Scarlet Sails is a magical pirate adventure game that placed 7th in the 2015 IF Comp (still excited about that result ). I’ve edited it so much since then that it’s roughly doubled in length, with better development of the magic system and MUCH wider branching, especially at the beginning. And just better writing overall. Oh, and an optional (and sarcastic) hint system, since a pirate’s life isn’t particularly easy to survive at the best of times.
My main concerns are that dead people show up when they shouldn’t (always awkward), that there might be new errors or bugs since the improvements, etc. Any comments for improvement, however big or small, are welcome. You can play it at:
This is pretty cool so far as I’ve played. Here’re the issues I found.
[spoiler]I bought Jalu, but he showed up later acting like I hadn’t.
I got into a duel with Captain Blood for disobeying her order to kill Jalu because he had knew where to find hidden treasure, and afterwards it seemed to indicate that I’d suddenly transferred to a different ship and was chasing her and the ship I’d originally captured. Then the next page seemed to go back to the original state with me discussing how to find the treasure. Later on we run into a Captain Starboard, who we seem to be chasing, but it’s never really made clear why or when this happened as far as I can tell.
I ended up catching up with Captain Starboard and then tried to parley with her. I felt like I chose the nice options throughout most of the game, but my morality stat never seemed to change. I’m not really sure what stat I need to get the peaceful option to work. Anyway, I ended up fighting, and it seemed to repeat two different possible outcomes to the fight, as Captain Starboard surrendered twice.[/spoiler]
I ran across the same bugs as above plus when I picked one of the suggested names it worked, but if I tried to write a name of my own it came up blank.
Also I had the hints turned off at the beginning, but they seemed to come on by themselves right before the duel with the Captain. They stayed on after that.
It seems to be a fun story. I have some bugs like others.
In the battle when Jalu reveals who he is and kill his father, I choose to not try to kill Captain Blood. Then Jalu reveals his identity, and after that, the game asks me to kill Captain blood, the choice to not do that is grey tint. It seems there is a back loop 4 or 5 choices before.
After I steal the Scarlet Sails and pass the test of whether I stay on board for disobeying orders, it says I am going with Captain Starboard to hunt the Scarlet Sails.
I decided to leave Blood immediately and steal my own ship, but eventually she magically reappeared during that romance part and when Killian’s former captain (Graves I think) attacked. And she decided to order me around! I’m the Captain, dammit!
Got the same problem with Jalu, and when I entered my own name, when I corrected the captain on the next page I said my name was “,”
Also when I date multiple people, only my romance with Jalu shows up.
And even though Jalu told me about the sea monster I couldn’t prepare for it and acted shocked when it showed up for the first time.
I played this game quite some time ago on the ifcomp (was it the ifcomp?) Anyway great story (even though I totally didn’t die like 100 times at the end)
For the greatest amount of original text since the IF Comp, try stealing your own ship or stowing away, both of which are options in Chapter 1. For the greatest amount of potential bugs, take every opportunity to kill people and/or romance people (it turns out love and murder are both tricky to code when you do them more than once).
And, once again, thank you SO MUCH to everyone. As they always say, it takes a village to raise a pirate. (That’s what they say, right?)
). I’ve edited it so much since then that it’s roughly doubled in length, with better development of the magic system and MUCH wider branching, especially at the beginning. And just better writing overall. Oh, and an optional (and sarcastic) hint system, since a pirate’s life isn’t particularly easy to survive at the best of times.
ill try your game and give u a feed back