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A jam submission

Picta MoriView game page

Short visual novel thriller featuring sinister AI image generator.
Submitted by Rastaanparta — 1 day, 48 minutes before the deadline
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Picta Mori's itch.io page

Results

CriteriaRankScore*Raw Score
Scariness...#74.6004.600
Fun#654.0674.067
Overall#683.6933.693
Halloweeny?#823.8003.800
Candy!!#992.8672.867
Monsterous!#1113.1333.133

Ranked from 15 ratings. Score is adjusted from raw score by the median number of ratings per game in the jam.

Log Line
Who would paint your death?

Content Warnings
Swearing, violence, death, gore, blood, abuse, stalking, compulsion, mental illness, stress and anxiety, physical illness, occasional flashing lights/loud sounds/screen shaking, alcoholism, car accident.

Team Members
Story/Development/Graphics/Sound Design - Rastaanparta
Sound Design/Composer - akole

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Comments

Submitted(+1)

I only got one ending so far but omg, this game is so beautiful! I love all of it!

I didn't expect it to hit me as hard as it did, the relationships between the characters felt so natural. I'll keep playing and try to get a different ending, but keep up the good work, this game is amazing!!

(+1)

I loved it! The atmosphere, the suspense, the art style, the writing... excellent from start to finish. The sound design really helps to immerse yourself in the story. How many endings are there? I've got two endings so far (a bad and a good one). 

Only one negative point: the "fast" option speeds up all dialogue, even the unread one. It can be quite annoying when you want to play again and read the other ends.

Apart from that, congratulations! This is very good. I've read a good amount of VN during this jam, and this one is definitely one of my favorite. 

Developer (1 edit)

Thank you for the review!

There are 6 different endings; 3 bad and 3 good ones, divided by who (if any) you meet in the ending scene.

So sorry about that faster than light "fast" option. I'll see that fixed in the future projects.

Pleased to hear you enjoyed the experience so much! Cheers!

(+1)

This VN strikes me - in the best of ways - a shorter, lower-key, and more intimate version of the obscure PC-98 VN Mirrors. The deliberate limitation of on-screen colors is masterfully used to help convey the story's ever-foreboding tone, as well as provide the sharpest photorealistic images at 640x480 I've ever seen in a modern RPG Maker game. The dialogue pacing is excellent, not to mention acts as a sort of silent voice acting by stopping, starting, and varying speed like voiced dialogue would. The characters are well-written. Overall, fantastic!!

While I do have some nitpicks, like the "Fast" option speeding up all dialogue, unread or not, I suspect it's merely due to the third-party plugin chosen and not a willing choice by the author.

Developer

Thank you so much for the review!

I'll see that lightspeed fast option fixed in the future! 

Submitted(+1)

This was really cool! The style suits the story so well :3 and I loved the thoughtful use of SFX to create the sort of melancholy and foreboding atmosphere that ran throughout the game. I was genuinely surprised by the more emotional moments + the suspense was done brilliantly too! I'd happily sit and watch a full-length horror film following this story :D

I've only got one ending so far, so I haven't tried all the choices yet, and I won't put spoilers, but what happened at the end of the credits made me smile :3 That was a nice touch!

Developer (1 edit) (+1)

I'm flattered you mentioned the idea of a full-length film as that was my intention when I planned the pacing of the story. Thank you for your review!

Glad you watched the credits to the end!

Submitted(+1)

Excellent little VN with a great sense of style and a nice mysterious, suspenseful story, and fittingly moody music that's not distracting.  I also quite enjoyed navigating the patient interactions at the beginning.

In terms of gameplay, the "fast" button was kind of annoying because I clicked it by accident and blew through a good chunk of the story before I managed to stop it without any way of going back.  Ren'Py gets around this by not skipping through dialogue you haven't seen yet.

Narrative notes (avoiding spoilers as much as possible):

The revelation after you leave the hospital works as a motivation for the main character, but the reveal came out of left field for me and it didn't seem to really go anywhere afterward.  It's possible I glossed over the early hints, but if not, I think it would help if you plant the seeds in the player's mind that this reveal is coming, even if the exact details/nature of the reveal aren't made known to the player until the reveal event itself.  (That was really hard to write without spoiling anything!)

A few grammatical notes:

Just a quick nitpick, a choice at one point says "Condolence her" - this should read "Console her" because condolence is a noun, console is the verb you're looking for :)

I also noticed a typo where I think "amidst" is spelled "midst" (when you choose between rushing to the door and trying to lose him)

"What if this time Jackie won't make?" - I think "it" is missing from the end of this sentence?

"The doctor wanted to keep me in monitors over night" - This should probably say "monitor me over night" or "keep me under monitoring over night" - the way it's written sounds like the doctor is going to jam you into a gigantic monitor ;)

"inappropriate" is misspelled when you see the website warning page

Developer(+1)

Thank you for your review! I really appreciate your grammatical notes and I'm so sorry to hear about your accident with the "fast" button!