An Ode to the Angelblood Coven and my Short-lived Solodev Intentions

I am blessed with a wonderful team, one that started small and grew and grew. 

Here's a peek behind the veil, from the early stages within the womb to the eventual birth of Angelblood.

I dreamt of Angelblood for many months, believing it would be my first baby jam project that I solodev. It was a fanciful new year wish of mine, and I planned on using only my wits and stock resources to nurse her to life.

But then I saw Ulalaria’s post in a recruitment channel.

How could I not fall in love with her art?

I asked if she’d lend her magical hand to bring Angelblood to life, and I was delighted when she agreed.

Ulalaria’s beautiful process work for Seraphix!

Moodboard for Seraphix, the Vampiric Angel Inspirations include the Stalk from Saga, the girly gorey angels by @Aeyochi, seraphim by @feefal, and some of my own doodles of apocalypse angels & apocalypse dragons

With my sprite artist set, my plan was to use my photomanipulation skills and potentially traced stock photos to make the backgrounds. Then, I would draw my own user interfaces (and potential self-insert main characters/side characters), along with small animations in the background…

One of my early concept doodles for UI before I realised I’m going to get carried away with these little details and never actually learn ren’py if I do everything this time XD

Unfortunately, life was also getting busy.

I thought to myself: since my main goal is to learn programming this time, I should just focus on writing and coding. This could be a stepping stone to my eventual solodev project. 

So I put my recruiting witch hat on, and thought about who I knew that could lend a hand.

Who should I ask to join the Angelblood coven?

Since all the characters in Angelblood are women, I thought I’d just reach out to other women.
(I never actually mentioned my secret witch-first approach to anyone when recruiting, it was just a fun idea in my head).
Anyway, here are some of the early team members I sought out:

• Lynnasaurus, a wonderful BG illustrator I met while working on Snow Angel & Silver Devil, a 2023 winter jam project I wrote for melody.
• Cinca, a lovely composer I knew from way back during my second ever jam collab. Her music and our gameplay ranked #3 in the Newbie Jam for Young Monk.
• Mii, a savvy UI designer (and Boba Bar server mod) who created the UI designs for the first VN I ever directed, Pilla’s Paradise!

BG Moodboard Inspirations include Howl’s room from Howl’s Moving Castle, Deckard’s room from Puppycat and Bee, and Maniani’s monsters. The cathedral layouts I added after.)

UI Moodboard Admittedly, majority of these references are just from Endysis’ chalky gothic UI (it’s just so damn gorgeous), sprinkled with some inky Burdock UI by Ingrid and magical gradient UI by Demeru

Pretty soon, the team grew and I was still dedicated in putting my blood, sweat, and tears into all the writing and programming.

But as I sank more time on repeat trips hauling things from my old place to my new one and jumping over pesky real life hurdles, I wondered if I’d really have the energy to learn both GUI and script programming in the next few weeks. Especially when I knew little about ren’py asides from adding dialogue and small bug bashes.

My regular routine was already challenged by random unannounced plumbing inspections, impromptu fire system tests, and plenty of other life surprises.

As luck would have it, I had been chatting with Cyberse7en while prepping for my VNConf talk. He was the programmer for an amazing spooktober mystery VN (Reaplaced) and shared how he wanted to work on more projects but wasn’t sure about working with strangers. I figured if he’s looking to collab, it’d be great to get some GUI help. He was 100000% for the sapphicƒstory, so I asked him to join!

Cyberse7en’s beta-reading feedback a couple weeks after setting up the initial GUI

Meanwhile, my supposedly tiny script coagulated from 5k to 10k words.

I realised we would really benefit from some CGs for the more dramatic parts and I knew exactly who I wanted to work with. Even though it was a couple weeks into the jam, I would be willing to add them in after the deadline if needed.

That’s when we welcomed Polly (Pauline’s Reinacher)! She’s an incredible artist who created really cute sticker and AR effects for Pilla’s Paradise, but as I continued to follow her work, I realized her passion is in horror and monster art. Perfect for the transformations in Angelblood.

What began as a two person team has grown more and more heads!

As it happens with jams sometimes, life made things harder for some of my team members to finish all of their parts on time. The original timeline of all final assets in by Feb 10 soon passed us by, and pretty much nobody except Lynnasaurus had all the work finished. And as the final week inched closer, I brought in some extra help.

I originally intended for the side character sprites to be just silhouettes for scope, but Navi found it more creatively fulfilling to draw them all out and of course, I agreed. She coloured Rowena beautifully and then became busy and asked for some help with polishing her Archguardian concept. 

I am still indebted to Cyberse7en for asking around and finding Dolly through Husbandogoddess, who jumped in to help with the Archguardian sprites. This seems to be the role he was meant for given his love for all things yellow!

3 hours after Dolly joined the team, he had a coloured draft ready!

Mii also told me she was having a much busier client week than anticipated, so I reached out to Chiara for Logo design. Every variation of our logo and our eye icon is all her!

As for sound, I sourced SFX from free resource libraries that require no attribution (I did reference the site anyways). Then I mastered them in the code. 

Cinca does magical work, but she already had her hands full with the three original tracks I assigned. As the story evolved, we needed more horrific transformation tracks that I just haven’t found the right fit for in the stock libraries. Out of the blue, William send me a really nice message and I decided to bring him on as well!

William has composed for all the VNs I’ve ever directed, including Pilla’s Paradise, Boyband Hell, Chiamour, and Angelblood!

All in all, I’m grateful for all the team members who lended their magic to Angelblood! Especially Lynnasaurus who powered through the backroom BG and many variations of cauldron CGs at the end, which really topped off the polish.

Took a while to find the exact scene in Witch Hat Atelier that I wanted to use as the inspo

I’m also very lucky that so many talented folks posted in recruitment channels and agreed to join on short notice to contribute more CGs! (While I was adding polish with ATL on the scenes, I realised I was using a lot of fade to black for scenes I simply couldn't visualise otherwise.)

This cutie by InstantRiot warms my heart! (And the only non-spoiler CG I can share)

Thank you again to all the souls who've shared their time with Angelblood, pouring a piece of themselves into its legacy. Whether you playtested Angelblood from its toddler form or helped create the very flesh upon its bones, every contribution is much appreciated and has made her all the stronger. 

With Lunar New Year, Valentine’s Day, and a big move in February, I simply could not have solodeved this project to the polished state it deserves without everybody’s support .
(Especially Cyberse7en who helped with the file type shenanigans for incorporating background animations by Jenny!)

I still aspire to solodev this year, but for now I’m happy to just learn more every game I work on, while collaborating and balancing life!

Lovely UI by Mii - (Despite the screenshot, I’m certainly not quitting— just going at my own pace.  I learned a lot this time around, and my journey is far from over!)

If you've yet to indulge in Angelblood and you're shortchanged on energy, perhaps you may like to join Aurracle's stream and playthrough of Angelblood tonight at 7pm EST.  
Our team is looking forward to tuning in! More upcoming stream announcements here!

To every player, collector, reviewer, commenter, your feedback is very much welcome!
(Shoutout to Noir who described our soundtrack as a massage for the soul.)

One of my bubbly cauldron and Quin’s hands CGs by Lynnasaurus

P.S. In the coming weeks, I'll be compiling my notes on what I've learned from my first-time programming, with tips and tricks for fools like me who are easily bullied by bugs and beginner blues. 
Careful what you put into your brew... witchcraft has concequences.