Visual Novel Progress "Coming Home"

[Rob_Silvermyst]

Over the past few months, I have started to work on what will be my first Visual Novel. This Visual Novel is going to be titled "Coming Home", a story about a former soldier having left the military after serving during war time and returning to his hometown that is loosely based on my own experiences and some of that of people I grew up with (Only three of them, as the others are purely fictional with influences from other VNs or stories). There he is greeted by his childhood friends, eight in total, varying from a human female to a post-op trans mouse (male -> female). But this is more than just a dating sim. It explores a variety of issues, both on the social level and psychological one as each and every character has some sort of issue, as well as those issues surrounding the main character.


A soldier's struggles do not end after war.


So with that being said, this is my first update on the VN. I myself am not the most competent artist, so all backgrounds right now are stock placeholders. I will be commissioning for art and music after I finish writing and coding the VN's dialogue, transitions and choices by putting up a kickstarter for the money needed to cover those expenses.


The main cast is as follows:
Robert Riven - A human male who completed his tour of duty and served in Operation Iraqi Freedom. This is the main protagonist of the VN. He must try to adjust back into a civilian life while still living with the memories of what he went through with episodes of PTSD (Post Traumatic Stress Disorder)
Carolyn Woulas - A human female. She went to middle school with Robert at St. Joseph. Her father is a very controlling and abusive cop.
Lilly Vixani - A female vixen who is 100% blind since birth. She moved to North Wolfhaven when Robert was starting high school.
Tara Savoie - A female red panda who was Robert's early childhood friend. She suffers from Bi-Polar disorder.
Freya Sekhmet - A female wolfess who focuses on kickboxing and bodybuilding. Befriended Robert in early high school along with her best friend and rival Terry.
Yosuke Kuro - A male white domestic feline with black hair and a blue streak. A former exchange student from Japan who recently immigrated to the US.
Terry Krauser - A muscular male black puma who has a passion for wrestling and acting. Closeted bisexual, submissive when it comes to romance and sex.
Nikky Lupa - A twinkishly feminine bunny male who is transgendered in mind. Flirty, plain spoken, but very reliable and sound-minded. He owns and runs a bar in North Wolfhaven.
Taylor Lynn - A mouse boy who, after winning the CT lottery, used that money to undergo a sex change operation, becoming a full female. She is rather shy and a bookworm, and she is very caring for her friends. She is often meek around strangers and can frighten easily.


Progress thus far:
* The prologue is finished. This includes a arriving at the airport, a van ride to the welcoming home party, and a ride from the party to the new house. Within this prologue are three sets of choices: where in the van you want to sit (which gives you two characters to converse with in each choice), an option of who you want to sit next to at the party, and which friend or friends you want to get a ride to your home from. This third set is going to influence some dialogue in Day One.


* Day one of Coming Home has been completed in dialogue and coding. Your choice in the prologue as to who you get a ride home from directly affects the main scene in day one. Only one set of choices given in Day One, which will have another effect down the line. Currently, I am working on a map and temp selectable icons for day 2, as day 2 is when you will start being able to select where you go, and in that case, who you end up spending time with. Days from day 2 on forward will have two chances to go about and spend time with the eight potential partners, save for major events. My hope is to get up to the next major point done sometime by February.

[Oanta]

Sounds like a good start. I'm not very good with art but if you have any questions about mental illness, I have two degrees and I work in group homes that serve people who have mental illness, brain injury, or chemical dependence. So I might be helpful in understanding some of the background of the illnesses you will be using it you want to use me as a reference.

[Rob_Silvermyst]

Thanks, though I am mostly working off of personal experience. Myself with aspects of PTSD, my friend Tara with her bi-polar episodes, and what Carolyn has been through under her father's abuse. The rest are purely fictional, but some are based on those I have known growing up before they moved away. However, I am always open to suggestions that will help things out.

Now then, onto update #2

Day 2 is complete dialogue and transition-wise. Day and Evening events were added (3 places to choose from in the morning and 3 places to choose from at night). Each area has either one or two of the other characters that will help to give a bit more background on their individual characters, and one spot in the evening lineup gives a choice to add an additional boost to affection and more time together with one of the two choices.

I have also finalized for myself  the flow of the story. 11 days up until the choice of who's path to pursue, 4 of which will have the day/evening bits. There will be 4 main line events, not including the events within the different character's romance paths which start after day 11. Each ending route will have 4 days to them.
Carolyn will have 2 endings.
Tara will have two endings.
Freya will have 4 endings: 2 main endings with two variation endings for polygamous line
Lilly will have 3 endings
Terry will have 4 endings: 2 monogamous, 2 polygamous
Yosuke will have 3 endings, 1 bring polygamous
Nikky will have 4 endings: 2 monogamous, 2 polygamous
Taylor will have 3 endings: 1 monogamous, 2 polygamous

[Rob_Silvermyst]

Alright, it has been quite some time since I last was able to really touch my work. Things went south in February as I lost my job at Foxwoods. Ended up having to pick up a warehouse picker job that had me working anywhere from 8-16 hours a day. While the pay was certainly better, I was run ragged, and on my two days off I was so tired and drained that I could only rest. Now that I'm back into security, I've been able to pick up my VN and work more on it.

Day 3 is complete. There are three choices for the morning, two of which have some branching areas that will let you become closer to one of the romance choices, as well as start digging into some of their issues and personality. You will also get to see a bit more of the main character's personality. A nice dose of humor for the choices in the mall and for Terry's path at the park. Yosuke's path is more of a quiet reflection. Carolyn's path takes a more serious path, showing her fears and concerns regarding her father's presence and worry for the safety of her sister.

The evening are two areas: Shopping with Lilly, playing in an arcade with Tara and Yosuke, and going to the bowling alley with everyone else. Lilly's path gives a bit better insight as to how much a blind person needs to have someone honest with them, pointing out the troubles that in a store, no product has braille. The bowling alley and arcade is more humor focused.

I will be working on the first major event, the visit to the VA mental health. The person you will spend time with before and after the visit is chosen based on who you asked during the day you spent moving your belongings into the new house (Carolyn, Taylor or Freya). It will also delve a bit deeper into the psychiatric problems PTSD can cause and what is used to help those afflicted with it to cope.

[Rob_Silvermyst]

Finally got done with the first main event in the VN, the trip to the Veteran Affairs, where the main character is diagnosed and given treatment for his PTSD. In this there are three characters that can drive him there based on who you asked back in the moving day segment: Freya, Taylor or Carolyn. In choosing Taylor, Yosuke comes along as well. In all three, you are able to learn more about  each one of these characters and their feelings towards you. In Freya and Taylor's routes, there's an option that triggers the potential path for a poly relationship (Freya and Terry; Taylor and Yosuke).

Next up will be one or two days work of more interactions before the second and third major events. After the third major event, the choice will be presented as to which initial character's romance path you want to follow. Only those who have a certain number of relationship points will be made visible and available at the choice menu. For the poly endings, you will need to get the trigger event to open up the option along that character's path. The poly couples (including you in them) are: Freya/Terry, Taylor/Nikky, Taylor/Yosuke

[Rob_Silvermyst]

Okay everyone, guess what? All that progress you've been seeing me make in these updates? They're gone. All that hard work, gone. What happened was the power supply itself crapped out and shot into my hard drive, rendering it stone cold dead and unrecoverable. All of my visual novel progress? Gone. With the exception of a bit I worked on ahead of time on my thumb drive, it's all gone. I have to start over from scratch.

I think what I will do is start up a patreon. I can use the money I get from that to commission art for the VN a bit at a time, and use the extra to help pay off some of my debts, because between having to get a new car, rent increase, insurance increase, I've got $20 for gas and $20 for food each week.

[Rob_Silvermyst]

  Well, here we are, back at square one, although with a bit of extra caution this time. I have made copies of the script on my new hard drive, on my thumb drive, and on my external hard drive. I'm going to try and see if the files can be recovered from my dead hard drive, but in the meantime I did have one saving grace of sorts: I had, at the earliest build, sent a copy to someone to playtest, so I have the first full prologue day saved.

Here are today's updates:
*Character value tags, definitions and starting triggers have been set
*Airport scene has been completed
*Three choices of where to ride in the van, determining which pair of friends you get to speak with, increase affection and learn some backstory on.
*Welcoming party at the pseudo Medieval Times restaurant, complete with another set of choices of who you want to sit with, raise affection and learn more backstory of the individual character.
*Choice of who drives you to your new home from the diner. Raises affection with one or two characters, also each one leads to the main characters first intense Post Traumatic Stress Disorder attack.
*Arrival at the new home leading to end of prologue day 1
*Final main line event before the route split both parts 1 & 2 complete
* Two daily events: Meeting Yosuke at the church and discussing differences between Shinto and Christianity in regards to churches and shrines, and another at the church towards the last part of Carolyn's main line before the major event and split as her plans to aid her sister start to crumble before her. These were in the making before the crash happened and were saved on my thumb drive.

*Morning of the beach trip right before the major event done, along with Lilly's first section of the beach day done. Mmm, snocones =3
   

[Rob_Silvermyst]

Update #2. Things are speeding up quite nicely. It helps that I've been able to spend most of my work days doing this during my quiet hours. I've been able to, as a result, spend 4 days a week and up to six hours a day  on this. Having the planner already made of who you visit when and still remembering all of the encounters has certainly helped.

* Prologue Day 2 is complete. The segment where the protagonist must tell everyone the events that happened in Iraq and in the car of the one who drove him home the previous day is slightly different depending on who it was that drove him home.
* 3 choices presented of which of three characters to ask for a ride to the Veteran Affairs building: Freya, Carolyn or Taylor. This determines the events of Day VA, which will sit between Main Day 2 and Main Day 3.
*Main Day 1 is complete. Day starts off with the Protagonist waking from a night terror, a nightmare displaying visions of those he could not save back when he was overseas as a medic.
* Morning Day 1, 3 Choices: Meet Lilly in the Park, Carolyn at the church, or Freya at at the School Track.
* Evening Day 1, 3 choices: Meet Taylor and Yosuke at the library,  Terry and Nikky at Nikky's Bar, Tara at the Store. At the bar, you can choose to play pool with Terry, or go and listen to Nikky's troubles.
* Main Day 2 is complete.
* Day 2 Morning, 3 choices: Meet with Carolyn and Taylor at the Library, meet with Lilly at the Store, meet with Tara in the Forest.
* Day 2 Evening, 3 choices: Meet with Freya and Nikky at Nikky's Bar, Meet Terry in  the Park, meet Yosuke at the Church.
*VA Day is done. Choosing to be driven by Freya will lead to a flag that will open up the Terry/Freya poly romance. Carolyn's route gives a more in depth look at Carolyn's past. Taylor's route has a split towards the last third of it, one path holding a trigger to open the option for a Taylor/Yosuke poly romance.

[Rob_Silvermyst]

Update #3 So far, so good on keeping myself on schedule. Today was pretty crazy with a city-wide power outage at work, but despite that, I was able to achieve the goal I had set for myself.

~Main Day 3 is complete
~Morning 3: You can choose to head to the Baseball Park and spend some time with Terry and Freya. There is a split where you can spend some alone time with either one, and if you asked Freya to give you a ride to the VA earlier and choose to spend time with her here, the option to have a poly romance between you, her and Terry opens up on her path. You can choose to head to the store to meet up with Tara and Yosuke. There is also a split here to earn some bonus affection with either one, and a bit more background on Robert in Yosuke's part. You can choose to head to the Riverside Mill and meet with Carolyn and her sister Christina, with a bit of time talking about the impending departure.
~Evening 3: You can head out to the forest to meet with Lilly. Here she confides in you of her parents intending to move, her worries, a bit more of her past, and how cherished the player is to her. Perhaps one of my favorite pieces written so far. You can also choose to head to the mall with Taylor and Nikky. Here there is a triple split, and one of those splits opens up the trigger for a poly romance between you, Nikky and Taylor.

[Rob_Silvermyst]

'Coming Home' visual novel update! I can officially say, I am at the 1/3 mark with dialogue, flags and coding.
Day 4 is complete! I'll be focusing hard now on some of the hardest and longest pieces as I round the corner and into the next few major events, each one going back to back, leading ultimately ito the route split where focus will then pull to who's romance path you wish to follow.

~Morning day 4: Two places you can choose from. Visit the church to meet with Carolyn and Lilly. Something doesn't seem to be right about Christina not showing up, and both the girls are concerned. You can also visit the park, where Yosuke and Terry have a little back and forth, only for Terry to over-react to a tease. You can follow Terry and learn about the side he's trying to hide, or stay with Yosuke and discover that he's starting to take as much of an interest in guys as he has in women. If either of these two are high enough in affection, you can get an early sex scene with Terry, or a confession from Yosuke.

~Evening day 4: Two places you can choose from. You can visit Nikky's bar, where an old 'flame' has come back with his gang and starts to cause havoc. Once the situation diffuses, you can either talk to Freya, who's frustrated with herself and what happened, or spend time comforting Nikky. After spending time with either, they realize how late it is and Nikky offers them to sleep upstairs. You will sleep on the couch, however, if you have high enough affection with either one, you will get an early sex scene and sleep with either Freya or Nikky.

If you are interested in helping me raise funds for the character and scene art, please consider supporting me on my patreon: https://www.patreon.com/cominghome

[Rob_Silvermyst]

Alright, it has been quite some time since the last update, but there is a lot that has been done!

~Beach Scenes are complete! The day starts with you choosing which of the eight you want to spend your day with. The first third of this focuses mostly on spending time with  the one you choose, delving a bit into each characters personality and story, as well as more humor. The second section brings everyone together for some fun around the soon to be bonfire on the beach. the last third falls back into spending time with your chosen friend, dancing and sharing a bit more of some heartwarming dialogue before everyone is driven back home.
~Major event part 1 is complete: Tragedy strikes in the early morning, and Robert rushes to the hospital.
~Major event part 2 with branch opening. The aftermath of the major event. At the end of this, any character you have up to at least 5 points of affection with will be selectable. There is also a default selectable option for in case you somehow manage to get no one to 5 affection and up, in case you want to do an early end and not choose to romance anyone.

At this point, I am going to purchase some royalty free backgrounds, as well as royalty free music and sound effects. Once these are done, I will open it for playtesting. Only once I have this playtested, made any adjustments to this main section of story prior to the paths, I will then open up a kickstarter to cover the cost of art for the characters, scenes, perhaps some custom music, and set some stretch goals for animation segments.

This is getting exciting!