Sooo I found this game in a collection a couple days ago and just got around to playing it today. For a demo this was really well done! I thoroughly enjoyed the realism of being a villain and honestly this game made me realize I was born in the right generation cuz if I were Cecilia I'd probs sewerslide (though that's what the game wants u do to anyway i guess). The mini games were a little hard tbh but re-earning the respect of people whom you've terrorized in the past is even harder. I'd probs say lower the difficulty on them but if the difficulty is attributed to how hard being a villainess is then it's fine i guess. There are a couple of bugs when I was playing but it's whatever y'all are students. Tldr I'm stoked to see any prospective future development
first of all i want to say that i love the concept! villainess manhwas are always so fun and it's hard not to wonder what you would do in that situation and being able to explore that in a game is so unique!
the art is adorable and i love the expressions as well as the character designs. the writing is beautiful and one of my favorite lines went something along the lines of "although you haven't really played the game a million times you have in your head..." and the prose in general is so lovely!
i think being thrown into a situation where literally all the game's love interests HATE you is definitely something that had to be getting used to, and they did piss me off at some point and while i was mad i realized no other otome game made me feel that way. i think it is 100% par for the course of being a villainess, whether through Cecilia's faults or the other characters' intolerance of her.
i've read through the comments and i think considering you completed this much before finals week it's very impressive for a team of first time indie developers. i cant wait to see more of the story and the characters and especially of Seraphina (she's my favorite character design although we haven't met her yet).
overall, i am very excited for whats in store for this game! i'll be following its development very closely.
with all of that said, some good faith criticisms i have are:
1. i've encountered a bug where if i save the background immediately changes to the blue sky background, which is a shame because i love the vibe of the background art.
2. i think the minigames' scale of difficulty needs to be adjusted, as, at least for me, it's much more efficient to do the book or fishing minigames as it gains way more stats than the other games.
i also think for all the minigames, it'd be helpful to have maybe pictures of gifs showing what we're supposed to do because i had to restart some of the games because it took me a while to understand what we were supposed to be doing at first. obviously there are descriptions of what to do but i think it'd be a lot more helpful with pictures to correlate with the descriptions.
i also think for the rhythm game, i might be biased but i want to see an option using the arrow keys because popular games like FNF use arrow keys (or WASD) for that format of rhythm game. this also might be a big ask coding-wise but it'd be nice to adjust the speed of the scroll of the notes to either slower or faster.
anyway, i wish you guys the best! i'd be excited for, like, a demo 2.0 (story that goes up to the first cg maybe?), or maybe even chapter by chapter releases to the story.
Hello! Thank you so much for playing our game and giving us feedback!
I am aware that the difficulties of the different minigames are not quite balanced. I'm planning to add different difficulty options to these minigames so that players can have a balanced experience and are equally motivated to play all the different games.
Including pictures in the instructions is a great idea! Tbh I rushed the whole instruction thing last minute so had to go for pure text, but I will be adding images to the instructions so they are easier to understand!
We are also compiling a list of bugs and are working on fixing them. So I hope the background bug will be fixed in upcoming patches.
Thanks again for supporting our team and the game! Stay tuned for our future updates!
Okay I loved playing this game. It's a total mystery and well written. I'm honestly surprised that the game is soo good, but also hidden, like I found this in a collection. Maybe if you add the historical/medival tag you'll find some more popularity.
Despite the obvious general lagginess, needs new sprites (like when Maverick was in his ball attire, and Mc was going off on how polished he looked... but he was still in his stuffy uniform).
I think adding a skip button would be helpful, as ngl repeating the same dialogue again and again it's a bit boring. And unlike the game 'Ambition; a minute in power', the game doesn't do a gamble on what the result of your choice will be. And it's gonna be hard to see where the difference of choices will have when playing the game.
not to be rude but....I genuinely don't know what the heck's up with the stat system. The book mini game is broken no matter how many books I pickup the stats don't work. The fan mini game is fucked, I hate it, like sometimes these bald white head mfs don't move or take ages to move. The talking mini game is a bit confusing (but actually not that bad reminds me of Tears of Themis)... The fish mini game although I also love Stardew valley but this is a cheap knock off, like make smt original. Although I appreciate the newness of the mini games to the world of VNs. This is like ... trash, like so bad.
What I mean by appreciating the newness is that, I can't think of a otome VN ,from the top of my head that has these mini games. While writing this I remember of 'your turn to die' and how that game implemented mini games. Where the mini games were suited for the situation.
This game... I feel like it would be better to get rid of the mini games altogether.
This game is a game of strategy and I assume the stats are going to be used to unlock certain dialogue, and make right choices. This means that players are going to load the game section till they reach the require amount of stats. And with the horrible horrible save and load section is going to be excruciatingly painful, to do that.
Plus the mini games that the player does in the beginning is useless these stats don't transfer to the game at all.
And those weird ass breaks in the game where the players can play the mini game. FUCK THAT SHIT. I click on a random baldie and it's the fucking book mini game, where I know despite fuck all the book I collect I will remain a stupid, uncharismatic, sick girl
(btw I appreciate the mini games, like I won't lie they were fun. and well made. Like chibi MC is SOOOOO CUTE. But I hate them in the main game... sorry... not sorry). Maybe you guys could do a challenge route with the mini games
But then again... idk while typing this out I keep comparing the game to 'seven kingdoms:a princess' problem'. A complex stats based , political otome game. I think the overall blueprints of the game are somewhat similar where the Mc's are thrown into a strange high-stakes world and have to build relationships and skills to survive. Although that game has some huge customisation, with it having a build a Mc section, the game overall is good to take inspiration from.
Look while playing the game I felt uncertainty with every choice, with some being both a personality choice and a plot choice. I felt like walking on a tight rope, and the reactions from the charaters' were a bit... hmm not helping. I just felt lost, with no way to track my progress with each character and heck a sense of direction. That made the game unsatisfying to play.
Although Cassius' horrifying expressions were quite funny.
Also I suppose I don't get 'playing as the og villainess' as like didn't the og villainess get her head chopped off from acting like herself, why on earth would our player choose to act like her.
Truthfully I think the game is too broad for the demo, the satisfying result of seeing that your choices truly do matter is nowhere in the demo, which is weird being that collectively all your choices should have some sort of a result.
Again while writing this I'm reminded of the masterpiece of what is 'death is the only end for the villainess'. Who's in a similar position to our Mc. But then again her mission is only to survive. AUDHIOHFEHh.
....
truthfully I have no idea where this game is going to go. Thinking about it is kinda infuriating. I haven't played a game where the stakes matter but you don't know what happens and you don't see the result of your choices lead to.
....
maybe that the point though... as you're the mc walking through the world, knowing that you execution is in X amount of days and if you don't change or worse make the wrong move you'll reach that ending sooner.
... idk I can't directly compare this game to any others I played before... maybe 'absolution:the way the lost', Anoldor, in that if you make one choice you'll lose out on another, eg with friendship etc. But these games had a sense of direction. I understand why the sense of being lost is there is in game, I literally typed out my thought process. But ngl 'absolution' is literally a horror game and I felt more scared and worried playing this game than that game and fuckty fucked up shit happened in that game. ( EDIT: looking back I might have been exaggerating, but idk the no sense of direction in the game really got to me).
I think including affection bars would be good for the game just for guidance and a lil notebook to write everything you've collected. E.g. events that you've signed up for and info you know about characters.
Charaters wise hmm in the demo no character stood out. We didn't get to see the whole range of personality nor feel out who they are. Maverick is honestly the best as he's not a total asshole to Mc, especially when she changes. And does speak some sense.
However I think I can just blame it on the overall shortness of the game, however I do see potential in each character.
Cassian and his carrot boy Esra need a good slap in the face. However I kinda get why they're acting like such brats as Mc's former self was probs a bitch to them for many many many years and Mc can't absolve herself from her past sins that easily. I mean Maverick's her step bro sooo it would make sense that he'd be more accepting.
... though seeing how the boys 'might be' LI's in the game is 'interesting', I wonder how they'll fall for our Mc.
Hermes and Isidora are actually a fresh breeze compare to all the other characters in the game. Being that they don't have the same history Mc has with the golden trio.
Hermes and Mc could have an 'interesting dynamic'. As funnily enough he's also a villain, with similar ideas as our Mc one had.
overall this game has great great potential however the setup of the game is ... shit. Like it's a VN but no skip button and RPG save files. Girl bffr. But the art is amazing. I'm gonna keep an eye on this game, hopefully an extended demo will come out and blow my mind away.
RIP I just rambled, sos if it all really didn't make sense
Heyo! Thanks for checking out our game and giving feedback :DDD
I think an important trend in this to clarify though (and trust I'll add this to the game page so no one else falls under the wrong assumption) is the context behind this base "demo" (I know demo is a bit of a strong word as you'll soon see).
This game was made during a school club game jam event where both experienced and absolute beginner developers were placed on teams and given part of the school year to develop these game pitches before a final presentation deadline. As such, what we have out now is less of a "get the full experience" demo and more of just a "this is what we could crank out during finals week" demo haha!
This includes writing (more choice variations, choices, scenes, interactions, gameplay explanations), art (sprites, backgrounds, settings), ui/ux (we actually have a notebook that will help track several things drafted up! great minds think alike), sound (if you hear a messy ambiance loop I am probably the guilty offender :0), and of course, programming! (ex. the stats are placeholder proof of concept and don't actually work). I know some portions can seem pretty jank right now (trust me, the minigame and 'random' blank scenes between vn segments will be WILDLY different once we get all that work done) but hopefully our closer intended demo build will provide a much more enjoyable experience once the necessary assets for the gameplay loop are finished, both as a visual novel and a stats management game. (Btw, Volcano Princess is also a big inspiration for mixing stats and visual novel segments!)
I of course can't make any promises on the exact timeline or order of things as this game is continuing past its game jam origins as a passion project of a bunch of uni students, but I can say that there are both things finished, just not published, and things being worked on that tackle exactly the points you bring up! Our programmers have been really amazing (Most of them learning Godot just for the game and practicing their experience with minigames and building the vn system from the ground up) and have been focusing on fixing more behind the scenes code, but hopefully once we're back to work after break and posting more content-oriented updates, you'll see just how awesome they are at making games that make sense with the environment ;D. Plus, as an avid Ren'Py shill I will not rest until we get all the features that'll make the vn play as smooth as butter!
TLDR; Dw!! We got you and this is DEFINITELY not a reflection of the gameplay experience, but I will make sure to update our page so that this a lot more clearer to potential players! Tysm for giving us such detailed feedback, (I can tell just from the sheer amount of properties you compared alone that you put a lot of thought into this comment) and I hope that eventually down the line, we'll be able to really show off a TRUE VxR demo with all the fixings! <3333
OMG you're so kind and knowing that this was released as a school project ... makes sense. Not in a bad way, it just that I get it because I'm gonna be studying computer science next year and I know bits and bobs about the course work process.
So despite my hatred towards the mini games, like I still do believe that the mini games are ... bad,. But I do appreciate the effort put into it, and if the mini games were a separate entity to themselves and properly worked. They're quite good and enjoyable.
Like I'm brash with my way of speech, but I geinuenly am speaking from the heart and I don't mean to offend the team in any way. It's just that this game is the combination of my passions, like I love villainess manuhas, I been there since the beginning and I love visual novels and especially romance. And ngl I'm a self proclaimed know it all when it comes to these genre's
SO since I'm the queen of Yapping, and I have all the time in the world so I'm gonna yap some more.
Yeah back to my statement of saying 'I've never played a game like this before', and knowing that you drew inspiration form 'volcano princess' it makes sense why I haven't. I have to ask, although this is a passion project, with a team as somewhat large as u have (13 people), I do think it would be a waste if u can't somewhat make a profit of the game. ( I mean I'm kinda shooting myself in the foot here, because I'm no billionaire and heck who wouldn't want a free game but still). With this in mind what type of player are you looking for. Because by all means this game is and tagged as a visual novel. Which it is but not.
I mean the game is a visual novel doesn't play out like a visual novel. I don't mean to be rude but it's so obvious that you guys don't play otome games. I've stalked your profiles (ik I'm insane), NONE OF U HAVE MADE A VISUAL NOVEL PRIOR TO THIS, (I guess expect LemonInk, as you've helped with moth to a match stick {which has it's flaws but is overall an nice game}). but then lowkey it does seem like these accounts are you're professional accounts... (I'm not that insane). But anyways, this is gonna sound similar to my previous rant but with more clarity.
One there hasn't been a game where the stakes this high, with a canon self-insert player, with a large variety of choices, and pathways to go. Oh aswell as that 1/4 of the games cast (including the Mc's Dad) absolutely hates the Mc. Like despises' her and treats her like dogshit AND THEY'RE NOT TSUNDERE'S.
Visual novels follow a flow diagram, you pick a choice that'll affect the dialogue and that choice might be brought up later on and effect the game. Funnily enough this game has wilddddd variety of choice, and reading your previous comments I get the idea where you guys are coming from. You know what type of villainess are u gonna be, (a smartie pant know it all - aria from Villainess turns the hourglass), (a sweetie pie- shruli from the step-mothers marchen), or a pathetic little slob (rubekia -I'm sorry for the description, like Ik she has trauma but for the point- from how to get my husband on my side). But with this type of game play it would be well odd. I mean I could be begging at one moment and cusisng a bitch out the next (-lololol me irl). Also being that the cast are close to each other and multiple characters will have a response if the Mc is rude to one. E.g siblings, friends etc etc. And not to forget a sharp blade that awaits her execution.
Also thinking about this game I have to ask is romance a central part of the plot or is it only a subplot. Because in the ER it seems to be a subplot. With the main aim of the game is for Mc to survive... But then that's not a Otome game
Like this game (when thinking about the minigames) plays like a money sucki- I mean mobile Otome game, e.g. Ikemen series, Tears Of Thermis and Isekai slow life ( don't ask me why I played that game). But story wise those games don't have much options, like they have different choices which only consequence is the dialogue right after and in the cause of Ikemen series there's a point system and depending on what choices you pick will give you two versions of the endings, dramatic or romantic. Both good endings btw.
However this game is different being that Mc has an execution to attend if she doesn't do something to change her ways.
I believe, with this type of game you should slim down the number of choices available or make them more subtle in a way.
Actually, I think this is important to note to keep in mind. Why I'm saying to slim down the amount of choices. It's because this game is complicated. Our life has a shit ton of choices, but the concequences are slim. Like the Mc from 'our life' aren't getting executed, at worse they're getting scolded by one of the milfs, This game however has pseudo-poltics and life and death situations, where the Mc is trying to gain power/allies. Having this many choices will lead to many many many many many routes and it'll just become a mess.
That being said there have been games that have done this, e.g. by incorporating a shit ton of choices, in a pseudo politics games. These games are 'Long live the queen' by Hanako Games (haven't played), Palais de Reine (haven't played a wouldn't, because the game has a virus in it) and 'seven kingdoms a princess' problem'. While I haven't played the first two games, so I can't talk much about them I have played the 'seven kingdoms a princess' problems'. This game has a SHIT TON of options, of how a character can react to situations they're in, which affects their personality and the Mc can die, in many ways. It's a beautiful game, and you should give it a try even if it's just the demo.
....
That game took 10 years to make. Being that there was only 1 dev.
Ngl I don't believe that this game is going to be as complex and heavy as 7KPP, but potentially it can be. (edit... maybe I'm overthinking).
It's honestly funny how you guys aren't aware of this.
....
On one hand I'm like throw the game out, it's flawed to the core, and too much for any of u guys to handle since none of you guys have made a visual novel and only made small simple games. However the writing is good; tension is there, potentially good characterisation is there, etc but it's built on a wonky structure and will fall.
However on the other hand I see the potential of what this game can be. (for context I'm bed-rotting playing VN's this summer holiday and so I have all the time in the world to care about this).
Then make a visual novel. Like get the team together a make a small VN, about fuck all, it can be private or whatever. But you need to get your head around what makes a visual novel a VN, and otome and otome. Don't make it complicated, because when you rush you get into situations like this. But just do it, because this game doesn't feel like you guys play otome games, but rather read a shit ton of villainess manhuas
Then this is the most important step, become a teenage girl. Get into the mentality of an angsty teenage girl. Because that's your audience..... I'm sorry but it is. If you undertsnad the teenage girl you'll understand the otome genre.
Lastly start from scratch, think about what game is it. Like think carefully and redo it completely.
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If you were to ask what I would do if I was stuck in your position.
I would first make a little pet character, who was sent my 'god', to help guide the Mc and cuss out the LI's with them. Examples of beings are Jasper from 'seven kingdoms a princess' problem' (in a world where everyone is lying to each other the Mc can 10000% trust Jasper, because although he may think poorly of Mc, he's unaffiliated with the politics on the island and provides support), The maid from Ambition a minute in power (when the Mc was seemingly abandoned by her fiancé to live in a dingy mansion, she was there to provide not only emotional support but is willing to clean up a crime scene for Mc), and that Orion from Amnesia Memories.(he's the closest example for my spin off the game, but he's like a pixie and he's stuck with Mc too essentially try to remember her past memories so he can leave).
Also from villainess Manhwa's Yona from Beware The Villainess, the maid from Miss not-so sidekick.
I think having an support character who the Mc can depend on is great, in making the game seem not so daunting, and lessen the horror side, and bring players satifaction of having someone to be able to vent to, while the player endures the harsh reality Mc's in. Also to give the player an overall plan for what to do, e.g. stash enough money in the safe so they can escape.
Next I would kinda arrange the system to be more simpler, being that there's a prologue of some sort where the character customisation could happen. Like the player could pick whatever the choices they want and that'll trap them into a route. E.g pathetic route, smartie pants route, etc. Which locks the player to a smaller amount of choices, and events which only that type of villainess can access. etc, and the game will continue from there.
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Here's me going off another tangent, but with that being said I'm proven that I am the Yaping Queen. Although messy, I do hope you consider my advi- yapping, I mean looking back it's kinda harsh but take what you want out of it. I don't hate you guys and I wish the best for you and the development for this game.
GAMES THAT I REC PLAYING
hero's journey- emrys route (love this game and even still remember his name. He hates hates Mc because SPOILERS Mc used to be a wacko psycho before amnesia. But he deep down falls for her after he learns about her amnesia.
Amnesia memories- that game is a classic, and ngl you really only need to play Kents route. Like him and Mc were having some relationship problems and then Mc got anmesia and fixes everything.
7KPP, a must play. It's confusing at first but first don't play with a guide, that game is made to be replayed to infinity.
A knights dilemma - I liked how this game although short grapples with politics.
Sorry i was creepily stalking other comments and i feel compelled to point out that in the desc this game is supposed to be subversion or even a critique of otome/villainess stuff so why would you actively try to make it like one (e.g. include a sidekick for the villainess - while i understand it's to make the game less intimidating i suppose realistically the villainess would have no real friends). Also even if it's obvi that this is everyone's first vn it's not a crime to be an amateur and everyones gotta start somewhere. big love and u dont need to sound condescending/patronizing when u give critiques next time!
You reached the end of the demo! We should probably create some in-game message telling you that, so we'll include that in the next patch. We'll be adding in more content soon, so please stay tuned! Thank you for trying our game - your save data will carry over to the future updates! :)
So, I finally got to play this demo! Yippie! (Spoilers and so much rambling-- forgive me--)
My thoughts on the game are just gonna be what I felt about it, so I dunno if thats gonna be important... haha
first of all, I feel so villainized. Dont get me wrong! I am a villain after all! (a pretty one at that) (I think I have a crush on the villainess' looks)
its cool that even if I was trying to be nice or amicable with some people, they still scrutinize me. Makes me think what did Cecilia do to make them see me as a monster?
but also, without the context of Cecilia's past (since she was supposed to be a one dimensional villain after all) I feel really bad for Cecilia. To have a father who loves his adopted son more than his own daughter, to be expected to know these prim and proper etiquette while her brother can get away with it, to be married to someone who despises you.... (but maybe its just because I dont know what Cecilia was like, maybe they had their own reasons)
honestly, I can see why Cecilia would turn out to be a villainess if she was treated like that for no reason. So, you try to fight back in your own way. If the people see you as this monster... why bother trying to be kind and friendly when they've already made their mind about you? You might as well give the people what they want. They want a villainess? then I'll be your villainess. (you can tell how much this affects me HAHAHASBHSADH--)
But I still have hope that we can be kind to other people. I'm not going to give up on redeeming myself (if we did something wrong) The demon lord and Isidora seems nice! (which is cool because I desperately need someone friendly in the game--) So I have hope that maybe some people will be friendly! (also, I find them so cute!! I love them so much <3) (The demon lord's rambles? I can relate to them so much) (I mean-- this comment is so long I think its considered a ramble??) (god help me)
Also, while I had my eyes on Cassius,(oh wow, me in the villainess' body, crushing on her fiancé, very original ;-;) I started crushing on Hermes.... (only because he doesnt seem to treat me like dirt ;w;) (my standards are as low as it can be) (its embarrassing, I know)
Oh, as the story progresses (yeah, I am writing these as I play them ahaha) The father seems to be... nice? I mean, he isnt as cold as I thought he'd be.
alright, so I'm one month in... (after the rhythm game haha) (I think I did pretty good :D) It seems that some of the maids are comfortable with me, which is a start! I believe in us LETS GOOOO
UH OH I ACCIDENTALLY PRESSED LOAD ON A UNSAVED FILE IT WAS A MISTAKE IM BACK IN THE VOID--
update: I adore the maids, I hope in the full game, I get to bond with them like those silly cartoon villain henchmen, or rather henchwoman in this scenario :D (you know, like a... "you got it boss!" type vibe? I would like to hype them up too HSYHGSDFGF)
I think I finished the game, wooo boy. I'm looking forward to it! Truly hope we can redeem ourselves (and not get killed again -cough cough-)
Lastly, THE ARTSTYLE LOOKS SO GOOD AAAAAA I COULD JUST EAT IT UPP!! <33 the expressions are seriously delicious!!
Haha, don't worry about the rambling! Personally, that's always my favorite part lol
First off, thank you for your kind words and thoughts so far, it's really motivating to see how passionate you are in your review! I'm glad to see that the frustrations of playing as a truly despised villainess are coming through. We're actually planning on further expanding variations in experiences and choices in the earlier chapters, as well as locking in on some pretty THICK path experiences in the third chapter... be prepared. And rest assured! Character relationships, histories, and development are a big focus of the game, so the shadow of the real Cecilia will continue to hang over you as you play and learn about her life. As for characters, it seems that Hermes has bagged another loyal fan (we'll see how that goes)! But if your standards are low, then mine are lower because Cassius is my king <333. And the Marquess... well, he's an interesting case. The next narrative update will definitely add some more factors to the mix! Thanks again for playing <3
Low standard besties LETS GOOO!! <333 I'm excited for the updates of this game then!! AAAAAaa I swear, Hermes is just-- I just think his first impression wasn't bad, I promise I'm still going to Cassius (who am I kidding, I'm going to pursue both of them) also, what do you mean "we'll see how that goes" OH NO IS HE GOING TO BE MEAN TO US?? I KNEW IT WAS TOO GOOD TO BE TRUE--
"the shadow of the real Cecilia will continue to hang over you as you play and learn about her life." Gosh, I am so ready to cry. STAY STRONG VIOLET!! (Thats the name I use for my character haha dont mind me--) but yeah!! Good luck to you all!! I'll be cheering through the screen :DD
EDITED review after uninstalling and reinstalling:
Bugs and errors I found when playing through - contains spoilers:
Error 1: Game crashes during fan minigame which I am highly aware is being fixed.
Error 2: Save/Load option not happening during selection of choices.
Error 3: Not being able to choose the same choice again when selecting through the alternatives.
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Overall thoughts - I know this demo had a lot of potential, the art is absolutely pretty and the mini-games definitely looks like there was a lot of effort put into it. The story seems absolutely amazing which made me stay, especially now that I have reinstalled it and played through it. The team was pretty kind as well, being very helpful through it all.
I will still stick through, just hope that the issues gets resolved quickly.
Hi Mike thanks for playing our game and giving us feedback!
From the errors that you described, I suspect the version you played is not the latest build.
Please download our latest version (should have a timestamp that says "15 days ago") and check out this devlog as well as this one to learn about how to clear your save files if your game crashes!
Please let us know if you have any questions or if the errors persist. Thanks!
It is the updated version, I checked and updated it before I made the comment…I’ll uninstall it completely and reinstall it, perhaps that would fix the issue I’m facing.
So I uninstalled and reinstalled, removed all entries and it is much better now. I still cannot input my name nor the choices that we once chose can be re-chosen, but there is more content to the “move on” dialog which did seem like a good closure for that route, I’m happy with that.
I hope that we get the save / load option right at the dialog because it’s much more easier to come back to it.
Edit: After I finished the fan minigame, it randomly crashed and now I lost all the stat I accumulated. A shame, really.
Edit 2:
This does not progress from where when I choose to find Isadora through a new way.
We're working on fixing the input and streamlining the content after a1c3_2. That's why you are experiencing the bug you showed in your second edit as that scene is yet to be fixed. And yes, there is currently no content after the ball. We are working on that too!
Could you describe what happened around the time the game crashed after you played the minigame? Did you play it in the free time zone and how many turns remained (aka how many games have you played in that zone before the fan one)?
Thanks again for playing our game and providing feedback!
Tried running the game on windows, but after showing the godot icon, the screen just went blank? The music was playing, but I couldn't see/interact with anything on screen. Not sure if this is a problem specific to my pc, but can you help me figure out how to fix this?
The game looks very promising and the main heroine looks fantastic! The plot is something I have been dreaming about, since reading so many mangas about villainess. p.s. Please, tell me that we can date Hermes! please! please!))
We're so glad to hear it! As fans of villainess stories wanting to pay homage to the great and facilitate discussions on the...less great...aspects of the genre, we're dedicated to giving players an experience that will be both indulgingly familiar and excitingly unique, as any good villainess story should be!
...And let's just say, Hermes definitely has some versatility in the role he plays through the story... ;))
For some reason, the game window always shows up in the top left corner of my PC. I am unable to drag the window around and the top options such as - or x are out of my reach. Is this intentional?
I'm loving it so far! The writing and art are spectacular.
I may have encountered a bug after the protagonist looks back to see where Cecelia lives, the dialogue box seems stuck on "false". Also, just a bit of feedback, it took me a while to figure out where the "back" button was for the settings because I'm not used to looking for it in the bottom right corner. Secondly, partially because the icons for Save and Load are the same, by misclicking an empty Load before Saving, I accidentally restarted and lost all of my progress which was a bit annoying.
I am super excited to continue to support this game!!
Hi Kenzie!! Thanks for your feedback. I agree that the save and load buttons were confusing so I just made them show the text for now (we'll put new sprites soon). Good to know about the settings screen as well. We appreciate your support!!
Really nice game. I love the idea and the art is nice.
We definitely get the creepy feeling from "the god". And I disliked the former ROs (are they still ROs by the way ?). It really shows how you can like some characters and when seeing more sides from them disliking them. It was well done.
I love the start and I'm curious on the developement you will choose.
A couple issues :
1/ The games lagged a lot. £It was difficult to play some of them.
2/ We can't save so it's impossible to test other choices.
3/ We can't reread the history. When you click on it it disappears and advace in the dialogue at the same time.
4/ There was no Hermes image. Too bad because he is definitely my fav' character at the moment ! If he is a RO I will definitely pursue him ah, ah, ah.
5/ I have no idea why but I can't get past the dialogue after coming back from the party ? It's like I tried every texts and it doesn't work so at first previous choices were freeze and I had to restart the dialogue without those choices then no choices at all anymore ? Is it a bug or the end of the demo ? I'm really confused. Please tell me I went to the end and not broke the game.
Hey! Thanks for playing our game. The demo is supposed to "end" after that scene but it bugs out; we'll be adding the remainder of Chapter 1 ASAP. Your save data will carry over and you'll resume in that scene with your data restored.
We're working on improving performance and adding saving and loading in the next build, so we hope you check out what's in store! We've fixed the Hermes bug and will upload that shortly. We hope to make these changes within the next 12 hours.
And just to add onto our lovely team lead, thank you so much for your comments and feedback!
Absolutely, for the former ROs we wanted to have players see new sides, good or bad, to characters that otherwise tend to get glorified. I don't want to spoil too much of the story, but let's just say...the former ROs aren't exactly in a position to be love interests at the moment.
But on the contrary, we have quite the plans for Hermes, and you'll absolutely be able to see more of him in the future. Glad to see you liked him so much!
hey! I'm sorry to hear that. Could you ensure that the .pck file is in the same directory as the .exe, and let me know if any errors show up on launch? Also, the game may take a long time to load upon first opening it, so could you try relaunching and waiting up to a minute and letting us know if that works? Sorry for the wait, we are still trying to figure out how to make the game run on all hardware!
The initial launch will take a while and even appears to be frozen. Could you try relaunching and waiting for up to a minute? Let us know if that works. Thank you!
We think that it might be a RAM issue. We are working on improving the performance of our game and will release a patch to address that soon. Please stay tuned for our update, thank you!
Hello! I really enjoyed what I could play of this game, but I did experience a few issues, and noticed things that I would like to see in a future update.
1. I could not scroll through the text history, after trying to move the slide bar for ages nothing happened.
2. The text would sometimes disappear and then never show up again, so I wouldn't see anything until I could make a choice
3. A Save and load Feature would be nice
4. Once the text tab disappears, there is no way to get it back
5. I see no way to replay the demo from the begining
6. I understand if not, but can I please romance Hermes?
Again, I really enjoyed it and am excited to see what happens next
Thanks for playing our game! We're adding saving and loading in the next build, and fixing a plethora of strange text bugs. We'll also fix the log not scrolling easily. Thanks for your feedback, and I think you'll be satisfied with where you can go with Hermes. :)
I downloaded the newest version, but now I can't play past the end scene of breakfast with the brother, all I get is the sky backdrop and the word false. I also noticed that parts of the god conversation are missing along with the maid changing scene in the morning.
Now a different issue is happening, where the game immediately opens on the morning of the ball, and I'm not allowed to progress past the conversation with the brother right before the ball.
I love the idea, however theres some problems with the game(keep in mind that I simply cant play to the end of the demo-the ball):
What its good:
Concept
Writing
Characters desings (the ones that I could see)
Major issues:
Backgrounds and characters images not loading
Game crashing
Unnable to play the mini games (loading images/crashing issues)
Repeating scenes and not let me choose the same dialogue alredy choosen-If this was supose to be a game mechanics is a bad one
Minor nitpick:
I particularly dont like the option : choose your type of villainess(meek,close the original,innocent,etc) for two reasons:
1.This choose does bassically nothing (dont lock dialogues,characters still treat you more or less the same,etc)
2.The type of villainess the player chooses portray is better demonstrate on the rest of the dialogues/choices, if you wanna the palyer see how theirs villainess is progressing why not put a personality bar in the game ? This way feels less constriged.
Thank you so much for playing our game as it is right now, and I appreciate that you've taken the time to leave your thoughts! The description you may have been looking at earlier is a little outdated, so the scene you're stuck at is our current endpoint for the demo. This was also made during a time crunch for a deadline, and the dev team is actually a bunch of uni students in finals week right now so it will take us some time to fix these issues, but we plan to release the rest of the act (ballroom scene included) after we've worked through a few of the bugs you mentioned. This game is also being built from the ground up in Godot, so we're taking baby steps in things like statistics and gauges. The bug with repeating scenes is absolutely an issue that we're aware of, and we're doing our best to fix that too.
As for the villainess type, thank you so much for leaving feedback on that too.
1. The main purpose of allowing players to choose is to let them have a say in what kind of "villainess" story they want to tell, and these tend to be the common archetypes! They mostly affect narration, but there *is* a big role they play that actually changes what dialogue options you get and the outcomes for it — except this is during the ballroom scene, which is unfortunately inaccessible at this moment. We're working on that too! There are also many changes that you may not notice until on another play-through, but we plan to expand this choice as well.
2. The personality bar is an interesting addition, and we will definitely consider it. We're also working on changing how characters react to which type you choose, so hopefully that is more to your taste then.
But besides that, if possible could you please also let us know which minigames didn't work so we can fix that as well? Thank you so much! So sorry that the version of the game you played isn't at its full best — we hope you'll enjoy the next version once we patch out these issues!
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Sooo I found this game in a collection a couple days ago and just got around to playing it today. For a demo this was really well done! I thoroughly enjoyed the realism of being a villain and honestly this game made me realize I was born in the right generation cuz if I were Cecilia I'd probs sewerslide (though that's what the game wants u do to anyway i guess). The mini games were a little hard tbh but re-earning the respect of people whom you've terrorized in the past is even harder. I'd probs say lower the difficulty on them but if the difficulty is attributed to how hard being a villainess is then it's fine i guess. There are a couple of bugs when I was playing but it's whatever y'all are students. Tldr I'm stoked to see any prospective future development
hi i just finished playing the game yesterday!
first of all i want to say that i love the concept! villainess manhwas are always so fun and it's hard not to wonder what you would do in that situation and being able to explore that in a game is so unique!
the art is adorable and i love the expressions as well as the character designs. the writing is beautiful and one of my favorite lines went something along the lines of "although you haven't really played the game a million times you have in your head..." and the prose in general is so lovely!
i think being thrown into a situation where literally all the game's love interests HATE you is definitely something that had to be getting used to, and they did piss me off at some point and while i was mad i realized no other otome game made me feel that way. i think it is 100% par for the course of being a villainess, whether through Cecilia's faults or the other characters' intolerance of her.
i've read through the comments and i think considering you completed this much before finals week it's very impressive for a team of first time indie developers. i cant wait to see more of the story and the characters and especially of Seraphina (she's my favorite character design although we haven't met her yet).
overall, i am very excited for whats in store for this game! i'll be following its development very closely.
with all of that said, some good faith criticisms i have are:
1. i've encountered a bug where if i save the background immediately changes to the blue sky background, which is a shame because i love the vibe of the background art.
2. i think the minigames' scale of difficulty needs to be adjusted, as, at least for me, it's much more efficient to do the book or fishing minigames as it gains way more stats than the other games.
i also think for all the minigames, it'd be helpful to have maybe pictures of gifs showing what we're supposed to do because i had to restart some of the games because it took me a while to understand what we were supposed to be doing at first. obviously there are descriptions of what to do but i think it'd be a lot more helpful with pictures to correlate with the descriptions.
i also think for the rhythm game, i might be biased but i want to see an option using the arrow keys because popular games like FNF use arrow keys (or WASD) for that format of rhythm game. this also might be a big ask coding-wise but it'd be nice to adjust the speed of the scroll of the notes to either slower or faster.
anyway, i wish you guys the best! i'd be excited for, like, a demo 2.0 (story that goes up to the first cg maybe?), or maybe even chapter by chapter releases to the story.
Hello! Thank you so much for playing our game and giving us feedback!
I am aware that the difficulties of the different minigames are not quite balanced. I'm planning to add different difficulty options to these minigames so that players can have a balanced experience and are equally motivated to play all the different games.
Including pictures in the instructions is a great idea! Tbh I rushed the whole instruction thing last minute so had to go for pure text, but I will be adding images to the instructions so they are easier to understand!
We are also compiling a list of bugs and are working on fixing them. So I hope the background bug will be fixed in upcoming patches.
Thanks again for supporting our team and the game! Stay tuned for our future updates!
Okay I loved playing this game. It's a total mystery and well written. I'm honestly surprised that the game is soo good, but also hidden, like I found this in a collection. Maybe if you add the historical/medival tag you'll find some more popularity.
Despite the obvious general lagginess, needs new sprites (like when Maverick was in his ball attire, and Mc was going off on how polished he looked... but he was still in his stuffy uniform).
I think adding a skip button would be helpful, as ngl repeating the same dialogue again and again it's a bit boring. And unlike the game 'Ambition; a minute in power', the game doesn't do a gamble on what the result of your choice will be. And it's gonna be hard to see where the difference of choices will have when playing the game.
not to be rude but....I genuinely don't know what the heck's up with the stat system. The book mini game is broken no matter how many books I pickup the stats don't work. The fan mini game is fucked, I hate it, like sometimes these bald white head mfs don't move or take ages to move. The talking mini game is a bit confusing (but actually not that bad reminds me of Tears of Themis)... The fish mini game although I also love Stardew valley but this is a cheap knock off, like make smt original. Although I appreciate the newness of the mini games to the world of VNs. This is like ... trash, like so bad.
What I mean by appreciating the newness is that, I can't think of a otome VN ,from the top of my head that has these mini games. While writing this I remember of 'your turn to die' and how that game implemented mini games. Where the mini games were suited for the situation.
This game... I feel like it would be better to get rid of the mini games altogether.
This game is a game of strategy and I assume the stats are going to be used to unlock certain dialogue, and make right choices. This means that players are going to load the game section till they reach the require amount of stats. And with the horrible horrible save and load section is going to be excruciatingly painful, to do that.
Plus the mini games that the player does in the beginning is useless these stats don't transfer to the game at all.
And those weird ass breaks in the game where the players can play the mini game. FUCK THAT SHIT. I click on a random baldie and it's the fucking book mini game, where I know despite fuck all the book I collect I will remain a stupid, uncharismatic, sick girl
(btw I appreciate the mini games, like I won't lie they were fun. and well made. Like chibi MC is SOOOOO CUTE. But I hate them in the main game... sorry... not sorry). Maybe you guys could do a challenge route with the mini games
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But then again... idk while typing this out I keep comparing the game to 'seven kingdoms:a princess' problem'. A complex stats based , political otome game. I think the overall blueprints of the game are somewhat similar where the Mc's are thrown into a strange high-stakes world and have to build relationships and skills to survive. Although that game has some huge customisation, with it having a build a Mc section, the game overall is good to take inspiration from.
Look while playing the game I felt uncertainty with every choice, with some being both a personality choice and a plot choice. I felt like walking on a tight rope, and the reactions from the charaters' were a bit... hmm not helping. I just felt lost, with no way to track my progress with each character and heck a sense of direction. That made the game unsatisfying to play.
Although Cassius' horrifying expressions were quite funny.
Also I suppose I don't get 'playing as the og villainess' as like didn't the og villainess get her head chopped off from acting like herself, why on earth would our player choose to act like her.
Truthfully I think the game is too broad for the demo, the satisfying result of seeing that your choices truly do matter is nowhere in the demo, which is weird being that collectively all your choices should have some sort of a result.
Again while writing this I'm reminded of the masterpiece of what is 'death is the only end for the villainess'. Who's in a similar position to our Mc. But then again her mission is only to survive. AUDHIOHFEHh.
....
truthfully I have no idea where this game is going to go. Thinking about it is kinda infuriating. I haven't played a game where the stakes matter but you don't know what happens and you don't see the result of your choices lead to.
....
maybe that the point though... as you're the mc walking through the world, knowing that you execution is in X amount of days and if you don't change or worse make the wrong move you'll reach that ending sooner.
... idk I can't directly compare this game to any others I played before... maybe 'absolution:the way the lost', Anoldor, in that if you make one choice you'll lose out on another, eg with friendship etc. But these games had a sense of direction. I understand why the sense of being lost is there is in game, I literally typed out my thought process. But ngl 'absolution' is literally a horror game and I felt more scared and worried playing this game than that game and fuckty fucked up shit happened in that game. ( EDIT: looking back I might have been exaggerating, but idk the no sense of direction in the game really got to me).
I think including affection bars would be good for the game just for guidance and a lil notebook to write everything you've collected. E.g. events that you've signed up for and info you know about characters.
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Charaters wise hmm in the demo no character stood out. We didn't get to see the whole range of personality nor feel out who they are. Maverick is honestly the best as he's not a total asshole to Mc, especially when she changes. And does speak some sense.
However I think I can just blame it on the overall shortness of the game, however I do see potential in each character.
Cassian and his carrot boy Esra need a good slap in the face. However I kinda get why they're acting like such brats as Mc's former self was probs a bitch to them for many many many years and Mc can't absolve herself from her past sins that easily. I mean Maverick's her step bro sooo it would make sense that he'd be more accepting.
... though seeing how the boys 'might be' LI's in the game is 'interesting', I wonder how they'll fall for our Mc.
Hermes and Isidora are actually a fresh breeze compare to all the other characters in the game. Being that they don't have the same history Mc has with the golden trio.
Hermes and Mc could have an 'interesting dynamic'. As funnily enough he's also a villain, with similar ideas as our Mc one had.
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overall this game has great great potential however the setup of the game is ... shit. Like it's a VN but no skip button and RPG save files. Girl bffr. But the art is amazing. I'm gonna keep an eye on this game, hopefully an extended demo will come out and blow my mind away.
RIP I just rambled, sos if it all really didn't make sense
Heyo! Thanks for checking out our game and giving feedback :DDD
I think an important trend in this to clarify though (and trust I'll add this to the game page so no one else falls under the wrong assumption) is the context behind this base "demo" (I know demo is a bit of a strong word as you'll soon see).
This game was made during a school club game jam event where both experienced and absolute beginner developers were placed on teams and given part of the school year to develop these game pitches before a final presentation deadline. As such, what we have out now is less of a "get the full experience" demo and more of just a "this is what we could crank out during finals week" demo haha!
This includes writing (more choice variations, choices, scenes, interactions, gameplay explanations), art (sprites, backgrounds, settings), ui/ux (we actually have a notebook that will help track several things drafted up! great minds think alike), sound (if you hear a messy ambiance loop I am probably the guilty offender :0), and of course, programming! (ex. the stats are placeholder proof of concept and don't actually work). I know some portions can seem pretty jank right now (trust me, the minigame and 'random' blank scenes between vn segments will be WILDLY different once we get all that work done) but hopefully our closer intended demo build will provide a much more enjoyable experience once the necessary assets for the gameplay loop are finished, both as a visual novel and a stats management game. (Btw, Volcano Princess is also a big inspiration for mixing stats and visual novel segments!)
I of course can't make any promises on the exact timeline or order of things as this game is continuing past its game jam origins as a passion project of a bunch of uni students, but I can say that there are both things finished, just not published, and things being worked on that tackle exactly the points you bring up! Our programmers have been really amazing (Most of them learning Godot just for the game and practicing their experience with minigames and building the vn system from the ground up) and have been focusing on fixing more behind the scenes code, but hopefully once we're back to work after break and posting more content-oriented updates, you'll see just how awesome they are at making games that make sense with the environment ;D. Plus, as an avid Ren'Py shill I will not rest until we get all the features that'll make the vn play as smooth as butter!
TLDR; Dw!! We got you and this is DEFINITELY not a reflection of the gameplay experience, but I will make sure to update our page so that this a lot more clearer to potential players! Tysm for giving us such detailed feedback, (I can tell just from the sheer amount of properties you compared alone that you put a lot of thought into this comment) and I hope that eventually down the line, we'll be able to really show off a TRUE VxR demo with all the fixings! <3333
OMG you're so kind and knowing that this was released as a school project ... makes sense. Not in a bad way, it just that I get it because I'm gonna be studying computer science next year and I know bits and bobs about the course work process.
So despite my hatred towards the mini games, like I still do believe that the mini games are ... bad,. But I do appreciate the effort put into it, and if the mini games were a separate entity to themselves and properly worked. They're quite good and enjoyable.
Like I'm brash with my way of speech, but I geinuenly am speaking from the heart and I don't mean to offend the team in any way. It's just that this game is the combination of my passions, like I love villainess manuhas, I been there since the beginning and I love visual novels and especially romance. And ngl I'm a self proclaimed know it all when it comes to these genre's
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SO since I'm the queen of Yapping, and I have all the time in the world so I'm gonna yap some more.
Yeah back to my statement of saying 'I've never played a game like this before', and knowing that you drew inspiration form 'volcano princess' it makes sense why I haven't. I have to ask, although this is a passion project, with a team as somewhat large as u have (13 people), I do think it would be a waste if u can't somewhat make a profit of the game. ( I mean I'm kinda shooting myself in the foot here, because I'm no billionaire and heck who wouldn't want a free game but still). With this in mind what type of player are you looking for. Because by all means this game is and tagged as a visual novel. Which it is but not.
I mean the game is a visual novel doesn't play out like a visual novel. I don't mean to be rude but it's so obvious that you guys don't play otome games. I've stalked your profiles (ik I'm insane), NONE OF U HAVE MADE A VISUAL NOVEL PRIOR TO THIS, (I guess expect LemonInk, as you've helped with moth to a match stick {which has it's flaws but is overall an nice game}). but then lowkey it does seem like these accounts are you're professional accounts... (I'm not that insane). But anyways, this is gonna sound similar to my previous rant but with more clarity.
One there hasn't been a game where the stakes this high, with a canon self-insert player, with a large variety of choices, and pathways to go. Oh aswell as that 1/4 of the games cast (including the Mc's Dad) absolutely hates the Mc. Like despises' her and treats her like dogshit AND THEY'RE NOT TSUNDERE'S.
Visual novels follow a flow diagram, you pick a choice that'll affect the dialogue and that choice might be brought up later on and effect the game. Funnily enough this game has wilddddd variety of choice, and reading your previous comments I get the idea where you guys are coming from. You know what type of villainess are u gonna be, (a smartie pant know it all - aria from Villainess turns the hourglass), (a sweetie pie- shruli from the step-mothers marchen), or a pathetic little slob (rubekia -I'm sorry for the description, like Ik she has trauma but for the point- from how to get my husband on my side). But with this type of game play it would be well odd. I mean I could be begging at one moment and cusisng a bitch out the next (-lololol me irl). Also being that the cast are close to each other and multiple characters will have a response if the Mc is rude to one. E.g siblings, friends etc etc. And not to forget a sharp blade that awaits her execution.
Also thinking about this game I have to ask is romance a central part of the plot or is it only a subplot. Because in the ER it seems to be a subplot. With the main aim of the game is for Mc to survive... But then that's not a Otome game
Like this game (when thinking about the minigames) plays like a money sucki- I mean mobile Otome game, e.g. Ikemen series, Tears Of Thermis and Isekai slow life ( don't ask me why I played that game). But story wise those games don't have much options, like they have different choices which only consequence is the dialogue right after and in the cause of Ikemen series there's a point system and depending on what choices you pick will give you two versions of the endings, dramatic or romantic. Both good endings btw.
However this game is different being that Mc has an execution to attend if she doesn't do something to change her ways.
I believe, with this type of game you should slim down the number of choices available or make them more subtle in a way.
Actually, I think this is important to note to keep in mind. Why I'm saying to slim down the amount of choices. It's because this game is complicated. Our life has a shit ton of choices, but the concequences are slim. Like the Mc from 'our life' aren't getting executed, at worse they're getting scolded by one of the milfs, This game however has pseudo-poltics and life and death situations, where the Mc is trying to gain power/allies. Having this many choices will lead to many many many many many routes and it'll just become a mess.
That being said there have been games that have done this, e.g. by incorporating a shit ton of choices, in a pseudo politics games. These games are 'Long live the queen' by Hanako Games (haven't played), Palais de Reine (haven't played a wouldn't, because the game has a virus in it) and 'seven kingdoms a princess' problem'. While I haven't played the first two games, so I can't talk much about them I have played the 'seven kingdoms a princess' problems'. This game has a SHIT TON of options, of how a character can react to situations they're in, which affects their personality and the Mc can die, in many ways. It's a beautiful game, and you should give it a try even if it's just the demo.
....
That game took 10 years to make. Being that there was only 1 dev.
Ngl I don't believe that this game is going to be as complex and heavy as 7KPP, but potentially it can be. (edit... maybe I'm overthinking).
It's honestly funny how you guys aren't aware of this.
....
On one hand I'm like throw the game out, it's flawed to the core, and too much for any of u guys to handle since none of you guys have made a visual novel and only made small simple games. However the writing is good; tension is there, potentially good characterisation is there, etc but it's built on a wonky structure and will fall.
However on the other hand I see the potential of what this game can be. (for context I'm bed-rotting playing VN's this summer holiday and so I have all the time in the world to care about this).
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My advice to you,
Lastly start from scratch, think about what game is it. Like think carefully and redo it completely.
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If you were to ask what I would do if I was stuck in your position.
I would first make a little pet character, who was sent my 'god', to help guide the Mc and cuss out the LI's with them. Examples of beings are Jasper from 'seven kingdoms a princess' problem' (in a world where everyone is lying to each other the Mc can 10000% trust Jasper, because although he may think poorly of Mc, he's unaffiliated with the politics on the island and provides support), The maid from Ambition a minute in power (when the Mc was seemingly abandoned by her fiancé to live in a dingy mansion, she was there to provide not only emotional support but is willing to clean up a crime scene for Mc), and that Orion from Amnesia Memories.(he's the closest example for my spin off the game, but he's like a pixie and he's stuck with Mc too essentially try to remember her past memories so he can leave).
Also from villainess Manhwa's Yona from Beware The Villainess, the maid from Miss not-so sidekick.
I think having an support character who the Mc can depend on is great, in making the game seem not so daunting, and lessen the horror side, and bring players satifaction of having someone to be able to vent to, while the player endures the harsh reality Mc's in. Also to give the player an overall plan for what to do, e.g. stash enough money in the safe so they can escape.
Next I would kinda arrange the system to be more simpler, being that there's a prologue of some sort where the character customisation could happen. Like the player could pick whatever the choices they want and that'll trap them into a route. E.g pathetic route, smartie pants route, etc. Which locks the player to a smaller amount of choices, and events which only that type of villainess can access. etc, and the game will continue from there.
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Here's me going off another tangent, but with that being said I'm proven that I am the Yaping Queen. Although messy, I do hope you consider my advi- yapping, I mean looking back it's kinda harsh but take what you want out of it. I don't hate you guys and I wish the best for you and the development for this game.
GAMES THAT I REC PLAYING
hero's journey- emrys route (love this game and even still remember his name. He hates hates Mc because SPOILERS Mc used to be a wacko psycho before amnesia. But he deep down falls for her after he learns about her amnesia.
Amnesia memories- that game is a classic, and ngl you really only need to play Kents route. Like him and Mc were having some relationship problems and then Mc got anmesia and fixes everything.
7KPP, a must play. It's confusing at first but first don't play with a guide, that game is made to be replayed to infinity.
A knights dilemma - I liked how this game although short grapples with politics.
bro we did NOT order a yappuccino ...
Sorry i was creepily stalking other comments and i feel compelled to point out that in the desc this game is supposed to be subversion or even a critique of otome/villainess stuff so why would you actively try to make it like one (e.g. include a sidekick for the villainess - while i understand it's to make the game less intimidating i suppose realistically the villainess would have no real friends). Also even if it's obvi that this is everyone's first vn it's not a crime to be an amateur and everyones gotta start somewhere. big love and u dont need to sound condescending/patronizing when u give critiques next time!
I finally could play it it was really good but then I'm stuck here without explaining is this a bug or what's going on? (after the ball is this scene)
You reached the end of the demo! We should probably create some in-game message telling you that, so we'll include that in the next patch. We'll be adding in more content soon, so please stay tuned! Thank you for trying our game - your save data will carry over to the future updates! :)
So, I finally got to play this demo! Yippie!
(Spoilers and so much rambling-- forgive me--)
My thoughts on the game are just gonna be what I felt about it, so I dunno if thats gonna be important... haha
first of all, I feel so villainized. Dont get me wrong! I am a villain after all! (a pretty one at that) (I think I have a crush on the villainess' looks)
its cool that even if I was trying to be nice or amicable with some people, they still scrutinize me. Makes me think what did Cecilia do to make them see me as a monster?
but also, without the context of Cecilia's past (since she was supposed to be a one dimensional villain after all)
I feel really bad for Cecilia. To have a father who loves his adopted son more than his own daughter, to be expected to know these prim and proper etiquette while her brother can get away with it, to be married to someone who despises you....
(but maybe its just because I dont know what Cecilia was like, maybe they had their own reasons)
honestly, I can see why Cecilia would turn out to be a villainess if she was treated like that for no reason. So, you try to fight back in your own way. If the people see you as this monster... why bother trying to be kind and friendly when they've already made their mind about you? You might as well give the people what they want. They want a villainess? then I'll be your villainess. (you can tell how much this affects me HAHAHASBHSADH--)
But I still have hope that we can be kind to other people. I'm not going to give up on redeeming myself (if we did something wrong)
The demon lord and Isidora seems nice! (which is cool because I desperately need someone friendly in the game--) So I have hope that maybe some people will be friendly!
(also, I find them so cute!! I love them so much <3)
(The demon lord's rambles? I can relate to them so much)
(I mean-- this comment is so long I think its considered a ramble??)
(god help me)
Also, while I had my eyes on Cassius,(oh wow, me in the villainess' body, crushing on her fiancé, very original ;-;)
I started crushing on Hermes....
(only because he doesnt seem to treat me like dirt ;w;)
(my standards are as low as it can be)
(its embarrassing, I know)
Oh, as the story progresses (yeah, I am writing these as I play them ahaha) The father seems to be... nice? I mean, he isnt as cold as I thought he'd be.
alright, so I'm one month in... (after the rhythm game haha) (I think I did pretty good :D) It seems that some of the maids are comfortable with me, which is a start! I believe in us LETS GOOOO
UH OH I ACCIDENTALLY PRESSED LOAD ON A UNSAVED FILE IT WAS A MISTAKE IM BACK IN THE VOID--
update: I adore the maids, I hope in the full game, I get to bond with them like those silly cartoon villain henchmen, or rather henchwoman in this scenario :D (you know, like a... "you got it boss!" type vibe? I would like to hype them up too HSYHGSDFGF)
I think I finished the game, wooo boy. I'm looking forward to it! Truly hope we can redeem ourselves (and not get killed again -cough cough-)
Lastly, THE ARTSTYLE LOOKS SO GOOD AAAAAA I COULD JUST EAT IT UPP!! <33 the expressions are seriously delicious!!
Haha, don't worry about the rambling! Personally, that's always my favorite part lol
First off, thank you for your kind words and thoughts so far, it's really motivating to see how passionate you are in your review! I'm glad to see that the frustrations of playing as a truly despised villainess are coming through. We're actually planning on further expanding variations in experiences and choices in the earlier chapters, as well as locking in on some pretty THICK path experiences in the third chapter... be prepared. And rest assured! Character relationships, histories, and development are a big focus of the game, so the shadow of the real Cecilia will continue to hang over you as you play and learn about her life. As for characters, it seems that Hermes has bagged another loyal fan (we'll see how that goes)! But if your standards are low, then mine are lower because Cassius is my king <333. And the Marquess... well, he's an interesting case. The next narrative update will definitely add some more factors to the mix! Thanks again for playing <3
Low standard besties LETS GOOO!! <333
I'm excited for the updates of this game then!! AAAAAaa
I swear, Hermes is just-- I just think his first impression wasn't bad, I promise I'm still going to Cassius (who am I kidding, I'm going to pursue both of them)
also, what do you mean "we'll see how that goes" OH NO IS HE GOING TO BE MEAN TO US?? I KNEW IT WAS TOO GOOD TO BE TRUE--
"the shadow of the real Cecilia will continue to hang over you as you play and learn about her life." Gosh, I am so ready to cry. STAY STRONG VIOLET!! (Thats the name I use for my character haha dont mind me--)
but yeah!! Good luck to you all!! I'll be cheering through the screen :DD
I've just your comment my my you're so cutteee. I just wanted to say that.
Wha-- You're too kind!! Thank you ehehe~ (^///^)
I think youre also cute yourself! and a charmer too ✨
EDITED review after uninstalling and reinstalling:
Bugs and errors I found when playing through - contains spoilers:
Error 1: Game crashes during fan minigame which I am highly aware is being fixed.Error 2: Save/Load option not happening during selection of choices.
Error 3: Not being able to choose the same choice again when selecting through the alternatives.
I will still stick through, just hope that the issues gets resolved quickly.
Hi Mike thanks for playing our game and giving us feedback!
From the errors that you described, I suspect the version you played is not the latest build.
Please download our latest version (should have a timestamp that says "15 days ago") and check out this devlog as well as this one to learn about how to clear your save files if your game crashes!
Please let us know if you have any questions or if the errors persist. Thanks!
It is the updated version, I checked and updated it before I made the comment…I’ll uninstall it completely and reinstall it, perhaps that would fix the issue I’m facing.
Sounds good. Please let us know how the reinstall went!
I forgot to update, my bad really.
So I uninstalled and reinstalled, removed all entries and it is much better now. I still cannot input my name nor the choices that we once chose can be re-chosen, but there is more content to the “move on” dialog which did seem like a good closure for that route, I’m happy with that.
I hope that we get the save / load option right at the dialog because it’s much more easier to come back to it.
Edit: After I finished the fan minigame, it randomly crashed and now I lost all the stat I accumulated. A shame, really.
Edit 2:
This does not progress from where when I choose to find Isadora through a new way.
Is there no content after the night time so far?
Glad to hear that it's working better!
We're working on fixing the input and streamlining the content after a1c3_2. That's why you are experiencing the bug you showed in your second edit as that scene is yet to be fixed. And yes, there is currently no content after the ball. We are working on that too!
Could you describe what happened around the time the game crashed after you played the minigame? Did you play it in the free time zone and how many turns remained (aka how many games have you played in that zone before the fan one)?
Thanks again for playing our game and providing feedback!
Tried running the game on windows, but after showing the godot icon, the screen just went blank? The music was playing, but I couldn't see/interact with anything on screen. Not sure if this is a problem specific to my pc, but can you help me figure out how to fix this?
Thanks for trying it out! I think it might be a compatibility issue since our game is experiencing some performance issues.
We are working on releasing a compatibility patch that will solve this issue across different hardware. Please stay tuned to our updates!
The game looks very promising and the main heroine looks fantastic! The plot is something I have been dreaming about, since reading so many mangas about villainess.
p.s. Please, tell me that we can date Hermes! please! please!))
We're so glad to hear it! As fans of villainess stories wanting to pay homage to the great and facilitate discussions on the...less great...aspects of the genre, we're dedicated to giving players an experience that will be both indulgingly familiar and excitingly unique, as any good villainess story should be!
...And let's just say, Hermes definitely has some versatility in the role he plays through the story... ;))
oh my god we need a bdsm test reveal from hermes
For some reason, the game window always shows up in the top left corner of my PC. I am unable to drag the window around and the top options such as - or x are out of my reach. Is this intentional?
Thanks for letting us know! I just fixed it so this will be resolved in the next build.
WOWWWW
I'm loving it so far! The writing and art are spectacular.
I may have encountered a bug after the protagonist looks back to see where Cecelia lives, the dialogue box seems stuck on "false". Also, just a bit of feedback, it took me a while to figure out where the "back" button was for the settings because I'm not used to looking for it in the bottom right corner. Secondly, partially because the icons for Save and Load are the same, by misclicking an empty Load before Saving, I accidentally restarted and lost all of my progress which was a bit annoying.
I am super excited to continue to support this game!!
Hi Kenzie!! Thanks for your feedback. I agree that the save and load buttons were confusing so I just made them show the text for now (we'll put new sprites soon). Good to know about the settings screen as well. We appreciate your support!!
Please provide windows build, I'm really curious about this game
It's up! Thanks for checking us out :D
Is this just me or when I try to download it, for some reason it only has the mac file and no windows files for the game?
Windows build is up! :D
Really nice game. I love the idea and the art is nice.
We definitely get the creepy feeling from "the god". And I disliked the former ROs (are they still ROs by the way ?). It really shows how you can like some characters and when seeing more sides from them disliking them. It was well done.
I love the start and I'm curious on the developement you will choose.
A couple issues :
1/ The games lagged a lot. £It was difficult to play some of them.
2/ We can't save so it's impossible to test other choices.
3/ We can't reread the history. When you click on it it disappears and advace in the dialogue at the same time.
4/ There was no Hermes image. Too bad because he is definitely my fav' character at the moment ! If he is a RO I will definitely pursue him ah, ah, ah.
5/ I have no idea why but I can't get past the dialogue after coming back from the party ? It's like I tried every texts and it doesn't work so at first previous choices were freeze and I had to restart the dialogue without those choices then no choices at all anymore ? Is it a bug or the end of the demo ? I'm really confused. Please tell me I went to the end and not broke the game.
Hey! Thanks for playing our game. The demo is supposed to "end" after that scene but it bugs out; we'll be adding the remainder of Chapter 1 ASAP. Your save data will carry over and you'll resume in that scene with your data restored.
We're working on improving performance and adding saving and loading in the next build, so we hope you check out what's in store! We've fixed the Hermes bug and will upload that shortly. We hope to make these changes within the next 12 hours.
Thanks for your feedback!!
And just to add onto our lovely team lead, thank you so much for your comments and feedback!
Absolutely, for the former ROs we wanted to have players see new sides, good or bad, to characters that otherwise tend to get glorified. I don't want to spoil too much of the story, but let's just say...the former ROs aren't exactly in a position to be love interests at the moment.
But on the contrary, we have quite the plans for Hermes, and you'll absolutely be able to see more of him in the future. Glad to see you liked him so much!
AMEN FOR HERMES SOOOO FINE I NEED HIM *drools and slobbers all over your comment to show that i'm claiming my territory*
looks like a great game but i cant really open the game on my pc :(
hey! I'm sorry to hear that. Could you ensure that the .pck file is in the same directory as the .exe, and let me know if any errors show up on launch? Also, the game may take a long time to load upon first opening it, so could you try relaunching and waiting up to a minute and letting us know if that works? Sorry for the wait, we are still trying to figure out how to make the game run on all hardware!
I try to open the file and it freezes and doesn't open :(((
Had to open task manager to close it.
Hi,
The initial launch will take a while and even appears to be frozen. Could you try relaunching and waiting for up to a minute? Let us know if that works. Thank you!
I tried to open it again and waited but this time a box popped up saying
"The instruction at 0x00007FFB2E741C27 referenced memory at 0x0000000000000050. The memory could not be read.
Click OK to terminate program"
Hi,
We think that it might be a RAM issue. We are working on improving the performance of our game and will release a patch to address that soon. Please stay tuned for our update, thank you!
Hi,
We have released a version that improves the performance of our game. Please check it out if you are interested!
I'm sorry to report back with bad news but it stayed on a black page for hours this time and didn't do much when I tried to interact with it. 😥
Hello! I really enjoyed what I could play of this game, but I did experience a few issues, and noticed things that I would like to see in a future update.
1. I could not scroll through the text history, after trying to move the slide bar for ages nothing happened.
2. The text would sometimes disappear and then never show up again, so I wouldn't see anything until I could make a choice
3. A Save and load Feature would be nice
4. Once the text tab disappears, there is no way to get it back
5. I see no way to replay the demo from the begining
6. I understand if not, but can I please romance Hermes?
Again, I really enjoyed it and am excited to see what happens next
Thanks for playing our game! We're adding saving and loading in the next build, and fixing a plethora of strange text bugs. We'll also fix the log not scrolling easily. Thanks for your feedback, and I think you'll be satisfied with where you can go with Hermes. :)
I downloaded the newest version, but now I can't play past the end scene of breakfast with the brother, all I get is the sky backdrop and the word false. I also noticed that parts of the god conversation are missing along with the maid changing scene in the morning.
I am encountering this as well!
Hi,
We have just released the newest patch earlier today. Did the same issue happen in this patch?
Now a different issue is happening, where the game immediately opens on the morning of the ball, and I'm not allowed to progress past the conversation with the brother right before the ball.
I love the idea, however theres some problems with the game(keep in mind that I simply cant play to the end of the demo-the ball):
What its good:
Concept
Writing
Characters desings (the ones that I could see)
Major issues:
Backgrounds and characters images not loading
Game crashing
Unnable to play the mini games (loading images/crashing issues)
Repeating scenes and not let me choose the same dialogue alredy choosen-If this was supose to be a game mechanics is a bad one
Minor nitpick:
I particularly dont like the option : choose your type of villainess(meek,close the original,innocent,etc) for two reasons:
1.This choose does bassically nothing (dont lock dialogues,characters still treat you more or less the same,etc)
2.The type of villainess the player chooses portray is better demonstrate on the rest of the dialogues/choices, if you wanna the palyer see how theirs villainess is progressing why not put a personality bar in the game ? This way feels less constriged.
Thank you so much for playing our game as it is right now, and I appreciate that you've taken the time to leave your thoughts! The description you may have been looking at earlier is a little outdated, so the scene you're stuck at is our current endpoint for the demo. This was also made during a time crunch for a deadline, and the dev team is actually a bunch of uni students in finals week right now so it will take us some time to fix these issues, but we plan to release the rest of the act (ballroom scene included) after we've worked through a few of the bugs you mentioned. This game is also being built from the ground up in Godot, so we're taking baby steps in things like statistics and gauges. The bug with repeating scenes is absolutely an issue that we're aware of, and we're doing our best to fix that too.
As for the villainess type, thank you so much for leaving feedback on that too.
1. The main purpose of allowing players to choose is to let them have a say in what kind of "villainess" story they want to tell, and these tend to be the common archetypes! They mostly affect narration, but there *is* a big role they play that actually changes what dialogue options you get and the outcomes for it — except this is during the ballroom scene, which is unfortunately inaccessible at this moment. We're working on that too! There are also many changes that you may not notice until on another play-through, but we plan to expand this choice as well.
2. The personality bar is an interesting addition, and we will definitely consider it. We're also working on changing how characters react to which type you choose, so hopefully that is more to your taste then.
But besides that, if possible could you please also let us know which minigames didn't work so we can fix that as well? Thank you so much! So sorry that the version of the game you played isn't at its full best — we hope you'll enjoy the next version once we patch out these issues!