Arolf Delano Santos
Abracademia; The Visual Novel
My first solo project
It was one of the most significant projects of my college years and my favorite project overall. Not only was this the first time I created a game by myself, but the fact that it had to be a visual novel means that I was able to develop my narrative and world building skills, which I am most passionate about.
Abracademia: The Visual Novel is set in a magical world where a magic student held in high regard by her family aims to excel in a test and beat her rival. It features a simple branching storyline with multiple choices and a few endings.
Game created using Ren'Py and Atom | Character assets created in Picrew | Background and UI assets created in Photoshop | Music and Sound Effects by myself, Kevin MacLeod and freesound.org
Making of the game
Writing Process
I was tasked in creating a visual novel in our Script Writing, and User Design subjects. First and foremost, was the narrative. I grew up writing my own stories so I decided to use one of my tales, Abracademia, a story about a school of magic, to serve as such.
Below is the visual design of the narrative structures of the two characters of the game: The main character (Ada Fawe; Blue) and her rival (Indy Cinders; Red).
Narrative Works
Plot & Story
Short summaries of the narrative
Plot
A test is being held in a magic school to see who can skillfully wield their weapons.
Story
A student held in high regard by her family tries to excel in her school and outperform her rival, who claims to be better than her.
Narrative Elements
Of the Main Character and her Rival
Main Character
Desire: The main character wants to prove her worth as a great student.
Inciting Incident: A test is about to be held.
Struggle: Her exceptionally skilled rival is present and the headmistress is visiting her class, adding some anxiety to the students.
Climax: She takes advantage of her classmates' anxiety and keeps her composure.
Resolution: The main character and her rival's scores were tied.
Rival
Desire: The rival wants to retain her status as an elite student and outperform the "rookie" main character
Inciting Incident: A test is being held and the headmistress was visiting, adding anxiety to the class.
Struggle: The rival's turn is about to start but she noticed that the headmistress' presence fails to distress the main character.
Climax: The rival gives it her all.
Resolution: Seeing the tied scores, the rival realized that she underestimated the main character and swears to beat her next time.
Short Story
The Narrative Told in Greater Detail
A class is about to be held in a school of magic. The students knew that their lesson is about the art of waving wands and staves so they talk about what is going to happen.
One student (the main character of the story) was conversing with her friends when her rival arrives, mutually giving each other a scornful look. Later, the professor arrives and begins the lecture. The class continues on, listening and asking questions.
Soon enough, the entire class went to a larger room to begin their test in showing their skills discussed in the lecture. As the students take turns, the main character hoped to impress the professor and outperform her rival. As her turn gets closer, the headmistress arrived. She began having a chat with their professor about the class’ progress. Her presence added pressure on the students, but the main character remained calm.
The test was finished and she had seen the results that she and her rival both performed excellently, but were at par with each other. She was quite disappointed that they are neck on neck. Her rival then arrived to check on the results and felt the same way. The two began to argue on who is better when the main characters’ friends arrived and interrupted it. Her rival then left, proclaiming that she will do better next time. The main character and her friends then proceed spend the rest of their day at a festival.
Making of the game
Design Process
After the narrative was made, the focus was set on designing the UI for the game, putting my artistic and planning experience from my previous group projects to use. It was initially planned to look and act like a story book. However, the final designs ended up to be more technical due to the limitations of the software.
Final Product
