Open Development Discussion

Welcome to my open development discussion!

As we’re approaching the end of Part 1, it’s time for me to decide how I’m going to tackle a lot of the issues that have been bugging me for the last couple of months. If I want to make any notable changes to the first half of the game, it has to be now since I don’t want to return to Part 1 once it’s out (outside of the necessary bug fixes, obviously).

Throughout Seeking Closure’s existence, the main three critiques I received were:

• I hate that Julia is the default girlfriend in the present timeline.

• Being in the present feels confusing since I, as the player, have no idea what happened in the past so I don’t know which decisions to make.

• I want to spend more time in the present to get the story going and have a reason to care about the characters introduced there.

The second and third points contradict each other, so with that alone – I can’t please everyone, but there are still changes I can introduce to ensure the game is more enjoyable for players who will discover it in the future here or on Steam.

It’s fair to assume that if you’re reading this, you’re already invested enough to stick with the game even if I keep everything as it is, but I need to consider future players as well.

When I devised my visual novel initially, making Julia the mandatory girlfriend felt like the only “right” choice for the story I wanted to tell. However, after 18 months of development, I regret this decision, particularly since I want to place as big of an emphasis on “player choice” as I can.

In my original storyboard, I wanted to add one chapter in the Present for every two spent in the Past until it catches up to the “current day”. This would allow me to give all the necessary backstory while also developing the characters introduced in the Present. Since I didn’t have any experience creating a story like this, the concept looked fine on paper.

However, I quickly realized that I’d written myself into a corner since it’s not possible to spend a lot of time in the Present timeline without other characters (or the MC) referencing past events. Nevertheless, I couldn’t freely reference the Past since you as the player haven’t experienced it yet and didn’t make the choices that will shape it. This wouldn’t have been an issue in a kinetic novel, but that’s not what I’m doing here.

Chapter 4 was already a bit messy. Even though it didn’t force you to commit to anything, you can have Fleur/Susan/Micaela show renewed interest in you (based on your choices in previous chapters), but since it’s possible to be completely done with them by the end of Part 1, their behavior can make 0 sense in retrospect depending on your decisions.

As such, I decided to stick to the Past timeline until it’s finished to avoid making that issue even bigger. This resulted in all the girls that are only included in the Present feeling forgotten and it will be an uphill battle to make the players care about them later, which is an issue since they have an important role to play in the story.

Another point of critique is the hairstyles of the girls from the past being very different in the present. Similar to most people, I prefer their past looks too, but at the same time, it would be weird if most of them kept the same hair for 5 years. On the other hand, is realism important in this case if the new hairstyle makes people like them less? I honestly don’t know and I might resolve this problem in a poll on a girl-by-girl basis.

With all of that being said, I’m currently considering several options while I gradually speed up development for Chapter 8.

• Keep everything as is. The laziest option, but one that a lot of existing fans and supporters will likely prefer since they’ve already played through all the problematic parts. However, I obviously would like to receive more supporters over time, so it’s not the optimal solution for me.

• Only make minor tweaks throughout Part 1, changing and expanding some of the dialogue to be less confusing and/or committal, while also adding more options to abandon paths that you’re no longer interested in.

• In addition to the above, rework the Julia-related content in Part 1 to make her an optional girlfriend and have a separate choice at the start of Part 2 (or in the end of Part 1) for players who will continue their old saves.

• Remove all the “Present day” scenes outside of arriving at the hotel and having the “flashback”, while keeping (and adding more) scenes of meeting Julia to build up her character without making her MC’s girlfriend by default. As such, at the start of Part 2, it’ll be up to you if Julia comes with you as your friend or love interest. Another benefit of this approach is that when you start talking to the present-day versions of all the girls, you’ll have full information on how your relationship developed and if you’re still interested in them. The downside is – it makes the story more linear, removing most of the “What happened? How did it come to this?” intrigue from the present timeline. However, since it isn’t delivered in a compelling manner already, maybe it’s not that big of a loss. If you’re a returning player, another drawback is that you’ll have to replay most of the scenes from Chapters 1 and 4 in Part 2, which will feel wonky and immersion-breaking if you continue your old save(s).

• Reframe the entire story and finish everything in the past, pretending the present timeline never existed, as the MC gets to ride into the sunset at the end of his vacation. This option completely abandons the premise of the story I wanted to tell, but I’m thinking about it for two reasons. Firstly, since there are no signs of the war ending anytime soon, I have no idea how long I’ll manage to avoid getting enlisted into the military against my will. As such, I can disappear any day without warning and you won’t get any closure for the game at all. Secondly, the current projections are that I’ll have electrical power for only about 6-8 hours out of 24 a day, starting from November, and if that happens, this will bring the development process to a near complete halt. I don’t want to choose this option, but if the consensus is “better an unplanned ending than no ending at all”, then maybe it’s the “right” thing to do.

My mind has been split between all these different options for months now and I still can’t commit to a single direction since all of them have significant drawbacks.

As such, if you have any thoughts on the matter, or if you would like to suggest a completely different option, I’m open to hearing you out (even if it’s related to something relatively small like the hairstyle dilemma). That doesn’t mean I’m going to do what someone else tells me to, but it might help me make a decision, while I continue to work on Chapter 8 since most of it is set in stone regardless of anything discussed above.

A part of me didn’t want to write this post since I don’t want to disappoint and upset people who will provide solid arguments that I won’t listen to (since it’s impossible to satisfy everyone), but I still decided to publish it in hopes of gaining some unique insight that I’m lacking at the moment.