I've been working out making this VN for a while - this song is special to me because I'm a huge fan of the artist, and the story in the lyrics is very haunting. 

Here's a little run through of how I created this specific VN, starting from the planning process.

Because this wasn't an extensive story line, I first wrote everything out in Notepad++. I have written in Ren'Py for Desideratum, so I knew internally how I wanted the script to look and when I wanted to use variables to choose an ending.

After I had written it all out (it's about 1,600 words) I created a base Ren'Py game with the color scheme I wanted. I then started to paste in my work in the formatting that Ren'Py requires. I knew at that point that a simple counter of options would allow me to pick an ending, so it wouldn't be anything too complex to actually code. 

I saved it all in, adding "scene" options in Ren'Py like "livingroom" and "bedroom" which I knew would help me separate out the scenes for the player. Once I played through and made sure both endings worked, I started working in Midjourney to make images for the backgrounds.

For each scene, I made a "charcoal drawing, horror" image in Midjourney, and then picked my favorite of the images and upscaled it. I knew to make them look more uniform I wanted to put a filter on them, so I did that in Canva. This is how all of the images look pixelated in the same way.

Once all of these images were edited and created, I worked on the GUI. I used GIMP to create the sketchy backgrounds and the choice images, picked a font that I felt went along with the pixely looking art, and then moved the options, font, names, and dialogue boxes around. I also removed the History option and bottom screen in Ren'Py since this was such a simple game that I don't think the player benefits from them being there.

Finally, I needed to make some music. I took a snippet of Gavin's song, stretched it to over 40 minutes long, added multiple effects, and compressed it. This gave it a very eerie quality. I then had it start at the menu and play until the final scene, where it fades out. 

The last thing I had to do was create a cover, which I also did in Midjourney. 

Overall, the process to create this game took me ~10 hours. This is because I've spent hundreds of hours prepping working with these tools: creating images in Midjourney and other AI art programs, coding in Ren'Py for my other demo, writing stories with choices. 

Please let me know what you think. Thanks again to everyone who has supported me as I've started working on games.