arewar

Julian's Route Future Plans

Added 2022-11-06 02:45:18 +0000 UTC

After Quinn's route is complete, I want to do a heavy edit of Julian's route.

What? Why?

There are quite a few reasons. These are the major ones:

First - There's some history into how I planned Julian's route which I spoke a little about here and on Discord. https://www.patreon.com/posts/mad-dev-on-quinn-72471858 I regret doing it this way and I think it was a detriment to the story.

Second - Of all the routes, I'm the least happy with Julian's. It's something I've repeatedly confessed on Discord. His route was by far the hardest for me to write. I ran into a lot of writer's block issues and didn't have a clear direction. I have a list of excuses and reasons for that and why I continued despite that, but in the end, the result is all that matters. I don't think it's up to par with the other routes.

Third - Of all the routes, Julian's is the least talked about. Whether it's positive or negative talk isn't important. If people hated his character or loved it isn't important. I feel like in the end, I get the impression Julian's somewhat dismissed. (And I totally get why he's not a favorite!) It's not that people don't enjoy playing his route, but as an LI he's… well, he's not interesting or appealing. He should be lovable despite his flaws / crazy, just like Brandon and Sebastian.

What's would you change about his route?

I've already addressed this some in his opening (for next release). Monika is fairly out-of-character throughout his route, given her distaste of violence and her history. This is especially true considering how cautious she is to Sebastian and Quinn. For her to simply tolerate a lot of awfulness without damn good reason isn't like her.
This is a big one - Julian's voice-in-his-head never really evolves into anything. It's not explored much, never comes into the story much, and ended up feeling kind of pointless. I want to jump into that aspect of his character a lot deeper.
Julian's ethical conflict never comes to a head, also feeling kind of pointless.
Julian's relationship with Monika takes a backseat to a lot of the drama and doesn't feel like it evolves very naturally. This is an otome game after all, romance is required!

What does this mean for the existing Julian route?

A lot of changes, including 1-2 new endings that will revolve around that 'voice'.

This will not be a complete rewrite of his route, but I currently expect most paths to have significant scene changes. Some endings may change as well.

What are the problems with doing this?

Essentially, time. I'm guessing a month. Doing this will likely delay the release from the penciled-in February. I'll provide an updated timeline once Quinn's route is complete.

When would this happen?

After Quinn's route is completed, before the polish phase, before release, and before the Alexander route vote.

Because Brandon's route content is not suitable for stores, I'm not willing to officially release the game without Julian's route feeling 'ready', so making it a DLC or patch isn't an option.

I'm not sure I like this…

I get it! You as the player would probably rather have brand new content than revamped old content. I probably would too.

But I think this is something I should do. I'm not thrilled about the idea of releasing something I'm not satisfied with for sale. I want to be confident when this is out to the public!

As a selling point for you all -

This rewrite will make a fun fan-suggested 'What If' scenario much more plausible
I promise at least 1 adult CG for you!

As a sample, here's a couple changes in progress I've been making during the polish of his demo route. I'm still editing and tweaking them, so this stuff isn't final.

I'm hoping these changes provide more insight into his character's state of mind and goals, and make Monika's feelings towards him a lot more understandable and natural.

Dragon-Pool Scene changes: https://youtu.be/LwDHwM1kf_M