itch.io

Hehe x3 Weeeell, I'm just glad that you like my games enough to want to binge them :D

I don't know if I'm necessarily good at making games cos there's still a lot of stuff I don't understand or don't know how to do, but I try my best x3 I feel like you can never stop learning though cos there are always new challenges to overcome and things to figure out!

I'm sure your ideas aren't all crap >.< Even if you think they might be, there will always be someone out there who loves it :3 When I started making my first game, I was pretty sure no one would ever play it, haha. To be honest, my self-confidence is so low that I still think that even nowadays when I release new ones x3 But I have learned that there will always be at least 1 person out there who thinks you have cool ideas and appreciates what you make :D

It does take a hell of a lot of time to make games, unfortunately >.< But you can always start with something super small just to test an idea and learn as you go :3

If you don't know or don't want to learn how to code, but would still like to try making a visual novel, I would highly recommend Tyrannobuilder!

I don't use it anymore, but it's what I started out with, and it really does allow you to make games without any previous knowledge or experience cos it's all done with drag and drop :3

I will definitely be back working on this in the new year anyhow :D It's my priority project for the year.

You have nothing to apologise for anyhow :3

Ahh, I remember you saying that about Apartment No.9! I hope it's not still haunting you x3 But I'm glad you decided to check out the demo for this project too :3

Development of this game is behind what was originally planned because of a few different reasons, mainly personal and life stuff >.< But we hope to have it finished and released sometime next year :D It's awesome that you're excited for more!

Hope you have a merry Christmas if you celebrate it, and a happy New Year too! ^-^

I'm glad you ended up liking the twist in the extra ending :3 I had always wanted to include that ending, but because of the limit on word count from the jam, it just didn't fit >.< haha. So I figured I'd make the director's cut version with that and a few extras :D

I think the voice acting really made the game what it is, so I'm glad you enjoyed it! Without the voice acting, it just wouldn't be the same.

Thanks so much for playing <3 Hope you have some happy holidays and also a happy new year!

Aww, man, I'm so glad you like what's there so far ^-^

If the finished version did end up becoming your favourite dating sim, that would be pretty epic!! I don't know if it will manage to live up to that though, haha.

It means a heck of a lot that you like it so much though! And to call it a masterpiece puts a big smile on my face :3

Development has fallen behind for a few different reasons, but we're hoping to finish and release it next year :D

Thanks so much for checking out the demo and taking the time to write something so sweet on the page <3

Happy holidays, and an even happier new year! :3

I will try x3 I think I need a stress shield, haha. You’re right though, rushing isn’t exactly a good idea >.<

I think spending some time away from my PC has started to help me put things in perspective better :3 And I’ve pushed myself these past couple of weeks to go to some places that I was scared to go, and see some friends along the way. That in itself has been a big help!

So I feel like I have a little bit of hope for the end of the year :3

Thank you for being so supportive as always <3 You’re amazing!

Hope you get to have some happy holidays and a super duper happy new year :3

Thank you <3 and I’m glad you like the game so far :3

I hope you get to have some happy holidays and an even happier new year ^-^

No problem at all :3 I can be quite slow to reply sometimes cos I get easily overwhelmed by pretty much everything in life >.< haha. But I always try to when I can.

Hope you have some happy holidays and a super duper new year ^-^

Thanks for checking it out :3 I hope to eventually have all my games on Steam someday, but that $100 fee per game is a real killer >.< That's why itch is so helpful, cos they don't charge devs to upload their games here :D

I'm glad you like the look of the demo anyhow ^-^

That’s awesome! I’m so glad you enjoyed the little demo :3 Thanks so much for checking it out <3

That’s so great to hear :D I’m so glad you’ve had fun with it even though it’s only a short little game ^-^

I really need to write more stuff like this because as much as I love yandere characters, the whole enemies-to-lovers (or enemies AND lovers) kinda thing is probably something I enjoy even more :D When I was a kid, I used to write silly little stories about Disney villains and heroes falling in love while still remaining enemies xD

The voice acting is definitely what sells it in this project though!! I feel like it would be nothing without the voice cast doing such an awesome job :3

I also wish there was more to it if I’m being honest x3 Maybe it was a bad idea to make it for a jam that had such a big restriction on word count >.< haha. But I will definitely use it as inspiration for future stories of the same variety!

Cos while stuff was only hinted at in this game, I definitely had a full backstory in mind while I was writing it xD Even if you take the troll ending into account, the characters still take that stuff pretty seriously, so a backstory is something they would’ve lived at some point, haha.

So glad you enjoyed the soundtrack too ^-^ Probably one of my favourites to work on even if it was short!

And yeah, it was on purpose x3 Sorry if it was frustrating to navigate though >.< I intended for it to be kind of confusing to make players feel a bit lost and disoriented + keep them guessing about what was really going on, but if it became annoying, that’s not ideal, haha.

Still, I’m super happy you enjoyed it despite that! And it gives me warm fuzzies to know that you still enjoyed it when you decided to play it again ^-^ Thanks so much for taking the time to type up such a nice comment <3

Hope you get to have happy holidays & an awesome new year!!

But they are both eeeeeeviiiiiil x3 They’ll kidnap you and never let you go!!! Then I’ll have to call the police x3

No, it’s totally fine to ask that here :3 Sorry it’s taken me a while to reply. I’ve not had a chance to go on my PC cos the run-up to Christmas has been so jam-packed >.<

Unfortunately, I haven’t ever been able to make a guide like that for Linux because I don’t tend to get much feedback from Linux users :( I know that some people on Linux systems have managed to play some of my games because a few have commented to say they enjoyed them.

On the other hand, I’ve also had comments from Linux users saying they managed to play stuff from start to finish, but there were small issues with the GUI, like the cursor appearing too small or too big on their system even though they can see from YouTube videos and stuff that it’s fine on Windows >.<

But yeah, I don’t think anyone has ever said what steps they have had to go through to actually get the games to launch :( 

I’m so sorry that I can’t be of more help! I don’t own a Linux or know anyone who has one, so I have no idea how to troubleshoot stuff like that if folks online don’t bestow the knowledge upon me T_T

If you can get the itch.io game launcher on Linux, there’s a chance that might help! But I have never even downloaded that on Windows to check out how it functions, so I don’t know how you download and launch itch games through that itch launcher >.<

Hope you get to have happy holidays + a happy new year! And thanks for your interest in the project :3

Thank you :3 That means a lot <3 And I am starting to feel a little better at least! Therapy has begun, and while I don’t think it’s had much impact yet, it’s still something, haha.

Pushing myself out of my comfort zone to do some stuff and see some friends these past couple of weeks has made quite a big difference to my overall mood at the moment.

So yeah, now instead of going into the new year completely depressed, I have a little hope :3

I hope you get to have an awesome Christmas if you celebrate it. Happy holidays! And I hope you get to have a wonderful new year <3

It was a lot of fun to try and do :D Thanks so much for checking it out! :3

Merry Christmas to you too if you celebrate it, and happy holidays if you have them! There’s some light at the end of the tunnel, so with any luck, it will be a happy new year all around :3

I’m so glad you think so ^-^ Thanks so much for checking it out and taking the time to write something so sweet! <3

Ahh x3 Well, at least you know for the future :D 

When I look at the instructions people have written, I always think I would struggle to know what to do if I had a Mac, cos it all looks super confusing to me, haha.

Hope you have a happy holidays and also a happy new year :3

I do have it listed on my main dev page here + on most of the game pages I think, but to make things easier, I can just type it out here :3

It’s:

melancholicmarionette@gmail.com

Apologies if you have already sent something >.< I haven’t been able to get on my PC at all these past couple of weeks.

Hope you have happy holidays & an awesome new year :3

Thank you :3 You’re always so sweet and it kind of blows my mind that you take the time to write such kind words <3

The good news is, I’m already starting to feel a little bit better, and I at least have a small amount of hope going into the new year now :3

I hope you have happy holidays, and an even happier new year!! ^-^

Aww, that’s so incredibly adorable ^-^ Made me smile the second I saw it! Which means even more right now cos I’ve been going through some really crappy times.

Thanks so much for taking the time to create & share it <3 <3 <3 (there are not enough hearts in the world, so just imagine it's like x100000000000000000 haha)

I hope you’re doing well :3

Ah, man, that sucks so much :( Thanks for checking it out at least! :3

The bad news is, there’s probably nothing I’ll ever be able to do about it >.< I only have access to a Windows PC, so when it comes to exporting Mac builds of my projects, I kinda just have to press the export button and then pray that it works for people T_T

I wouldn’t be able to tweak UI or anything like that cos I have literally no way of verifying how it looks on Mac :( 

And I have no idea whatsoever how to allow players to change the size of the mouse cursor in-game because all I do is reskin the default Unity UI that’s provided within Naninovel. I don’t know how to add options that aren’t already there >.<

So yeah, I’m really sorry about that :( I wish there was more I could do to help because it really sucks if someone wants to play the game on a platform other than Windows because I have no way of properly testing things to see if they work properly.

I really appreciate you taking the time to check out the game though! I’m just sorry I couldn’t do more to help >.<

I’m so glad you had fun with it despite it being what it is, haha. It means a lot that you stuck with it and think it works out well :3

I do think that you’re right, it probably would help to call it a kinetic VN, but there’s one giant problem… it seems many people don’t read the game page at all >.< so they’d probably wind up missing the memo :( 

I think that’s the cause of a lot of the negative comments I get on the game (and on some of my other projects too >.<) the fact that sometimes, people just don’t read all the info on the page, so they’re commenting out of context. 

And I mean, I don’t blame em cos I ramble a lot, so there tends to be a lot of info to digest T_T haha. But I literally cannot put things any more concisely because I really struggle to do that in general thanks to my ASD :( 

But no, you’re not horrible at explaining what’s going on in your head at all! X3 I get ya! And ti would make sense to advertise it that way :3 I just reeeeally suck at explaining anything at all, haha. 

That’s super kind of you to offer help :3 I’m always looking to work with different people, so I guess whenever another script is ready, I could give you a poke or something. Also, feel free to drop me a demo of your voice to my email anytime! That way, I’ll have a better idea of the kinds of characters it might fit :D 

And thank you :3 I’m just sorta slowly emerging from a big ol period of burnout right now, but it means a lot to read such kind words <3

Honestly, my memory is awful, so if you did comment on other projects before, I would probably have forgotten and would need something to jog my memory x3 I can’t even remember the birthdays of people in my own family without a billion calendar reminders xD Regardless, I appreciate you taking the time to check out my stuff and write something so sweet :3

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.

Ahh, thank you so much for checking out some of my games, and I’m so glad you decided to play this one too ^-^

I’m always kinda worried with this one that maybe people who come across it might avoid it because it says it’s still in development, but the thing is, while that’s technically true, the overall storyline is complete within Orange Blythe’s route. My intentions for adding Blue Blythe’s route are mainly for fluff stuff >.< I feel like I haven’t communicated that very well on the game page though cos I totally suck at explaining stuff T_T

I’m so glad you enjoyed this one and my other games anyhow! Thank you so much for taking the time to play & share your kind thoughts :3 I really appreciate the support <3

Thanks so much for playing both volumes :D I definitely prefer the story and the characters in volume 02, but that’s because I hate stories with school settings with a passion xD

Glad you enjoyed the bloopers as well! Bloopers and outtakes are my favourite extras on movies, so it’s fun to include them in games too :3

Ah! Thank you so much for playing it :3 And for liking it enough to come back and play it again :D I’m glad you had fun with it and that you still enjoyed it the second time!

Thanks for taking the time to leave such a sweet comment <3

I hope he haunts you in your dreams, hehe.

It’s a good job no one is forcing you to play it then! x3 

Unless your friend does force you to, and then I guess you’re in trouble xD

No worries :3 I honestly wish there was a quick way to edit and re-export a new version of the demo though cos knowing of all the stuff in it that’s janky really bothers me xD Maybe I can find some sort of way to do it that won’t break the whole thing >.<

Thanks again for checking it out anyhow :3

Sorry I’m so slow to get back to you. I’ve been dealing with a lot of personal stuff lately that had me avoiding my PC completely for the past couple of months >.<

Firstly, thanks so much for playing the game :D 

And to answer your questions…

Regarding when it will be finished, I honestly have no idea x3 It won’t be anytime soon! This is pretty much just a slow side project that I come back to when I don’t feel like working on my main projects, so development is extra slow >.<

There’s also some content in volume 03 that I personally don’t feel that comfortable with, so I’m not sure yet whether I will be skipping over it or not! I might try to make it work if I can :3 I want to try and stay as true as possible to the original stories of each volume when I work on localising them, but I think that’s gonna be quite difficult for me with volume 03. 03 is also my least favourite of all the CDs, haha.

Whatever happens though, I will finish it eventually :3 At least the volumes are self-contained stories I guess.

As for Aoi… hmm, yeeeeah, but she’s also a massive biiiiiiitch x3

Thanks again for playing!

Thanks so much for checking it out! And I’m super glad to hear you had fun with it ^-^

I can’t lie, it might be quite a while before I can finish the other volumes cos it’s a bit of a snail-paced side project, and there are also some issues with the content in volume 03 that I’m not entirely comfortable with xD But if I can find a way to make it work with a translation that doesn’t completely kill the meaning of the original story for that volume, then I’ll still try my best to localise it, haha.

Thanks again for playing :3

Sorry it’s taken me ages to see this and reply >.< I’ve not been in a great headspace lately so I’ve been avoiding my PC altogether since the start of October. Seeing this made me smile though! I can’t believe you decided to replay it x3 That just shocks me cos it’s still one that gets hardly any downloads in general, haha.

I also wish there was more of the architect character x3 Not just here, but in my other projects too! Sadly though, the VA playing the character is someone who has disappeared from my life :( I wish that weren’t the case, but he’s just moved on to bigger and better things. More power to him cos he’s such a talented person and deserves success :3 But it, unfortunately for me, means he doesn’t have the time to dedicate to someone who can’t afford to pay him much when others can properly compensate him for his time and talents >.<

I can’t lie, I’ve agonised over what to do about it because I would still really love to have a consistent figure that appears across various projects. My main concern is finding a VA who I can rely on to record for the character over the course of several years, and that’s a big ask for anyone x3

Thank you anyhow for taking the time to come back to the game and to leave such a sweet comment! You’ve always been so supportive and I appreciate it more than I have the words to describe <3 I hope that you’re well and that the end of the year has been going smoothly for you!

So glad to hear you enjoyed the game :3 Thank you so much for checking it out!

Hehe, Snowe is quite the catch x3

Sorry it’s taken me so long to reply >.< I haven’t been on my PC since the very beginning of October cos of some personal problems, but I’ll do my best to answer your question now :3

As far as I can remember, I listed the sprite artists in the credits text document rather than in game just because they’re assets that I purchased to edit and use rather than sprites commissioned by an artist. But I just did some digging, and I can link you to the artists that I bought the original sprites from :3

I just edited the colours of everything using GIMP, haha.

Sooo the main sprite for Saffie and Snowe was from someone called m-rakko: https://www.pixiv.net/en/users/74070192

For future Saffie, it’s a sprite by Ameharu: https://www.pixiv.net/en/users/79431323

For the lil dragon, it was an artist called otohimenohanagasa, but I can’t find a link for them anywhere now >.<

For Snowe’s spirit form, it was by an artist called Silon, and unfortunately, they appear to have left the platform they sold their stuff on and deleted everything, because my old purchase link for the sprite just takes me to a dead page now :( 

Snowe’s beast form was by an artist called Haekura/Hachino (and is actually a live2D model for rigging): https://www.pixiv.net/en/users/4237338

And Saffie’s bear art is by someone called Susun: https://x.com/susun_ga_omise

I think that covers all the sprites :3 Editing the colours was a lot of time-consuming work cos most of em were just PNG files rather than layered PSDs, so it meant painstakingly selecting areas to alter the colour one section by section x3 Sometimes I wonder why I put myself through the pain of doing that cos it would be so much easier to just use them as they come, haha. I feel like it’s worth the effort though just to make them unique to the project, haha.

Thanks again for playing ^-^

Thanks so much for checking it out! I’m so glad you had fun with the demo so far ^-^

I’m quite behind on the game’s development because of impersonal problems >.< but I’m hoping to be able to release the full version sometime in 2025 :3

Thanks so much for the kind words & support <3

(copying my reply -with a couple of edits - from the other thread in case anyone happens to see this and has a similar problem with their computer)

Since I see you posted a similar thing on another project of mine, I can only assume there's something your computer really doesn't like about games made using Naninovel in Unity :(

What that could be I have zero idea without troubleshooting, and that would sadly be impossible at the moment as I am too unwell to get on my PC. It would also require me to export and send to you a separate dev build of the game for you to send me any error logs that your computer generates, so quite longwinded >.<

I know it's not helpful to say, but plenty of other people have played this and The Hostage from start to finish without any issues at all, so it must be something specific to your device :(

I appreciate you checking out the games regardless! I'm just sorry that they don't seem to work correctly on your computer for whatever reason cos that sucks for both of us T_T

That's  just one of the woes of everyone having different devices I guess. I know everything I make works on both my PC and on the family potato laptop (albeit slower loading on the potato) cos I test stuff for ungodly amounts of time before releasing, but that doesn't mean the games will run perfectly on every device out there, unfortunately. 

For big companies, it's not so much of an issue cos they can get a whole team to troubleshoot, but I'm just one person making games as a hobby x3

There are a billion different reasons that a PC could fail to run a game properly. I've come across a fair few bugs in other people's indie games I've played. Sometimes, I'll download something that has no sound at all, even though I've seen video playthroughs and know the game has sound. I know there's something my PC doesn't like about the game for there to be no sound for me, but I have no way of knowing the cause, and the dev wouldn't stand much of a chance of figuring it out without going through time-consuming tests.

Computers can be a nightmare sometimes >.<

Yeah, sadly that was an old Naninovel bug (which has since been fixed at least :3) that shouldn't be a problem once the game is updated. It's just that exporting an update with that fix in isn't an easy task >.< 

If it were quick to do, I'd release an update of the demo that fixes that issue + some other UI-related gremlins, but the version of Naninovel that the demo was made in is so incredibly out of date now that any update will break most of the code in the demo T_T

Basically, I will need to start the game from scratch with the latest version of Nani. But I don't feel that's worth doing until there's more actual content to add story-wise. So, for now, the janky demo will have to suffice x3 Sorry aboot that! And cheers for checking it out :3

Since I see you posted a similar thing on another project of mine, I can only assume there's something your computer really doesn't like about games made using Naninovel in Unity :(

What that could be I have zero idea without troubleshooting, and that would sadly be impossible at the moment as I am too unwell to get on my PC. It would also require me to export and send to you a separate dev build of the game for you to send me any error logs that your computer generates, so quite longwinded >.<

I know it's not helpful to say, but plenty of other people have played this and Darling Duality from start to finish without any issues at all,  so it must be something specific to your device :(

I appreciate you checking out the games regardless! I'm just sorry that they don't seem to work correctly on your computer for whatever reason cos that sucks for both of us T_T

That's  just one of the woes of everyone having different devices I guess. I know everything I make works on both my PC and on the family potato laptop (albeit slower loading on the potato) cos I test stuff for ungodly amounts of time before releasing, but that doesn't mean the games will run perfectly on every device out there, unfortunately. 

For big companies, it's not so much of an issue cos they can get a whole team to troubleshoot, but I'm just one person making games as a hobby x3

There are a billion different reasons that a PC could fail to run a game properly. I've come across a fair few bugs in other people's indie games I've played. Sometimes, I'll download something that has no sound at all, even though I've seen video playthroughs and know the game has sound. I know there's something my PC doesn't like about the game for there to be no sound for me, but I have no way of knowing the cause, and the dev wouldn't stand much of a chance of figuring it out without going through time-consuming tests.

Computers can be a nightmare sometimes >.<

Cheers for checking it out :3 Even if I wasn't satisfied with how it turned out in the end, it still makes me happy if anyone can get some enjoyment of some kind out of it :D

And sure! Now, cos it's been a long time since I wrote this, I can't remember 100% exactly what I was thinking with that ending, but I'm 99.9% sure I meant it as the MC being turned into literal fertiliser x3

Just one of those crazy sorts of dystopian things where those in charge want to ensure everyone in society is contributing in some way, so if they deem that a person is no longer useful alive, they will have them melted down to use them as human mulch/fertiliser for crops that will eventually feed the rest of the population >.<

Soooo, yeah, that's quite grim I guess x3 I feel like maybe I should've written 2 different fertilisation endings though where 1 was as I just listed above, and then another where MC is used in a more sexual way to contribute to society xD

Thanks again for playing! :3

Hey hey! Glad you think it looks worth checking out :3

Unfortunately, even though I would really love to have this and all of my other projects on Android, I just don't know how to get them to work on Android T_T

I tried in the past, but every build I made just resulted in my phone displaying a blank screen even though the software told me the builds were successful :(

I don't really know what went wrong, so I'm either gonna need someone to teach me how to do it right, or try again sometime now that I have a different PC and hope that I can get it to work at some point x3

I think it would take quite a lot of time because not only do I need to figure out how to make builds playable on Android, but I'd likely also need to adapt the UI to work better on a mobile screen >.<

So while it's something I definitely want to do in the future, it's not likely to be any time soon since I don't know how right now :(

I'm sorry that's not very helpful >.< A few people have mentioned that some of my games work on emulators on Android phones, but as far as I'm aware, they don't run that smoothly on emulators and can crash randomly. I just thought I'd mention it in case it's something you wanted to try.

Sorry I couldn't be of more help. I really appreciate your interest in the game though :3

Thanks so much for checking out both of em! And for the luck too cos I will definitely need it x3

Glad you had fun with them :3 I don't know if some of the other stuff I've made will be your cup of tea or not (mostly yandere vibes in them or horror of some description, haha), but feel free to check out my other projects in the meantime cos it's gonna takes me aaaages to get the full version of Darling Duality finished >.<

Thank you again for the kind words and checking out my games <3

Thanks so much for checking it out! And for sticking around to see all the endings :3

I'm still hoping to remake this someday in the engine I use now since the one I originally used to make this was a bit clunky, haha. Not sure when I'll get around to it, but I'd like to have it on Steam someday.

Cheers for all your kind words <3