Happy Easter!

Happy Easter, everyone!

Have you been eating tons of cake and cookies and lying around doing nothing? What, is that just me? I was just… uh… brainstorming. Here, look at this chibi drawing of Ayrius and Ember.

This way to the torture chamber.

I’ve been making some headway with the backgrounds. I’ve convinced my mom to give me her laptop for rendering purposes. New BGs! Only two so far. Antique furniture is a pain, it’s probably not going to look very antique-y. I should do more research. *sigh*

I’m getting back to writing as soon as I can move again (I ate lots of sweets, remember? Warren would be proud). I’ve even written down some ideas for endings. Convoluted true ending is convoluted.

Hope you have a fun Easter. Bye~!

Poison Sweet: new logo, screenshots and how the game works

Lately I’ve been working on re-inventing Poison Sweet’s image.  I was dissatisfied with the UI, so I decided to change it (easier said than done). While I was at it, I tried coming up with a logo for it. I’m not very good at creating logos, as you may have noticed from my previous games, but I tried, okay?!

I also thought I’d give you a sneak peek at the new UI

I am in love with that texture in the background. I got it here. This site has some really pretty and free textures, so I thought I’d share. ^_^

Save menu with a delete button. Le gasp!

Ignore the random numbers at the top, they’re secret information. lol
***and make that “leave”

The background still isn’t final, but I like its overall look.

I’m still debating what to do with the “poison/sweet bar” (the top right bar, that’s what I like to call it. hehe). It’s basically a classic love points bar, but it’s influenced by more than just interactions with Ayrius. It can be changed by the MC’s reaction to certain pieces of information or events.

For four weeks until the wedding, from Monday to Friday, you can choose a place in the castle to spend your time: the library, dining hall, kitchen, gardens, your own room and eventually a nearby town and -hee hee- Ayrius’s chamber. Is that Ayrius’ or Ayrius’s ? Gah, I’m never naming my characters names ending with s again! So anyway, these places are where events can happen, but even just visiting some of these places will grant or withdraw a point.  This is why I think the p/s  bar is necessary and shouldn’t be kept as a cheat like in Summer found me.

The problem is, do I want to display it from the start? I’m thinking the second playthrough is better, since it might ruin immersion and all that. Personally I like to pick choices as I would in real life on the first  try, so the poison/sweet bar might hinder that. Maybe I could even make a hide button, for people who want to try their luck on their own? What do you think?

If you’re thinking the bar makes the game too easy, let me tell you something… you can’t go back on your choices in this game! I’ve decided I want to be evil. Muahaha. To be fair, you CAN rollback if you’ve just clicked on a choice, since the points are usually added after the conversation/event is over, so if you click by mistake, you can try again.

So if on working days you pick your destination, what about the weekends?  Well, you get one ‘date’ with Ayrius each weekend, with a total of four dates. By date I mean he takes you to some random place, without you having any say in it. >.> Dude needs to work on his manners. Yup, I just pinned the blame on an imaginary character, deal with it.

The different endings I have planned will not only be unlocked by the p/s bar, because that would be too easy to code (*sigh*), but by discovering secret shtuff and building relationships with other characters, mainly Helena (the cook), Leonore (Ember’s friend), and another secret(?) character. There will be sad endings, so get your tissues ready.

Of course, everything I’ve written here is subject to change, cause that’s how I roll.

Poison backgrounds

Back to our regular updates! No whining in this one, folks.

So I’ve been thinking photograph backgrounds are not going to cut it after all. I’ve been trying to modify my background-making process, with minor success. u_u Still using Sketchup to create furniture and stuff, but from that until the finished product it’s a looong winding road. I hope to one day have a nice, clear algorithm that I can follow and make pretty pretty bgs every time. Riiiight.

Anyway, lesse some pics. Tiny pics because at full res they look kinda…yeah. Especially the lower one. *shudders*

 

Test backgrounds

To CG or not to CG…?

If you’ve read earlier posts, you know that I’ve never made event CGs for my games before. I did try, but I never finished any, because of reasons.  We all know CGs are awesome and we want all visual novels to have them, right? But are no CGs better than bad ones?

Anyway, I’ve tried making one, and it took a pretty long time, at least for someone who wants to finish a drawing in one day. I actually worked on this 3 different times. I’m still not totally happy, but I think it looks. Usually event CGs have some sort of weird angle that makes them look more dynamic and dramatic, but I didn’t think of that until it was too late. Oh well, he’s just eating cake, what’s dramatic about that?

So, without further ado, here’s the ‘masterpiece’:

Shiny hair *_*

Would this quality be ok?  Keep in mind this is a pretty straightforward image, only shoulders up, something more action-y would be harder for me to draw. And please don’t kill be with comments about anatomy and perspective. x_x

 

A taste of poison

I’m usually pretty shy and I -still- get embarrassed thinking that people are reading something I wrote and looking at something I drew, even though Summer has around 8000 downloads (I can’t wait to say it’s over 9000!) .  How did that happen?!

So what I’m about to do in this post will hopefully help me get over my fears. People post different types of works all the time and get criticized for it. Besides, I haven’t posted anything in a while so I figured, why not some dialogue? Not everyone has  the attention span of a goldfish and needs pretty pictures.

So here’s a little peek at an event that takes place in the palace garden:

Ayrius “Ember, what a pleasant coincidence.”
Ember “I didn’t know you liked to take walks in the garden.”
Ayrius “Why else would I have a garden? I quite enjoy the calm and quiet.”
Ember “Am I bothering you? I’ll come back some other time.”
Ayrius “If you can refrain from talking my ears off as you usually do, I think I can survive half an hour in your company.”
Ember “What is that supposed to mean? I never-”
“I stopped myself, realizing that while he was most definitely wrong, it was wise to avoid an argument.”
Ember “Fine. I’ll be quiet.”
Ayrius “Good. Walk with me, then.”
“I made a point of being quiet. I even stepped as lightly as possible in order to avoid making noise.”
Ayrius “You are quite amusing at times.”
Ember “Amusing? I’m not saying anything.”
Ayrius “And yet you managed to amuse me. Why are you so stubborn? You’re like a child.”
Ember “You said to be quiet, so I am.”
Ayrius “Now I feel like conversing with you.”
Ember “Would you please make up your mind?”
Ayrius “You’re spirited today, aren’t you?”
Ember “I’m spirited most of the time. Are you only now noticing?”
Ayrius “I meant more than usual. Has something good happened?”
Ember “Not particularly. I just like summer, and long walks, and the smell of flowers…”
Ayrius “What about me?”
Ember “What about you?”
Ayrius “Are you enjoying my company?”
Ember “Enjoy might be a little much. I can certainly survive it, though.”
Ayrius “You remember that?”
Ember “It was a minute ago. And let me say I am ever so pleased you haven’t keeled over by now.”
Ayrius “Come now, don’t spoil the mood with an attitude like that. Let’s enjoy our walk.”