Posting this review for my good friend, Lyra. She will probably post this on prefundia too.
Dear Igrasil team,
This is Lyra from prefundia. I hope you remember me? I apologize for not responding to your reply there. I am trying to meet deadline with my own projects at this time. But rest assure, I have heard news of your demo and have proceeded to spread the news to other devs and coworkers about Bloody Chronicles. I even took the liberty of trying out your demo 2 nights ago, and I am intrigued and impressed by it.
One of the major factors that draw me to your game was the art. The art is beautiful and I was admiring every sprite, every hand drawn detail during my play through. I love the art. I love all the sprites, but my favorites will have to be Aki and Kaoru because they are so adorable. =) I tend to lean toward cute characters, so I may be baised here. Oh, who am I kidding? I LOVE ALL THE SPRITES!
GUI design and music is equally fantastic. I do think however, that some music choices could be a bit different. For example, when Kazuki enters the meeting room and sufferings some verbal slaps from Suzumi, the music could have been something more subtle, less heroic feeling. But this is just a personal observation of mine, more nit-picking than anything. Frankly, I am a fan of the music used here and enjoyed every bit of it.
Story plot and writing was strong for the most part. There were certainly some grammatical issues throughout the game (though it is expected. I'm sure this is noted by your team, and you will have it polished up for the full release) The interchanging perspectives from 1st and 3rd person may cause some confusion for readers. I would suggest picking just one style and sticking with it. Any descriptions can be leave to voice actors/SFX to act it out for you. It is up to you which perspective you would want to use because any style can work for your game. This is where writing strengths will be applied.
Lastly, the bonus aspect of any visual novel (that often gets overlooked or unrecognized in my opinion), the voice-acting. Now I have expressed my adoration for the voices on prefundia already, I believe. And that has not changed, in the least.
I'm a little sad that Kazuki does not have a voice, but I understand why you guys left it that way. A lot of players like the protagonist not voiced so they can be the ones to voice him/her and really immense themselves in the character's shoes and feel what the character goes through in every situation. So, good move there, really.
Akito's VA - I am sure John Archer is a great voice actor and for the most part, he did a great job as Akito. He's got Akito's goofy character down and his deliveries are pretty great for the most part. Occasionally though, some of his lines come off as too quiet; his voice would trail off or he end up slighly mumbling a word or two. There were also times I felt his lines were a tad forced. He is doing great though, and I look forward to hearing more of Akito.
Suzumi/Kaoru's VA - I have started to check out Skyler's and Sayaka's voice work since they were announced for your game, and I am very impressed with their work (from what I have seen/played), so I was really expecting a stellar performance from Skyler here. And she is doing a spectacular job so far, for both Kaoru and Suzumi. Great voices for both. I have to mention that Skyler does sound like she is reading her lines sometimes, so I hope she will keep note of that. She has great deliveries.
Aki's VA - Like I said; I have been looking into Sayaka's voice work, and like Skyler, I came into this with great expectations. Sayaka is doing a spectacular job as well. I think Sayaka's voice hits the right note of innocence; being cute, but not overly so. She sounds so happy for the most part that I end up giggling. Great deliveries from her, too.
David? - He sounds great! Audio quality was a bit questionable, but I don't know if this was just a person from the development team voicing a fun commentary, but I like the voice. =)Overall, I thought the voice-overs were really great. Sayaka's Aki and Skyler's Suzumi were my personal favorites. I do hope that the occasional side characters also be voiced, to keep things consistent. I do notice that John pronounces Aki's name differently from everone else, so you might want to make note of that. Keep pronounciations consistent.
Audio definitely needs some polishing as well. Akito's lines are awfully quiet.
I guess that is all I have to say for now. Keep up the wonderful work and be sure to polish the story up. =)