Update 19 - Behind The Scenes (The Seven Realms)

While writing Realm 2, one of the problems I encountered was balancing the time with the Love Interests and the plot development. For example, Naya and Kali had almost no scenes in Realm 2. So during the break between Realm 1 and Realm 2, I wrote almost all the solo scenes you had with them. The pancake scene is one of them. I'm glad I added it because it was just sweet, and the renders for it turned out great. It also allows me to slip the fact that the gang is going to change house at some point, hehe.

Overall, I'm still not 100% happy with how Realm 2 is balanced, but it's way better than before. 

So initially, this update would start with the meeting with Arianne… Oh boy… This meeting. I wanted to show everyone how selfish a ruler Arianne is. She will do anything to save her own skin, even if it means dooming her people. It must suck to have a ruler like that.

If you sided with the Witches, I think the walk in town with the LIs is my favourite downtime with them. The little dance with Leyala was also cute. I think it's one of the most romantic moments they had together.

If you sided with the Demons, you have one of the hottest scenes with Kagome (and Lilin if you opted for it).

In this update, we also have a nice relaxing chat with Zyair! 

Zyair is your bro. No matter your choices, he will follow you and help you (a little bit like Garrus in Mass Effect). You can go Paragon or Renegade; Garrus will follow. That's the kind of bromance I love and the one I want you to have with Zyair. 

I also think it's important to show that Atlas has friends and a life outside the LIs and Harem Members.

The last point I wanted to discuss is the famous choice between the Witches and the Demons.

To be completely honest, I thought most people would choose the Witches. Even if Arianne is a bitch and Ba'el is a bro, I thought killing billions of innocent people would be something most people would want to avoid. So, I tried hard to balance everything, so it would be a hard choice, but in the end, it seems that I failed as the overwhelming majority chose the Demons lol.

In The Seven Realms, there are no good/correct choices and no bad/wrong ones. A combination of choices can lead you to something dark, but there won't be one choice that will screw you over.

I know people have found Leyala's stubbornness annoying, but we need to put everything into context. For us, it's a game/story. For Leyala, it's her life. She was raised with human values, and suddenly she's been thrown into a new moral system where she has to decide who lives and who dies. It's different from witnessing someone die and being the one making the decision that will lead to billions of deaths. 

If tomorrow I'm teleported to a world where to punish someone, they drown all the children of his hometown; I will have a hard time getting behind it, all the more if I'm the one who has to drown them.

It's also important to note that Atlas is not perfect in all of this. His lack of communication is evident, which can be explained by who he is. For more than 2,000 years, he has been single. He never had to explain his actions to anyone. So, he never even thought of telling Leyala how frustrated he was. He never even considered talking to her to fix this issue. And he never put himself in her shoes and realised that she's never killed anyone before, and now people were asking her to be responsible for billions of deaths. He never even asked how she wanted to go about it. Maybe her plan may work after all. But no one knows because he never asked for her input, and they never tried to find a solution together.

That's why there was no third choice, because of Atlas' imperfections. However, throughout the game, he will grow, thanks to Leyala's influence, and Leyala will grow thanks to his.

It was important for me that nobody was perfect in The Seven Realms and to have all the characters growing together. I wanted to represent genuine relationships where you can love someone with all your heart, but their imperfections can drive you crazy. Sometimes, having different values can lead you to a wall where you can choose to give up or communicate to find a solution and grow stronger.

I'm not going to lie; it's been hard for me the last few updates to read about how Leyala was so annoying to some players and that she was now the least-favourite LI. I started to wonder if I should have given her less of a personality, and no moral or human conflict. Or if I should have done to hell with logic and made her a sociopath who instantly doesn't care about what people are doing around her when entering this world.

I still don't know if I took the right decision. Maybe I made her too stubborn. Perhaps Atlas' fault in all of that was not shown enough. Ultimately, I still love my characters to death and hope you find how I make them resolve their conflict satisfying.

We're only approaching the end of episode two out of seven. These characters and this story have a long way to go yet, and we hope you will stick around to see where their journey takes them!