itch.io

Yeah. 😞

If you like fantasy and can tolerate non-real worlds, then I don’t really understand half the things you found wrong with TToF, because they are issues with the setting not matching the real world. (The other half are issues of human nature/behavior and I agree they probably could be better.)

I’ve heard of Grove but never played it. But also it looks like an RPG, not a VN? If you want more agency, that definitely would be the way to go. Unfortunately I don’t really play many of those.

For SF/F I might recommend Lyre, which is kind of like Adastra, except the wolf isn’t a jerk so there’s no drama with him. (All drama is with the environment instead.) I had issues with the world not making sense though, so you might also.

If you’re okay with the superhero genre then Super Nova could be good. Short so far but the protagonist is moderately strong and only 1/3 of the BFs is an ass.

I have others I like more, but they either have weaker protagonists or way more relationship issues and drama, which you seemed not to like so much?

Okay, this sounds like you want a few main things:

• Very thorough world-building
• A heroic and inspiring protagonist, not a depressing or helpless one
• No major relationship drama

I suspect some degree of relationship drama is inherent to the Romance genre. 😕 And while there are a couple VNs that have strong protagonists, I cannot think of ANY that have the level of coherent world-building you seem to be looking for. You spent a long time explaining how TToF isn’t like the real world—if that is a problem for you then any kind of fantasy or SciFi will not work at all, and your best option is contemporary stories that are set in the real world.

To that end, I would recommend these:

Ocean Avenue - similar to EA, but the protagonist starts with goals and tries to achieve them

After Years - has no jerks and is low on drama. Kegar is a supportive wingman, and the protagonist does stand up for himself sometimes

You might also like Santa Lucia, but I haven’t played that one in a while so I’m not confident in that recommendation. Another contemporary one with an active protagonist is London’s Aesop, but it has some fantasy elements and is currently on hiatus.

TBH I think you’re more likely to find what you want in contemporary romance novel novels, not furry VNs.

This comment feels to me like you’re picking out one color in a painting and asking why everybody paints everything red. Especially since two of the VNs you mention have non-jerk options. (Though yes, they all have fairly weak protagonists.)

But the short answer is: Because it’s popular.

What do you wish had happened differently? I or someone may be able to recommend something more to your taste.

Ah, nice. Thanks for the info.

Hey, is there a place to report bugs?

I picked up the Faith’s Reward ability, but it seems to be applying -2 strength every time I fight anything, even if I flee or there was no corruption involved?

I’m playing 5.3 from the link here on itch.

It’s been a while since I looked at it, but I’m pretty sure what it is is that stamina is regenerated when you hit the combo button before the moves consume it, which is why you’re always down the full move amount at the beginning of the second turn, as well as not getting full regen if the amount missing is less than the regen amount. (Despite this, the amount you can spend on moves is still limited to the pre-regen amount.) I’m not sure how that interacts with symbiote form—probably depends on the internal ordering of when the form triggers, which might be after stamina regen?

why use a female sprite for giving the gay OC a boyfreind instead of a man

Why use a male sprite instead of a female one? Any gender can perform that role adequately. A genderless robot could perform it. An inscrutable energy alien could perform it.

The fact that you’re a fan of Oscar doesn’t mean he deserves more screen time, and it especially doesn’t override Dyne’s contract obligations.

why would you do that instead of sticking with the theme of men?

There is no such theme. The VN featuring only gay romantic relationships is not at all the same as the game focusing exclusively on men.

. . .you just gave maria a new dress to wear and a silly little wand. why would you do that

Partly, because I made him do it. Several of the old patron rewards to add character outfits were mine, and for one of them I chose “Maria in a fairy godmother dress” because I thought it would be amusing to me. Which it is, because Maria is great and I like her more than half the male characters.

As for why he put the outfit there specifically—I can’t answer, but likely it’s because he needed to add it in somewhere where it would sort of fit into the story, and there aren’t a lot of places it could work.

It’s a Bacon, Lettuce, and Onion sandwich.

Normally the sandwich is a B L T (bacon, lettuce, tomato) but Marcus and Evan talk about how they hate tomato, and change it to onion instead when they make the sandwich.

You can get one by becoming a patron!

Nice—looking forward to it. There have definitely been some interesting hints dropped about Dorothy politics becoming relevant soon…

Technically Dyne isn’t to blame for that one—he was obligated to include Fairy/Bara Godmother Maria somewhere because of a patron reward request from four years ago.

That said she is still completely awesome.

Regrettably the Diviner path has not yet been implemented.

surely I should get to choose what happens to at least some degree.

You do. You can pick from the cards. If they don’t line up optimally then you pick your best option and go with it and yes sometimes that is just one card even after you mulligan.

TBH I rather like the combat system. It is a bit random at first, and you probably should never fight anything before you get the symbiote (and throw out the stamina recovery card). But when you get more sigils—and especially after dropping ranks in Valiant Rush—it comes into its own as an interesting exercise of making the best use of the hand you’re dealt.

If I were to make a change to it to make it less random, maybe it would just be to add some power that lets you mulligan more often, or that lets you do a 4>1 or 1>4 chain sometimes.

Sure, but at some point that means they’re actually a hybrid? If they can flip from healing to just-as-good offense so easily then that means they’re a balanced caster, not a healing-skewed one.

I guess it depends on what you mean by “healer”. I generally take that to mean low-power, indirect, or non-existent offensive abilities—if they can do both defense and offense then they’re a red mage instead.

Updated guides to the routes are available to patrons who pledge $5/month or more.

Hmm. That sounds much more like the Unholy Arts school to me. >_>

There is currently only Patreon and Itch.

Requiring a party clearly just means that HA needs to be the harem path! :P

I suspect part of what makes it difficult for single-protagonist games is that healers need a party—you can’t really have a solo healer going out and vanquishing monsters because their talents are primarily for restoration rather than vanquishing.

That said I love playing them and also appreciate that they’re making an appearance here. >_>

SOON

The game is still incomplete, so no one has the full version.

The version here on itch is slightly more incomplete than the one on Patreon.

Probably stressful. You’d have to worry about making sure everyone got along, not showing too much favor to anyone, helping everyone advance their disjoint lives… it would be a pile of work.

There are a lot of scenes without any background, but missing-file errors specifically might be left over from when Dyne shifted background artists or might be typos, and should get fixed eventually (assuming patrons are reporting errors enough).

Somehow I suspect the way to gain Reth’s heart is to sneak up and nab it out of his pocket while he’s distracted.

Dyne makes a patron-only post twice a month with the link and password. If you’re at $10 then you should see two: one for the non-gallery version and one for the with-gallery version.

The most recent one is here: https://www.patreon.com/posts/update-1-112-45262115

Unfortunately the gallery is the $10 level reward on Patreon.

Alas, it is complete.

and tell me more about how to do that??

Patreon! https://www.patreon.com/dk999

Twitter! https://twitter.com/DyneWulf

There is not, but if you’re a fan you can get more Azaghal content from the actual guy:

https://twitter.com/grand_azaghal

Not yet, but eventually.

You know, teleportation and gate magic is quite prone to accidents. Why, you could end up stranded on a deserted island halfway around the world if you’re not careful!

(ponders whether Silas will settle for a cramped dorm room or whether he’ll push the furniture aside and set up the tent instead)

Whoa, this is a really good start. I could definitely use more friends like Silas, and types like Reth seem pretty rare in this genre—which is unfortunate, given how interesting they can be. >_>

Er, okay, that is not the VN app. There should have been another file in that same directory that is an actually executable application. If there’s not, then it’s very likely your virus protection killed it, and you’ll need to go tell it not to. (Or just turn it off temporarily.)

Can you send a screenshot or something? Your browser might be auto-extracting, which means you would just double-click the thing instead. I’m not sure without being able to see it.

That is definitely a windows computer, then. You should download the windows file from the download page of the game, and then right-click and pick an option like “extract”, and then double-click the application inside the extracted folder.

Yeah, basically. Just hearing about Apple’s total lock on what apps you can install annoyed me so much that I’ve never even considered getting an iPhone.

Are you on mac or windows? Either way you should have a zip file, that when you extract it it contains a program (app for mac, .exe for windows) that you can click to run.