The Update

Before we get into my rambling thoughts, I'm happy to announce I've updated the game and the preference menu is back. I accidentally broke it, but it's back! It includes the typical options renpy has by default as well as the option to switch between the default font as well as OpenDyslexic font.

I also made minor edits to grammar.

The Thank You!!!

Firstly, thank you so much to everyone who checked out PRETTYOY Inc.!!!! As of writing this, it's currently sitting at 491 plays!! It's my most played game and far exceeded my expectations!! None of my other releases have even hit 100 plays, so seeing the reception this got was wild and unexpected. When I saw it hit 100 plays in two days I near imploded. This might not seem like big numbers to some, but it means the world to me so again, thank you so much for giving this weird little game a try!

The Postmortem aka The Rant

Well, I don't actually know where to begin now that I'm writing this LOL. I guess at the beginning is a great start.

At first, I had no intention of joining Velox Fabula. I had just mad a very small demo for Otome Jam which I wasn't feeling 100% about and was starting to feel a bit of a creative drought. This happens every summer, so I normal rest during the season. When I saw the jam announcement, it was more for me to follow. I love game jams a lot solely because I always find a lot of great games and devs to follow that I didn't know about before, so I was curious about it from a player standpoint only. And I mean, I barely made something for a two month game jam, I doubted anything would come out of a ten day one.

Then I saw some of the prompts during voting and thought 'maaaaaaybe if one of the prompts catches my eye, I'll consider.' I have a million story/game ideas lying around and if one happened to fit then what the heck. Worst I could do was fail. But I honestly wasn't that serious about it.

And then the theme was announced.

The Actual Jam

Ok so, I had nothing to fit the theme. At least, I thought I didn't. I scanned through my ideas and then shrugged off the idea of joining. It didn't matter anyway, because again, there was no way I'd make something in ten days. Also, I didn't have ten days. I had maybe six depending on how busy I was. But my brain likes to do whatever, and it pulled me back to my idea doc.

Long story short, in my sea of ideas I had an action side scroller game called "PRETTYBOY Inc" inspired by Inside and every dystopian ever. It featured one player character who had 3 different play styles (Gold, Iron, and Cobalt), as well as two other major characters. The point of the game was to fight your way out of a questionable organization. 

This is one of those ideas you have knowing damn well you're not going to have the time/skills/fun/etc to make but you jot down anyway before promptly forgetting about it. But my brain went 'that's the one.'

Before I threw myself into the rush of game deving, I gave myself some simple goals:

1. Learn how to code/design GUI

2. Pace myself

3. Keep it short. Even shorter then that.

And somehow? I did it.

The process for PRETTYBOY Inc. is Hiring was honestly a wild one. I started with the GUI design first, because it was time to stop being afraid of it. As mentioned above, I kinda broke some things. Important things, but I also learned a lot. Both in visual design AND the coding part of things. The entire first 24 hours was literally just giving myself a mini crash course. 

Day 2-4 were spent switching between the art and outlining/writing. I handwrote a decent portion of the script. I normally outline by hand, but I've never written a game script by hand before and honestly?? I feel like that helped So Much when it came to the writing process. Granted, I wrote it all out of order and in-between my outline and notes and looking at it kinda looks a little unhinged, but it worked!

Day 5 was spent finishing off the script/edits/making sure it was functional. And then I threw it on itch.io before I doubted myself and canned it instead LOL.

The Game Itself.

PRETTYBOY Inc. is Hiring! had 5 endings planned. The three you saw in the game, the one where you're not hired, and a very Tragic end that you get if you pick the honest response at every question. Quick note, for the sake of discussion I'm going to be referring to MC as Cobalt to make things easier.

So, fun fact, when I went into making this, I decided there was an 'honest' response to each of the Interviewer's questions. I think this idea is most obvious in the resume/previous job question, but I ended up scrapping the fifth end. Honestly, I don't think it matters, and I think Cobalt's truth is as important as the inevitable outcome (although if you want to speculate each of the 'true' answers, feel free and good luck LOL). There were also a few question/scenes I threw out because it didn't fit the flow or felt too repetitive. I honestly just looked up 'job interviewer questions' and went wild.

When I released the game, I actually didn't have any fears in regard to the story because I didn't think anyone would play. Not in a looking-down-on-myself way, but just in a 'neither of my other games have hit 100 downloads' kind of way. Like, I thought it would be much the same as what I've released previously so far. 

So imagine my surprise when it smashed through 100 plays in two days. All of a sudden, I was like "wait, does the story only make sense to me--?"

I love weird and surreal games a lot, and this was an ode to that love, but it was also the first time I've made something like this. I was well aware I made a lot of it up to interpretation and a whole lot of things implied without being outright said. I full-heartedly believe in the advice 'trust your audience' but I wasn't certain I trusted myself.

Based on all the comments, it was fine! But I was certainly stressed for a while there.

In part, it's because you have to play the game multiple times to get the full picture. I also knew it might not be obvious how to get certain endings, hence why I added the guide as well. I know I personally struggle with getting all the endings on my own, and as much as I wish I could be the guy who can 100% a visual novel without touching a guide, I Am Not.

Moving on to the actual story.

This is pretty much a weird mashup of real life frustrations. Current job hunting woes, the utter state of Corporate America, and also complicated feelings of being trans. In fact, the basis of this story is centered around Messy Trans Feelings, as well as each of the main 3 endings. I'm like 95% sure that didn't come through to anyone but me lol. I'm more curious about whatever others got out of it in the end.

Cobalt is also a fun character for me. While the details of their personality changes on the ending aka who he ends up becoming, being in his head was fun. And also imagining how the same backstory can still lead to being totally different people. He's a liar with a questionable past, and I would love to explore more of his character.

So will I make this into a series?

Maybe? 

My brain is always everywhere all at once. I still want the original idea to become a reality so maybe a decade from now when I actually learn coding that will happen ajskjsk. 

On a more realistic note, I have two other ideas. Both short VNs. One is about another character who works at PRETTYBOY Inc. and is Cobalt's rival. This one will probably lean harder into surrealism, and all 3 main endings are canon. Which ending is at play depends on the choices. The second one is more a melancholic one about Cobalt's sister, and follows the Cobalt end specifically. Neither of these will actually have a focus on him, though.

Again, if I come back to this is a 'maybe.' I do still need to work on my current project Spring Boy, and this was all a very Last Minute idea after all. But the possibility is there if I ever feel like fleshing things out.

Jam End Thoughts + Ranking

Honestly, all I have to say for this part is I learned a lot and I had fun which is the real win in my book!! All the wins were well deserved, but even outsider of the winners I enjoyed a decent chunk of the entries. Seeing how everyone took the theme and made it their own and how each entry was so different from each other was really cool and I'm also so happy I managed to play every single entry. I would have missed out if I hadn't.

Real talk, I ranked where I expected. I made the chaotic decision to use a RANKED game jam to learn some things (and honestly for a second there, post-rating everything I forgot this was even ranked LOL). But yeah, for the rankings:

• Creativity: #7
• Writing/Narrative: #9
• Theme: #12
• Art/Visual Design: #14
• Overall: #14

I also got 13 in voice acting?? (lmfaO) and 16 in music/sound design (probablyyyy because I broke the preference menu) and those are my stats!

So yeah, pretty much where I guessed, which means no major thoughts here.

Overall, this felt like the first time I did a game jam (even though I technically did Otome Jam), and I think it's because of how much more I participated in rating/commenting/reblogging things so I was a little more connected to the community. With all that said, thanks for reading my rambling and also thank you again for playing!!