itch.io

hello! ^^ i played the original game back as a teenager, and Serafina's Crown when I was in college! I loved both so this release is really exciting to me hehe, I'll have to play it ASAP :) I was looking for the original Serafina's Saga a bit ago and was really sad to see it wasn't available anymore slkfjdsklfj so I'm glad that this was the reason! (Speaking of - the itch.io page for Serafina's Crown still links to the old (broken) link for the original game! It might be good to replace it for any players looking on that page ^^)

I am like. So miserable right now lol <-- (I promise this is a compliment)

I work with children on a daily basis, so this story was pretty much engineered to hit me where it hurts... seeing the conditions that the kids endured, the way they were treated by all of STOP's employees, and watching Pavel's horrific transformation from a bright kid to a person broken by all the trauma piled onto him... uh, I am gonna have to try extra hard to be normal when I go to work in an hour LMAOOOOO. In particular, Dr. Deidre's earlier case study critiquing the rigorous schooling and Dr. Tan's comment about "throwing them snacks just to see if they run harder" mirror some of my real-life experiences (in education, not in a child testing lab, thank god) and sort of got my blood boiling haha.

I liked the art a lot - all of it is very cohesive, not to mention extremely well-presented. The combination of speech bubbles, NVL-style text, textboxes, and records combined with the panning backgrounds and the very dynamic sprites made this such a fun and beautiful game to watch. 

Overall, I'm so so impressed with how polished this game is for something that was made for a 30-day jam; it speaks volumes of both your prior experience and your clear vision for what you wanted this game to be. There are so many other myriad Thoughts (not to mention vague Feelings that haven't yet become Thoughts) that I want to communicate about what an experience this game was, but I fear that if I tried to get them all down this comment would end up very disjointed and rambly, haha.

Thanks very much for sharing this game, and I'll definitely be checking out malViolence after I've finished with this year's Spooktober entries!

I am like. So miserable right now lol <-- (I promise this is a compliment)

I work with children on a daily basis, so this story was pretty much engineered to hit me where it hurts... seeing the conditions that the kids endured, the way they were treated by all of STOP's employees, and watching Pavel's horrific transformation from a bright kid to a person broken by all the trauma piled onto him... uh, I am gonna have to try extra hard to be normal when I go to work in an hour LMAOOOOO. In particular, Dr. Deidre's earlier case study critiquing the rigorous schooling and Dr. Tan's comment about "throwing them snacks just to see if they run harder" mirror some of my real-life experiences (in education, not in a child testing lab, thank god) and sort of got my blood boiling haha.

I liked the art a lot - all of it is very cohesive, not to mention extremely well-presented. The combination of speech bubbles, NVL-style text, textboxes, and records combined with the panning backgrounds and the very dynamic sprites made this such a fun and beautiful game to watch. 

Overall, I'm so so impressed with how polished this game is for something that was made for a 30-day jam; it speaks volumes of both your prior experience and your clear vision for what you wanted this game to be. There are so many other myriad Thoughts (not to mention vague Feelings that haven't yet become Thoughts) that I want to communicate about what an experience this game was, but I fear that if I tried to get them all down this comment would end up very disjointed and rambly, haha.

Thanks very much for sharing this game, and I'll definitely be checking out malViolence after I've finished with this year's Spooktober entries!

(also I will be reposting this comment on the game page for algorithm reasons)

Thank you! Niv was a delight to write, her design and personality were both straight from the mind of our character artist, so all due credits for Niv's conception should go to him ^^ I agree on the familiar too, I had so much fun incorporating him!

Thanks so much for playing and sharing your thoughts!

Thank you!! I'm glad to hear the Funny hit for you, I know humor is very subjective so I was a bit worried about how mine would hold up. (Silly names on the dialogue textbox are one of my favorite jokes so I'm double glad you liked that one LMAOOOO.) The witch was so incredibly fun to write; her personality was set by our character artist, teasugarr, so major props to him for how Nivienne turned out (as well as every single character design)!

Thanks so much for playing and leaving your thoughts!

And if I cried about the little trash baby when then.....

This was such a sweet game! I loved the crows' manner of speech. The Crowmother's sort of archaic speech was very charming, and I liked Crowchild's adorable pluck! Also really enjoyed all the references to the garbage that Crowchild is made of, haha. I only got the one ending (presumably the best one?) and while I usually like to play for multiple endings, I really don't want to see a bad ending for little Crowchild haha;;;

I liked how each character's story was touched on! This feels like the perfect amount of game; not too much, and not too little. The story was told excellently within the short time frame that you had for it.

Thanks for sharing this game with us!!

And if I cried about the little trash baby when then.....

This was such a sweet game! I loved the crows' manner of speech. The Crowmother's sort of archaic speech was very charming, and I liked Crowchild's adorable pluck! Also really enjoyed all the references to the garbage that Crowchild is made of, haha. I only got the one ending (presumably the best one?) and while I usually like to play for multiple endings, I really don't want to see a bad ending for little Crowchild haha;;;

I liked how each character's story was touched on! This feels like the perfect amount of game; not too much, and not too little. The story was told excellently within the short time frame that you had for it.

Thanks for sharing this game with us!!

(also I'm going to repost this comment on the actual itch page to help with visibility!)

the post says "1 submitted character per VN" ^^ so maybe the protag, or if they don't have a sprite go for the most favored and/or eye-catching love interest!

The minigames here were really fun! The last one in particular was really unique, I paused in eating my lunch to give it my full attention haha. Excellent job setting up the spooky atmosphere - the art, music, and faux voice acting all built it up.

Potentially a small bug report? I waited to attack the monster when I first had the choice, and the next time the only available choice was to attack, so I did, but when I did so I got the achievement for attacking as soon as possible.

I am so so so curious about the ending that I didn't manage to get but I'm a horror wimp haha;;; and this game is frightening enough that I'm not quite sure I'm ready to play it again LMAOO. If I feel braver I'll come back to this one though!

The minigames here were really fun! The last one in particular was really unique, I paused in eating my lunch to give it my full attention haha. Excellent job setting up the spooky atmosphere - the art, music, and faux voice acting all built it up.

Potentially a small bug report? I waited to attack the monster when I first had the choice, and the next time the only available choice was to attack, so I did, but when I did so I got the achievement for attacking as soon as possible.

(Going to repost this comment on the game page to help with visibility ^^)

;w; Avalon was our artist Tea's concept! I really liked writing him and Niv, and picking out his sfx ^^ shoutout to Glaneur de sons on freedsound.org for all the bubble sfx they uuploaded!

Thank you for playing and leaving a comment! nwn

Hi there! ^_^ I enjoyed my time with this game! Your art is so gorgeous - I especially loved the demon's design (so beautiful) and the CG that you get from ending 5. I definitely paused my reading for a moment just to admire those! The BG art stood out to me as well, I thought that the single-color palette for each one was really unique, and the colors you chose suited each background ^_^

The story was very gripping. In very few words, you showed clearly Amelia's history with the Baron and the abusive situation of the present. I was rooting for her very early on. I also really, really liked what you did with the Baroness a lot - for a character who is only physically present for one scene, she's fairly complex and has a lot of weight in the story both before and after we see her on-screen ^_^

ALSO you would not BELIEVE how sad I was when I got ending 3 haha;;; I didn't realize that combination of choices would lead to that outcome and I was SO sad I felt like I'd betrayed Kuro >_< so props to you for making me feel emotionally attached to such a short experience! Thank you for sharing your game with us!

(Also, this project is set in an existing universe? :o you should drop some more info in a reply to this comment and/or link it on the itch page! This is the first of your work that I've seen and I'd love to see more.)

Hi there! ^_^ I enjoyed my time with this game! Your art is so gorgeous - I especially loved the demon's design (so beautiful) and the CG that you get from ending 5. I definitely paused my reading for a moment just to admire those! The BG art stood out to me as well, I thought that the single-color palette for each one was really unique, and the colors you chose suited each background ^_^

The story was very gripping. In very few words, you showed clearly Amelia's history with the Baron and the abusive situation of the present. I was rooting for her very early on. I also really, really liked what you did with the Baroness a lot - for a character who is only physically present for one scene, she's fairly complex and has a lot of weight in the story both before and after we see her on-screen ^_^

ALSO you would not BELIEVE how sad I was when I got ending 3 haha;;; I didn't realize that combination of choices would lead to that outcome and I was SO sad I felt like I'd betrayed Kuro >_< so props to you for making me feel emotionally attached to such a short experience! Thank you for sharing your game with us!

(Also, this project is set in an existing universe? :o you should drop some more info in a reply to this comment and/or link it on the itch page! This is the first of your work that I've seen and I'd love to see more.)

(also also i'm gonna repost this comment on the actual itch page haha >_< I'm not sure if having comments on the page helps to raise your engagement or not but I figure it can't hurt!)

Hi there ^^ you can exit the extras screen by hitting the escape key on your keyboard, as with any other Ren'Py game. I apologize if this was unclear.

I also apologize if the lack of voice acting was offputting to you, but we made no claims of having it and chose not to include it early on in development because we knew we would not be able to implement it effectively within the time constraints of the jam.

As for the motivations being silly, well... it's a comedy game, they were meant to be pretty silly, so I'll take that as a compliment LMAO. Thanks for your feedback.

Literally, I've just finished this VN and checked for any more info from the author and it seems like their socials have been wiped... T_T Andy Church if you are reading this comment, please know that I really enjoyed this and would love to see more from you but even if I never do that will never diminish the experience I had with this VN.

cute game! thanks for making it (:

I haven't played this but Quinn is a hottie mcthottie for real like hiiiiiii baby <3 will be keeping an eye on this!

A friend of mine has gotten me more into the horror genre recently so I wanted to finally play this game since I've really enjoyed some of your other games ^_^ had a fantastic time with it!! I really enjoyed finding all of the endings, it was challenging to find the right paths but not to the point where it was frustrating. Super looking forward to the commercial version. (:

I absolutely adore your writing!! I meant to play this ages ago bc I looooooved Pairs but somehow it got pushed into my backlog T_T but I'm so so so glad I finally read it, and it might actually be a good thing I waited so long - it really hit for me emotionally since I've had a lot of friends that I've parted ways with in recent years. I also loved the way you wrote the other world and the prince; it just barely toed the line of horror with the best elements of the genre. Your writing is the perfect blend of descriptive and thought-provoking without being dense, and the art was all super pretty.

Thank you so much for your work and I'm looking forward to playing more of your games!!

this is soooooooo cute, can't wait til I can next hang out w my homie so I can kiss him goodnight

omg cute!! almost cried tbh (happy tears) this felt like a hug <3

This was so cute!! I managed to get the true end after some experimenting. Great job. ^_^

Oh hey!! This would be totally awesome if you could! What's the best way to contact you for more details about this?

This game was SO funny. The humor was perfect, and despite Gry being an objectively awful person, I was endeared enough to him that I always found myself rooting for him to win. I got all 4 endings and I really enjoyed finding all of the dialogue and items!

This was a really cute story! Jastiline is so pretty. I just wish it hadn't ended quite so abruptly - I would've liked to see their routine together after Halloween.

I've had this game on my to-play list literally since it came out 4 years ago and I finally, FINALLY got around to playing it as I started to get through my backlog this year. I really enjoyed the game's humor and fourth-wall breaking (Narrator was SO funny). I liked all of the routes but honestly I think the secret route was my favorite. Thanks for a great game and I look forward to continuing to play your awesome games! (:

Lowkey just did this because I was bored and I saw "genderqueer," but actually this really did make me reflect on names and what I want from them to the point that I feel brave enough to try a new one for the first time, which I've thought about doing but haven't actually done before. Thank you.

This game has been on my "to play" list since it came out and I could have sworn I put it there two years ago at most but apparently it was first released four years ago? Wild. I'm actually glad that I waited so long to play it though, because I was recently diagnosed with Celiac disease and Lane's difficulties with eating actually resonated really heavily with me. I don't have the same moral issues, of course, but simultaneously not wanting to think about eating and thinking all the time about where and when I'm getting my next meal, about the absolute ordeal that it can be to prepare a meal, and having no choice in the matter of the diet that I need in order to survive and stay healthy - I felt all of that with Lane and it really made me connect with him as a character.

I also really enjoyed both Thomas and Parker's routes. I liked all of the character relationships and the dialogue felt super natural. Parker's dialogue especially might legitimately be the best and most realistic "we've known each other for forever" dialogue I've ever seen in anything ever.

Really great job on this, I hope I get the chance to check out your other games soon (hopefully sooner than four years from now).

I got these errors when I tried to add Ren'Edit to my game:

[code]
I'm sorry, but errors were detected in your script. Please correct the
errors listed below, and try again.

File "game/renedit/renedit/renedit_screens.rpy", line 8: u'caret' is not a keyword argument or valid child for the input statement.
    input id "input" color "#90a6ad" outlines [(absolute(2),renedit_blue,0,0)] caret Transform("renedit/pen.png",xzoom=-1,ypos=-0.2) 
                                                                                    ^

File "game/renedit/renedit/renedit_screens.rpy", line 49: u'tooltip' is not a keyword argument or valid child for the imagebutton statement.
    tooltip _("Add a note on the current line.") 
           ^

Ren'Py Version: Ren'Py 6.99.12.2003
[/code]

I wrote a longer comment on LemmaSoft but to sum it up: Beautiful story, beautiful writing, I did cry. Struggling to get the fourth ending and I really want to experience the full story. Highly recommended to anyone who might be reading this comment.

This was a beautiful story. Thank you for writing it.

The voice acting was great, and I thought the world was really cool. I wish there would have been more opportunities to connect with the characters, though - there was just enough interaction to make me really like some of them, but most of the story's resolution had to do with the plot rather than the characters. Really nice job overall though (: and like Ecaeris said I would be interested in more games taking place in this universe with these characters.

This was a really cool game! I liked being able to walk around and talk to everyone to solve the mystery.

This was really cute. I liked both Zethe and Quinn so I got all of the endings (although it made me feel bad to choose and leave the other one all alone T_T).

WHOOPS i'm back because as a teacher-in-training Lumina's ending made me really emo and I wrote crappy poetry about it, it's not like. good but hey something that you made inspired someone else to make art about it so like legitimately good job, I haven't written a poem in like a good month at least and it's not an easy thing to unlock.

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1tCLPz_BPaoLN61fsTzMVXiCwlO-5SmBYNZqiJiL8k8c/...

I really enjoyed this! I usually don't like partial voice acting (I prefer full or none at all) but you guys did a really good job with this one, so I left it on. The moment where the games gets serious with Sadiya really hooked me fast, I was super invested at that point. I felt like the puzzle right after wasn't very well explained in the game, and it took me so long to complete that it took me out of the narrative a bit. Still, I thought the idea behind it was good, and the ending got me right in the feels. I chose Sadiya. <3 I think it would have been even more effective if I literally couldn't reload and make another choice after that, but at the same time, I was glad I could see everyone else's ending too. Overall, really good job on this. Will be looking out for more stuff from you in the future. (:

Is there a Windows version? The Linux version doesn't work for me and the other one can't even be opened by my computer.

This was a fun game, I liked the urban fantasy world. I think I managed to get all of the endings. Ilya was probably my favorite love interest. (: And I loved the cats!

I got ending 1/5 first lmao, I figured out the location to go to but I couldn't quite find what I needed to find there! But I got all of the endings eventually and I really enjoyed them. :) I used the walkthrough for ending 3/5 but I was able to get all of the others on my own.