Sapphire Snowe: The Bear, The Beast & The Blizzard

So glad to hear you enjoyed the game :3 Thank you so much for checking it out!

Hehe, Snowe is quite the catch x3

Sorry it’s taken me so long to reply >.< I haven’t been on my PC since the very beginning of October cos of some personal problems, but I’ll do my best to answer your question now :3

As far as I can remember, I listed the sprite artists in the credits text document rather than in game just because they’re assets that I purchased to edit and use rather than sprites commissioned by an artist. But I just did some digging, and I can link you to the artists that I bought the original sprites from :3

I just edited the colours of everything using GIMP, haha.

Sooo the main sprite for Saffie and Snowe was from someone called m-rakko: https://www.pixiv.net/en/users/74070192

For future Saffie, it’s a sprite by Ameharu: https://www.pixiv.net/en/users/79431323

For the lil dragon, it was an artist called otohimenohanagasa, but I can’t find a link for them anywhere now >.<

For Snowe’s spirit form, it was by an artist called Silon, and unfortunately, they appear to have left the platform they sold their stuff on and deleted everything, because my old purchase link for the sprite just takes me to a dead page now :( 

Snowe’s beast form was by an artist called Haekura/Hachino (and is actually a live2D model for rigging): https://www.pixiv.net/en/users/4237338

And Saffie’s bear art is by someone called Susun: https://x.com/susun_ga_omise

I think that covers all the sprites :3 Editing the colours was a lot of time-consuming work cos most of em were just PNG files rather than layered PSDs, so it meant painstakingly selecting areas to alter the colour one section by section x3 Sometimes I wonder why I put myself through the pain of doing that cos it would be so much easier to just use them as they come, haha. I feel like it’s worth the effort though just to make them unique to the project, haha.

Thanks again for playing ^-^

Ahh, thank you so much for all your kind words <3 It really means a lot :3 And I’m super glad you enjoyed the game!

I’ve been trying really hard to include the option to pick the LI’s gender in all of my projects for a while now because I feel like it’s just nice to have that extra bit of inclusivity :3 It sort of stems from me being a picky player xD Because years ago, there were lots of games I would think looked cool, but if all the romance options were fem only, or the protagonist was masc only, then I just wouldn’t play because I would rather go find a different game that suits my preferences x3

Sometimes, I do regret having both options because it basically = double the amount of work xD Cutting 2 lots of the same voice lines can be extremely time-consuming, as can testing both versions work correctly >.< And then when it comes to paying VAs, it also means the cost doubles, haha. In the end though, I am always glad that I put in the extra effort to include both :3 

It also means the world to me that you would describe the story as a book definition of heartwarming ^-^ It’s extra scary releasing something like this that is more personal. I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t extremely worried about how it might be viewed >.< It’s just that everyone’s experiences with this sort of thing are so varied and unique to each person that I was worried I might offend or upset someone somehow. 

So yeah, I’m glad that it resonated with you in a way :3 

Thanks so much for playing it + for taking the time to write such a sweet comment <3

You’re too kind!! x3 Thank you for always being so sweet <3

Lazy Polar Bear and I are working on something for Otome/Josei jam right now :D It’s only gonna be a demo cos I went a bit mad and wrote the story script around 55k words or something >.< But the demo for Otome Jam will have a big chunk of it, like 17k words maybe! 

We’re aiming to release the full version later in the year for Monstrous Desires Jam, but no idea if we will manage it, haha. The full version will also have the usual choices of masc/fem voice for the LI + for the protagonist too, but it’s otome-only for the current jam as it would be too much extra work to make the deadline if we tried to add all the other options x3

It’s a Limbo Line spinoff called Lovestarved with a darker sorta romance going on cos Sapphire Snowe was so sweet and fluffy, I felt doing a 180 and going back to the dark side xD

Hope you’re well & having a great year so far ^-^

Maybe not all the suicidal stuff though cos that would be bad >.< although, technically, Snowe would save you, but still!!

Tbh, I wish it snowed more where I live. Years ago, we used to get some pretty snowy days in winter and try to make the most of it cos it would disappear as quickly as it arrived, but this past year, we didn't get any at all :(

I’m glad you do :D I can’t take toooo much credit for the look of the art in my projects since I can’t actually draw to save my life >.< For this project, I just picked some sprite assets that I thought fit well, and then I spent hours and hours editing the colours and adding effects to them using the program called GIMP :3 I spent soooo long trying to make CGs for this one just by editing the heck out of my assets, haha. I’m happy that all the time spent editing paid off though cos I was trying my best to make everything look pretty and cohesive ^-^

I always prefer working with artists though than editing assets :3

That’s great that you enjoyed the writing too! This one was pretty personal x3 haha. 

I remember you commenting before :D Thank you so much for your support and all your kind words <3 It means a lot that you like my games! I hope you’re having a good 2024 so far :3

Life is a pain in the butt like that x3 I’m forever meaning to respond to things but they just get pushed further and further back when irl stuff piles up and gets in the way, haha. Holy moly lemon cake though! x3 I hope it was tasty! I imagine it must’ve been :D I haven’t had anything like that in sooo long… and now I want it >.< I remember making lemon poppyseed bread/cake with my grandma many years ago and then devouring it just the two of us, haha.

Hehe, yeeeeah, it’s a liiiilttle bit embarrassing to have this one out there in the sense that I went a step further with some of my personal feelings on mental health-related stuff than I did with Bitter/Sweet x3 When I finished all the music + the story in my head, I thought to myself, do I really need to make this into a game? It’s already served its purpose in soothing me for the most part, so maybe I should just leave it at that. But then another part of my brain kicked in just shouting, do iiiiiiit!! So it is what it is I guess xD

The most frustrating thing about it is that I desperately want to console anyone who is feeling similarly to how I was at the time of writing it all because I don’t want other people to ever hurt like that :( but at the same time, I feel as though I completely lack the words to actually say anything that can make things any better. I’m even worse in person! I want to do all I can to help people who I notice are in pain, but it’s like I’m paralysed and don’t know what actions to take to be of any use >.<

That’s so incredible to hear about Saffie! That means a heck of a lot x3 I think Jennifer voiced the character perfectly and I can’t imagine anyone else doing her justice the way that she did. 

It also means a lot that you’d say that about my voice acting even though it was dubbed over by AI :3 On a personal level, I feel like I just about managed to pull off the delivery I was after for fem Snowe, the narrator, and the misc characters, but there were definitely a few dodgy takes in there that I’m not particularly satisfied with x3 And I feel like I would struggle with a more emotional sort of character. I think Snowe not being suuuuper expressive was a big help in getting the right kind of sound for her. I reckon if my natural voice actually sounded a bit closer to the voice I picked for her, I would be a bit more comfortable using my voice without overdubbing, haha. It’s pretty incredible though that there’s even technology like that out there. It did generate some laughable attempts to copy some of my efforts, and it couldn’t handle laughter at all x3 but for the most part, it was pretty accurate, scarily so really. 

One day, I might stop completely hating my natural voice, haha. It would be nice to do more voice acting properly. I miss acting in general >.< That and writing were my two main passions as a kid until I had it all beaten out of me by anxiety, haha. Heck, I would have gone to performing arts college if it hadn’t been for the fact that the only one I could possibly travel to after leaving secondary school required you to also take a module in dance alongside drama x3 Had that not been the case and I wound up studying there, my life could have taken a very different path since I never would have encountered my very first abuser! But nope, the prospect of having to do a unit in dance completely put me off doing performing arts entirely because (presumably thanks to my dyspraxia) I can’t dance to save my life x3 

If I ever did want to seriously try voice acting though, I’d have to get a better mic and somehow soundproof my room or move house or something because the background noise from the busy road outside is bad >.< I can edit it out, but it seems to drop the overall quality of the recording. I’d also need some kinda lessons I think because I have a lot of mouth noises and stuff to edit out xD That’s super sweet of you to say my voice by itself is soothing though!! My brain wants to deny that with every inch of my being considering I can’t stand the sound of it and think I struggle with sounding quite monotonous in my regular speech x3

Well, I think everything you wrote to describe the game is beyond anything I could ever hope for and I appreciate it beyond words that you chose to take the time to type all that you did :3 “Meaningful” is probably one of the most meaningful (and I’m not trying to be funny there x3) words you could have picked! As much as I like to tell myself that this hobby of mine is entirely for me, there’s no getting away from the fact that anyone who writes anything probably hopes that at least one person might read their words, and with this being such a personal project, I’d be lying if I said any negative comments I might get on it wouldn’t be hurtful. On the flip side, it means any positive comments mean so much more because, while I always pour my heart and soul into everything I do, stuff like this really does have a piece of me in it, haha. I know it’s not gonna resonate with everyone, but to hear you describe it as meaningful is enough for me to be content with it and know that releasing it wasn’t a mistake :3

Like I said, I’m not very good at consoling people >.< I feel like no matter what I say it will come across as kind of hollow, especially when there’s nothing I can really do to help :( But still, I’m sorry you’ve been going through an awful time. You don’t deserve that >.< You’re always such a ray of sunshine to me and I wish that all your times were good and happy ones, not bad and crappy ones!! 

I don’t think it comes across as all over the place at all :3 Being sick is never good though >.< so I hope that it’s something you’ll be able to recover from soon! Whatever it is that you’re going through, I hope that it will pass as soon as possible, or at the very least, improve in some way and that life will stop being a dick to you!! x3 I don’t want to pry, but you’re always welcome to drop me an email or something if you ever want to talk about stuff! I might not be very good at cheering people up, but I can listen (with my eyes x3)

Thank you for always being so incredibly kind, caring, and supportive :3 Sometimes I wonder if I’d even still be doing this without amazing people like you around! Because as much as I keep at the hobby for the sheer love of it, there are days now and then when it sometimes feels like it would be less painful to just stop. It’s on days like that that I remember people like you and all the lovely things you’ve said. Sometimes, that’s all it takes to hold back the demons encroaching! Other times, it’s the one thing I somehow manage to hold onto like a candle in the abyss that stops the darkness from swallowing me up completely x3

Words are never just words. And yours among others have given me strength in times when I’ve otherwise had none. That’s something I will be forever grateful for :3  

Thank you for playing the game :3 And I’m sorry you’re feeling suicidal. You’re right, life can be really hard >.< If I’m completely honest, I feel suicidal most of the time, but working on these projects at least helps me to block that out a bit.

I feel like people’s mental health is getting worse and worse as time goes on :( More and more people that I know are dealing with depression than ever before. 

You have to keep fighting though because even when it feels like there’s no hope, it’s true that you never know what could happen in the future :3 And it’s true that no feeling lasts forever. As hard as it is to keep going, you have to because you only get one chance at life, and if you commit suicide you might miss out on a lot of wonderful and happy times to come.

The crazy thing is that I feel like I don’t really have a reason to live besides not wanting to hurt the people who love me >.< but like I wrote for Saffie, I don’t exactly want to die either. I just wish life was less painful. I also wish no one had to deal with depression and suicidal thoughts because it’s hell. Which is why I wanted to write a story with some happy endings for Saffie :3

I hope that things get better for you soon! + That 2024 turns out to be a brilliant year for you :3

Thanks so much for playing this one too ^-^ I’m so glad you were able to relate to Saffie! I was a little worried that actually stating she has an ASD diagnosis might make it difficult for players to relate to her whether they have an ASD diagnosis themselves or not since the spectrum is so vast. That’s partly why I tried not to write tooooo much about autism specifically and focus more on Saffie’s feelings in general because anyone can struggle with anxiety and depression at any point in their lives.

I don’t think it helps either that while a lot of people are aware of autism these days, they have a sort of skewed idea of what it looks like due to limited coverage in the media and stuff >.< A lot of folks seem to think we either have special needs and learning difficulties, or we are socially inept geniuses with savant skills, and they don’t realise that it’s not as black and white as that x3 A lot of people with ASD don’t fit into either of those stereotypes. I know I certainly don’t, haha. 

I think getting my diagnosis made me feel more able to talk about it and be more open about it as I learn more and more about how it impacts me. Cos pre-diagnosis, even though various professionals had said to me they were 99.9% sure I was autistic, I didn’t want to research it too much or anything just on the very slim chance I wasn’t because I didn’t want to be labelling myself as something I wasn’t. Now that I have a definitive answer that I am autistic, it’s a bit more liberating and I can learn more without worrying about that side of things.

I totally agree though that it’s interesting to hear about other autistic people’s experiences! I find I can generally relate to at least a small part of stuff people write or talk about even if not everything! And it is nice to have a reminder that you’re not completely alone and that there are other people out there who understand you cos it can feel very isolating a lot of the time x3

So glad you liked the different narration from what I usually go for :3 With most of my stuff it’s more designed for like self-inserting I guess, but I really wanted this to be Saffie’s story and have it be more like the player is going on the journey with her I guess. Makes me super happy you liked the OST too since that was pretty much what got me out of the depression bit for a while and what gave me the idea for the game in the first place x3 Since I used making the music as a way to soothe myself, I kinda hoped it might come across as soothing for others in some way too :3

Thanks so much for always being so kind! <3 I hope 2024 is going well for you so far!

Well, I’m glad you happened to come across it and ended up enjoying it :3 Thanks so much for checking it out and taking the time to get the different endings ^-^

Yeah, the “You’ll get used to it” line is one my mum used to use on me a lot when I was younger, haha. She thought my depression and anxiety was a phase and that the more I exposed myself to the job I was doing at the time, the better I would feel about it eventually because, according to her “That’s life!”…

I never got used to it, and I never felt better, haha. It just made me more and more depressed and then suicidal because it required me to not be myself from the moment I walked into the store >.< And spending the entire day pretending to be someone I wasn’t and attempting to suppress my actual self was just exhausting to the point that I felt like the real me didn’t even exist anymore.

It would technically be possible to add a feature to allow the player to choose the main menu background, but it’s not something I’ve tried to code before, so it would probably take me a while to figure out how to do it x3 I have a rough idea of how to make something like that work. But a quicker fix would be just to start a new game because then it will reset automatically to the original main menu background :3 Also, getting any other ending would do the same thing because it will just replace the menu background with the one that corresponds to that particular ending. Starting a new game would be the fastest way to change it though.

OR... when I update the game soon with the masculine voice lines for Snowe, I could enable the dev console and add the commands to the walkthrough guide or something that would just enable players to open the console and pick a main menu background by altering a score counter!

Thank you again for checking out the project and for your kind words :3

It miiiight end up being early February rather than January because I was only just able to get back on my PC for the first time this year this week x3 So I’m pretty behind where I had hoped to be by now with adding those masculine voice lines, haha. It’s possible I might still make it for the very end of January, but I dunno, we shall see xD

I’m glad you’re liking the sound of it anyhow :3 You’re so sweet!! x3 Thanks for always being so kind and supportive! I really appreciate it <3

Hope 2024 is going well for you so far ^-^

Thank you as well for checking out the game and for leaving such a sweet comment <3

I hope the game proved a decent distraction :3 I’ve spent a handful of Christmases and New Years alone or in the company of abusers, and it’s certainly not the nicest place to be when everyone else is getting all merry and in the mood for the holidays >.<

I hope you at least still had a nice cosy Christmas and a happy new year :3

I wish beings like that were real too! Or heck, even if just magic was real in some capacity and I could talk to animals or something x3 

Tbh, I’m not the biggest fan of Christmas cos of how crazily commercialised it is, but the thing I’m most thankful for is being able to spend time with my dad and brother and just chill without my poor dad having to worry about his back-breaking work >.< And I think being away from family in previous years has just made me extra grateful for getting to spend time with them! My Christmas and new year was nice enough :3 Pretty much just chilled indoors with my family. Had a bit of a meltdown on Christmas eve cos too much stress had built up >.< but I managed to relax a bit in the end x3

Hope 2024 has started out well for you! Your avatar is super adorable by the way! x3

You don’t need to apologise :3 Your English is better than you think! And you never have to apologise for writing too much cos I do it all the time, haha x3 I just really appreciate the fact that you enjoyed the game enough to want to write about it ^-^ So yeah, thank you so much for playing this one as well!

None of the bad endings are especially bad in this one :3 I guess it’s a slight spoiler to say but, no one dies in any of the endings at least! It’s just the bad endings are significantly less happy than the good ones is all, haha.

I tried not to lean too heavily into the autistic stuff with Saffie as a character in the hope that she might still be relatable even for people without any experience of autism :3 So yeah, I guess even though the diagnosis is kind of a trigger that leads her to head out into the wilderness, her anxiety and depression is ultimately the main problem in her life that causes her to feel so terrible. 

Sometimes with stuff like autism, it can be helpful to know, but in many instances, having a diagnosis isn’t helpful anyways or can even be detrimental for some people, so I don’t blame you for not wanting to know!

I’m glad you could empathise with Saffie either way :3

Having a loving family is always going to be better than not having something like that, but the worst thing about depression and stuff is that it can still manage to worm its way inside you even if you have love in your life :( 

The very first time I went to therapy, I said to the therapist something along the lines of not understanding why I felt so terrible because I had loving parents and no trauma in my initial upbringing as a kid. I said I shouldn’t feel this way when there are people out there who have nothing, who are suffering and living lives soooo much worse than mine. And the therapist said to me that I shouldn’t compare my suffering to other people’s suffering because it will never change the fact that if you’re hurting, for whatever reason, you’re hurting. You have to live in your body and deal with your mind, and if you’re depressed then you’re depressed x3

I guess I should probably say there are spoilers from now on!

Yeah, unfortunately, you can’t avoid Saffie choosing to commit suicide since it’s a key point in the story, but no matter what the player chooses, Saffie will never actually be successful in her suicide attempt.

Snowe put Saffie in the prison for a few different reasons. Firstly, Snowe was scared that Saffie would try to hurt herself again, so genuinely wanted to keep an eye on her and keep her safe until Snowe was more confident that Saffie wouldn’t try to hurt herself again. At the same time, Snowe was extremely lonely and wanted to keep Saffie there for more selfish reasons. And yeah, Snowe didn’t actually lock the cage because Snowe didn’t want to truly hold Saffie there against her will + Snowe was fairly confident Saffie wouldn’t try to escape because Snowe had once had a similar mindset to Saffie in the past just feeling stuck.

I always used to try and hide my emotions from people too because I didn’t want them to worry x3 especially from my parents when I was having a bad time at school! I knew if they saw me cry they would just worry, and I didn’t really even know how to explain to them that I felt so awful and that school was the cause. Plus I always feel really bad when other people are sad, so if my crying made them sad, it would only make me feel even worse to have upset them >.<

But yeah, I totally agree, having people pity you just isn’t helpful and makes you feel even worse >.< It doesn’t solve anything, and as you say, everything will often be forgotten again soon and people move on. 

Like you, I also look calm on the outside a lot of the time when inside my emotions are exploding and I’m struggling to control them. It’s really hard to live like that cos it’s like constantly having to monitor myself to make sure I don’t erupt and accidentally hurt myself or someone else >.< 

I think it’s good to use stories to help process feelings and emotions :3 Writing it all down like you did by sharing your story here can be cathartic and possibly even lead to connecting with others who have similar experiences! The worst thing about being depressed is feeling like you’re fighting the darkness all on your own, so the more people who share their stories, the less alone everyone will feel if they happen to find them :3

I feel like your story would look amazing as a short animation! But I don’t have the skills to make something like that >.< 

I definitely empathise with your story :3 And for real life it’s very significant because if you carry negative feelings with you and just ignore them or try to push them away, they will only end up causing more harm :( We have to acknowledge all parts of ourselves, even the parts that are painful to face. It’s super hard and even though I’ve been trying to work on it for years, we have to try our best to accept ourselves and be kind to ourselves. Cos yeah, beating ourselves up about stuff is only ever gonna make everything worse. We get enough crap from other people, so we’ve got to try to at least be on our own side x3 Having all parts of ourselves unified is the ideal way to move forward and try to be happier :3 

Sometimes it is really helpful to write stuff down like that because you can make sense of things a lot better when they’re outside of your head. When you keep everything inside, it just gets all muddled and murky + almost impossible to unravel >.< So I’m glad that writing was able to help you see things about yourself more clearly :3 It definitely helps me a lot sometimes! 

You didn’t ramble too much anyhow! There is no such thing as too much rambling :D 

I’m truly lucky to have amazing people like you check out my games! So thank you very much again for playing and taking the time to write so much cos it really means a lot :3 

I hope that you’re able to have happy times to balance out the times that aren’t so good! I guess all of us who carry some darkness inside us are always going to struggle >.< but I hope that we can at least find things to hold onto that help keep us going and make life worth living despite the bad times :3

I hope 2024 has been going as well as possible for you so far! And I hope you’re taking care of yourself :3