As a huge thank you to LordIrishDas, and because he did such an amazing job of running the contest, I’m going to post the link to Julia Caesar and The Great Fire of Rome, while I work on the article I promised him. I’ll likely yank down the files by the end of the week.
This is my first attempt at making a game. I wrote it in 12 days panicking constantly about the deadline looming and I was writing it right up until midnight. I didn’t get a chance to beta it thoroughly, but the two beta-testers I did have were absolutely amazing. The game’s really unpolished just now which is one of the reasons I’m so tentative about posting the link. I know the stats don’t really work properly, I didn’t have time to balance them or implement them how I wanted.
I’m currently working on a completely different project. I do plan to go back to Julia Caesar once I’ve finished the other project, but it will likely be several months at least. I don’t plan to open up the Julia Caesar files and fix or change anything until my other project is done. I know there’s plenty that needs fixed, and polished, and the second episode to write, but I get distracted really easily. I need to stay focussed on my current project. If you want to offer things you think need fixed you’d be better emailing it to me (the email addy’s on the game) than posting it here since it’ll be easier for me to keep track of there.
Anyway I give you Julia Caesar and the Great Fire of Rome! The result of 12 days of craziness and an awful lot of caffeine.
I. Could. Not. Stop.
Laughing!
This is awesome! I love how we have to babysit Nero (one of the worlds biggest trolls) in the first chapter. Not to mention that the comedic writing style is ON POINT.
@FairyGodfeather Man that was hilarious!! If you could do that in twelve days then I can’t imagine what you’ll be able to do in SEVEN MONTHS! You know how to write!!
@Ada Thank you very much. I know it is a bit different from the usual choicescript game. I wanted a protagonist with personality, although sometimes I think Marcia’s might eclipse Julia’s, and they are both a bit crazy.
I must not genderbend Julia Caesar and offer a male path called Julio Caesar Conquers the World. No! Definitely no. People would cry. I would cry. It shall not be. No all-singing, all-dancing adventures of Julio Caesar. No crying of “what is this atrocity! Make it stop! My eyes are bleeding! NOOOOO!!!”
So now it’s July and several months after the contest and I haven’t polished Julia Caesar. I wrote an article about the process of creating the game just after I finished writing Julia Caesar. I don’t think it’s going to get polished any time soon, (the article or the game) although I do intend to go back to it. The goth chapter would only take slight tweaking to get it playable and I have detailed notes on the other chapters.
So the link above’s working again, until I have another anxiety attack and decide that the game sucks so badly I’m pulling it down until I have the proper time to spend on it.
I had planned to post my article to the forum but it’s too big for one post. It’s two big for two posts. I didn’t even know there was a character limit. So instead I’m uploading the article to dropbox and the link’s https://www.dropbox.com/s/1vxrbb58674k2sf/howIwrotejulia.txt I may or may not get around to actually formatting the article and linking it to the game and vice versa but at the moment I’ve not even looked over it to make sure it makes sense.
*SPOILERS*
I am loving this game! I have played through it six times since you sent me the link! It is hysterical, and there aren’t all THAT many spelling or grammar errors. My favorite part as a whole is saving, and flirting with, or course, Arachne Web! My favorite individual choice so far is DEFINITELY when I have the bucket brigade and Crassus comes over and I get to change the song I’m singing to “Crassus is an ass!” That had me laughing like a maniac for about ten minutes straight and off and on for the next hour. I’m not sure why I thought it was so funny, but I did! I guess I just loved the way that Julia completely blew him off when he came over and without batting an eye changed the song to insult him, and what’s more, the entire brigade joined in! I hope you get around to making the next episodes soon! Of the ones listed, I can’t decide if I’m most excited for the Goths or the Peasant Revolt!
*END SPOILERS*
One thing bugs me, though. The last line, or somewhere at the end, is something that says the gods have taken notice of you and the life of a hero is not an easy one. Well, what do heroes do? They get useless quests from the gods, of course! Yet, there was no “Quest for the Everburning Candelabra” or “Planting the Sprig of Purple Peaches of the Gods” or “Tame, Kill, or Find and Run Away From the Platinum Mouse and Companion the Copper Kitty” listed under upcoming episodes! Of course, I would love to see you make up your own ridiculous object to find or plant to plant or monster to… whatever or any other quest since odds are you can think of one much better than those that I thought about for literally two seconds.
@Galador Thank you. You’ve made my day. Thank you so much for the feedback. I have been turning over whether to continue Julia Caesar or not. It was fun to write, but it seems very different from everything else available.
I didn’t get the chance to really implement the gods in that part. I had intended to have a larger scene at the temple but I ran out of time, which was just as well since it gave me the opportunity to add another Crassus scene instead and I really wasn’t sure what I was doing with the gods.
I think the idea of a Hero Quest for the Gods would be fun.
Arachne’s had past experiences with the gods, of course, with the whole weaving thing, which isn’t quite what was detailed in the myth and I think I had vague notes about that. Julia herself is descended from Jupiter. It’d likely be a musical quest they’d have to undergo. Or for some fashionable item, like winged sandals, the golden fleece.
@FairyGodfeather The fact that it is so different is a part of what makes it so wonderful! Not that I am one of those corny people who says that anything different is always best, but this really is a funny and enjoyable game where you don’t spend forever making difficult moral decisions and instead do whatever Julia thinks should be done!
I think you could do really well with a musical quest! The songs Julia sings are hilarious and really contribute to the atmosphere of the story even though they aren’t the greatest works of poetry in history! I also think that you would be better off making up an item yourself for her to find rather than using one that already exists in Greek mythology unless you want to make her go and find something purely for vanity’s sake, which has much potential for humor. I would say find the golden fleece to made into some kind of cosmetic shawl or cape and have Julia completely disregard the practicality of her new attire, or maybe have the same idea, a cape or something, but have her go and find the tapestry that Athena wove during her loom duel with Arachne and use it to decorate her palace! That way, Arachne could have a bigger role in that episode, and you’ll be able to have more characters to interact with during the quest. Or at the very least, it could make for a very comical opening scene! You could simply have Julia and Marcia find someone else along the way…
Something frivolous and vain, I think, is the best way to go with the quest if you are not going to make it something that is simply ridiculous and doesn’t actually serve any purpose whatsoever, such as what I said above about the Purple Peaches of the Gods.
You mean you didn’t spend hours trying to work out if you should kill Nero, or instead sing him a song? It’s one of the benefits of having a bush-like structure instead of a tree I think, where the intention is to have a lot of choice, a lot of fun paths, and for the game to be replayable so you can choose whatever options you want just to explore, and then go back to the beginning and try again and see where another path leads.
If I were doing the golden fleece, I’d definitely have it transformed into a fashionable object as opposed to kept just as a fleece, and since it was a quest for fashion Arachne would definitely be a big part of them.
I think, most likely it would be a plot where Athena (well Minerva I suppose) comes to Arachne claiming that she doesn’t have anything decent to wear for the latest God Party and she has to upstage that annoying Venus. Arachne had better help her or she’ll turn her into a spider again. Then Julia stepping in to help Arachne out of the mess, and the two of them travelling to gather legendary artifacts to make the best outfit ever. I think they’d want to use a Rainbow somehow.
@FairyGodfeather Yeah, I like that whole bush thing! It worked really well for The Great Fire of Rome!
That’s perfect!!! A quest to assemble the best outfit ever made! That could be quite the amalgam of legendary artifacts! The fleece for a cape, the winged shoes, the Girdle of Hippolyta, the Necklace of Harmonia, the Nemian Lion’s coat literally for a coat, that sort of thing! I’m not sure how many of those actually cross over into Roman mythology, though.
Also, you could say Minerva and Arachne made amends a long time ago and say that Minerva now has Arachne as her number one fashion consultant! That could make for a great opening scene if you do it right!
On a different note, I totally didn’t even realize that I’d written Athena instead of Minerva! It’s so much easier to have gods like Apollo who kept the same name for both civilizations!
That reminds me! Nero says that Zeus is angry at Rome, and then like two lines later Jupiter is mentioned! I’m not exactly sure where this is in the game (obviously during dialogue with Nero) but that stuck out to me as probably the biggest blunder in Julia Caesar!
WHEEEEEE! Thank you so much for your comments.
It’s one of the benefits of having a bush-like structure instead of a tree I think, where the intention is to have a lot of choice, a lot of fun paths, and for the game to be replayable so you can choose whatever options you want just to explore, and then go back to the beginning and try again and see where another path leads.