Tunnel Vision

Thanks so much for checking it out! And even more for sticking around to discover everything :3 That really means a lot and I’m so glad you had fun with it :D

Also, thanks for the heads-up on Ryan’s link! I had no idea >.< I guess he must’ve changed his website or something, so I’ll have to see if I can find the updated page or ask if he can let me know what it is.

Woo! :D Thanks so much for taking the time to check out the game and leaving a lovely comment :3

I just hope your brain isn’t toooo messed up x3 May all your dreams be nightmares :D

Hehe :D Yeah, 2023 ended up being a fairly productive year in general! I don't know why, but somehow it felt like I hadn't achieved that much, but then I realised that I made Bitter/Sweet, The Hostage, Tunnel Vision, and Sapphire Snowe all in 2023 xD

I guess it felt like I hadn't done much cos I haven't made much progress on my longer-term projects >.< It was very much a game jams year, haha. I didn't even intend to participate in any jams after I released Tunnel Vision for Spooktober jam, but then I wound up working on Sapphire Snowe for Winter VN jam anyways because it helped me get through a really rough time.

Hope 2024 is going well for you so far! :3

That’s so awesome to hear :D Puts a big smile on my face to know it had you hooked for a while ^-^

I always wonder when it comes to jam games made in a mad month’s rush if they even make any sense or if they’re just a giant messed up blob of ideas that’s just baffling xD So it means a lot when anyone says they’ve enjoyed playing through and makes me beat myself up just that little bit less, haha. It’s always tempting to just keep adding and adding to things, but then they get outta control x3 and sure, they can be updated post-jam, but since I already have a handful of projects waiting to be finished, I tried my best to make this one a complete story within the jam timeframe so it wasn’t yet another project that I have to go back and finish, haha.

I’m glad you managed to get all the endings and artwork in the end :3 Thanks so much for playing and for showing the team some love <3 May all your dreams be nightmares too :P

I'm so sorry that my reply is horrifically slow >.< I have pretty much been out of it for all of December. I just got too overwhelmed with everything and couldn't cope with much, so as a result, I'm now crazy behind on my replies :( 

Thanks so much for your kind words! So glad you had fun with the game :3

SPOILERS

Ah, man, that sucks about the gift >.< Unfortunately, I didn't actually make that myself. I made the main game with Naninovel, and someone else in the Spooktober team made Rhime's gift in Ren'Py. I tested the Windows version that she made and that works perfectly, but as always, I had no way of even opening the Mac one >.< and as far as I know, she doesn't have a Mac either, so she wouldn't have been able to test it :( 

I could mention it to her, but since she can't test Mac stuff, I'm guessing she probably wouldn't be able to fix the Mac version >.< You're not missing out on tooooo much because it's basically just the extras section there as a separate download. It's got the OST in a music player, blooper reels, bonus art like sketches and other doodles from the different artists on the team, and my rambling about the project.

I guess I could maybe just upload all that stuff in a folder or something so it can just be downloaded directly from the gift page! Cos it's a shame if no one on Mac can see any of that bonus content >.< I probably won't have time to do it this year, but I'll make sure to get it all uploaded sometime in January!

Thanks so much for playing and I hope you get to have happy holidays :3

Hey hey! I just wanted to say that I did read your reply that you typed up a while back, but I haven't had a chance to respond until now >.< I came to read over it again and reply, but I see that you've deleted it x3 I can only apologise that it's taken me so long to get around to replying. I just got totally and completely overwhelmed with everything and pretty much shut down >.< So as a result, I'm horrendously behind on all my replies. I think it was just one of those phases that happens sometimes where when I can't cope with everything, I just focus on one thing that I can do, and everything else gets completely neglected cos I can't function properly >.< yay, autism!

I can't remember exactly everything that you said, but I remember thinking that it was all very well-written and helpful! I wanted to thank you for taking the time to type it up :3 

But yeah, I remember agreeing with much of what you said and thinking you had made some really good points and suggestions. I would say if you happened to have the post anywhere to dm it to me on Discord or send it in an email or something so I could go over it again, but I'm guessing you probably don't have it now, haha.

It's okay anyways. I'm just sorry I'm so slow >.<

I hope you get to have happy holidays anyhow! :3

Aww, that means a heck of a lot so thank you very much for taking the time to play through it and then coming here to type up such a sweet comment :3

I’ve been in a bit of a bad way this month and starting to doubt my ability to make a decent soundtrack, so it’s incredibly uplifting to hear that you enjoyed the music ^-^

May all your dreams be nightmares too :P Hope you had a fabulous spooky season :3

*High five* So glad you think so! And thanks so much for playing this one too ^-^

Man, that really sucks you had to go back and replay to capture the video though >.< I would’ve been devastated if that happened to me x3 That’s nuts you even had the patience and dedication to go back through it again!!

I once sat typing out a chunk of story draft for a project on my potato laptop when it randomly crashed on me and I lost around an hour’s worth of writing x3 It made me want to cry cos it didn’t save and I didn’t have a backup, so I have a sense of how crushing it must’ve been x3 

I also feel the pain of having no idea how to fix things cos mystery bugs are always popping up and wreaking havoc on my life >.< haha. 

Thank you again for being so awesome and for all your words of encouragement <3

Hehe, glad to hear it :P Sorry about Simon though x3 He is a bit of little shit, haha. Thanks so much for playing <3

Aww, that means a lot that you think so! Thank you so much for playing it and for taking the time to leave such a sweet comment ^-^

Hehe, thank you very much for taking the time to play this one and leave such a kind comment :3

It really wouldn’t be the same without all the amazing voice actors who lent their time and talent to the project! They’re the ones who really breathe life into the characters with their epic performances :D

So glad you liked the VA and the art :3 I’m so proud of everything the team managed to accomplish, and humbled to have been able to work with such an awesome bunch of people! That’s why jams like this are so special! Cos I could never manage to make something like this on my own, that’s for sure. I know there are plenty of talented devs out there who are able to create masterpieces solo cos they can write and draw, but I’m not one of them, haha. I can’t draw to save my life T_T And even though I’m normally a solo dev, I much prefer being part of a team! That feels like it’s where the real magic happens, haha.

Thank you so much for all your kind words <3

Woo! I’m glad you had fun with the journey :D Thanks so much for checking it out! And for such a lovely comment too :3 That really means a lot ^-^

Aww, I’m glad you decided to check this one out too! Your videos are always a lot of fun :D Thanks so much for giving this one a go <3

So glad you had fun with this one!! Thanks so much for playing ^-^

Yeah same, really wanted to try it out. :(

Sorry my reply is so slow >.< I’ve been away from home going to visit different spooky attractions, and then I got ill in the process, haha. Caught some sort of nasty cold from somewhere!

Anyways, thank you so much for checking it out and for streaming it on your YouTube <3

I don’t blame you for wanting to punch Simon xD I certainly did while testing, haha.  Glad you found parts of it creepy cos I can never tell if something is genuinely creepy or not since I consume so much horror I’m pretty much immune to it at this point x3 Thank you again for all your kind words! I really appreciate you taking the time to play the game ^-^

Sorry my reply is a bit slow >.< I'm away from home atm with limited internet available and only my phone to type on (walking in the Peak District with my pops + heading to Alton Towers for Scarefest x3) and most of the time since we left I've had no signal at all, haha. 

Really glad you've had fun with the game so far ^-^ Thanks so much for taking the time to check it out! 

Hehe, that's an interesting choice to go for first time but I approve of the why not attitude :D 

To find what you're looking for, download the extras file from the game page (it's a really small file) you should be able to go from there by following the instructions inside :3 

I should probably update the walkthrough guide with a note at the end when I get home >.< I'll make an edit and add it to the bottom of the guide page, but itch won't allow me to mess with the post on mobile x3

Hope you get to have a brilliant weekend! :3

Weeell, this is some kinda spooky coincidence cos I just finished playing your Spooktober game and was typing up a comment on your page when my browser crashed (thankfully, I'd already copied most of it to a text doc before it happened, so I only lost like a sentence, haha) and when I reopened it, I saw an itch notification saying you'd commented here! Which means you officially beat me to it x3

Anyways, my brain is trying to refuse to compute that I could possibly be anyone's favourite Spooktober writer x3 I feel so vastly inferior to everyone, haha. But I feel incredibly honoured that you think that and wish I could give you a giant hug of appreciation!! Thank you so much for playing this one and for leaving such lovely feedback <3

I certainly couldn't have made the game that we did without everyone's help and amazing talent :3 It was a bit of a bumpy road in places, and there were times we thought we might have to resort to cutting out big chunks of the game, but we made it in the end. I think this might actually be my first-ever project where 100% of the art is original (none of it by me, of course, since I can't draw to save my life T_T) Cos usually, even when I've had the opportunity to work with awesome artists during other jams, I have still ended up using a few paid or free assets here and there. This time, aside from the fonts and a handful of edited asset pack sound effects, everything else was original stuff made for the jam by various folks on the team ^-^

That's so cool that you tried both pairs of voices too! There was a point where it was looking like it might only be possible to get the BxB pairing fully finished in time for the jam deadline, but thankfully, with a lot of work and not much sleep, we got the full lot of voice combos in there, haha.

!!!There be spoilers below!!!

Hehe, weeeell, you were supposed to be able to play hangman as well as Simon Says, but that was one of the things that very swiftly got slashed with the scope knife cos I realised there was no way we'd have time to add 2 minigames, and also didn't wanna add to the list of needed UI assets >.< So yeah, instead Rhime just has a convenient headache if you try to play hangman xD

Speaking of managing to get stuff done, that point you mentioned about the "credits" well, we had a backup plan to end the game just before there if things went drastically wrong and it wasn't possible to actually finish the remaining sections of the game in time for the end of the jam, haha. I even had an extremely rough alternate draft of the hospital scene where Rhime's reasoning for what happened prior to that is similar but different x3

I would've been gutted if we had no choice but to go with that alternate version because it would've meant ditching the whole idea of Rhime being a deity and all the meta stuff, but it was better than not having an emergency backup plan at all I guess!

I totally agree about going meta being hard to pull off, and I'm still not entirely convinced we managed it here without being somewhat cringy in the process, haha, but it was a fun experiment to try out :3 I haven't done any forced quits in my projects since Impostor I think, and that was years ago back when I was still using Tyranobuilder!

Aaaand, I can also see people being annoyed by the shutdowns as well, yeah x3 In fact, I annoyed myself when I tried to playtest on my potato laptop because on my PC, the game launches pretty fast, but on my potato, it takes like 30+ seconds to launch sooo, it's kinda painful trying to get some of those endings when you have to keep re-launching the game on a terrible system T_T I really don't think using Naninovel/Unity helps the situation either cos I'm sure it would launch and load waaaay faster if it were a Ren'Py game!

I'm glad that you at least found it amusing more than annoying though :3 Tbh, it wouldn't surprise me if something similar had already been done in some form by someone else! Especially with how meta stuff seems to be getting more popular these days. With any luck though, there's nothing tooooo similar out there >.<

xD I love that you did a full psycho playthrough, haha. That's like what I do when I play stuff like Mass Effect, haha. Always pick the choices that come naturally to me on a first play (usually the 'good' choices), then 2nd play, full renegade :P

Yeeeeah, the cat was a bit of a contentious thing x3 I even said that while a CG would be cool for the shock factor, it might be too upsetting for a lot of people, so maybe it would be better to just have Li close their eyes, and handle that scene in darkness with just SFX in the hope it would somehow make it a bit less grim... but then NeonSaphir drew the CG anyways, and there was no way I was gonna waste it, so we just thought, screw it, it's not like the player is forced to take that action, so let's go for it x3 I have a bad feeling that the animal death content warning might put a lot of people off of even playing the game though >.<

And thank YOU for playing it and for being so sweet and supportive! It means a lot and I really appreciate it :3 Gonna go splurge my ramble about your game in your comments now! Mmmwwaahahahahahahaha :D

Hooray for spoopy surprises :D

I felt so bad asking the voice actors for so many meows x3 But then when they all delivered, I was blown away at how amazingly they went for it! I tried to explain to my brother how happy I was to get such a great variety of meows for the project, and he just gave me an unimpressed look like he often does, and said something along the lines of "What is wrong with you?" >.< haha.

So glad you liked the OST cos I poured my soul into it x3 I'm very rarely proud of or satisfied with whatever my contributions are to a project, but that soundtrack is one of the few things I at least feel content with for once xD I'm absolutely proud of the team as a whole though :3

To me, that's one of the most magical things about Spooktober Jam in general, the fact that you can team up with complete strangers and somehow make a game together just stuns me every year! (Well, not everyone on the team was a stranger x3 but a fair few were people I'd never met before who I was only able to team up with thanks to the jam recruitment channel on DevTalk!) It's such a cool thing to be able to do, and I love it a hell of a lot more than solo dev :D

Hearing you say you appreciate the pronoun and voice options for Linnet makes all the sleepless nights extra worth it ^-^ I can't lie, it did reach a point in the jam where I was beginning to regret the decision to have 2 voices for Linnet & 2 for Rhime xD Well, not regret having them because it was important to me, but regret trying to squeeze them in for the jam deadline >.< Because we were supposed to have an audio engineer on the team who was gonna help me cut voice lines, so I figured the workload for VA wouldn't be too bad if we split it between us, but then she got ill right as the jam began and I wound up having to do it all myself x3

The sensible thing to do at that point would have been to decide to add the remaining voice options post-submission deadline in an update! And I did think it might end up coming to that. In the end though, I decided to just push myself harder to get it all added in time. It would have felt wrong to not get it all in there because, while I never expect to win anything personally, I at least like to hope the folks I've teamed up with might stand a chance for their individual contributions, and I really didn't want to deprive the VAs the opportunity of competing for best voice actor when they'd put so much time and effort into recording their lines!

I hope the team sees all your kind words cos I'm sure it will make em all smile the same as I have while reading your incredibly sweet feedback ^-^ I really appreciate you taking the time to check the game out and spending the time to write such a thoughtful comment too! It means the world to me after I spent the month running myself into the ground to get it done x3 and I couldn't have done it without such an amazing team :3

I did manage to apply the scope knife in places, which is something I've previously failed at, but I definitely need to give myself less to do in the future, haha. Cos as people keep reminding me, skipping sleep and meals because I'm working on a game jam is not an acceptable excuse xD

If your friends do end up checking it out, fingers crossed they have fun as opposed to thinking, what on earth is this insanity?! x3

(Also copy/pasted from the jam page cos it would be a bit weird if I responded to this differently here xD) 

Holy moly, thanks so much for taking the time to write up such a detailed review/feedback! I massively appreciate that :3 I thought I was writing a lot in what I was typing, but you've definitely done waaaay better than me, haha. Reading what you've written, I feel like maybe I should've expanded more on my thoughts on each story I've read so far! Cos I feel like I've been too brief with just summarising >.<

Anyways, *high five* for the Saw love :D Hope you get to see the new one if you want to to! I was planning to this week but I've been too busy and exhausted, so hoping to catch it next week instead :3

I guess I better say everything else under spoilers x3

Ahoy there! There be spoilers below!!! 

I know what you mean about content warnings cos I'm generally unphased by most things in the content I consume x3 It's very hard to upset or disturb me because I've consumed so much horror throughout my life that I'm pretty desensitised! That one was one I was worried about when thinking of players though, and as a player myself, if a game gave me a choice to do that, I wouldn't pick it, I would also kill a human character before an animal one if it came down to it xD Tbh, I had the same reaction when I first saw the finished sprite for bloody-mouthed Sorbet x3 LPB made her such a cute kitty, haha.

That's so cool that you figured out the names were anagrams! <3 But yeeeah, hangman as a minigame was one of the victims of the scope knife xD Fem voices almost were too because I wasn't anticipating having to cut all the voice audio and add fx myself this time since we were hoping to have my best friend's sister join us for all things audio-editing and SFX design, but she got ill for the month, so, sadly, that didn't happen. It was definitely a struggle to deal with, but I'm glad I still managed to get it in there in time for the jam deadline cos it would've been extremely unfair to the VAs if I hadn't :(

So glad you had fun with Simon Says at least :3 I'm not really a lover of minigames or puzzles myself x3 so it's always really difficult to know if I've done stuff like that justice as a dev when I dislike it as a player, haha. I really wanted to try and include something like that though just to attempt to add more jeopardy to Linnet's escape!

That sucks so badly that you couldn't get past the eventual relaunch though :( It sounds horrible to say, but I hope it was cos your computer is clunky and old xD Just because I tested it on my PC and my potato laptop, and most of the team have played it by this point too, and none of us had an issue getting it to work, so if it is a problem with the game, I imagine it'll be a nightmare to try and figure out the cause and fix it T_T

More than that though, I wish Unity wasn't so slow on older systems >.< because I'm guessing that's what the issue is :( I don't suppose you remember if it took a while to launch the game the very first time you started it up? And if you experienced kinda long load times at the points where there were loading screens? Aaaand, when you tried to relaunch and got a black screen, how long did you wait until giving up on it?

You don't have to answer that btw cos I imagine you're probably busy! I thought I would ask just to see if it's maybe the same problem I had when I tested it on my potato laptop x3 Basically, on my half-decent PC that I made the game on, startup only takes about 3 seconds whether it's first time or relaunching for story purposes, and load times are around 5-10 seconds on loading screens.

BUT

On my potato laptop, it's a different story >.< Startup takes around 30 seconds, loading times on load screens take between 33-45 seconds :( And relaunches for story purposes take between 30-50 seconds on a black screen like you mentioned T_T

It all loads eventually, but it's so, so SLOW, haha. I get the splash screen come up pretty fast on the potato, but then it stays on a black screen for ages before everything actually kicks in. It would be interesting to know if it would have eventually loaded on yours after a considerable amount of time like it does on my potato, or if your computer just straight up says nope and nothing will ever happen no matter how long you wait >.< Cos I firmly believe my potato is more potato-y than other people's potatos xD The stupid thing takes around 15 minutes to actually boot up from sleep or shut down, haha. So I kinda use that as a way of thinking, well, if it works on this awful thing, surely it'll work on anything x3

It's an issue I've noticed with everything I've ever made using Naninovel/Unity :( And when I've asked about it to try and improve performance on potato systems, I've never gotten further than the answer 'It's just Unity' >.< Which is beyond frustrating, haha. It makes Ren'Py seem vastly superior because games made using that run much more smoothly on my potato (unless they include animation like blinking/lip flaps and stuff, in which case, my potato just freezes up and dies xD)

But yeah, it's especially irritating in the case of this project because only 1 of the 5 endings can be reached without relaunch >.< I suppose while I'm asking questions, I should probably ask which ending branch you were on? Just to make sure it was one of the intentional crashes you reached and not a random unintentional one that we somehow missed in testing x3 Again though, please don't feel as though you have to answer!

Anyways, I'm glad it didn't spoil it for you at least x3 It is still really annoying though that I can't seem to find a way to improve performance in any of my Naninovel games :( Funnily enough, I had the same issue with my older Tyranobuilder ones too! My first game took something like over a minute to launch on my potato laptop o.O And I always try my best to optimise assets, but that doesn't seem to make any difference to overall performance, just total download size >.<

What confuses me even more is that, with Tunnel Vision for example, on my potato, once things have eventually loaded, everything runs really smoothly, like no lag on button presses or with transitions and stuff like I get when I try to play some Ren'Py made games on it, but those launch and load times with my Naninovel made projects are beyond horrific instead T_T

I'm sure Philip will be over the moon to hear your thoughts on his voice acting if he reads this :D And same goes for LPB for the fact that you pointed out the colour palette cos she had a very specific vision for the artistic direction of stuff :3

I'm also a happy bunny to hear you enjoyed the soundtrack ^-^ I actually love making music more than I do writing nowadays xD To the point that I think next year, I'm just gonna try and join a team as a composer if anyone will have me cos I keep kinda running myself into the ground being project lead giving myself waaaay too much work x3 I was working 15-18 hour days for Spooktober, and that's just, well, daft tbh and I don't know why I put myself through that >.< (well, I do, because I have issues with obsession and tunnel vision thanks to my ASD xD) I think if I'm just focusing on making music, I'll have a much more relaxed time jamming for once! And it'll be a totally different experience to join someone else's team :3

Thank you so much again for taking the time to both play through the game and for such amazing feedback ^-^ I appreciate it more than I can even put into words and I'm sure the rest of the team do too! Also, right back at ya with the congratulations cos your team's project is an absolutely thrilling and funky bundle of fun <3

Aww, well, that's super sweet of you ^-^ I'm glad you liked it even though it's quite mad, haha. I did wonder if it's maybe a mess cos sometimes I find it hard to organise all my random ideas into something that makes any sort of sense xD

It was certainly a lot of fun to work on, and it's thanks to having such an awesome team that everything came together in the end :3

Really appreciate you taking the time to play it and leave such a kind comment <3

xD That is perfectly valid and I do not blame you for a single second for feeling that way, haha. In fact, I would happily put a mob together and help x3

Kinda just relieved to have the f*cker outta my head tbh! Now you guys can deal with that mess and get bullied instead of me :P

Thank you so much for your kind and encouraging words as always <3

I'm in mega paranoid mode at the moment, terrified I uploaded the wrong builds or missed some horrific bug somehow, haha. So to know you reached an ending brings me some small amount of relief! My brain always convinces me that even if I test stuff over and over and don't encounter any issues, that there are still issues there somewhere, I just haven't found them yet x3

Glad you've been having fun with it so far ^-^ The whole cast did a phenomenal job! I'm just really proud of the team in general :3 It always amazes me at the end of jams when you see a game come together cos it's like, you know how it happened, you worked your butt off to make it, but it still somehow seems like a miracle that it's out there in the wild when at the start of the month it was just an idea xD

It brings me joy beyond words to hear you say that about the soundtrack ^-^ of all the osts I've worked on, I poured my soul into this more than any other, haha. I tried my best to see if I could create a soundtrack that was more cohesive cos like, with most of my soundtracks, I make each track without thinking too much about the soundtrack as a whole. I mean, I did kind of try to do some repeating motifs in the Bitter/Sweet one, and again in The Hostage, but I feel like there either wasn't enough time or the limitations of the jam meant I couldn't quite achieve what I was hoping to x3 But with this one, I finally feel like I made a proper soundtrack for the first time, haha. 

It's not often I'm content with my own work, but I'm genuinely proud of the soundtrack this time x3 if people came here to say my writing sucked but they liked the soundtrack, I'd still be a happy bunny xD

Thank YOU for being so sweet again :3 I really appreciate all your kind words as always <3

Glad you think so :3 

SPOILERS 

The cat's death can be completely avoided ^-^