After one month of hard work, "Playing With An Incubus" was just released this week. I'm still very surprised with all the love this game is receiving, which I really didn't expect when the idea for this game first appeared to me. Thank you all so much for enjoying my work!

Today I want to talk about everything that happened during the development of this game, from start to finish.

The idea literally appeared when I was playing a gacha game (yeah, the same type of game that drives Alex nuts during this VN) and wondered: what if someone was playing a game like this and instead of summoning an unit, they summoned a real entity? I have no idea how my brain came to think this, but the idea wouldn't leave my mind. At the same time, the Spooktober VN Jam was announced and I realized it could be a nice idea for a Halloween themed game.

After some brainstorming, I came to the bare bones of the idea that we have today: a guy would be playing his favorite game and, due to the energy of his enjoyment, he'd end up luring an incubus to his room. So he'd have to choose: spend the night with the incubus, or keep playing his game?

Actually, the game started as a SFW kinetic novel because I wanted to make it a submission to the Spooktober Jam. But as the story developed, I noticed that forcing the game to be all-ages was restraining my ideas. So in the end, I decided to just release it as a "normal" VN and include the spicy route. Maybe next year I can come up with a real spooky idea for the Jam because I'd love to join at some point!

The first week of September was when I did more progress in the game. Moved by the hype of creating something new, I did the sprites, the background and the first parts of the writing during that time.

The following week, however, was when I almost dropped this VN. It was probably burnout since I worked in all my free time during the first week, but everything I did during this second week felt terrible. I hated my writing and I had no motivation to finish the CGs, so I forced myself to take a break for at least some days.

When I went back to the game I still felt a bit down, so I worked on the programming (since this is a kinda relaxing task for me). It helped me get some of the hype back, so I could work on finishing the writing and then the CGs. I had everything fully done around 19/09, so the last few days were just me putting everything together on RenPy and playtesting.

So, it was exactly 22 days of work on this game. It feels like a lot of time when you're going through the development but now that I look back at it, I can understand why I burned my brain during the second week. I really challenged myself with this VN and while I'm glad I could complete it in such a small time, I'll never do it again LOL

I'm pretty satisfied with the final game and I know some aspects could be improved, but one thing that I learned from this game is: stop being perfectionist so you can actually enjoy the process of creating stuff. I'm always too worried about the quality of the things I do that sometimes I forget about the whole purpose of doing this that is having fun! It's okay if it's not perfect, this won't be the last VN I'll release and I can always improve for my next project. I guess that's what makes it so fulfilling, to see how much we've improved since we started.

Then that's it, I'm happy to finally release this game and even more happy to see that you are enjoying this creation of mine. It truly makes all the hard work I've been doing this month worth it. Thank you all so much!

Now, what comes next?

Those who finished the game must have noticed that little quote in the credits and be wondering if this is just a demo or a first chapter of a longer VN. My answer is: "Playing With An Incubus" is complete as it is. HOWEVER, during the writing phase, I couldn't help thinking about more details about Rodric's life. Where he lives? What he does when he's not working? How's his relationship with the other incubi?

When I created him, I wanted to make a different kind of incubus that's more like a magical creature (like vampires, werewolves...), so I ended up imagining a whole lore about his species and how his relationship with Alexandre could be very lifechanging to him.

It's not set on stone yet, but in the future I could expand the idea of this game into a longer story if I manage to make it interesting enough. It's written down on my list of "stories for future projects", so maybe we'll see more of these guys in the future in a VN or even a webcomic!

For now, consider "Playing With An Incubus" a complete visual novel with an open ending. It could be expanded in the future but it also could not, so let's just wait and see if the story will develop more. I'll keep you updated on it, for sure!

Thank you again for the amount of love you've been giving to my projects! I'll likely be taking a break now because I really need one, but soon I'll be back with news about my two other VNs, "Birthday Cake" and "Way To A Vampire's Heart".

See you!~