Nothing left (to burn) [WiP] — July 16 update!

Nothing left (to burn)

"What would you do if the most important person for you suddenly died? "

Having dropped out of St. Mary’s after years of bullying, you believed you had a second chance, but your life comes to a halt when your best friends crashes to the ground from the top of the school’s building. The media dismisses it as a suicide, a tragic but expected result, but you know better; the only way Drew Moore would have jumped from the school roof is if they had been pushed into their death.

The police and the school turn a blind eye and close the case, but you have a faint idea of who’s responsible; the same people who made your life hell at St. Mary’s. You could blame most of the student body and the teachers for covering their eyes when the abuse happened, but out of all of them, you want to make the perpetrators pay.

With nothing left to lose, you finally decide to return to St. Mary’s as a senior to uncover the truth; and this time, you won’t be the vicitm.

The game: Nothing Left (to burn)

TRIGGER WARNINGS: sensitive themes such as suicide mentions, discrimination (mentions of bullying), violence and strong language. All the awful things you can expect from High Schoolers, but nothing too graphic. I would say the story is suited for audiences that are at least 15+.

ROs

Olivia “Livvy” Haywood: senior. As the class representative, she only has the best of intentions. Livvy was meant to act as a mediator between teachers and students to make their communication easier, yet most of the time she takes the brunt of both sides.

Rami Moussa: senior. You remember him from your sophomore year, but back then he was a grade ahead of you. You’ve gathered that he was held back a year after getting expelled for violently assaulting two members of the football team.

Kiyo Miura: junior. You think you’ve heard about her before leaving St. Mary’s; an emerging track and field star. Yet for some unknown reason, she has stopped running indefinitely, and seems to be mingling with the wrong crowd.

William Tate: senior. He has transfered this year. Although he seems friendly enough, he’s reticent and quiet, preferring to be left to his own devices. There are rumours of him being a goth who thinks of himself as a vampire, due to his pale complexion and never seen eating.

Alexis Payne: senior. Identifies as non binary, but refuses to tag themselves further, finding labels too restricting for their liking. A free-spirited soul that believes in the innate goodness of people regardless of how many times they are let down.

???: secret RO?

Changelog:

Update June 2 (2019): Finished Prologue (about 3000 words).

June 3 (2019): corrected some errors and changed the files to UTF-8, should work in Chrome and Firefox.

June 7 (2019): added 1/4 of Chapter 1 and information about the ROs.

July 14 (2019): Chapter 1 is 3500 words long.

July 16 (2019): Added 1 full scene + the start of a second one in Chapter 1 (+3500 aprox)

August 28 (2019): revamped prologue, 10k words (without code)

September 25 (2019):

  • Corrected reported typos.
  • Recalibrated some stats.
  • Added two thirds of Chapter 1, 6,7k words (without code).

October 31 (2019):

  • Added sleepover scene in Prologue (+6000 words)
  • Added two new scenes and some extra choices in Chapter 1 (+10000 words)
  • Included flavor text in Chapter 1.
  • Added the start of Chapter 2 (1500 words)

April 18 (2020):

  • Made a short FAQ.

July 16 (2020):

  • Made a Skip System for New Game+
  • Split up the Prologue, now it’s 2,5k words. The other part is now Chapter 1.
  • Chapter 1(used to be the Prologue) has a new scene over 10k words.
  • Added optional customization scene.
  • Changed the news article, courtesy of @SuperNova, thank you!!
  • Chapter 2 has some extra choices and the last scene has a little bit of branching depending on if you let Drew sleep over.
  • Chapter 3 first 1500 words got scratched. First 13,5k words are up!

TOTAL DEMO: 66.500 words approx (code not included)

To do list:
  • Add choices in the sleepover scene (Chapter 1), friend route.
  • Finish Chapter 3.
  • Chapter 4-?
  • Make Edits.

I know I have been absent these past two years, but a lot of stuff happened. I have had a lot of unpleasant issues in real life, both mental and physical health problems, and while I’m not going to elaborate much on that, it has been a ride. I have other projects open, but after some time, I’ve come to the conclusion that I’m not ready for them. I didn’t abandon or scratch them; I just need to take my time with them because I started them when I wasn’t in my best headspace.

This story is meant to be a lot of bad things in my life handled in a way that won’t hurt me anymore, so I need to get rid of them first to improve. I hope that in the long term, this can be cathartic for you too :smile:

Where to find me: Tumblr
I’ll answer questions, post snippets and reblog some things that inspire me :smile:

Extras

Snippets

Drew (Romantic) Snippet, post 210 — 1/23/2020

Fanart


College aged MC and Drew, found in post 344, by @Lea_I

Would you use the ROs for your revenge?

  • No, I would never do that to them. It’s cruel and they don’t deserve it.
  • Only if they also have their own reasons to help me.
  • Maybe, if I personally don’t like them.
  • Absolutely; I only care about vengeance
  • Other reasons (please explain them in a post).

0 voters

FAQ

FAQ

How long will be the game?
I can’t say for sure yet as the demo is in a very early stage, but it will be definitely longer than 100k words! Maybe between 200k-300k if everything goes well.

Can I change my MC’s name later on?
No, the MC’s name (which you can choose) will stay the same, but you can change pick a fake surname (customizable too).

If I pick my looks, can I change them later on?
Yes! The first time will be to set the MC’s actual looks, but later on there’s a second customization where you can dye their hair, cut it or grow it, wear contacts, etc.

Can I kill the bullies?
Your MC can be responsible of some deaths, but not all of them will die. Despite all proof pointing the contrary, this isn’t a violent game for the sake of violence.

Can I avoid violence?
Yeah, absolutely! Some events (not all of them gory, don’t worry) might be scripted, but your character won’t be forced to physically hurt or kill anyone unless you make the choice.

Why bother with ROs (Romance Options)? Isn’t this a revenge game?
Good question! While the theme of the game is revenge, it’s also very character/relationship driven. It’s not as much as romance as it is about people, and I decided to address them as ROs to differentiate them from regular NPCs: they are meant to be a lot more than that! They can be allies, confidants, tools… anything!

Are all the ROs willing to help us?
No. Each one has their own personality, and some might be more willing to commit crimes than others. Some might need to be tricked/blackmailed into helping you.

689 Likes

I really like this so far, can’t wait for more

4 Likes

Good work :+1: Keep it up.

3 Likes

First of all welcome back! :tada:
I liked the beginning very much, the whole theme of bullying and their victims touches my nerve hard. Though I hope we will get chance to investigate before render judgment.

5 Likes

Looking forward to this :blush:

2 Likes

It’s awesome work and can’t wait for more! I always hated bullying and will be the reason I will go all revenge on them! Glad you’re back and hope your day is great! :heart:

8 Likes

hope you keep on going on this it good read

2 Likes

Very interesting indeed.

3 Likes

I barely read anymore, but I will poke my head in to say that that your WIP has an extremely intriguing title and premise. I look forward to ugly crying when this comes out as a HG.

14 Likes

Get an error when I go to the link:

Error: prologue line 1: invalid character. (ChoiceScript text should be saved in the UTF-8 encoding.)

2 Likes

I am sure where the scalare is should be escalate.

So far, it looks pretty good. Interested in seeing more.

3 Likes

I got say this base on how this story going for how do we get are deserve retribution taking it high or low note get these called getting them in prison or :skull_and_crossbones:

5 Likes

You cover your mouth, unable to mutter a sound.
Would it better if here be I and my? Since other choices are first person narrative perspective.

2 Likes

After several attemps, I knew that she would never listen to me, so we didn’t talk about the issue anymore.

Throws up an error for me

prologue line 528: Non-existent variabele ‘dtheiy’

But so far a really awesome WIP with a interesting premise. I’ll keep checking it out :slight_smile:

2 Likes

Thank you for your kind words of encouragement! I’m happy to see you enjoyed it! :smile:

@Langre yeah, the MC will do some detective work before deciding what to do, and also investigate the truth about Drew’s death. In fact, the MC will spend their remaining junior year and summer before their senior grade doing some field work.

@kekexterror yeah, bullying is an awful thing :confused: This is somewhat of an outlet for me, for all the unresolved things that I’ve had to deal with over the years. It takes some time to heal, but that’s the goal.

@Samuel_H_Young thanks! Although 'till project is finished is going to take a while :upside_down_face:

@Taylor_Enean are you using Firefox? Unicode works with Chrome, but I’ve changed the files to UTF-8 coding, so it should work with Firefox too. Scrub a a little your cache or use an incognito tab and let me know if you can play :slight_smile:

@Dpwjeremy thank you! I’ve corrected it, clean your cache and you’ll see the correction.

@Takashi_Shin the initial idea is to take revenge through whatever means necessary; with some, death or prison aren’t required, but who knows, sometimes things get a bit out of hand.

@Runbunnyrun you’re right! Thank you. Sometimes when you write you kind of forget these things :sweat_smile:

@Yippie I squashed the bug, thanks!

19 Likes

It works now, thanks. Will try it later when time allows.

1 Like

I don’t know how it happened, but I realized that I was crying over my friend’s death :cry: Good luck with your game, I liked it and felt it

9 Likes

Oooh, really interesting concept. I like it. :grin: Probably half of your readership will be transported back to the good old days of being bullied, so also definitely a relatable topic there that isn’t often explored in COG (at least as far as I’ve seen).


Also, I found a few grammatical mistakes for whenever you next edit…

“You’re even surprised they had the decency to keep you[your] friend’s name a secret; nowadays the journalist[journalists] that make it to the top news are hyenas”

“you are chocking[choking]”

“And like with most cases of abuse, it escalates, to the point it’s untenable [.]”
(forgot a period)

2 Likes

That was… short. :thinking:

I’d like to see more, though, and it reads easily and clearly, so I guess I can say that, at least. :relaxed:

Yay? :grimacing:

1 Like

@Mei_Hiroshi thank you! My intention was for the player to connect with the MC’s friend (Drew), since part of the plot (and their motivations) revolves around their friendship :smile: You’ll see more about Drew in the future, too!

@buggygirl11 hey! I’m sorry for being absent for so long, we have a lot to catch up, don’t we? Thanks for the mistakes, I’ve corrected them. And yeah, the reason I’ve wanted to explore the issue of bullying is because not only it’s about personal experiences, but something that is rarely explored in detail, so there’s a lot to deal with and unpack.

@Taylor_Enean thanks! Since English is not my first language, I try my best to be clear, although I’m a messy writer (which means a lot of mistakes and sometimes sentences that don’t make much sense outside my head) :sweat_smile:


I’ve updated the demo with a bit of Chapter 1; remember to clean your caches to avoid playing the old demo :upside_down_face:

17 Likes