Hello everybody!

I'm writing this devlog to let you know that I've just released a new VN: Eldritch Idol!

Eldritch Idol is a short, silly project about raising Cthulhu into a cute idol. It has 28 endings(!!!), some of which are rather bad (you can get killed in multiple ways), some of which are cute and wholesome (there is a romance ending), and some of which are just plain silly (you can get reincarnated in another world as a catgirl). Unlike all of my other VNs, it's written without any descriptive text at all. The story is told solely through dialogue and internal monologue, which keeps the pace brisk and breezy.

Though the VN is 60k words, a lot of the individual scenes are rather short, and I estimate most people will only see about 30% of the content in this game on their first playthrough. There's a lot of random scenes scattered about with various different unlock conditions,so I hope you'll have fun trying to find everything!

I've made a lot of VNs over the years, but this one is pretty different to my usual offerings. Eldritch Idol actually has some degree of gameplay: namely, you get to raise Cthulhu's stats! I've been making VNs for over 10 years now, and I've never attempted anything this complicated before. I guess I figured a month-long game game would be as good a time as any to try doing something completely different, haha ;;

The dating sim framework I found on Lemmasoft was instrumental in getting this project set up. I used it as the base for the game, and I don't think I'd have been able to put this VN together without it. I also scoured Lemmasoft for help threads on how to code the main character customisation screen, and how to get the condition switches for the MC's side sprites to behave. I never would have been able to code this project if it wasn't for all of the kind people on Lemmasoft leaving coding tips/tricks over the years, and I feel very grateful that I'm part of such a helpful community!

I was ideating over this idea for a while, and thought it'd be fun to make it into a reality for this year's Spooktober. My last Spooktober VN, Girlfriend Simulator, was a dark, depressing story, so I wanted this year's entry to be markedly different in tone. This story is the polar opposite of Girlfriend Simulator, since it's so silly, but I hope people enjoy it regardless!

Do let me know what you think once you've read it! I'd also be interested to know what ending you got first! ☆

If you find any bugs, typos, or have any feedback you can email me at ebihimes@gmail.com, leave me a comment on Itchio, or join my Discord server here!

Alright; I think that's everything! Thank you so much for your time, and I hope you enjoy Eldritch Idol!

- ebi x