【Kickstarter】Love and Chaos: A Share House Visual Novel

The Plot

You’ve just become the manager of a new share house. The residents have gathered in the living room for you to meet them… But wait. They all have issues?! Attraction sparks on all sides as you spend more time with them, and love blossoms unexpectedly under one roof.

Game Description

-A visual novel-style game which you progress through simply by tapping. -Enjoy reading various stories for free every day. -Inclusive tales of love featuring guy-girl and girl-girl romance.

Character Introduction

[Amane Kimijima] Voice actor: Taku Yashiro

University student. Only interested in drawing and painting. Focuses so hard that he forgets to eat and sleep. When his energy runs out, he sleeps wherever he falls.

[Rara Shirosaki] Voice actor: Shiki Aoki

Aspiring underground idol. High energy and always smiling. Appears to be an optimist, but her actions are guided by a desire to make everyone happy.

[Meguru Wakatsuki] Voice actor: Daisuke Namikawa

University student. Popular with women and men thanks to his great communication skills. Often finds himself depended upon, but he can be cold behind his smile.

[Shirosaki Nene] Voice actor: Rui Tanabe

Employed part-time. Makes enemies easily because she speaks her mind (often harshly!), but she is in fact very attentive to others. Has a strong protective streak toward her twin sister Rara.

[Chiyako Mano] Voice actor: Rena Maeda

University student. Always looking for inspiration for novels she writes. Speaks and acts without caring what others think, which leads to her being seen as a weirdo.

[Ibuki Takahito] Voice actor: Noriaki Sugiyama

The protagonist’s boss. Strict with others and himself. Contrary to his intimidating straitlaced attitude, he’s actually very kind-hearted.

Background

Thanks so much for your interest in crowdfunding “Love and Chaos: A Share House Visual Novel”. My name is Akane. I was in charge of planning and production for this game, from creating the characters and developing the plot to devising the game’s world.

Around the time I first began wanting to make a game which would help players learn how to better connect with themselves while enjoying romances between characters, I was personally troubled regarding my own personal relationships, and was under a lot of pressure at work. This led me to visiting a mental health clinic.

Back then, I found myself longing to get into an accident every day rather than face work. I honestly thought that I could escape from work and my relationship issues with impunity if I were hospitalized. I was sure that people wouldn’t blame me or be disappointed if I got injured in an accident and couldn’t work. After all, I wouldn’t be responsible for causing it!—That was how I was thinking.

Fortunately, over the course of guided Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) with a counsellor, I came to notice and learn about those negative thinking patterns I’d fallen into without ever noticing. Slowly but surely, I regained the ability to feel joy at work.

Even among my friends who faced the same sorts of issues, while some were themselves recommended by people to seek counselling and CBT, I noticed most of them were hesitant. They said things like, “I don’t think my problems are serious enough to need medical help” and “I’d be embarrassed if anyone found out I was in therapy”. Some of them were also very anxious that they’d be diagnosed with ADHD or another condition without being properly examined or taken seriously if they dared to take the plunge and seek assistance from a professional.

By being afraid or embarrassed, or not wanting to to uncover particularly bad memories or thoughts, or for any other reason… What if people spiral downwards beyond the point of recovery because they aren’t able to receive consultation with specialist organizations? That question preyed on my mind. I felt like the world would benefit if there was a tool out there that would deliver accurate info easily to help people understand their own minds.

My first thought about how I could create something like that was that I should do something related to entertainment. I’ve been making VN romance games for a long time, so that felt like a good option. But what cemented it was how, as an otaku, I’ve always been inspired by certain characters. I’ve always been saved by idols who aim to make their audience smile, and anime characters who stand up against unimaginable foes when push comes to shove.

Full text

Why crowdfund?

The smartphone version of this game was released 4 June 2018, and has been downloaded by more than 10 million users in Japan and China. Happily, we’ve received a lot of feeback along the lines of “It provides a lot of helpful advice I want to follow” and “It’s made me feel more positive about things.”

We’ve received countless requests from English-speaking fans to distribute the game in English as well, and are currently working on an English translation.

We’d also like to release a PC version on Steam. As a growing small company, we’re still working at learning the ins-and-outs of releasing on Steam and how to adapt games to new systems. Of course, we’d love to make sure more customers can enjoy this game, which is why we’ve put together this Kickstarter project!

If we raise $6,000, we’ll be able to release the game on Steam with the same vertical screen format as the smartphone version. If we raise $13,000, we’ll be able to release it in horizontal screen format.

Introducing the team

HIKARI Lab is a professional group of psychologists who aim to realize a society where everyone is able to receive psychological care easily. We are comprised of doctors, clinical psychologists, and publicly-funded psychologists who are committed to solving problems, reducing them, and providing services that are truly meaningful to society. We began as a student venture and have supervised games, apps, and manga, as well as provided advisory services for corporate product development and online counselling services involving facial expression recognition via AI.

favary is an up-and-coming game company which focuses on developing games for women and the LGBT community. Our motto is “Let’s build a world full of more of your favorites.”

Our small group of elite staff includes two representatives with more than 10 years’ experience in our field, and all of our other staff have more than 6 years’ experience in game development.

We’re proud of our committment to producing stories and graphics of outstanding quality, and make works that can only be achieved by a small company.

Where will funds go?

Cost breakdown:

– $4,500 to develop a new build. To improve cost effectiveness, we will develop the game for PC using the smartphone version as our source.

– $900 for debugging. Since the game must work on a range of devices around the world, debugging a single bug can be expensive. We will preferentially debug to suit more commonly used devices, and will need to exclude devices that are uncommonly used or have low specs.

– $600 for our Kickstarter fee.

Project Timeline

We’re aiming to release the game within six months after crowdfunding ends. I.e. If crowdfunding ends in December 2020, we’ll plan for a June 2021 release.

Rewards

[Pledge without a reward]

Thank you very much for your support!

[Be credited]

1: Credited by name

Your name will appear in in alphabetical order under a “Special Thanks” section in the game’s credits and on favary’s website.

* Please write your name in the remarks column. It doesn’t have to be your real name. If you don’t enter anything, we’ll use your Kickstarter user name. Please understand that we won’t be able to publish any names that may be considered offensive or are overly long.

* This reward is included for all pledgers.

[Collection of main visuals and illustrations]

2: Cover image wallpaper

Wallpaper for your smartphone of the game’s main visual featuring all of the characters in Love and Chaos: A Share House Visual Novel.

3: Illustration collection

A digital book containing all illustrations that appear in the game.

[Steam Key]

4: A Steam key

One Steam key for Love and Chaos: A Share House Visual Novel.

[2 Steam Keys]

Two Steam keys

Two Steam keys for Love and Chaos: A Share House Visual Novel.

[Digital art book]

5: Digital art book

A digital book containing illustrations appearing in the game as well character info, design sketches, etc.

[Sponsor recognition]

6：Sponsor recognition

Your name will be featured with the credit of “sponsor” in the digital art book.

[Message from staff (digital)]

7: Digital thank you card

A special thank you message from the creators of Love and Chaos: A Share House Visual Novel.

Message from the team

“You can learn how to have a good relationship with yourself while having fun.”

It took longer than expected for us to first start production on “Love and Chaos: A Share House Novel” after first coming up with this concept.

Because favary is a small company, we collaborated with several other companies to help us realize our vision. But as they say, “It all comes down to the bottom line.”

We went on with other work while keeping the thought “We’ll make it happen someday” in the backs of our minds. It wasn’t until we met with HIKARI Lab that the project took off in earnest.

The process of creating a game by combining my know-how of writing characters and stories with HIKARI Lab’s psychology skills and experience was really a joy. We took great care to ensure that no parts of the various stories would take more of a toll on readers than was absolutely necessary, and when it came to establishing the game’s mechanics, we committed ourselves to long-term profits over short-term ones in order to enable many people to keep playing for free.

Right now, we want to deliver “Love and Chaos: A Share House Novel” to more pepole, and to accomplish that as soon and as best as we can. And we strongly wish to continue meeting the challenge of making games that fit the concept: “You can learn how to have a good relationship with yourself while having fun.”

We’d love it if you’d join us on this journey.”