I hope it's okay to comment here instead of on the submission.
I absolutely love this game and would definitely play the complete game (or help out with it if you're looking for co-conspirators, but it seems like you've got it covered and I don't have much of an artistic or musical talent anyhow). I liked the little touches, like Aika being able to climb over tables and changing someone's equipped outfit actually changing their outfit. Also, this is one of the most different-and-interesting RPG maker games I've played in a long while. It reminds me of Disgaea and Strawberry Panic, which are... two things I did not expect to see combined, but like both of; and I like the setting and characters here too. It actually does feel like a yuri anime.
With that said, oh wow, that difficulty. Pirats and catfish can defeat Aika and Shizuka (respectively) in one hit during their first appearances, and it's not like I'm under-leveled because this is the only level I can be at this point. There is no room for error.
While playing through once, I noticed a lot of minor (mostly non-game-breaking) issues that should mostly be easily fixed. Actually, you may have found some of them already, but here goes:
During the scripted nurse office visit, Aika is invisible.During the pre-baths scene, Shizuka is invisible.During the pre-battle scene at the underground lake, Shizuka is invisible.The freezer one too actually.You can cancel out of the underground lake visit (or I think just not talk to the teleporter?), leaving you at the hub area but unable to see anything except menus (black screen).Catfish at the baths wield pirat claws.Replaying a level locks all later levels, meaning you can never advance the story, only replay the earlier levels over and over. This can be really bad if you save over your last save before you notice what happened.The pirat cosplay crafting recipe requires a swimsuit, not a pirat bikini as specified.Aika fails to get a bento and ends up with toast, instead - but the item you get is a bento, and both are available in the shop after the kitchen visit.Is Aika supposed to have Blood Harvester? I wouldn't have cleared the kitchens without it and I can't even imagine trying to clear the baths with the rusty kama, but it makes her basically invincible after she hits level 3-4 since every hit will steal more health than her maximum.The cheerful slice of life music keeps playing during the freezer battle. Actually, maybe that was deliberate?
Chapter 2 Edit: All of these bugs are fixed now.
Suggestions:
I think the difficulty might be a little too hard for right at the start of the game. Though it does help to make the early battles interesting, I was expecting a tutorial, not a pirat walking past and one-shotting Aika. It took me three or four tries to win each level (even after I equipped Blood Harvester, I kept losing Shizuka), though I think I could do it reliably now. Making Aika and Shizuka's physical and magic defenses a bit closer together, or raising max health values a bit, might help?Chapter 2 edit: Health values are higher now and I think the new ones are fine.- There are lots of minor elements to the game that could probably be hinted at in Aika's dialogue, rather than leaving players to figure them out (but maybe shouldn't be?): scarves, Aika ignoring some obstacles, arming up before the baths, that sort of thing.
The victory music is a slowed down version of the game over music. Changing it would help me feel like I'm actually winning.Chapter 2 Edit: It's actually not the victory music, actually, and it wasn't before either. I just checked. The victory music is fine. It's the music that plays after the victory message, during the post-battle scene, which is less of a problem.- Letting healing items be used on adjacent allies would fit in with both the strategy RPG and yuri genres.
- The red text on the map information panel goes off the right side of the screen; maybe move it down to the bottom? I'm guessing this is not your fault though.
Change the attack animation for catfish? I'm pretty sure their attack hits magic defense but it looks like a claw slash. Or maybe I'm severely misunderstanding the attack damage formula.Edit: New one is better.
And a parting question to close out this wall of text: English titles instead of Japanese honorifics. Was this a conscious decision? There's nothing wrong with it, and I can tell what honorifics they would be using, but if everyone has Japanese names anyway, it just... feels a little strange (coming from subtitled anime and translated manga, anyhow).
Thanks for making this, anyway, and good luck with the complete version! I enjoyed the demo, and if I seem overly critical it's just because I want it to be even better.
Edit: Accuracy