The art is so cute that I'm sad the "H" button doesn't work in this game. I can't take a good screenshot without hiding the overlay menu... *sigh* And it's SUCH a quaint little town too!
Mikel's name is strange for the setting.... it sounds spanish. But the town looks semi-medival uk.
.....is it normal to run outside after strangers just because you think they hurt themselves? oO It sounds really bizarre to me, but I'm hardly an expert on normal human behavior.
I see why Lovecraft never drew his creatures... It's kinda cute. But not remotely what it should be. (Which in incomprihensible.)
....why am I forced to answer like a moralistic person? >_> Going soft is NOT a good change for a conqueror in my book. Nor is being what he used to be bad.
I also agree with Mikel about the punting. I'm all for punting any obstacles into the water. Why can't I say that? *pout*
( *randomly imagine a conversation with a certain squid faced someone* "So do you prefer my human shape or my other shape?" "You look good in both, but... I think I like your human form better. If only because you have lips." "Oh," *blushes* "And because I happen to know how squids mates, and....yeeeeeeahhhh...." xD )
....kinda wish there was an option to make a flirtatious comment when a certain someone reminiscent about having people worship him. ^_^
I also want to hit the main character over the head repeatedly until the ridiculous moral and ethic nonsense is beaten out of him.
The ending was extremely disappointing. A school ceremony, and not a word about your love interest.
(I could not care less if a certain idiot woman lives or dies. She deserves what she gets for threatening my darling.)
Is there more than one ending in this game? Cuz I want a different one! >_<
EDIT:
Oh, wait... there's more after the credits. oO
Did Mikel ever heal? It doesn't look like it. I DO love how unapologetic he is about the things he's done tho. ^_^ I'm happy I picked the one person who had not gone completely native --so to speak.
And the ending is so bitter-sweet. It's so sad....😭
And I keep wondering if he would have been restored if I had just pushed him into the pond. *sigh* Not that I was ever given an option.
Is there really only one ending that varies with which love interest you choose? I'm guessing choices doesn't matter much... And the lazy-ass character description doesn't help.
But Lovecraft and a cute barista.... I may check it out despite it all for that.
Haha, if "lazy ass" description refers to Mikel's here on the page, it was a funny joke made with the team during our final moments on the game jam. It's also a quote from The Lego Movie which we felt fit his flirtatiously laidback personality. :)
To answer your question, there's four total endings. Related specifically to Love Interests, two of those endings have unique outcomes.
Thanks for leaving us with your lovely review and for taking the time to play TSUL! For a majority of our team it was their first ever visual novel. ♡ Cheers!
RIP, i hope you make it possible to play on Mac sometime in the future. i can suck it up and use the browser version, and i'm gonna lol, but it would be nice to be able to download on mac
also omfg i was really debating between Mikel and Garret, leaning towards Garret because i love a single dad, but i went back to my save to see the difference between hanging out with them (when you first see the tat studio) i can't bring myself to go back because Mikel legit gave me a tattoo. i can't not keep it, wtf
okay it worked out LMAo i was so leaning towards Garret at the start that it still chose him for the final scenes lol
Hehe, thank you so much for playing lunat1c! We're also big fans of Garret 🥹 We're hoping to provide a build for Mac if there's enough considerable interest in the nearby future. I am glad you got to enjoy our VN in-browser at least! Happy Holidays!
i'm glad you guys made it available to play in the browser lol, theres nothing worse than when a game won't run on mac OR the browser so i'm glad one option works lol
Seeing the that there is already a predetermined appearance for the mc is really disappointing.. it leaves little room for immersion and serves no purpose to the plot.
Thanks for your feedback! We hope you're able to enjoy TSUL for what it does have to offer in storytelling, and will take note of your comment for future projects. Cheers!
I genuinely think TSUL did a great job at combining mystery, romance, and cosmic horror- making it more than just a visual novel but an absolute experience that had me on the edge of my seat until the end! The overall plot, scoring, voice acting, and character art had me completely immersed in the story. Each character had their own unique charm, making it soooo difficuly for me to choose who to romance (despite knowing I was gonna play the rest of the routes after my first playthrough lol), but Garret caught my heart first- WHAT A SWEETHEART HE IS!
I was also really surprised about the length of the game, considering the time it took for it to be made. As I said on my stream, the TSUL team did an amazing job and I hope they get more love and recognition in the days, weeks, and years to come!
Rhee, thank you once more for taking the time to play TSUL and now for leaving us with the absolute sweetest review. Our team had so much fun tagging along during your livestreams and we were super happy to see you have just as much fun playing our VN. It means the world to us!
Cheers from the TSUL dev team, xoxo from Garret, and Happy Spooktober!
I don't think I've ever really encountered a setting like this that felt so... comfy, despite the elements you'd think would be unsettling/off-putting?
And the cast, too, despite certain obvious factors, I really found myself just wanting to get to know all of them. They're really endearing all in all. I think there's something to be said for the cast (if you know you know) wanting normalcy, while the crux of the plot cues off of certain others reaching for the unknown, the forbidden, the dangerous-
Hi Don, thank you so so much for taking the time to play through TSUL! I absolutely loved watching, and I admired your persistence with achieving minigames (though I will admit it ails me this was an older build, I wish we could have pushed our updates faster so you could perhaps have a bit more ease in your gameplay experience! Haha), and really, really enjoyed your commentary and reactions for Sanraya's Route (with a glimmer of Garret, too). Your thoughtful reflection at the end was a treat and truly warmed my heart to hear. Thank you so much. Cheers, and have a Happy Spooktober!
There is a very particular, special kind of oddness that permeates certain small seaside towns, and this is honestly the first time I think I've seen that represented so well! Absolutely adored this start to finish; the character and monster designs are both phenomenal, the story is strong, well-written, and intriguing, the music melodic and whimsical--and I practically shed tears of joy when I found I could skip the fishing mini-game, because for reasons unknown fishing mechanics are my perennial bane, hahaha.
(Additionally: I see that Pan's Labyrinth easter-egg! Or rather, heard it! 💚)
My only--admittedly greedy--complaint is that after falling in love with all the cast of characters, I was left wanting more of the ensemble interactions at the end; though then again, I still wouldn't be ready to let them go. ✨ Such wonderful work, team--one of my favorites of the jam by far!
I absolutely loved this game’s story, characters, and overall vibe. It’s incredible what this talented team accomplished in just a month. Everything worked so well together, from the music to the art direction to the writing. The lovely (partial) voice acting added a lot to the characters, too. Great job!
It took me about 5 hours to finish one playthrough (reading everything out loud and spending lots of time theorizing what would happen next), which is an impressive length for a jam game. I went into my playthrough expecting to go for Garret, but I found all the characters so charming that I wanted to romance them all (including best girl Ophelia). I ended up with Mikel and was grinning like an idiot through the whole last act of the game. So fun!
The game provides the option to skip mini-games entirely through the Settings menu in addition to a hybrid approach where you can choose to move on if you fail a particular mini-game. I appreciated both options. While playing through the first time, I wanted to at least try the mini-games to get a feel for the experience the developers intended, but was relieved when they didn’t block progress. Then it was useful to turn off the mini-games entirely when skipping through large chunks of the game to get to certain choices and endings.
The game already felt pretty complete and high-quality with v1.3. With a little more polish, it’ll really feel professional. I’m glad to see some of the issues I noticed were fixed in v1.4. If there’s one more thing I’d like to see… Gallery, pretty please? 🥺 The CGs were so cool, I’d love to be able to revisit them easily (and also see how many I missed). Just a quality-of-life thing.
Anyway, I really enjoyed this game and would recommend it to anyone who enjoys a good mystery and/or romance!
Hi Cera, thank you SO much for your outstanding review of TSUL and once more, for streaming your super fun playthrough!!! We were so happy to watch it and I for one, very giddy about your own reactions for our dear Ophelia! 😆
It's funny you mention a CG Gallery- It's currently in our discussions for further polish. We heard from a few other players for a desire to revisit CGs they encountered, and our team is floating the idea of even including concept/process work in the Gallery! If we happen to greenlight any of this, it'll certainly be announced in a future dev log. ☺️
Thank you again, our dev team is super grateful! Cheers and have a very spooky Spooktober. 💙
I absolutely adored playing this!!! It was so polished and impressive, especially for something done in a month - a massive props to the entire team for this incredible undertaking!!!
The aesthetic of the game was fantastic, the art was such a delightful tone setter, and the music added some really nice ambience. The voice acting was also such a good touch, and really added an extra layer of delightfulness to the characters. And the MONSTER DESIGNS!! I was blown away by them, and really loved the incredible variety of creepy-beautiful critters in this game. Sanraya’s true form was definitely a highlight for me. I also really appreciated the little artistic details, like the fish animation in the loading screen and the decal around the text box!!
Also an honorable mention to Garret's little eye-stalk tears <3 I never thought I would see a crustacean monster cry!!
The story and characters were really lovely, I was really impressed by how much content you all were able to weave in, and how rich the story was even when working within a limited amount of time. The murder mystery aspect was really enjoyable, and I loved how the interactions with the romance-able cast were interspersed very nicely between the plot beats. I also was really struck by the dynamics between the eldritch horrors, the relationships they had with each other were such a nice touch and added some extra dimension of the world for me. I loved watching them banter and interact.
I ended up romancing Angélique for my first playthrough, and was so charmed by her. Honestly I was toast after the first "darling". I also really loved Mikel, and am planning to romance him in my next playthrough <3 I also have to mention our morally...questionable best friend. Ophelia was very compelling, I adore a mad scientist archetype sm.
I also adored the little very feesh-hungery critter...I love him...he's so cute.
There was clearly so much love and care put into every part of this, and it made the game such a treat to play through. Thank you all for the super fun game, and I hope you can get some rest this month after completing this amazing accomplishment!
You've seen me yapping everywhere now but it cannot be said enough, thank you so much for playing TSUL! We are looking forward to the next two episodes, I will be patiently waiting with my bowl of popcorn, and my polished, framed photo of GOAT DAD.
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The art is so cute that I'm sad the "H" button doesn't work in this game.
I can't take a good screenshot without hiding the overlay menu... *sigh*
And it's SUCH a quaint little town too!
Mikel's name is strange for the setting.... it sounds spanish.
But the town looks semi-medival uk.
.....is it normal to run outside after strangers just because you think they hurt themselves? oO
It sounds really bizarre to me, but I'm hardly an expert on normal human behavior.
I see why Lovecraft never drew his creatures...
It's kinda cute. But not remotely what it should be.
(Which in incomprihensible.)
....why am I forced to answer like a moralistic person? >_>
Going soft is NOT a good change for a conqueror in my book.
Nor is being what he used to be bad.
I also agree with Mikel about the punting.
I'm all for punting any obstacles into the water.
Why can't I say that? *pout*
( *randomly imagine a conversation with a certain squid faced someone*
"So do you prefer my human shape or my other shape?"
"You look good in both, but... I think I like your human form better. If only because you have lips."
"Oh," *blushes*
"And because I happen to know how squids mates, and....yeeeeeeahhhh...."
xD )
....kinda wish there was an option to make a flirtatious comment when a certain someone reminiscent about having people worship him. ^_^
I also want to hit the main character over the head repeatedly until the ridiculous moral and ethic nonsense is beaten out of him.
The ending was extremely disappointing.
A school ceremony, and not a word about your love interest.
(I could not care less if a certain idiot woman lives or dies. She deserves what she gets for threatening my darling.)
Is there more than one ending in this game?
Cuz I want a different one! >_<
EDIT:
Oh, wait... there's more after the credits. oO
Did Mikel ever heal? It doesn't look like it.
I DO love how unapologetic he is about the things he's done tho. ^_^
I'm happy I picked the one person who had not gone completely native --so to speak.
And the ending is so bitter-sweet.
It's so sad....😭
And I keep wondering if he would have been restored if I had just pushed him into the pond. *sigh* Not that I was ever given an option.
He's really sweet tho. ^_^
I like him a lot.
Is there really only one ending that varies with which love interest you choose?
I'm guessing choices doesn't matter much...
And the lazy-ass character description doesn't help.
But Lovecraft and a cute barista.... I may check it out despite it all for that.
Haha, if "lazy ass" description refers to Mikel's here on the page, it was a funny joke made with the team during our final moments on the game jam. It's also a quote from The Lego Movie which we felt fit his flirtatiously laidback personality. :)
To answer your question, there's four total endings. Related specifically to Love Interests, two of those endings have unique outcomes.
Thanks for leaving us with your lovely review and for taking the time to play TSUL! For a majority of our team it was their first ever visual novel. ♡ Cheers!
So only one single ending per love interest then? I see....
I'm sad there wasn't a way I could help him restore his powers.
(Hey! I like villains. lol)
But at least I know now.
what if i want the mc
So true. Emmie is cute. We also love Emmerson. Self-love <3
Such a well-done and professional-looking game!
Digital Hag, thank you so much for your kind words and praise!
God I love Mikel sm (did I make an account just to say this… maybe)
Hi JoshuaDistortion, thank you so much for playing! Mikel may fancy you as well 💚
love it , but i would love more romance. but game was great.
Thank you for taking the time to play TSUL! ♡
RIP, i hope you make it possible to play on Mac sometime in the future. i can suck it up and use the browser version, and i'm gonna lol, but it would be nice to be able to download on mac
also omfg i was really debating between Mikel and Garret, leaning towards Garret because i love a single dad, but i went back to my save to see the difference between hanging out with them (when you first see the tat studio) i can't bring myself to go back because Mikel legit gave me a tattoo. i can't not keep it, wtf
okay it worked out LMAo i was so leaning towards Garret at the start that it still chose him for the final scenes lol
Hehe, thank you so much for playing lunat1c! We're also big fans of Garret 🥹 We're hoping to provide a build for Mac if there's enough considerable interest in the nearby future. I am glad you got to enjoy our VN in-browser at least! Happy Holidays!
i'm glad you guys made it available to play in the browser lol, theres nothing worse than when a game won't run on mac OR the browser so i'm glad one option works lol
Seeing the that there is already a predetermined appearance for the mc is really disappointing.. it leaves little room for immersion and serves no purpose to the plot.
Hi Waltzforveenus,
Thanks for your feedback! We hope you're able to enjoy TSUL for what it does have to offer in storytelling, and will take note of your comment for future projects. Cheers!
i need mikel pls give him his own game
Made the last video
Made a video that's before the last
Made a video with lots of Garret
Made another video
Finally a new video
YAHOO! Can't wait to watch!
I LOOOOOOOOOVE MIKEL
his designs, the effect on his voice, his personality!! I love him ; v ;
Thank you Xepheris for playing TSUL! Mikel says you're certainly not bad for a mere mortal! 💚🦑
Really amazing designs! :D
mistling, thank you very much for the lovely compliment and for checking out TSUL! 💙
One of my favorites from this years jam! Loved all the characters, the over all vibe and the lovecraftian is LOVEcrafting! 💜
Thank you so much again MissKatonik, we had so much fun catching your livestream and we're happy you loved the lovecraftian lovers! ^-^ <3
I genuinely think TSUL did a great job at combining mystery, romance, and cosmic horror- making it more than just a visual novel but an absolute experience that had me on the edge of my seat until the end! The overall plot, scoring, voice acting, and character art had me completely immersed in the story. Each character had their own unique charm, making it soooo difficuly for me to choose who to romance (despite knowing I was gonna play the rest of the routes after my first playthrough lol), but Garret caught my heart first- WHAT A SWEETHEART HE IS!
I was also really surprised about the length of the game, considering the time it took for it to be made. As I said on my stream, the TSUL team did an amazing job and I hope they get more love and recognition in the days, weeks, and years to come!
Can't recommend this enough!
Rhee, thank you once more for taking the time to play TSUL and now for leaving us with the absolute sweetest review. Our team had so much fun tagging along during your livestreams and we were super happy to see you have just as much fun playing our VN. It means the world to us!
Cheers from the TSUL dev team, xoxo from Garret, and Happy Spooktober!
And the cast, too, despite certain obvious factors, I really found myself just wanting to get to know all of them. They're really endearing all in all. I think there's something to be said for the cast (if you know you know) wanting normalcy, while the crux of the plot cues off of certain others reaching for the unknown, the forbidden, the dangerous-
Delightful work, thank you for sharing!
Hi Don, thank you so so much for taking the time to play through TSUL! I absolutely loved watching, and I admired your persistence with achieving minigames (though I will admit it ails me this was an older build, I wish we could have pushed our updates faster so you could perhaps have a bit more ease in your gameplay experience! Haha), and really, really enjoyed your commentary and reactions for Sanraya's Route (with a glimmer of Garret, too). Your thoughtful reflection at the end was a treat and truly warmed my heart to hear. Thank you so much. Cheers, and have a Happy Spooktober!
There is a very particular, special kind of oddness that permeates certain small seaside towns, and this is honestly the first time I think I've seen that represented so well! Absolutely adored this start to finish; the character and monster designs are both phenomenal, the story is strong, well-written, and intriguing, the music melodic and whimsical--and I practically shed tears of joy when I found I could skip the fishing mini-game, because for reasons unknown fishing mechanics are my perennial bane, hahaha.
(Additionally: I see that Pan's Labyrinth easter-egg! Or rather, heard it! 💚)
My only--admittedly greedy--complaint is that after falling in love with all the cast of characters, I was left wanting more of the ensemble interactions at the end; though then again, I still wouldn't be ready to let them go. ✨ Such wonderful work, team--one of my favorites of the jam by far!
I absolutely loved this game’s story, characters, and overall vibe. It’s incredible what this talented team accomplished in just a month. Everything worked so well together, from the music to the art direction to the writing. The lovely (partial) voice acting added a lot to the characters, too. Great job!
It took me about 5 hours to finish one playthrough (reading everything out loud and spending lots of time theorizing what would happen next), which is an impressive length for a jam game. I went into my playthrough expecting to go for Garret, but I found all the characters so charming that I wanted to romance them all (including best girl Ophelia). I ended up with Mikel and was grinning like an idiot through the whole last act of the game. So fun!
The game provides the option to skip mini-games entirely through the Settings menu in addition to a hybrid approach where you can choose to move on if you fail a particular mini-game. I appreciated both options. While playing through the first time, I wanted to at least try the mini-games to get a feel for the experience the developers intended, but was relieved when they didn’t block progress. Then it was useful to turn off the mini-games entirely when skipping through large chunks of the game to get to certain choices and endings.
The game already felt pretty complete and high-quality with v1.3. With a little more polish, it’ll really feel professional. I’m glad to see some of the issues I noticed were fixed in v1.4. If there’s one more thing I’d like to see… Gallery, pretty please? 🥺 The CGs were so cool, I’d love to be able to revisit them easily (and also see how many I missed). Just a quality-of-life thing.
Anyway, I really enjoyed this game and would recommend it to anyone who enjoys a good mystery and/or romance!
Hi Cera, thank you SO much for your outstanding review of TSUL and once more, for streaming your super fun playthrough!!! We were so happy to watch it and I for one, very giddy about your own reactions for our dear Ophelia! 😆
It's funny you mention a CG Gallery- It's currently in our discussions for further polish. We heard from a few other players for a desire to revisit CGs they encountered, and our team is floating the idea of even including concept/process work in the Gallery! If we happen to greenlight any of this, it'll certainly be announced in a future dev log. ☺️
Thank you again, our dev team is super grateful! Cheers and have a very spooky Spooktober. 💙
The next video
Made another video
[Spoilers]
I absolutely adored playing this!!! It was so polished and impressive, especially for something done in a month - a massive props to the entire team for this incredible undertaking!!!
The aesthetic of the game was fantastic, the art was such a delightful tone setter, and the music added some really nice ambience. The voice acting was also such a good touch, and really added an extra layer of delightfulness to the characters. And the MONSTER DESIGNS!! I was blown away by them, and really loved the incredible variety of creepy-beautiful critters in this game. Sanraya’s true form was definitely a highlight for me. I also really appreciated the little artistic details, like the fish animation in the loading screen and the decal around the text box!!
Also an honorable mention to Garret's little eye-stalk tears <3 I never thought I would see a crustacean monster cry!!
The story and characters were really lovely, I was really impressed by how much content you all were able to weave in, and how rich the story was even when working within a limited amount of time. The murder mystery aspect was really enjoyable, and I loved how the interactions with the romance-able cast were interspersed very nicely between the plot beats. I also was really struck by the dynamics between the eldritch horrors, the relationships they had with each other were such a nice touch and added some extra dimension of the world for me. I loved watching them banter and interact.
I ended up romancing Angélique for my first playthrough, and was so charmed by her. Honestly I was toast after the first "darling". I also really loved Mikel, and am planning to romance him in my next playthrough <3 I also have to mention our morally...questionable best friend. Ophelia was very compelling, I adore a mad scientist archetype sm.
I also adored the little very feesh-hungery critter...I love him...he's so cute.
There was clearly so much love and care put into every part of this, and it made the game such a treat to play through. Thank you all for the super fun game, and I hope you can get some rest this month after completing this amazing accomplishment!
Made a video
You've seen me yapping everywhere now but it cannot be said enough, thank you so much for playing TSUL! We are looking forward to the next two episodes, I will be patiently waiting with my bowl of popcorn, and my polished, framed photo of GOAT DAD.