Ask!

[kourousx]

Regarding the art:

I've only played something like ten commercial visual novels. (and perhaps 15 or so OELVNs on the RenPy site) Whether the art was done as a team or individually, it had a "unity of appearance" that made it always look like the work of one person. Now, this can be a good thing and a bad thing. The pro games look professional, but they can have a "sameness" about them that feels very cold. Too slick. Unemotional.

Now while going through KS, I was aware that I was seeing different artists with different styles. Sometimes a cg would come up and I would feel slightly jarred, because it felt quite different from previous cgs of the same character(s). There was also quite a difference between some cgs and the photo-realistic backgrounds + sprites screens that preceded them.

(This is an observation, not a complaint. I stopped autoplay and just gaped in admiration of the Lilly confession cg. A slick pro vn would have no place for beautiful impressionism like that.)



So, were there any discussions or efforts directed getting the artists' styles to mesh? (I'm guessing that doing that is extremely difficult)

[Guest again]

Why was Misha studying sign language abroad? It was my understanding that sign language was regional, and JSL, ASL, BSL etc were all fairly different.

[Merlyn_LeRoy]

In Shizune's cinematic by Mike Inel, are real JSL signs being used, and if so, what are they saying?

[DanMan]

I did Hanako's Act 4, and it's not happening.

>The only writer with a route that had an epilogue refuses to give equal treatment to the other route that he wrote
Oh, so this is just a way of playing favorites? I know that you started by just writing Lilly's route, but with how much time passed in between those routes being finished and the final game being released, I'd like to hear your excuse.

[Lurch]

I guess all the devs are either asleep or sick of the questions, but hopefully this'll still get a look.

How do you feel about the questions? What kind of questions do you appreciate, and which ones drive you insane?

And from a more personal note - Like a lot of people here, I suppose, I write fanfiction. The longest I've done took me about a year and a half, working on and off - and criticism of it really cut deep. Having worked on this for five years now, what reactions do you have to readers comments?

Are there criticisms you agree with? Compliments you disagree with? People who are so off-board that your eyes boggle and you mouth 'wtf' to yourself? Just how do you deal with feedback on something you've put so much time into?

[uwa]

2. I had never written anything before KS in any form.

I'm really surprised by this. I guess I should be encouraged that it only takes five years to go from 0 to Lilly (and Hanako) path.

I hope the writers are taking the cries of "moar!" as a compliment, because they really are. Even when they're dickheaded.

edit: A real question just occurred to me. The Emi path is a little unique in that the Bad End has a pretty hard-to-miss escape hatch (Misha's question). Was that added later, was the other path added later, or was the split route how the end was originally conceived?

[Guest]

First of all, I wanted to thank everyone who has worked on this project for creating such a wonderfully well written and touching visual novel.

Now my question is: Who is the artist that drew Kenji when he took of his glasses?

[Suriko]

I did Hanako's Act 4, and it's not happening.

>The only writer with a route that had an epilogue refuses to give equal treatment to the other route that he wrote
Oh, so this is just a way of playing favorites? I know that you started by just writing Lilly's route, but with how much time passed in between those routes being finished and the final game being released, I'd like to hear your excuse.

Different paths work best with different endings. I also never really thought of the final Lilly scene as an epilogue as such; just a scene that took place after a small timeskip (there are scenes with longer timeskips in Shizune's path). Pretend that it happened before the credits if you don't like it that much.

Delta has made a handy pictorial guide that can serve as an epilogue to all routes. It is as follows. Giant spoilers, obviously:

[Silentcook]

I guess all the devs are either asleep or sick of the questions, but hopefully this'll still get a look.

How do you feel about the questions? What kind of questions do you appreciate, and which ones drive you insane?

And from a more personal note - Like a lot of people here, I suppose, I write fanfiction. The longest I've done took me about a year and a half, working on and off - and criticism of it really cut deep. Having worked on this for five years now, what reactions do you have to readers comments?

Are there criticisms you agree with? Compliments you disagree with? People who are so off-board that your eyes boggle and you mouth 'wtf' to yourself? Just how do you deal with feedback on something you've put so much time into?

My day job plus four years of working at this pretty much cut "drive me insane" out of my vocabulary. "Annoy" is the most I'll admit to.
Anyway, I doubt anyone is going to be surprised when I say that insightful questions or "talking shop" are most interesting, while repeating myself is meh. Sometimes I wish questions would stay answered...

We have been very harshly critical of our own work in many ways, to the point that we had to accept we'd suck in some way and get KS done or we'd never actually publish it. I personally feel mostly relief that it passed outside scrutiny, and just look to the next step.

[ze spy]

Do any of you happen to know what software Nicol uses to compose music?

[shogg]

Wow. I never thought that this game would be so big when I first heard about it. I just have one question:
1. What was the program that was used to draw the characters?
2. KS inspired me to write a visual novel of my own. Do you have any tips on how I should start? I already have a basic idea of a story.
3. Are you going to make an English players guide?
4. Is there any way I could get my hands on one of the KS pins that was in a previous reply, or an Artbook?
5. You had said about being tired of Visual Novels. Are you going to make any other type of game with 4LS or another team like it?
6. Are there any characters that you didn't help with that you don't like or feel that they could have been done better?
That's all I can think of.
I, personally, am very happy with the outcome of it. I finished Hanako and am almost done Emi.
One last question! In my Hanako play through, it ended with her having somewhat reluctant sex and making me breakfast, and it finished with us walking to the city. What ending is this?
Thanks!

[Hivemind]

2. I had never written anything before KS in any form.

I'm really surprised by this. I guess I should be encouraged that it only takes five years to go from 0 to Lilly (and Hanako) path.

I hope the writers are taking the cries of "moar!" as a compliment, because they really are. Even when they're dickheaded.

edit: A real question just occurred to me. The Emi path is a little unique in that the Bad End has a pretty hard-to-miss escape hatch (Misha's question). Was that added later, was the other path added later, or was the split route how the end was originally conceived?

The escape hatch was put in after I realized that there was basically one choice which really determined your ending. And when I say "I," I of course mean "Silentcook and the rest of the dev team." So I decided to use some old ideas I had floating about combined with a few off-hand comments in the script which made Misha the natural choice (although if I'm being honest I don't remember the details, a lot of Emi's path involved a rather complex backstory that I ginned up in order to make the stuff I wrote feel natural--in other words, Emi has a lot about her which I didn't put in the story and, quite frankly, wouldn't bother to ever get into. It's the big thing I learned on this project--you can never have too much background material when you write, but you also should probably keep it out of the story).

This was maybe the only decision on Emi's path which came about for a gameplay reason--I would have written a scene similar to it even if we didn't need something to make it less of a jarring decision, but making her the actual outlet was entirely a case of 'gee, making one choice the only thing that keeps you from a good ending is kind of a dick move.' You may have noticed that a lot of Emi's choices don't seem to do anything, and that's because they really don't. I wasn't very good at thinking in terms of branches, more in terms of small differences. Pick certain choices and you'll maybe get a little extra than you would otherwise, but it won't mean you get a bad ending over a good ending.

[InXplotch]

Just a quick question that may have been already answered:

Why does the osx lion version lack a fullscreen mode?

[uwa]

This was maybe the only decision on Emi's path which came about for a gameplay reason--I would have written a scene similar to it even if we didn't need something to make it less of a jarring decision, but making her the actual outlet was entirely a case of 'gee, making one choice the only thing that keeps you from a good ending is kind of a dick move.' You may have noticed that a lot of Emi's choices don't seem to do anything, and that's because they really don't. I wasn't very good at thinking in terms of branches, more in terms of small differences. Pick certain choices and you'll maybe get a little extra than you would otherwise, but it won't mean you get a bad ending over a good ending.

Thank you so much for answering! Emi's path ended up being my favorite partially because you can do that last minute turnaround.

That view of dickmovery makes it interesting, though, that it's not just one but two necessary good decisions that separate you from the bad and worst ends in Hanako's path. Were cpl_crud and Suriko trying to illustrate the thin ice Hisao is on, and that was more important than dickery concerns? Is the gameplay consciously intended to make a statement about the state of mind of the character? That is, even after what he said Emi still loves Hisao and he can salvage it*, whereas Hanako is very nearly completely fed up with Hisao?

Sorry for all the ridiculous questions, I'm just fascinated with (or a complete dork about) how gameplay and story can work together.

* edit: I guess I should clarify this. You explicitly said the option was added for gameplay purposes; I'm just wondering if there was consideration about whether that gameplay fit with Emi's state of mind.

[McBaggin]

Hello! First of all , I love the game and you guys for making this game!

My question is to any of the writers is ; how much did you learn as a person from learning about the disabilities to working with others for over 5 years on a great project for one goal.
Thanks for your time and I hope to see more any of your work!