itch.io

Omgg genius!! I'mma steal what you call snakes and call them noodles from now on 😍

Jewelry and trinkets! Like status buff necklaces, element-resistant bracelets, etc

I make little bracelets and stuff irl u see 🤭

Definitely a merchant, mostly selling accessories that boost stats. 😁

EDIT: I'll also buy raw monster or crafting material from the main character to create these accessories.

Yes, it's intentional.

Also this game needs an MDZS tag so people can find it!!!!

Aww, thank yoou~ I really hope they help too! Hope to put out more whenever I can~

Nice!! You're really creative with the sprites! So glad they helped~~~

So glad to hear the sprites helped! 🥰 Pretty clever too, to use silhouettes to make up for extras - helps give the game background more depth while also focusing on important characters (the non-blanked out ones)! I hadn't thought of doing that before- might borrow the idea from you if I ever need "fodder" sprites quickly. Drawing multiple randos just to speak one or two lines each is so unnecessary 😖

Thank you thank you~~

It's a siiiiiiiign! You two will be together till the end of time (at least as long as Kungfu Panda exists...)

No problem 🥰 Good luck on your game

Aaaah! A pretty good idea to go the VN route! It can link to your fic too so anyone from the game jam will be able to find your fic. Will get it a ton of views and kudos then~

Good luck on the game jam!!

Sorry for the late reply! I haven't been logging in lately!

Yeah, you can give new arm posts, recolor, etc! I don't mind how it's altered, personally~ So that does mean you can change them to hold weapons, drink wine, etc.

Oooh, which clan would the Bamboo Hero one fit into? 😍 I wonder if he'll be a rogue cultivator marrying into another clan, ehehe~

Sorry for the late reply! Sure, go ahead! Have a lovely day, and good luck on the project~ 🥰

LOL what have you NOT done after killing a man on a first date?? Death by bats

I personally don't mind if you do, but they were made by collaging royalty free stock vectors together, so I don't recommend it.

LOL that's a deep sea romance

Looks good! Might give it a try sometime! Thank you for sharing~

EDIT: This was what my ghost thingy wore:

This was fun to demo! Too cute~

Thanks for ordering the special! Gotta love what real romantic dinners look like, haha! Thanks - I'm glad you liked it! Cute is the best~~

You're welcome~~

Click on the "Run Game" button at the top.

Thanks!! Glad it didn't SUCK 😂😂😂

Thanks! Hot and spicy noodles redefined, eh? 😉

Thank you thank you~~

Oooh who did you get???

Hi! Thanks for your comment - and sure, please feel free to use it how you like!

Hahaha savageee

Thank you~~

Does the typical game being a game which plays in browser, rather than a game which requires a download, make you want to play it more?

Not really. I don't typically try browser games that I don't like the premise of. I wouldn't want to play a browser game just because it's a browser game.

If it helps, I tend to look at premise first - how it looks, feels, and what it's about. If there's a browser version available for something that's caught my attention, I'll play it there on the fly - it makes it easy for me to just scroll down and write a comment for it. If the game requires a download, I probably won't play it for the time being until I can either find time to sit down and install it, or play other bite-sized browser games with a similar premise first before coming back to it... if I remember to, that is. 😅 If I'm on my phone, I will only play browser games.

Of course, the download-required games would need to be from publishers I know and have an amount of trust in, such as particular developers I've chatted with (either from the same writers' group or game jam), folk from the same fandom or a reputed publisher like Y Press Games. Large, long, and graphics-heavy games tend to be better downloaded, but for safety reasons I do try to ascertain that the developers are genuine first before downloading them.

I feel browser versions of games make them more easily accessible on mobile devices or people who're casually browsing for something quick to play, which in turn makes them look more desirable as a whole statistically. Ease of access can be quite a draw, but I personally find first impressions - thoughtful synopses, nice cover images and screenshots, attractive character profiles - to be more successful in getting me to try them out overall.

Thank you so much for the update! I've tried it out and it's great! I hope the developers will start tagging them so they'll be easier to find in the future. Bless~

I was more or less looking for the latter - Victorian-related stuff, which may or may not be in the name or description. For example Victorian-inspired games, assets, comics, etc.

Hi leafo, thanks for letting me know!

Sure, here's the query in question: https://itch.freezing.top/search?q=victorian

    do I have to make do with these platforms I don't like

Well, for me personally, the beauty of being a hobbyist is that we don't really have to make do with any platform we don't particularly like - we can just leave off it and concentrate on developing things we enjoy, without the need for any external promotion at all. Unlike the folk who've spent money developing stuff and must make it back, I don't think I've ever suffered a loss not being on Instagram, Tiktok or Facebook. 🤔

Though, if it helps, you can try Reddit if you like. Granted, it is a big platform, but it's also discussion-based and the scope of our posts are usually only limited to a certain sub unless someone decides to cross-post it, so you can just hang around the small communities and post there. There are numbers involved, as per most platforms - karma - though that's negligible at best and doesn't hinder discussion or feedback in general. I've gotten some good feedback for two of my fangames there. The only original story of mine that got a number of visits from there was "The Swordsman Who Lost His Nipples", though, so I can't vouch for it 100% when it comes to serious stuff.

Alternatively, I'm also on Tumblr, which is smaller and more intimate than, say, Twitter. An interesting part of Tumblr culture is that folk who reblog our posts also tend to add "micro-comments" in their tagging system, making their reblogs a lot more personal. The site is slow and laggy at times, but the upside is that you can post pictures and format text there. It's customizable too, to a degree. In terms of promotion... just like Reddit, I've only seen my fangames do well there. My original stuff kinda gets ignored. (EDIT: I do see writers use Tumblr to get their works out, though. Maybe give it a go to find other writers there?)

That said, I do tend to prefer engaging in fast-moving platforms like Twitter. Twitter as a platform is exciting when it comes to speed, and I get to respond very quickly to other people's posts too. The best bit is that most posts are short and concise, and that facilitates rapid-fire replies, which adds to more replies from folk who see them in their own timelines. For folk like myself who're restless and like chatting others up, it's a pretty nifty platform to be on. My experience on Twitter has been good, even if I've slowed down lately due to login issues. I don't get too many clicks for original stuff there, but my fangame posts did balloon up like crazy.

As far as I know, though, self-published original games, art and stories can be pretty hard to promote on social media, even on the slower ones. Your best bet may be to join a Discord server and reach out to fellow developers. Some developers have a following that's comprised mostly of other developers. If it's "genuine" non-dev players we want, it's market research that we'd need to do before even making our game, let alone promoting it. That part's just as tricky as finding the right social media platform for it.

Good luck!

Thanks for the update! Gave it a spin and I love it~ I love that typo tolerance too! It does help when you can only partially remember the name of something you're looking for.

Quick question: Will the search function have a pagination system, such as a "Next Page" at the bottom of the page for searches with a large amount of results?

I did notice a cutoff after a certain amount is displayed, and there's no Next Page link to click on, meaning I can't browse further than the initial page of results. It's not affected by auto-loading as a setting either. I checked and searching by tags has a pagination system, while searching by keyword (using the search bar) doesn't.

If not, it's fine too. Thanks again! 🙏

If it's a music jam you want to join, there's the OST Composing Jam that's featured to start next month: https://itch.freezing.top/jam/ost-composing-jam-7

It seems to be an annual thing that runs through every July of the year. Here's a link to the one hosted last year and the one prior.

Good luck! I took a look and there are prizes there! 🤤 Well, the prize itself is a feature on the playlist, but that counts, right?

No problem! I felt like I really needed to mention the visuals because they were moving - it's small, but it's also an extra step that shows the love that's been put into presenting it. The browser version seems to work on Firefox. I imagine any players having problems with it may have been using Private Browsing, which might cause an overlap of minor errors when you're selecting options. You can try advising them to swap out of Private Browsing first and see if it works better.

....Of course Lan Wangji of all people would remember those rare rules and bring them up. 🤦 What is wrong with this man, LOL 😂But I love this version of him that you've written, he's pretty cute that way!

Aww, thanks for giving them a try! Gotta love ancient Rome too - culture from that era's pretty interesting. And thanks for mentioning others in the fandom! I actually made a feature post in late 2022 linking to MDZS fanmade games, and when I saw a browser version pop up for yours I made some time to try it out (downloads can be difficult for me). Thanks for  making a browser version! It's definitely made your game very accessible! I had a good time with it, bless~

Sure, I'll consider that if I ever get stuck!

I took a look at your game page. If it helps, you can try doing these things to see if your views and download stats improve:

1. The part where you mention that your game is a virus scares me quite a bit. 😨 Try making sure it's not potential malware first., maybe...? If it triggers virus warnings, it's not a good sign.

2. The title of your game seems to have a typo. First impressions always count in marketing, so it's pretty important to make sure we don't have a typo in our title!

3. Maybe update your game cover thumbnail to make it look more dynamic. Perhaps add the title to it in a very nice font? It would make the cover look more complete.

4. Your blurb may need work. Short and catchy usually works!

5. Try adding relevant tags to your game to make sure it can be found (e.g.: horror, puzzle). There's this thing about the average session only lasting a few seconds too - you may want to change that to reflect the actual time taken to complete a session of the game.

6. Try to identify the system requirements for the game and check that on the download zip file. These will help your game get filtered by the search system a little better, since it'll automatically add it to the platform tagging. Right now nobody can tell if your download file is meant for Windows, Linux, Mobile, etc.

7. You can try adding which engine you used to make it too, so other developers using the same engine can find it and review it.

I think that's about it. Good luck!

D'aww, thanks. If it helps, ratings are private and only viewable to the developer receiving them, the rater and the rater's followers, which may be why they can be pretty different from the comments. You can't respond in any way to ratings, and the public can't see what they are.