Further Thoughts Regarding LoveSick Mode (and a new build)

Yesterday, I proposed an idea for Yandere Sim: allowing the player to choose the game’s presentation. You can experience the game as a “cute dating sim gone wrong” with an atmosphere that is dependent on the player’s actions, or as a straight-up horror game with a dark and serious atmosphere.

I proposed this concept because I was seeking a way to satisfy the people who were displeased with the game’s current presentation. Over the past 24 hours, I’ve been listening to feedback regarding this feature, and the verdict is almost unanimous: it’s not a good idea.

I’m hearing a lot of people say that they fell in love with the game specifically because it combines dark subject matter with a cutesy anime exterior. I’m also hearing people say that, if I give the player with the option of completely changing the game’s presentation, then the game’s concept loses its strength and charm. It sounds like I’m saying, “I’m not confident in my vision for the game…you might not like my vision for the game…here’s an alternative…s-sorry…”

I think it was a terrible idea to present LoveSick Mode as an independent game that co-exists alongside Yandere Simulator. That’s not what it is; it’s a command that recolors the interface, desaturates the environment, and darkens the lighting. If anything, I should have presented it as “Edgy Mode”, a grimdark easter egg, instead of presenting it as an alternative way to experience the game.

Starting now, in the build of the game that I just uploaded a few minutes ago, the player is no longer presented with the option of playing either “Yandere Simulator” or playing “LoveSick”, as if the two of them were separate games. The player can press “L” at the title screen to activate LoveSick Mode and see what the game would look like with a grim, dark, edgy vibe, but it should not be regarded as a separate “game”.

My vision for the game is still exactly as I described in the first 3 minutes of the video; an innocent dating sim that is cutesy by default, and only develops a dark atmosphere if the player deliberately makes it that way by consistently pursuing violence. The next 4-and-a-half minutes of the video only succeeded at sending mixed messages regarding my intentions for the game, and for that, I deeply regret uploading that video.

I’ve received a number of questions about LoveSick Mode, and I’d like to address those inquiries below:

If you change the game’s title to “LoveSick”, will you change the game’s atmosphere and presentation?

No, and I really regret the fact that I didn’t make this clear in the video. I want to keep the “dating sim gone wrong” vibe, no matter what the game’s title is. If drop the name “Yandere Simulator” and start using the name “LoveSick”, this doesn’t mean that anything else about the game needs to change. We can still keep the game’s current atmosphere, interface, presentation, etc.

I definitely should have chosen a different name for “LoveSick Mode” so that people wouldn’t presume that changing the game’s title to “LoveSick” would also involve changing the game’s presentation to be dark and edgy.

Won’t the game’s development go by super slowly, if you’re developing two games simultaneously?

LoveSick Mode isn’t a separate game; it’s just a different coat of paint. I simply wrote a script that automatically changes the color of all text boxes / text labels; I didn’t have to change every aspect of the interface manually. The rest of LoveSick Mode – film grain, darker fog, and desaturated colors – was achieved using scripts that already existed. Almost no “new” work was done in order to create LoveSick Mode.

I don’t intend to spend very much time expanding LoveSick Mode beyond its current state, so you don’t have to worry about it eating up development time from this point forward.

Are you going to abandon the current title screen for the LoveSick title screen?

No, although I do have plans to make the title screen much more dynamic than it currently is. Ever since the very beginning of the game’s development, I have always wanted the game’s title screen to reflect the player’s actions. For example: If you play the game in a pacifistic manner, there would never be anything creepy or morbid at the title screen. If you begin to kill people, then corpses would begin to appear at the title screen, and the atmosphere would begin to darken. If you kill Osana with fire, then you’d see Osana’s charred corpse at the title screen.

The LoveSick title screen represents the darkest that the Yandere Simulator title screen could possibly get, if the player has been murdering dozens of people throughout the game.

The only good thing about LoveSick Mode is the new Senpai Creation Screen. Can this become a part of Yandere Simulator?

Sure. No problem.

Anything else?

I’ve prepared a new build of the game. Click “Continue Reading” to learn what’s different in this build.

Fixes, Changes, and Additions

• Because everyone unanimously agrees that LoveSick’s Senpai creation screen is objectively superior to the previous Senpai creation screen, the default Senpai creation screen is now a pink version of the LoveSick Senpai creation screen.
• Adjusted the settings for the “Rim Light Test” that is accessed by pressing the “R” key at the Settings menu. If you weren’t satisfied with how it looked before, try it again!
• From now on, if the game is desaturated (because of low school atmosphere or LoveSick mode) the colors will temporarily return when Yandere-chan walks near Senpai.
• Fixed bug that would cause LoveSick Mode to deactivate when the player chose “Restart Week” at the Heartbroken screen or the Calendar screen.
• There is no more “Yandere Simulator or LoveSick?” screen. Now, the only way to activate LoveSick Mode is to press “L” at the title screen.
• Fixed bug in the Senpai creation screen that could cause the camera to remain permanently zoomed in on Senpai’s face.
• Removed the “gentle eyes for Mai Waifu” feature, since it could cause her character model to deform in strange ways.
• Fixed bug that would cause Musume’s face to have a different skin color than the rest of her body in LoveSick Mode.
• Fixed bug that would allow the player to bump into “Place Bug” triggers as if they were physical objects.
• Moved a few bugs to more discreet spots. (There are 10 bug spots in total, have you found them all?)
• Fixed bug that would prevent male Social Butterflies from being able to react to murder.
• All Occult Club boys are now Cowards, except for Daku Atsu, who is now a Teacher’s Pet.
• The player will now hear a voice clip from Info-chan when setting a bug.

In Closing

Over the course of the game’s development, I am going to propose a lot of ideas. Some of these proposals are not going to work out. When this happens, please understand that pitching ideas, getting feedback, and ditching bad ideas is just part of game development. This isn’t the first time that I’ve made a proposal that was unanimously rejected, and it probably won’t be the last time, either. (Fortunately, this sort of thing only happens about once a year.)

I try to do my best to satisfy as many people as possible, but I’m not perfect. Sometimes I succeed, and sometimes I drop the ball. When I fail, please try to be understanding. You might feel disappointed when I suggest an idea that you don’t like, but try to remember that when I let down 1.6 million people, nobody is more disappointed than me.

Thank you for following the development of Yandere Simulator.