters, a few CG's got adjustments that I felt were needed. Here's an idea of what I mean:

Before:

After:

• Since this CG will be commonly seen throughout the game, I felt like the view should be updated! I wanted to go for a detailed, scenic look with varying colors. I think out of all the Day & Night settings I redid, this one was my favorite to illustrate! Also, I slightly adjusted the window frame but kept the rustic look it was intended for! :]

(Not every single CG got reworked as this would've cause the [extended demo] to be pushed out even further into 2024.)

• I added a few immersive CG's throughout the game to really give a dynamic view of what you choose to do as well. These were mainly added in areas that would need suspense and foreboding elements .
• There are also a few never seen before CG's of Noah that also got fixed up too that I wanted the player to find on their own. Some of them were drawn back around Summer/Fall when my art style wasn't really consistent. Some of the lighting and overall look were redone.

You'll see what I mean once you get to play! :]

• Another thing I did was fix the "Rollback" commands in the game. I tried fixing it before and messed up so I left it alone for a while until I was ready to come back and fix it. I tried my best to place them in areas where it made sense.

I also showed one of my play testers the new SFX's that would replace an old one that we agreed didn't fit the game. In the end we ended up picking 2 different ones to give a more diverse/immersive feel.

They also told me to check for more grammar mistakes and I found a few more again... :,]

That's all I have to share for now, Thank you again to everyone that has stuck around by keeping up with what I've been creating and believing in me , I appreciate the support I've been given! :,]

Oh cool, I'll look into this more! Thanks for letting me know! :]

I am 100% for real!!! >:] I am excited too, Thank you for your support and kind words! :,] 

Thank you so much for you continued support and motivation! :,] I can't wait for it to be played! 

I really am too! I can't wait to see how everything will go and thank you for your support! :]

SURPRISE!

TREMBLING ESSENCE [EXTENDED DEMO]: 

💙FEBURARY 10TH💙

Here's a early Valentines Day present! :]

Hello guys and welcome to my devlog! This is a surprise that has been in the works when the interest in what I've been working on got a lot of positive reception and continued to do so! From this I decided to extend the demo out even further and allow the rest of Day 3 to be playable!

This [extended demo] will include:

• Two full routes that continue out the rest of Day 3.
• Revamped dialog and scenarios
• Updated and alternate sprites of Noah
• New and updated backgrounds
• Day and night settings
• Animated scenery in certain sections
• New music/SFX's
• Visual effects that indicate HP loss/immersive play
• 23 different endings (An additional 10 have been added!)
• More interactive choices
• A few easter eggs have been added!

The old demo from March 2023 is no longer canon and will serve as an archive since much of it has been changed! If you haven't played it yet and would like to just for fun, here's a link! :]

Please note: If there are CG's/scenes you've seen from past game development posts that aren't in the [extended demo], that's because they are most likely from other routes/paths that contained spoilers that happened too early for my liking and need fixing.

If you have any questions, feel free to send them in my ask box on my Tumblr! :]

Thank you to everyone that has stuck around and believed in me by keeping up with what I've been creating so far, it doesn't go unnoticed and I will always appreciate the support I've been given! :,]

Game development Trembling Essence update:

Hi guys and welcome to my devlog! I am here with another update about the game, this one will be fairly short as well! :]

If you would like to play the demo here's a link to it. :]

In good news, both of my play testers were able to replay the game and go through everything I've written up so far. Listening to their advice has really helped me progress the game/story and revisit a couple of things from Day 3 that would fit later on in the game. It goes into spoiler territory so I can't explain too much but it mainly has to do with pacing the story. :]

As for the routes, both play testers gave the green light for them and there were only a few things that needed fixing.

• There were about 2 situations where the conversation between Noah and the player(Y/N) happened out of order that needed fixing. I cleaned up some of the dialog and rearranged some of the talking points to make it easier to understand, once I showed both of them the results they said it was easier to follow! :]
• A reoccurring SFX that happens in the game was suggested to be replaced with something else. I was fine with this since it was something in the back of my mind that I wasn't too about adjusting so this really gave me the go ahead to do so. I'm still looking for one that fits but hopefully I find one soon! :]

• They also ran into a a couple grammatical issues I still missed (e.x.: Brake instead of Break) and I'm very grateful these were caught because I'm still surprised some were left around. I also did more dialogue fixing too since some descriptions were too clunky. :,]

Also, here's a new CG! This was originally going to be used to replace the old living room window but my play testers and I agreed on liking the dated version a lot more. This was going to be scrapped but I found a better place for it! :,]

I'm still brainstorming how this area will look but maybe sometime next week it'll all be figured out!

I don't really have too much else to report on this time around. I've mainly been fixing a lot of the things my play testers have mentioned and doing a few tests here and there.

Thank you guys for all of your kind words and support, especially from the OC x Buckshot roulette drawings I did, I didn't expect the sudden boost with those. All of this is greatly appreciated! :,]