It has been a few weeks since the release of our O2A2 2025 entry: "[RE]:boot | Echoes Linger in Lunar Dust", so I thought it would be a good time to post the game's post mortem — now that any lingering emotions settled down.  

I want to talk with you about the 10 days of the entry's development, what happened after the game released & what I'm currently working on / what I will be working on in the future! 

For me, the jam started on a Friday on 6am and I had one goal in mind as it was my HomeOffice day at work: get up early and write as much as you can before the work day starts. Writing (and hopefully finishing) the script on Day One was my biggest priority as it had to go to my lovely editor (the chattiest of champignons) and then to a bunch of translators.

→ Each and every O2A2 I set myself a goal to make use of something I haven't done before; to learn more about the engine and to better utilize its mechanics. O2A2 2023 I released my first Visual Novel ever, O2A2 2024 I released a game visualized as a phone and O2A2 2025 I tackled translations (which was harder than I thought).

On Day Two I traveled across Germany to one of my closest friends, Lena (bkatz Design), she worked on this project as main illustrator responsible for the main artwork & the cover art. After finishing the latest season of Squid Game and going to some small festival to eat "Bratwurst", we got a 12-pack of Spezi cans and got ready to work! While I worked on the UI, code and script implementation — she went ham on the main artwork; nearly finishing it over the weekend! On Day Three it was time to say Goodbye to her and travel back home. It was so nice spending time with her, coworking, laughing and vibing to music.

I took Day Four and Day Five off from work to dive deep into the game — worked on the code, implemented translations. I knew, if I wouldn't get the majority done over the course of those two days, I would have a hard time releasing the project on time. Especially since I was also the programmer for Min's entry "Be (not) Afraid". 

The following days I returned back to my day-job & crammed all my tasks left on the projects to when I'm off from work, even staying up longer than I should have (well, I kinda stay up longer than I should — with and without jam, haha...).

And by some miracle we finished the complete game by Saturday. — One and a half days before deadline. With beta-testing, itch.io page and all!

A collage of the development:

After the game released I was riding on a high — we got so much traffic and browser plays, rose up in the popularity of the submission list. We even got up to the first place (if only for a few hours)! Which I had never achieved before. But with the jam concluding, more games being submitted and the days passing, the traffic, plays and ratings dropped in an instant.

→ We fell as fast as we rose up.

While it is a bit heart-breaking, I expected as much—and by now I can handle it much better than I would have two years or even just one year ago. I noticed that games with (hot) male protagonists, especially on the cover, click much better than other entries. Don't get me wrong, it's not necessarily a bad thing — it's just a pattern I noticed and something I know I can't combat, since my stories are more niche and don't catch a bigger audience. While I would have been enraged and huffing & puffing about it 1-2 years ago, by now I've come to terms with it.

And I'm really proud of this personal development. I'm happy I learned to distance myself more from all of this and can view it through a clearer (less emotional) lense.

I am happy with what we were able to produce in such a short time span & the very open story I was able to come up with — with the goal to leave the player speculate & draw their own conclusions.

As you might have already seen on my social media, [RE]:boot wasn't the only project I've been working on, that's taking place within the SEELE Series. In February / March, I started working on the story of "PRE/Lude | Love's Lost Requiem" — a point & click, investigative Visual Novel tightly connected to YOMINOKUNI. Yet it's still considered a stand-alone.

You play from the POV of Luna Marie Voigt, a young student forced to stay at home due to a mysterious illness that leaves her bedridden for a big part of the day. The only person able to visit you is your childhood friend Jean Ravier (nickname: Ravi), who studies mechanical engineering and medicine. He helps you navigate through your days, which seem with no chance of your health improving. But you have him by your side.
But one day you get a mysterious message from a strange man — causing you to you find yourself questioning the situation you are in. Is ... Ravi really your friend?

We expect to release a demo by the end of this year's SuNoFes (2nd of September).

In-Game Screenshot:

But this is not the only game within the SEELE Series, that I am planning to work on and release soon . ™️  It's an episodic Visual Novel concept following a very eager spirit-investigator and her very un-eager partner.  Each story/visual novel focuses on a spirit and their story — while you try to free it from its lingering binding to earth, you also get to know more and more about the duo. I'm planning to release the first "episode" during the recently announced "ShouJosei Jam"! I came up with this project & concept back in 2022 & it was (with YOMINOKUNI) what lead me to Visual Novel development in the first place!

Okey! I think I have been yapping for way too long now. — I hope that you found the Post-Mortem at least somewhat interesting and I hope you'll let me know your thoughts within the comments of this blog post! 

Anyways, I will leave you be now! I hope you have the greatest day, week, month and year!

Buh-bye!!