Diamon

Yo fellow people from fuwa. I was thinking about a potentially interesting concept, I was wondering if anyone was interested in creating a VN in a participatory way : it would be basically a (nearly) free of access projects that anyone could access to at anytime and be able to meddle with what was already created, or create their own new project. I don't want it to be something where we need to create a "team" with "members", it would be some sort of public account accessible to anyone interested in Fuwanovel. As a result, you're free to invest yourself as much as you want on this, for example you could start working on a project for a week and then decide to drop it if you don't have the motivation to continue, and someone else could totally decide to take the reins if the project interests him. So really, anyone is free to participate, without specific amount of involvement or any specific skill required. We'll be using the beta site Cloudnovel which is a site where we can create a Visual Novel online, it requires no programming knowledge and is very similar to a video editor.. If you want to have access to the account, just make a post saying so in this thread, and I will pm you the ID and PW. Of course, I'm not expecting anything "serious" to come out of this because of the very nature of this project, Also, you can create what you want on this editor, whether it is a seemingly more "legit" VN or whether it is a "trollish" VN (https://vndb.org/v14965 anyone?), as long as you respect DRM (= don't steal any asset from a real VN). If by chance it happens that someone wants to start a serious project on a separate and private account, they will just have to ask me so and we will create a personal account for that purpose. Ofc, I'm well aware that the biggest problem will be asset creation, and the only solution would be to use free assets : - Free of rights sprites (http://lemmasoft.renai.us/forums/viewforum.php?f=52) - Photo montage (Anyone wants to do a VN with a OriginalRen as a protagonist? ) - Free of rights backgrounds (http://lemmasoft.renai.us/forums/viewtopic.php?f=52&t=17302) - Photographic backgrounds - Sprite makers (such as : https://forums.fuwanovel.net/index.php?/topic/7888-sprite-maker/?hl=sprite or http://pochi.lix.jp/k_kisekae2.html) - Free of right music / sound effects (easy to google) If ever some people want to create assets themselves for that purpose, it would be awesome, but I don't expect a lot of people to do so because it is kinda time consuming^^ The only knowledge that would be required is basic photo manipulation skills, since you will need to learn how to create picture with transparency, resize pictures... TL;DR : How does it work concretely? => Sprites, BG and music will be taken from assets on the web that are free of right and linked in the cloudnovel library by the users themselves (I will try to put some assets I found myself, but do not expect me to look for assets for you, it's easy enough to google and I linked quite a few things already) => How are the projects handled : - Person A decides to try creating something. I give him the password and ID, and he creates project1. - Person A finds assets he wants to use, upload them and start creating his VN. - Person B gets interested in project1 as well. He decides to meddle with project1 as well, and A and B discuss about what they want to do in this thread. - Person C is not interested in project1, so he decides to create his own project, project2. After one week working on it, Person C gets tired of working on that and abandon his project. - Person D notice project2 and finds potential in it, and decides to take over from where it was left. All of this only works if everyone respects the work of each other, so no trolling allowed (like deleting or completely changing someone else's project that is being worked on without asking them just to screw them). If ever something like that happen, I will immediately stop the whole thing and delete the account. So if anyone is interested or if you have questions, feel free to ask here! EDIT : It seems that most people prefer to have precise roles, so I guess I will list what are the different job required if you want to participate. Don't worry, there is no skill requirement^^ - Asset finder : First, you need assets, so you need someone who can find assets on the web, or create them yourself. It can be photoshopped pictures, or filtered backgrounds, creating sprites from a sprite maker... That's what an asset finder is here for. - Writer : I don't really have to explain I believe^^ - VN creator : Basically, the editor is the one that will put all the assets together with the writing in order to create the VN. he is the one responsible for creating the animations of the different sprites, put the sound effects, or the text effects... It's very similar to video editing. Of course, you can accumulate several roles, or even all of them at once. If you'd like to participate, please state which role you'd like to take on! I'll try to list everyone here!

Oh, a fellow french member! Welcome to fuwanovel! If you're an artist, don't hesitate to lurk around thr newly created Creative Corner! I hope we'll get to see some of your art!

On top of my head, I'd say Comyu and Cho dengeki stryker who are both fairly recent (2009 and 2011 respectively). Props for Dengeki having awesome animated sequences, even though the art is not outstanding (still fairly acceptable). I remember comyu having nice art as well, even though not on the level of grisaia for example. You could also try Steins;Gate even though the art style is a bit... Special (very waterpainting style)

A very nice article! Overall, I believe writer's block is a mix of several things : - A sense of perfectionism that actually prevents you from writing "crappy" drafts : you subconsciously prefer writing nothing than writing trash that will need to be improved later. - Trying to write only with "concepts" in mind, and not concrete examples. For example, the writer wants to have "character X and character Y have a fight." Except he doesn't try to find a reason, how does each character react, what does it influence... - A lack of planning between your ideas (as you said yourself) not knowing where you're going prevents you from finding concise ideas and transitions between your scenes / ideas. - And more generally, the lack of idea as a whole. But imho, lack of idea for a story is merely a sign that the lore / universe is not enough elaborate, or that the characters lack depth / traits / quirks / personality. The more elaborate all the elements of your story are, the easier it becomes to find links / relation between the lore and the characters, thus making it much easier to find content to write.

(It feels I'm only posting picture after picture lately... Well, be it I guess.) A new character, Natsuki! Appearances can sometimes be deceiving... Who might she be...?

Very interesting reply, you do point out the trade off and issues that go with going with more engaging stories in general. 1°) You are talking about failure or success, but an interactive story doesn't necessarily need to have "good" and "bad" ends (I'm mostly talking about stories without gameplay elements). Aninteractive story doesn't necessarily need to give you a "game over" merely because of a choice. Even when it's a moral choice, it can be a mean for you to get into a route. For example : The main protag (you) go through 3 events. You are accompanied by 4 characters (let's say heroines). During each event, you will have to ultimately choose one heroine to sacrifice to continue (it can be either one choice or several, direct or indirect...). After the 3 events, there would be only one heroine remaining, which would basically be your "route". 2°) It all depends on what you call "driving you forward". The only thing that can stop you is death, that, I agree. Death of the MC is a game over, as a result, any moral choice is irrelevant if the results is only about having your main character die or not. Except, all choices don't have to be thing that affect success or failure. What is even success in a Visual Novel or an interactive story? Reaching the end of the story? But what if you had several endings to your story, and that neither of them is canon, and neither of them can objectively be judged as "better" than another? It's the same as the heroine routes concept. I'm not seeing those choices as "life and death choice" that leads you forward. They are merely checkpoints that define which branch/route of the game you'll play. Meaning that even if you answered randomly to every question, you wouldn't get a "game over", you would just arrive on a path / route randomly. 3°) I partially agree, with such a system, it's only natural that the trade off for enhancing immersion is generally having to sacrifice character development. However, I do believe that both are not completely incompatible. I'll just take as an example my favorite game in the medium that illustrate it, The Walking Dead series by telltales : Basically, you don't decide everything, as the character still has a personality on his own, but you can choose to influence some parts of the character's personality. 4°) I totally agree with you here. In the end, it's just a matter of whether you try to play honestly or not. It depends on the mentality of the person that read the story. However, a choice can still have options to choose that are equally reasonable, in a rational point of view. If a choice in a situation can be summarized to => Take a risk / Play it safe, you have no way to know which one you should take. For example, if you're aware that "taking a risk" will give you higher chance to rescue character A, but that playing i safe will give you higher chance to not have character B not be hurt, there might not be any answer that is better to choose. I haven't played either of these games unfortunately. Also, regarding the rest of your post, I am not trying to actually judge and say "All VN should use this kind of choice system", I'm merely saying that "Wouldn't it be interesting to have more VN that create more involvement for the reader?". I do like a lot character development, growth and consistency that you can find on most traditional VN. But at the same time, I enjoy a lot storytelling that engages the reader more, for example I'm very fond of the game produced by Telltales. They are quite close to Visual Novels as a genre by nature, and a lot of people enjoys it, so it's only natural to wonder if people think there will ever be VN with such system/gamplay that will ever be created.

When playing a Visual Novel, especially Japanese ones, there was always one thing that I found disappointing: the use of "choices". I have yet to find a VN where the choices you make are really meaningful. 1°) Way too often, the choices you make in a VN are either : - Go with/support heroine A or Don't go with/support heroine A. - Choose heroine A / B / C / D - Go to location A / B / C / D, which will make you meet heroine A / B / C / D Those choices are always very practical, and never appeal morally to the reader, it's mostly either random, or either depending on whether you like the heroine or not. They aren't that many games where the choices you make actually force you to consider the situation you're in, and uses the mood or a moral dilemma to influence your decision (All VN are not like that fortunately, those who stand out as very good VN tend to have more meaningful choices, Steins;Gate being a very good example, but also G-senjou and Grisaia to some extent). 2°) Something I find more in some OELVN, but that I have yet to find in japanese VN, is choices that actually asks for your opinion on something. Because sometimes there are questions that don't have any "right" or "wrong" answers, or at least where the answer is not obvious. Those choices don't have to be necessarily practical (= they can or cannot have an influence on the plot or on future decisions). But I feel that it makes you grow as a player, and sometimes even as a human being if the VN asks you the right questions. It can even make you learn something about yourself. For example, wouldn't it be interesting to have a choice where you're asked : "Is it okay to sacrifice a few to save many?" => Yes / No "Is it okay to sacrifice many to save your loved one?" => Yes/ No "What is the best way for a human being to be happy?" => Being with his loved one / Being wealthy / Succeed in your projects/... You could go as far as having only those kind of choices in a VN, and make it that the personality of your character is modeled progressively based on those choices. Let's just take a stupid example : take a star wars VN. Have the main protagonist be a jedi. Maybe those kind of choices you make before would actually determine whether you'd fall on the dark side or not. If you decided that it was okay to sacrifice people earlier, maybe it would change the course of one of the later event, thus making you getting closer to the dark side. (not an ideal example, but you get my point). Basically, it's not exactly a "The story changes and adapts to the choice you make." but rather a "The story changes and adapts to how you shape the personality of your character." I do realize that it requires much more writing and creates a much more complicated flowchart when it comes to the storyline, but it's nothing impossible to realize. 3°) Lack of dilemma when a choice is given to a player was always something I felt missing. Again, it doesn't have to be very practical or not, though it can be very interesting sometimes. "Yourself, your best friend and a young child are starving. You only have food for one person." => Keep the food to yourself. => Give the food to your best friend. => Give the food to the child. With an example like that, it could or could not have consequences, either it does nothing except changing some dialog lines (if played well, you can still create feelings of guilt, sadness or anger for the character), or it could give you a "point" for this character for the choice of the route later on, or it could even decide about who would survive or die if you go to an extreme case. It could also be this choice that makes the difference between one of the character helping you or abandoning you when you're in a pinch. Maybe it's something proper to japanese mentality and culture, or just because the companies want to take the least risks as possible and want to spare their readers, but a VN is rarely a "b*tch" to you. It will rarely put you in a situation of "conflict of love and duty", and in dilemmas situations. Maybe because sometimes those choices can be harsh to make, and cruel, and that the VN can basically trick you because of the fact that you can never guess if a choice is relevant or not. But again, it would create a very interesting experience imo. 4°) Lack of pressure when selecting a choice. This one is more of a gimmick, but most of the time, there isn't any pressure on the reader when he has to make a choice. What about adding a time limit to pressure him? Especially if the choice is a dilemma, it makes it even more effective. "A woman and her young child are going to die. You can only save one of those, and the person will accompany you for the rest of the story. If you save the child, he will be a burden, if you save the woman, she will hate you forever for not saving her child." => Save the children => Save the woman => Save none of them Now imagine you have a timer to choose which one. If you don't choose anything by the end of the time, none of them will be saved. Again, it adds pressure on the player, but at the same time, it's much more immersing. You are taking the real decisions, it feels like you are becoming the main protagonist. In the end, I feel that the use of such a system for choices is something that the western VN scene could pull out easily and more naturally, because we are actually used to those kind of development where characters you're attached to die (Walking Dead, Game of Thrones...). We are used to stories that are more "cruel" with their own characters. And you, people of Fuwanovel, as VN readers, what are your thoughts on that? Do you know of any VN that already use choices similar to what I described? Would you be ready to play games with such a system? Would you enjoy it?

Little Busters rocks! Such a nice story! Else, welcome to Fuwanovel! Creating a Visual Novel is for sure not easy, but with some motivation and determination, everything is possible!

I always figured that adapting "The Walking Dead" series into a Visual Novel would be interesting. (Well, the Telltale games are kinda similar to Visual Novels in a way I guess). The setting makes it so that it has to be dialog heavy, building trust through your choices with the people you meet, having sometimes to choose who will live and who will die...

Thanks a hundred time!! I'm very happy to see my guide featured on the Fuwa blog! (And sorry for the numerous typos and grammar mistakes... ><)

Haha, it's fine don't worry!^^ The only thing I can say is that people can also be interested in concepts, as long as it's presented neatly and cleanly like you're doing, so you might as well want to look for members on other sites even without anything concrete at hand, even in devianArt. If you actually look for non famous artists with less followers, I'm pretty sure you can actually find some hidden gems that are looking for artistic projects to involve themselves in, even for free, or even if they are not sure they'll get paid. And truth be told, you will have a much much easier time to attract people into your project with art. Anyway, I can only wish you the best of luck on your VN, I'll be following your progress!

Welcome to fuwa! Hope we'll get along!

You seem to be a very conscientious writer, and I'm glad to see that there are more people out here on Fuwanovel trying to create OELVN! You may have already read it, but I wrote a guide about VN developement on Fuwa that hopefully will be of use for you : https://forums.fuwanovel.net/index.php?/topic/7981-so-you-want-to-create-a-visual-novel/ Now, some little questions / comments I had : 1°) If you have an idea about the plot of your story, what about writing a short synopsis in the presentation? It is more appealing than a list of events, faster to read, and it's easier to figure what do you want to focus on as a writer : Plot? Emotion? Reflection? Romance?... 2°) While your post is very neatly and professionally written, remember that you are dealing with amateurs and people that never tried to participate in this kind of project in the first place. You're the one asking for help, so it might be a good idea to have a little more encouraging tone, even though I totally understand that you're worried about the quality of the work that can produce the artists / writers / composers. 3°) I'll be honest here, if you're going with a 6-8 hours VN, you probably won't have a team with more than 10 members (if it approaches that number, than it's a bad sign for you), and if that'ts the case, you don't need to recruit someone solely for the purpose of managing. I actually think that you would make a good manager yourself, seeing that you're the one that started the project in the first place, and as a result has an idea about the general direction you want your VN to take, and seeing that you seem to be quite the organized guy as well! 4°) Are you envisaging the possibility of starting a kickstarter? 5°) Because you are starting this thread on Fuwanovel, doesn't mean you need to recruit only on Fuwanovel. For artists, I'd recommend skimming through deviantArt and pm artists yourself, especially since you seem to have a precise idea about what style of drawing you want. For composers, you should try either Lemmasoft or directly try your luck on Soundcloud (or Youtube). 6°) I'm not exactly sure if more than one writer is a good idea for a short length VN, especially since it doesn't seem like there will be routes or anything like it. It might bring you more conflict and work than what you'll expect in the end. 7°) If you're interested in an alternative for ren'py that doesn't require a programmer, I might be of help^^

I'm pretty sure the "translation" team and "developers" team are two different branches / entities at Sekai project. And I'm pretty sure that those two branches are working on their own thing, as the leaders of each group are different people. I'm not even sure if money they get through the selling of the games they developed themselves go to the company itself that is Sekai Project, or if it goes to individuals that worked on it as a whole (as a result, there would be no real "funds" generated by the sales). Also, I'm no sure how their agreements with the japanese companies work, but Sekai project is definitely giving a lot of the money they get through the sales to them. They are only translator and distributors in this case after all, not creators.

I don't know much, and not sure if my info is reliable. Actually, here is the thread in question. It was made at the time when Sakura Spirit was released. You can check the replies of people that came in contact with Winged Clouds; it's quite astonishing. (Check the reply of the user called "Raithfyre"). Edit : Actually, you can also see someone from Sekai Project defend himself from being responsible for anything concerning Sakura Spirit XD

Developers are called Clouded Wings if I remember well. They are kinda "shadow developers"

I'm pretty sure Winged Cloud and Sekai Project are quite independant. I think it was stated from Sekai project when Sakura spirit came out.

Thanks, should be fixed.

Looks like they released a more in depths analysis of what went wrong on their kickstarter. As a fellow developer, I can only say that it sucks for them... At the same time, I can't help but feel that those kind of issues are inherent to projects involving money and kickstarters.

Kanon, my first VN! So nostalgic... Even though I have to admit that there was one route I never managed to play (Shiori's route) for some reason.

Sigh... If it was only the game, I guess that would still be alright... But I've heard that they were also very rude as game creators, stealing stuff, blocking their contact on Skype...

Hell, why not! Might as well shamelessly claim my award here!

The art of your project looks amazing! I also like a lot the opening song! I'll try to play your demo when I have some time!

EDIT : We don't need a writer anymore currently! Hello people of Fuwanovel! We are currently recruiting for the Lucid9 project, the roles needed being writer and Background artist. You can visit the thread about our project here : https://forums.fuwanovel.net/index.php?/topic/4543-demo-available-lucid9-project-a-mystery-vn/ 1°) We have one route writer position to fill in. The requirements are : - Native English speaker with a good level - Experienced in writing (whether it is fanfiction, VN, LN, novels...) - Willing to work with an already planned route to some extent - Available with a decent or good amount of free time - Available and reactive on Skype. 2°) We might also use a hand for Background Art, we are using now a method called "paint-over" (basically, it's painting over a real picture to make it look like an anime style background). Requirements are : - Good photoshop skills - A lot of patience - Adaptability - (optional but might help a lot) Drawing experience. If ever you're interested in one of those two roles, feel free to pm me!