warwoof

[warwoof]

monty from splendor & misery

[warwoof]

the last mabuse

[warwoof]

farewell intervale's out now on itch btw ^^

[warwoof]

there's definitely a sweet spot for alienation of the player that was missed on the part of the writing in key areas

jensey's meant to feel alienated, but also (at times) alien to the player. even so, it's important to give Him the agency to understand things if You choose to (fun grammar there), and as that meta relationship develops, you become increasingly intertwined

so, hyperspecific political terms and theories are thrown around, and both you and him go "this is indulgent" and soldier on.

…except that isn't where people (from what i've seen) are getting stuck

some players are doing fine with that, and are instead struggling with the usage of suni and (more often) esperanto.

i'm still a bit torn on how to handle it, because yes it'd be easy for LG in the introduction to go "esperanto is the intermundane auxiliary language, #zamenhof4evr" but i feel like that detracts from players who can piece that together, assuming they're provided the necessary clues (question is if those are being provided… skull emoji)

and would that alone be enough for players? prooobably not

at the same time, it's frustrating if from the start you want to know what 'dhar'linn doloro' means, and you just don't get told (especially if you're not sure if it's a member of the cast, the protagonist, or a character speaking aloud)

it's also been a headache for fan translators, obviously

idk i'm still really open to new approaches for this specifically, i don't think it's been entirely solved even in the indev build

2. There a lot of words and terms thrown around that sound just a little bit familiar, just enough to think ‘’this is term that may as well exist IRL but in another language’’ but no point of reference, so it added up to the initial confusion of who was talking, and I felt completely lost. - 4/?

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[warwoof]

(gonna pair some together bc they're interconnected)

this was def a failure within the public build of s&m

a lot of the lore text (esp for LG) was written w the idea that 1. you'd have a map (which wasn't included in that release LMFAO) and 2. that there'd have to be a compromise for how we handled the thoughts

w the old system (the one in the public build), it was on a case-by-case basis, so on LG interaction 1 it's "tell me more" or "fuck off" and on interaction 999 it's the same, as it is w every other choice and character. obv that means the LG interactions (the WHOLE time) need to assume that it could always be your first time interacting w LG, so it has to be accommodating at the expense of responsiveness

that tension between limited mechanics and the narrative forced a lot of compromise in the prev release, w things like character affinity to player alignment having to be paused.

now that they work, a lot of the old content is having to be redone bc it doesn't need to dance around those limitations (hence the ungodly dev time on this update omfg)

it's also why some mechanics meant to indicate Something Changed (like the blue and red overlays) feel kinda orphaned, bc they're meant to be tied into this much larger network of systems that (at the time of prev release) wasn't ready

All in all, there is also the fact that most of what I learned of the world (nations, setting, those things) came from content outside of the VN proper - like the fact we are on a planet with 2 moons, not an anthropomorphized version of our own world and so on. - 6/7

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[warwoof]

Those are my observations on what stood out to me in terms of communicating the world through the writing. I hope this helps you in some way, or gives you some perspective. I’m not looking to bash this VN. I feel you are scracthing an itch, in a genre that is slowly being standardized (VNs, FVNs). But I also felt there is a disconnect in what is being showed and what can be inferred from it. I’m very curious to follow the progress in this front, and other projects you may have in store! - 7/7

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[warwoof]

All in all, there is also the fact that most of what I learned of the world (nations, setting, those things) came from content outside of the VN proper - like the fact we are on a planet with 2 moons, not an anthropomorphized version of our own world and so on. - 6/7

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[warwoof]

There is also a framework that is inherited from the DiscoElysium formatting that I feel is weird - like the « dice roll ». You’re not rolling any dice, and there are no mechanics attached to these moments, but you hear the same sounds, and on some level I expect some follow up later down the line of the dialogue options I chose to expend on - but no, it’s just a little extra info on the world. Which is nice and good, but the formatting feels out of place then. - 5/7

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[warwoof]

2. There a lot of words and terms thrown around that sound just a little bit familiar, just enough to think ‘’this is term that may as well exist IRL but in another language’’ but no point of reference, so it added up to the initial confusion of who was talking, and I felt completely lost. - 4/?

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[warwoof]

But yeah I feel like there is not enough points of references for people to ground the setting in something concrete. I was confused as hell with the intro. A combination of factors. 1.I didn’t know who was talking at first - my 1st thought was that, the portrait next to the text column belonged to the POV character, but that didn’t seem to fit, and there was no portrait displayed in the bottom corner at 1st. - 3/?

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[warwoof]

But it feels very opaque, even cryptic. I feel some of it is by design, given the genre (noir/dialogue heavy/geopolitical oriented/character dynamics, and so on). But I also feel there is a gap in what is intentional opaqueness and what is not. I knew I pushed a little harder in the story because of the presentation, similar to that of Disco Elysium, and some other aspects like the art, ambience, general tone of writing. - 2/?

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[warwoof]

hello again, this is the previous anon that posted the sequence of asks for the S&M VN. Feel free to post my asks, no problem!

🙂‍↕️

[warwoof]

hello there! I wanted to offer up some impressions on Splendor and Misery, as I feel this VN has potential but, for the time being at least, limited reach and a niche audience. I hope you’ll be able to continue working on it despite the difficulties! I stumbled upon S&M a little while back but only recently went through it (read it like, last month), and I wanted to say I'm very intrigued by what this story is about. The art style is great, there is a depth to the world. - 1/?

anon u hit a lot of really good points would u mind if I post the rest of these

[warwoof]

an absence

[warwoof]

loverboy

özbey from s&m

[warwoof]

waif artisto

kilian from s&m

[warwoof]

outlanders

jensey + kristin from splendor & misery