Aug 19
I’m officially on “vacation” now until mid-September, so for basically a whole month! Which really just translates to me having to spend 20 hours less every week on my part-time day job and dedicating all that time to VN development instead!
And naturally, I want to make the most out of it, which I’ve already started with during these last few days!
Aug 12
First of all, in case you haven’t seen either of them yet, we’ve made two special announcement posts this week, one for Steam‘s Visual Novel Fest and the other for the Mystery Gamedev Community, which we have created with a couple of fellow devs in order to bring creators and enjoyers of mystery games together. We’ve already welcomed over a hundred people on our dedicated Discord server, many of whom have shared their recommendations for mystery and puzzle games or their own works and experiences of creating them. So if you’re looking for new mysteries to solve or help and support to create your own, be sure to pay us a visit!
For me personally, it sure has been a ton of fun so far and also very helpful and enlightening, especially in regards to some marketing-related things, which have been discussed in the developer channels!
Aug 07
For this past year, Steam has been holding a number of fests to celebrate specific types and genres of games and, this August, they’re putting the spotlight on our personal favorite medium of interactive storytelling: visual novels!
As such, our Halloween-themed murder mystery SHINRAI – Broken Beyond Despair is taking part in the event and will be 50% off for the whole duration of it, while its complete soundtrack is up for grabs at a 75% discount! Not only that, you can even save an extra 10% if you decide to go for the soundtrack bundle! So yeah, if you’ve been planning to check out our little VN for a while now, or you’re looking for something to get an early start into the spooky season with, what are you waiting for? Go get it now!
(Especially since, due to this event taking place, there won’t be the usual anniversary sale later this month!)
Now, if you’ve already played SHINRAI, then this is also a great time to learn more about our upcoming dinosaur-themed murder mystery GENBA no Kizuna, which is set in the same world as SHINRAI and has quite a few connections to it. And while you’re at it, be sure to add it to your wishlists! It’ll only cost you a single click, but will provide us with great amounts of joy!
Aug 07
Today, I’d like to introduce you to a little something we’ve been building up behind the scenes with a number of fellow mystery devs:
An entire little community that aims at mystery developers coming together to help and support each other in their endeavors!
But that’s not all! Despite the name, we’re not open solely to developers of mystery games, but also to their enjoyers!
Aug 05
Can’t believe the year’s progressed this far already, but welp… here we are at the start of August again! And as you should know by know, it’s a month that holds very special meaning to us, since it’s the one in which we released SHINRAI – Broken Beyond Despair all the way back in 2016, so… a whole fricking seven years ago! Holy crap!
Jul 29
As you may have already seen on Twitter, all of the background art for GENBA no Kizuna is finally done! Which not only means that we are another big step closer to its completion, but that I can also give you some final stats on this category of assets now:
Jul 22
So, this past week has once again been dedicated to mainly two things: script work and background art.
I have actually finished up the final scene of our penultimate “chapter” now, but still need to work a bit more on the script for the last couple of investigation segments. Definitely wanna get that done by the end of the month, so that will be my focus for next week!
Jul 15
As you can see from the title, I’ve primarily returned to script work this past week. With the BG art for the backyard done now, I can finally finish up the investigation segment for it, so that’s one part I’ve spent a lot of time on: thinking up and writing the background examination comments and dialogues.
I’m simultaneously also working on the conclusion to the second investigation phase, however. Before it’s time for the final showdown with Raptor Pack Productions to unravel all the remaining mysteries and identify the actual killer, Keiichi can approach the members of his team one last time to have a final, quick conversation with them before they gather up to confront the suspects.
Jul 08
As mentioned in last week’s blog post, I’ve spent last Sunday fully dedicated to background art again and did, in fact, finally finish up both backyard BGs along with all of their variations! With this, almost all the BG art for GENBA no Kizuna is done! There is only one more location I gotta work on: Terano‘s room. That will be the last place you get to investigate in the game, although it won’t be a full room investigation. Instead, it will be more focused on accessing Terano‘s laptop. As such, I am still a bit indecisive as to how much of the room I should depict. Should I offer a view similar to Ryuunosuke‘s room, meaning that basically half of it is visible? Or should it just be a close up of Terano‘s desk, given that his computer is the main (and really only) point of focus?
Jul 01
Alright, so there’s your first look at the backyard of the Kaseki residence! It’s not 100% done yet, as I still need to fix the lighting conditions, but other than that, nothing else will change. By tomorrow evening, I’m planning to have both backyard BGs, including their variations (the investigation is supposed to take place at the beginning of the “golden hour”), fully done.
