Devlog #3 – Designing Someone Who Feels Real
When I look back at the people who stuck with me, I don't remember the speeches they gave.
I remember the way they looked at me in the quiet moments. The way they leaned in when they were curious. The way their attention drifted when something inside them changed.
Those details can be subtle, almost invisible. But they're the things that give shape to a memory.
When we started designing the Future-Person (FP) for our visual novel, we wanted to capture that specific gravity. A sense that we genuinely understand her, even in a world where everything else seems vague or uncertain.
As the story unfolds, the FP is the only person who feels fully real. Everyone else is brushwork and color. But she stands there clearly, as if she stepped out of a memory that hasn’t happened yet.
Constraints Create Clarity
Here was the challenge: We wanted an anthology. The world needed to be open enough to support any story a writer might dream up.
But a system that tries to do everything usually ends up doing nothing well.
So we embraced a constraint: The FP is fixed. She is a single, clearly rendered character. Everything else—the side characters, the crowds—is abstracted. They're silhouettes and archetypes.
What started as a way to limit scope quickly became a philosophy. By giving the FP clarity and giving the world ambiguity, we created a fulcrum. The narrative pivots around her.
It means we can’t tell every story. But we can tell stories about the connection between the MC and the FP exceptionally well.
Expressions vs. Identity
Here is a trap I fall into a lot: I feel that if a character has more sprites, they must have more personality.
But in practice, giving a character "infinite" expressions can makes them feel generic. They become an actor being told what to do, rather than a person genuinely expressing how they feel.
To avoid that, we stopped thinking in terms of "emotions" and started thinking in terms of masks.
In real life, we feel more than we show. Our inner world is messy. But what we let people see is usually fixed and practiced.
We approached the Future-Person the same way.
Instead of giving her every possible expression, we gave her a limited palette. A small, consistent set of reactions that she has practiced, and is comfortable with. She can still feel anything, but she doesn’t show everything. She only shows what she wants the world to see.
That constraint anchors her. It collapses infinite possibility into a real person.
Gaze and Posture
Body language usually hits us before words do. A slight lean forward feels like an invitation. A turned shoulder feels like a goodbye.
We wanted to capture that, so we designed four distinct poses for the FP. Each one represents a different level of emotional distance:
- Leaning in – Curiosity or connection.
- Standing near – Soft, conversational intimacy.
- Neutral – A pause, a breath, a moment of uncertainty.
- Turned away – Retreat or hesitation.
These aren't dramatic anime poses. They’re the kind of shifts you might not even notice someone making. But they change the temperature of a scene instantly.
To add nuance, each pose has two gaze variations: direct and averted.
This is a tiny amount of effort, but has a huge impact on expressiveness. Eye contact can feel intimate or dangerous. Looking away can feel shy or protective. By offering both, the FP can communicate even when she's silent.
Dynamic Color
I mentioned in the last devlog that our backgrounds shift color to match the mood. We wanted the FP to do the same.
When a scene glows in warm golds, her highlights soften to match. When the world cools into distant blues, her palette shifts too.
This works because Inkweaver doesn't just treat images as flat stickers.
The engine respects the structure the artist built. It reads the character as component layers—albedo (color), occlusion (shadow), and lighting. Because the engine understands the difference between the "paint" and the "light," we can manipulate those layers individually in real-time.
It allows us to "re-light" the character on the fly without ruining the art.
This makes the FP feel connected to the space. She isn't just pasted onto the scene. She is the scene.
Closing Thoughts
There’s a line I keep coming back to while working on this project:
People don’t become important to us all at once. They become important in small, quiet moments we didn’t expect.
That’s how we want the FP to feel. Like someone you've known forever, but only just started to notice.
To do that, we didn't need a massive library of assets. We needed an acting system—a character who moves, looks, and hides her feelings in her own unique way.
In the next devlog, we’ll look at the flip side: the silhouettes, the abstract figures, and the people who influence the MC without ever stepping into the light.