Operation Backlog Completion 2026

All My Romance Offerings for Valentine’s Day

 My Games, My Stories, Video games, Writing  8 Responses »  Tagged with: , , ,
Feb 142018
 

If you’re familiar with my writing, you might associate me with horror, but I do have work in the romance genre, too!

For Valentine’s Day, I’ve decided to give a general overview of my romance work, including a game we haven’t discussed before.

First, there’s the lone romance among my published stories. “A Special Present,” found in the Love Under the Mistletoe anthology, is a sweet romance about two of Santa’s elves who fall in love. However, I will point out that it’s one of my earliest published stories, so the writing may not be as polished as usual.

It might be my sole romance story for now, but I’ve been writing more romance lately, so that may change. (*anxiously watches the #KissPitch progress*)

Let’s move on to visual novels.

Ascendant Hearts came out last month, and it’s seen positive reviews so far. It’s a romantic comedy set in a fantasy world that parodies JRPG tropes, and there are three romance choices (as well as a non-romance ending).

Ascendant Hearts isn’t quite as “safe” as my elf story, although it’s still pretty tame unless you get the NSFW patch from the website. Even then, there are no H-scenes and the story remains the same.

Moving on, I wrote the script for a second galge/bishojo visual novel just released last week! My Strange Girlfriend lets you romance three girls afflicted by a strange curse that gives them animal characteristics. It’s a cute story, with some humorous moments as well as serious scenes.

I’m currently working on another visual novel with a similar style.

So there you have it: my current romance offerings for Valentine’s Day. Horror and romance by the same writer? It’s more likely than you think.

Catching Up on the Weekend’s Kingdom Hearts 3 News

 Video games  No Responses »  Tagged with: , ,
Feb 122018
 

This weekend was pretty incredible for Kingdom Hearts fans. We hoped we’d get something from D23 Expo Japan 2018… and it turned out to be two trailers and a wealth of information.

I went through a spoiler-filled analysis of the story content in these trailers at KH Theories, so here I’ll focus more on going through the new information we have.

Here is the first trailer.

This trailer confirms several things:

  • Marluxia is returning.
  • Vanitas is returning.
  • The Monsters Inc. world is real.
  • Ariel appears to be a summons.

It was also interesting to see Sora’s interactions with Marluxia and Vanitas, since he has connections to them without knowing why.

The second trailer mainly introduces the new theme song by Hikaru Utada, “Oath” in the Japanese version and “Don’t Think Twice” in the English version. However, it shows some adjustments to scenes from previous trailers as well as new content at the end.

In the new scene, we see Riku (with a new design) and Mickey in the Realm of Darkness. Riku’s Keyblade has somehow been broken, and he leaves it behind for “the other me.” Official renders include what appear to be his new Keyblade.

This has prompted a lot of speculation.

But even more information came out over the weekend besides what was revealed in the trailers!

Do you miss NPCs in Kingdom Hearts? It looks like they’re back for Kingdom Hearts 3! A “Making of Kingdom Hearts III” presentation at D23 included a look at the Kingdom of Corona (Tangled), which is a lively world filled with NPCs.

You can check out more NPC shots here.

Square Enix also revealed a new Game & Watch style mini-game (this seems to be be based on Disney’s Giantland), that the final stage is something Nomura has always wanted to do, and that KH3’s Gummi Ship segments will include an open exploration phase and a combat phase.

I’ve never enjoyed the Gummi Ship segments, but it sounds like it might be more fun in Kingdom Hearts III.

Meanwhile, it also sounds like Kingdom Hearts Union Cross and Kingdom Hearts III will be linked in some way. Nomura calls this Project Xtrace.

KHUX will start using completely new worlds, the main scenario will develop rapidly, and KH3 will reveal why Ventus is around during Union Cross.

(Maybe I should start playing it again…)

Kingdom Hearts III will also include a Rare Heartless themed after Japanese pudding, and they’ll have fruit accessories. The Gummi Ship will also be customizable, in a system similar to how customization worked in Kingdom Hearts 0.2.

Finally, development of the worlds has been split into three stages. The first stage, which includes Toy Story, Monsters Inc., and Olympus, is 90% complete. Tangled is in the middle stage, which is 60-70% complete. They’ve indicated there are 10 worlds, but it’s unclear if this refers to all the worlds or just Disney worlds. (Update: apparently the actual Japanese wording could indicate anything between 10-19, so we don’t know how many worlds are in KH3 yet.)

Phew. That’s quite a lot of new information! Are you excited for Kingdom Hearts III? What do you think about the new details that were revealed this weekend?

The Good Life Kickstarter Launches on March 26

 Video games  No Responses »  Tagged with: , ,
Feb 092018
 

Remember The Good Life, a strange mystery RPG from the developer of Deadly Premonition that we discussed back in August?

The Good Life definitely sounded interesting, although a bit confusing. (It’s an RPG, but also a life sim? Plus there’s photography? And all the characters turn into cats at night? Except then they announced a dog edition?)

Swery (Hidetaka Suehiro) and his new studio tried to crowd-fund it through Fig, which might not have been a good idea. Fig’s investment model could be worthwhile, but it doesn’t have strong name recognition yet.

In the end, The Good Life raised $682,864 of its $1,500,000 goal (wow!), which meant the campaign was unsuccessful and the game was left unfunded.

This week, Swery announced that a new crowdfunding campaign for The Good Life will be launched through Kickstarter on March 26.

According to his announcement, they have made changes and are much more prepared for the campaign this time than they were the first time. It should be interesting to see what parts have changed.

So if you were interested in The Good Life and wished it met its goal, don’t lose hope yet. It’s coming back next month for another try!

 Older Entries  Newer Entries