4/8 true colours dev notes

cross-posted from my website:

i initially came up with this game because i was upset over yandere simulator, funnily enough. i had been following the project for like, six years, from very early in development. i was like twelve, and seeing the game progress over the years, the building going from awkward shape with empty rooms to actual campus, the characters from the same model with the same ponytail copypasted to actually having unique hair models, the game get more and more methods of interaction and elimination was just magical to me. it was what got me interested in making games in the first place, and it was something i was deeply attached to growing up. so hearing that yandev was being accused of grooming a kid, and that so many people had jumped ship wasn't just horrifying, it was like... there was a hollow in my chest where a bit of my childhood had been torn out of my chest a bit. even if the accusations weren't true, there was still a noticable shift in the project that made it feel like doubtful that it would ever get completed. like if ayano's voice actress, one of the most iconic people involved in the team, left, how would you ever recover?

i was talking to a friend about how upsetting and terrible this was, and he reassured me by saying that i could become a much better gamedev than yandev ever was. and then i kind of remembered. i liked the april fools' day joke where the rivals were turned into hot guys who competed for ayano's heart, and i thought the idea of making a dating sim out of those character archetypes was deeply funny and almost a sort of reclamation? but ten love interests is way too much. i didn't like dating the nurse (needles? scary) or the teacher (i just don't like flirty guys unless they're lame), but eight love interests is still too much...

then i had the idea of merging them, and that's how the duality theme was born

aman is a mix of a hardcore delinquent and the cutesy little brother type (well, he's more of a jokey best friend, but he was still designed after the cutesy little brother type), bern is the (melo)dramatic flirt with purple swirly hair and the energetic jovial jock in one, cain is the tsundere and the kind and gentle (lmao) cooking club pres, and dean is the shy girl with creepy interests and the stern and cool student council president

i didn't originally mean to make them related at first. originally, bern and dean looked way more different, but between me going "you can't name a guy bear (bern's placeholder name) and not make him fat" and accidentally drawing dean fat, they ended up looking really similar. cain and dean became siblings because it was really funny to make the guy literally named cain an actual good older brother, and aman was thrown in there because i went "you can't just make everyone but aman related"

while the characters originally started as a spin-off of yansim characters, i'm really proud of how they ended up becoming their own characters by the end

aman was the first character i came up with and the one who inspired the two sides to every character dynamic, because i liked the idea of both "rough delinquent guy but he's short and adorable" and "cutesy guy with a secret conniving side" and wanted both at once. i was so greedy that it inspired this game's unique mechanic lmao

bern was the one i struggled most with like, being excited for? because i liked aman so much he inspired the game, cain was fun because i loved two-faced guys, and dean was a sweetheart from the outset. but i don't actually LIKE flirty guys unless they're dorky, so bern's dialogue was a struggle. so i made myself write all of bern's route first thing, and i ended up loving him. wouldn't have been able to complete the game without him.

cain is fun! i love pink boys (don't look at him and noct too closely it's fine), i love tsunderes, i love bitchy characters, so like, he's REALLY FUN to write. i don't know why he stretches out his words so much though. his dialogue just happened that way.

i need to be honest. i do not remember WHY i decided dean should be trans. as far as i know it just sort of happened. but i love her regardless. i gave her a love of doll making because i started watching doll customization videos to take notes on their techniques for drawing faces (and ended up getting hooked on watching the entire process...)

no one has any noses because i was going "well, i don't like drawing noses, ears, faces, lips, hands, animals, buildings, or nature, so i'll just avoid drawing most of that." (i made it in rpgmaker half to practice the new engine i got and half to avoid backgrounds) but then my apple pencil broke soon after making the love interests sprites... i literally couldn't draw the things i liked or disliked after that... i couldn't draw a male or more gender neutral equivalent to the feminine main character sprite. that's also why my friends drew the title screen art and some of the cgs

the yandere path was included half as a nod to the inspiration and half because it's really funny to include a yandere ending to such a cutesy wholesome work. i didn't know what the ending would be if you pursued them while they were the yandere, until i thought it'd be really funny if it was just implied they fucked

yes, some of the npcs are just liphiyo. the other npcs are from a story that i ended up not writing because it was too convoluted.

the 4/8 is just because there are four love interests yet eight endings. i think if we had an original soundtrack, it'd be fun to make everything in 4/8 time.

another fun fact: i am a very... let things happen kind of game developer. i kept accidentally putting dots on cain's sprite and i liked the look so he just has three beauty marks now. i didn't realize there was a heart on bern's love mode sprite until afterwards but i liked it so he just does that now. i stabbed cain's eye out so i didn't have to draw the other one. and so on.

i had actually been planning on making an artbook and bonus stories to sell for this game, but i ended up rambling too much and making it more of a dev note showcase...

the love interests being a, b, c, and d and all ending with n was accidental. but then i thought it would be fun to make love interests for the entire alphabet...