I’m really happy about this anouncement that I’m going to make on this blog. Finally, ya gurl has graduated from university! *insert loud cheers here* This is actually already a late announcement since I’ve been a bum for like two weeks now, but I do think this news at least deserves its own blog post here in my dev blog. And I just have to warn you, this might be a much longer blog post than I intended.

The last four years have been the most fun, most exhilarating, most exciting, most troublesome, most painful, but definitely most memorable four years of my life thus far. I learned countless lessons and I made countless memories with so many people– family, friends, and acquaintances, many of whom are going to stay with me forever.

It’s been such an amazing rollercoaster ride and I’m really happy to have stayed in the visual novel community that whole time. VNs have been a big part of my life since I was a kid, and I know it’s going to be a part of my life no matter how old I get.

As an elementary school student, I spent hundreds of hours beating every Ace Attorney game, immersing myself in its wonderful world and quirky characters. In high school, I discovered more visual novels, especially in the Original English Language Visual Novel (OELVN) scene, and I got terribly addicted to them! Now, that’s the kind of addiction that I didn’t mind having.

I put up a blog, then my personal blog– you know, the kind of blog everyone as a 13-year-old had that contained whatever they were thinking about that day– and made it my personal visual novel diary that chronicles all the visual novels I’ve played, particularly the otome ones, which were and still are my favorite genre.

At 14, I finally decided that I wanted to create a visual novel of my own, so I came up with Seasons of Love, my first ever visual novel idea that I’m still dreaming about completing someday. The problem was, I had underestimated what it took to create a long and complex visual novel such as that one, so it was no surprise that I wasn’t able to finish it. It still remains on the back burner, with page after page of complete outlines and all, to this day.

Thankfully, as we all know, 14-year-olds are incredibly resilient and stubborn, so despite my initial ‘failure’, I used 8 days of my free time the following summer to make Summer Paradise. At 30,000 words, it was much shorter than what I had planned for Seasons of Love, but the important thing was that I had finally managed to finish one game. I was part of my school’s publication as an editor for 1 year and a news and features writer for 6 years, and I’ve joined and won in dozens of both intraschool and interschool writing competitions, but never have I ever felt as happy about my own writing as that moment when random people on the internet first started playing my game– my own game, the very thing that I worked so hard for.

It’s strange, isn’t it? How something so simple can give someone such joy and a sense of accomplishment and satisfaction.

The rest of the years would eventually pass in a blur. Now, it’s been 6 years and I’ve finally gotten my bachelor’s degree in a management course, all while partaking in several visual novel projects. Majority of them have been released, some were unfortunately cancelled, while others have been put on an indefinite hiatus. After all, problems can and will occur in life, and they can’t be avoided. Even outside the visual novel sphere, I’ve had some major issues too. I had gone through a horribly long and drawn-out breakup with someone who I thought was already ‘forever’. I had to watch my family almost fall apart after two deaths. I battled depression during college and had to go to therapy a lot of times, and I almost dropped out of college at one point. I even tried to take the ‘easy way out’ of this life twice. I guess you can say that I’ve definitely racked up a lot of experience points over the years.

But well, here I am, still alive and kicking. I’ve learned that the saying is true: what doesn’t kill you only makes you stronger. I’m much stronger now than when I was 14, that’s for sure. And to tell you the truth, I’m still learning about so many new things, both in life and game development!

See, one of the things that I love most about VN development is that there’s always something more to learn. As of this writing, that number of visual novels I’ve taken part in is already up to 16 announced projects, 9 of which have been released, and I can’t be prouder of each one. They are all my babies and I love them all with equal measure. But I am constantly still striving to improve my writing (and my coding too!), which has led me to experiment with different genres. It’s hard to admit it, but learning really does only exist outside of your comfort zone. I’d like to believe that I’m continuously improving, only because I’m challenging myself more and more and delving into things that my younger self would have been too scared or doubtful to do before.

Writing is my passion. Always has been, and always will be. And while I still dream of completing Seasons of Love someday as well as releasing a VN/RPG hybrid (kind of like Harvest Moon or Rune Factory), for now my only goal is to continue pushing myself out of my comfort zone to be the best version of myself.

After all, I still have the rest of my life to learn.

“Education must not simply teach work—it must teach life.” – W. E. B. Du Bois

So, I missed this week’s progress update due to some more irl stuff (I guess I’ve come to accept that as long as game dev is not my full time work, this will always be a part of my blog updates, ha), but nevertheless, I’m back for some development sneak-peeks!

• Changeling – I’ve finished coding the last route! I’m still waiting for one last sprite that I need to code in, though. Anyways, things are looking really good. Even though my role in this project is just pretty minor, I’m nevertheless excited for the release. I personally found the story very charming and absolutely intriguing, so I can’t wait for you guys to try it out yourselves, too!
• Selfish – Still on Leon’s route! I might have to revisit some of the earlier scenes too, just for some improvements.
• Enchanted – I’m at ten out of 25 of the planned common route scenes. At this rate, I’ll probably finish everything in 3 weeks, but I’m actually hoping to finish the common route it before May ends. My undergraduate classes end next week, so I’ll actually be free for the rest of May! Here’s to praying that no other things come up that will delay the progress.

As for other updates… well, as I said, my last day of classes (for my whole undergraduate college life) will be next week! I’m super excited to move on from this stage of my life and move on to the next one. I haven’t applied to any jobs yet, though. I consulted with my parents and some people in school and I’ve decided to take some time off first, at least for a couple of months. I’ve had a really stressful (but super fun) four years in college so I’ll be using this time to rest, relax, and work on my passion first (hello there, blogs and visual novels) before I work in an industry related to my degree (which has nothing to do with writing or game development at all). I’m also going to use this time to think more clearly about my path for the future.

(Speaking of the future, if you guys know any openings for writing or coding jobs, especially ones that will only start next month or July, please do give me a message! I’d highly, highly appreciate it. I’m looking for something to fill my time while I’m not yet working full-time.)

Anyway, that’s about it for this update! Thanks for reading, and please check back next time for more!

Remember to keep playing, everyone~

I’m actually pretty happy about this blog update. I didn’t have any classes (except for one single 3 hour class) for about 5 straight days due to May 1 being a public holiday. That means, I got to work on a lot of stuff!

• Selfish
  • Last 6 scenes to go! The rough draft is still pretty rough, but I’m actually glad that we’re making some progress here. I talked to the project head recently regarding the choices in-game. As of now, the story is pretty linear, but we’re going to incorporate around 8 choices per route that will lead to either a good ending or a bad ending. There’s no in-between in the Selfish universe! (Just kidding.)
• Changeling
  • I’m about 9,000 lines into the script, which is more than 3/4 of way there. Once I finish (which will be about 12,000 lines) I’ll re-test the whole game for bugs and coding errors. Hope there won’t be much to fix! Oh, and if you want to follow this game for more updates, you can check out Steamberry Studio’s blog or Twitter account!
• Enchanted
  • Ah, this is one that I’m super excited about! Remember the unannounced otome game that I mentioned in last week’s update? Well, we’ve finally announced it! Get ready for Enchanted: A Wish of the Heart, a fantasy, comedy, romance otome visual novel about a girl named Amethyst who comes across a strange jewel that may or may not have some magic powers. I’ve joined the team as the writer, coder, as well as the social media manager (wow, what a title! But this just means I’ll be in charge of posting on and updating the social media accounts of the team hehe), so I guess it’s obvious why I’m so excited. Anyway, if you want to check it out and perhaps follow for more progress updates, you can visit Teacup Fox’s website or Twitter account!

Another thing that I’m super excited about is the new update to my blog! I’ve done a major rehaul of the theme and I’m really loving it so far! Well, actually, after setting up Teacup Fox’s website, I kind of thought about cleaning up my own blog since it’s been quite messy these last few… months? Years? I don’t remember when I last did a theme rehaul.

I’m really happy about this change though! Hopefully, when I get enough money, I can finally get a self-hosted WordPress site (it’s so expensive to keep a self-hosted WP blog huhu) as it’s part of my 2018 New Year’s Resolutions. But hey, it’s only the second day of May and I still have almost seven months to save money. Definitely keeping my fingers crossed for that one!

Anyway, that’s it for this week’s updates. See you again in next week!

And as always, don’t forget to keep playing, everyone!

Granted, the main reason why I’ve been so busy is because I’m currently trying to finish my undergraduate thesis (which has something to do with haunted places in my country – yes, my interest in horror is painfully obvious in my topic choice) but other than that, I’ve also made considerable progress in my visual novel projects as well.

• Selfish
  I’ve gotten past that hard-to-write scene that I told you guys before! It’s all thanks to Valhalla, our project head and one of my co-writers. Right now, I’m currently around 75% into the script. The goal is to finish it before May or at least the first week, because as I said, the demo will be released in May. According to our project head though, the demo may be pushed back at least a week. I’m not too sure about all the details, but you can find out more in the latest updated by Winged Studios on their blog. Regardless, I’ll be sticking to my original schedule. Better be too early than too late, right?
• Changeling
  I’m currently at 4,000 lines, which is about 1/3 of the way through. Like I said in my last blog post, I’m planning to finish it this week. Hopefully, nothing else comes up so that I can stick to this plan.
• Unannounced Otome
  Until this is announced, I think I’ll stick to calling it ‘UO’ because it’s so long. Anyway, I’ve been working on it steadily the last few days. There’s still a pretty long way to go, script-wise, but since it’s going to be a relatively short game anyway, I’m actually planning to finish this by May or perhaps June. Let’s see how it goes.

I love working on several projects at a time because working on just one honestly tires me out. If I’m working on just one consistently, I end up feeling brain-dead just a few hours into it. So what I usually do is, I set up time blocks per game in my schedule and switch accordingly. That was, my brain feels fresh at all times. I actually like this writing-coding job I have right now, since I can do a ‘write (Selfish) – code (Changeling) – write ( UO) – code (Changeling)’ setup, then just rinse and repeat.

And speaking of time blocks, I’ve been using a weekly timetable so much these past few weeks! It’s super effective. I’ve actually got an overloaded sem this semester and it’s getting harder and harder to schedule everything the usual way. I only have classes three days a week, technically just two since on Mondays I just have one class, but those two days are the absolute hell. 7:00 to 17:30, no breaks in between. What happens is that I’m usually up by 5:00, then I leave for school at 6:00, and then arrive home at 18:30 or even 19:00, depending on the traffic. Spending 14 hours of your day preparing for, going to, and coming home from school is certainly very exhausting!

Anyway, that’s about it for now! I’ll update you guys if anything new comes up!

Keep playing, everyone~

It’s something that all writers, at some point in their lives, have experienced at least once (and usually way more than once).

So, I’ve been working on this otome visual novel for quite a while now. The title is Selfish, and it’s indie dev studio, Winged Studios’ first project. It has a very interesting plot, one about courtesans and kingdoms and deep, dark secrets. Intriguing, isn’t it? Yeah, I thought so too! I think I’m really lucky to be given the chance to be the writer for two of the five routes. So far, it’s been really amazing.

BG by Vui-Huynh, taken from Winged Studios’ blog

But here’s the thing. I’ve been stuck on this one scene for literally weeks. Yes, weeks.

I’ve tried everything. I’ve tried skipping it, I’ve tried changing it, I’ve tried gluing my butt (well, maybe not, but I definitely thought of it) to my desk just to please, come on, write it.

And still, I’m stuck.

I’m sure you guys know how frustrating it is to not be able to come up with something remotely decent when you’re trying to write something. Or, when you finally do come up with something, you realize that it’s trash and end up deleting it anyway. And so the cycle goes on and on and on. *cries*

During these times, it’s so tempting to just give up on it and completely remove that scene altogether (…although, of course I can’t, since it’s a pretty vital scene, haha). But see, the thing is, if I give up, then that scene will remain unfinished, probably forever (no, not really). Meanwhile, if I try, I’m probably going to have a hard time, but eventually, I know that I’ll also end up writing it the way I want it to be written, and I’ll be a much better writer than I was before, too.

Well, what do you know, the saying, “you miss 100% of the shots you don’t take“ turns out to be applicable when it comes to writing hard stuff!

I’ll try again. And again, and again, until I finally get that scene right. I definitely won’t give up.

After all, you guys will be there to cheer on me (and the whole team) right?

If you want to be updated on Selfish’s progress, you can follow Winged Studios’Twitter account or dev blog. The latter is still pretty new so it doesn’t have much on it, but rest assured, more content will be coming soon!

How about you, how do you overcome writer’s block? Share your experience in the comments down below!

And no, I’m not dead, don’t worry! This isn’t a ghost talking to all of you. Sorry for not posting for so long! I haven’t thought of posting in a while since I haven’t really been working on anything new.

Wait, scratch that, I actually do have some updates worth mentioning.

Here are some of the stuff that I’m currently working on for this year!

• Selfish – I’ve been working on this game since last year, alongside Kachuna. There are three writers onboard, and I’m in charge of two out of five routes. I may be part of the team, but I’m totally, totally fangirling at the awesome art!  The demo is going to come out sometime this May, so be sure to watch out for it!

Logo taken from Winged Studio’s website

• Changeling – I’m really happy to be given the opportunity to work on this project! I’m currently the coder for two routes, which has been a pretty awesome job so far, because I get to read while I code the script. I was actually already planning to play the demo; imagine getting paid to read it (okay, maybe not exactly)! I’m done with the first route, hopefully I’ll finish the last route next week.

Image taken from Steamberry Studio’s website

• Unannounced Otome Game – Yes, I’m working on an otome game again! Yay! Otome is my favorite visual novel genre, so this is definitely great news for me. It’s a short, fantasy game that features three really cute guys. Right now, it’s still unannounced, so I don’t want to ruin anything by spoiling it here. Sorry! You guys know I love ya, right? And anyway, it’s a pretty short project, so I’m sure you’ll hear about it pretty soon!

Other stuff I’ve done this year:

• Coded Razzart Visual’s new BxG, GxG eroge! I also coded one of their games last year, so I’m really glad that they chose to hire me for coding work again. It came from a super unexpected email, too! Aah, repeat clients always make me so happy!

Image taken from Razzart Visual’s website

• Finalized Kachuna! I finished writing the complete script, including the eroge scenes, around June of last year (7 months since I first started writing), but it took me around 9 months to code everything in, including the voice acting. Uwuwu, I’m really embarrassed about that. I’ve already explained the reason why I went on a hiatus, but still, I take all the blame for the delay. Sorry to all the people we had waiting! *bows down 100x*

Obviously, 2018 has been a pretty amazing so far, and I just can’t wait for the rest of the year! Still looking for some stuff to do for the latter half of the year, but hey, we’ll get there when we get there. Meanwhile, my writing/coding commissions are always open, ready for a new project. *wink*wink* Feel free to shoot me a message for inquiries, help, or just anything under the sun, really (yes, we can talk about your dog too, if you want).

Keep playing, everyone! :”)

P.S. If you want to play His Chuunibyou Can’t Be Cured a.k.a. Kachuna (I hope you do!) you can purchase the game for less than $15 on Steam or MangaGamer. There’s also a free demo available on the Steam page, so please do check it out!

What about you guys? What are you working on this 2018? I’d love to know in the comments below!

It’s already January 11, which means this is already 11 days late, but you know the saying, ‘better to be late than never’, right?

2017 was a really wild rollercoaster ride.

A lot of things happened to me, especially in the latter half of 2017. From May 2017-July 2017, I took a break from my regular VN work, because I had to focus on school related-things. To be more specific, I went on an internship this summer, for my major in college.

Everything was going perfectly well, until life probably decided that it was going too well for me. April rolled around, there was this huge hurdle that I had to overcome, but I did manage to get through it. I did.

But from then on, things took a turn for the worse.

I don’t usually post these things here, on this blog, but I just want to get it out. I usually keep my personal life separate from my VN life–from my life that you guys read about here– but I feel like sharing this part of my life right now.

(Trigger warning for depressed or suicidal people.)

The first bad thing that happened was going through a really horrible breakup with someone who I thought was already for the long-term. And that was right before my birthday. My birthday in 2017 was definitely the worst birthday I’ve ever had in my entire life. It passed by like a blur, because I had just been wallowing in sadness the whole day. I went out with some friends, but I just… felt empty. After that, everything was much more of a blur. I skipped a lot of classes, missed a lot of requirements, barely passed my exams. I tried to take ‘the easy way out’ twice. Both attempts failed, thanks to my friends and family who were very observant of me. My parents were already so worried, they tried to make me drop out of school. I really, really wanted to drop out, but dropping out would cause a few major ripples to my friends (I’m currently doing my undergraduate thesis, and if I dropped out, my thesis partner wouldn’t be able to graduate on time either, and I felt that she didn’t deserve that) so I just gritted my teeth and continued on with my semester. I was already depressed at this point and was undergoing therapy and counseling sessions so that I can go back to normal. But then, my maternal grandmother’s youngest brother suffered a stroke, which really affected my family greatly. And then, if that wasn’t bad enough, a close uncle of mine died from a heart attack. I watched my cousins cry over the untimely loss of their papa. Think that’s bad? Just a few weeks before Christmas, my paternal grandmother, who just turned 84 this year, suffered a stroke that left her unable to stand, let alone walk, anymore. But despite her loss of mobility, we’re honestly just glad that she’s still alive and well.

2017 was the worst year of my life so far. Definitely the worst. Never in my life have I spent a whole month crying my eyes out every single day. Never in my life have I lost 15 pounds in a week due to stress. Never in my life have I had so many bad things happen to my relatives in a span of three months. And never in my life have I sat crying in the bathroom, a bottle of pills in my hand, contemplating whether or not to just end things right then and there.

This year taught me that it’s amazing how much people can hide these things from other people. If you see all my pictures from this year, even from the latter half of this year, you wouldn’t know about all these. You wouldn’t know about all the nights that I spent crying by myself, tortured by my thoughts and nightmares. You wouldn’t know about all the days I spent walking around like a zombie, trying to pretend that everything’s fine when the truth is, everything was already falling apart. And you certainly wouldn’t know that just by looking at the surface, because all you’ll see is a happy girl with a warm smile.

2017 was one heck of a year, I’ll give you that. I almost gave up, but I’m really glad I didn’t. I’m glad I held on. I’m glad that I chose to believe in myself after all, in my friends, in my family. I’m glad that I chose to believe that there is still hope. I’m glad I didn’t choose to hit the ‘Quit’ button, because hey, in life, there’s no ‘New Game’ button. You have to keep going. But you can always ‘Pause’ and ‘Resume’. You can take some time off for yourself, you can take a rest every now and then. Life may be like a game, but for me, I think life is not a race. And if life throws you hurdles along the way, it’s okay to rest before taking on the next one. Even if they all come at the same time.

2017 may not have been my year, but I did learn to be much, much stronger. Or rather, I learned that I could be much stronger than I thought I was. And for me, that’s one very important lesson that I’d gladly take for the rest of my life.

And now, I’m excited for you, 2018! Bring it on! I’m ready~

Oh, and always remember, everyone: keep playing!

Okay, so… this is the moment we’ve all been waiting for, for like weeks now, haha. Kachuna is now 100% complete!

*insert tears of happiness here*

Well… the ‘clean’ version, at least. For those of you who don’t know yet, Kachuna has an eroge version, which will be released sometime after the clean one. That’s actually because Steam doesn’t allow 18+ games on its system, and Kachuna will be initially released on Steam.

Anyway, I’m really, really happy for this development!

I’ll still be updating this blog constantly, though, since I still do have a couple of ongoing projects. Right now, I’ve got one project I’m actively working on and one that’s just about to start. Since Kachuna is now complete, my main goal now will be to finish the demo for Ethereal Pulse, a BxG visual novel by Illum. Studios. I had to slow down my writing for this project in order to reach all the deadlines for Kachuna, haha, so I’ve got a lot to make up for!

Fun fact: the coded script has around 300k+ words… and this was all done under 6 months. I’m also in my 3rd year of university, and surprisingly (and I was really, really surprised) I actually managed to maintain my average grade. Sure, I had sleepless night after sleepless night so I guess you can say I sacrificed my health a little bit in order for that to happen, but I did try my best to take care of myself as much as I can! I also did have a lot of stressful times though, due to working on business plans one moment and then writing character scripts the next, hahaha. My daily to-do list actually has two columns now, one for visual novels and the other for schoolwork. While working on Kachuna I also had a couple of other projects, as I said, and they also had their own deadlines. Deadlines, deadlines, deadlines everywhere! It was stressful and exhilarating and oh-so-worth it all at the same time.

I gotta admit, I never thought I was capable of something like that, haha, and I’m really happy that I was able to challenge myself through Kachuna. If you told me 6 months ago that I could consistently write around 50k-70k words per month, I’d have told you that you were insane. But these last few months… I managed to do just that.

Perhaps, just like Jun, I also needed a wake-up call in order to strive to do better. More than just a visual novel project, perhaps for me Kachuna was also a journey of self-discovery.

It’s been a really amazing 6 months working with the Tamaya Kagiya team! I’m definitely looking forward to working with them again. I do hope you guys will support our future endeavors, just like how you’ve supported my works in the past.

From the bottom of my heart, thank you so much everyone! Remember, always keep playing!

xoxo,
Ran

P.S. I actually have a Twitter account now! Yay me~ I made this like 10 days ago, but I only feel comfy about sharing it now. Hahaha. Feel free to tweet me or send me messages. I promise I don’t bite!

[Update: Kachuna has been released! You can purchase it for $14.95 on Steam or MangaGamer. Available for PC, Mac, and Linux]

So I guess it’s time for some Kachuna updates!

As of today, the coded scripts for the common route, the choice route, Tsumiki’s route, and Shiro’s route are already complete. There are three more routes left, namely Megumi’s, Ai’s, and Yui’s. I actually love seeing sprites in visual novels change expressions often so I’m taking my sweet time with these. I mean, seriously. Don’t you hate it when a sprite only moves like once in every ten lines?! I like seeing them look alive, which is why I always do blinking sprites and make sure to change the expressions or poses as much as I can.

Fun fact: it took me 16 straight hours (only took short breaks for brunch, dinner, and bath in between) to code Shiro’s route, but 10 days to code Tsumiki’s route. I don’t know why I had so much trouble in her route! Then again, by the time I finished her route, I already knew all the shortcuts and nifty tricks in order to make the job a littl bit easier. Also, while I was doing Tsumiki’s route, I had to rewrite a couple of common route scenes (which will also be used in the other routes) and that also took a nice amount of time. And lastly, I was going to school almost every day while doing Tsumiki’s route. I sure as heck didn’t have 16 hours to burn through in one (almost) sitting.

That’s about it for today. I’m seriously hoping I can finish the next three routes in the next three days! I’m super duper excited for this game, guys, but also a little scared. I’m so scared that I almost don’t want anyone to play it, hahaha, but at the same time I want to share it with everyone. Ugh, I’m weird, aren’t I?

Keep playing everyone! I’ll talk to you again in the next update!

I say I’m back, but I was never really gone from visual novel development as I’ve been working all this time from the background. Hahaha. But I’ll be making more frequent updates from now on since my semester is finally over! Can I get a cheer or two there?

For updates, I’m glad to say that Kachuna has been fully funded on Kickstarter! Yay! To everyone who backed our project, as well as those who gave us all well wishes, I thank you all so much from the bottom of my heart. To the 334 backers who believed in us, thank you for helping us bring our project to completion.

And speaking of completion, I’m also happy to announce that Kachuna is now around 90% complete! I just pulled that value out of nowhere, haha, but it’s a good guess (wow, I’m calling my own guesswork a good guess whoops) considering that only the coding part is incomplete at this point. Plus the beta-testing, but I’m basically playing while coding anyway, to ensure that every single part is thoroughly tested.

The full unscripted game is around 22,000 lines of code, and I’ve already coded around 9,000 lines at this point. It’s not really hard, just completely tedious, and I could only do a couple hundred per day since I still had to spend my 7AM-4PM in school. Usually, 5PM-7PM is reserved for schoolwork, while my 8PM-1AM is for visual novel stuff. Yeah, I need to get back to a regular, less haggard sleeping schedule, haha. Now that the sem’s over though, I’m hoping to do maybe 1,000-1,500 lines of code a day. Wish me luck (and lots of patience when dealing with errors, haha)!

Okay, so that’s about it for now! I also want to update you guys on a couple of other projects I’m working on, but I think I’ll wrap up Kachuna first before dropping more information on the others. All I can say is that 2017 is such an exciting year for visual novel projects (for me) and I’m really looking forward to going on this journey with you guys!

Keep playing everyone~