Devlog #4 – Supporting Characters
When I look back at the moments that changed my life, I know I was surrounded by people.
Friends, family, strangers in a crowd. They were there. But when I try to replay those scenes in my head, most of those faces are blurry.
It’s not because they didn’t matter. It’s because they weren’t the center of the story I was living. They were the forces pushing and pulling me, but they weren't the focal point.
These are the supporting characters of our lives. We might not remember them clearly, but they shaped us all the same.
Concrete Future, Abstract Present
We had to make a choice about reality.
In our story, the Future-Person (FP) is a paradox: she exists in a future the MC hasn't reached yet, but she is the only thing that feels solid.
To make that contrast work, everyone else had to be uncertain.
So, we decided to render the supporting characters abstractly. They are soft silhouettes, simplified forms, and impressionistic shapes.
To be honest, this was also a practical necessity. Our goal is to build an anthology where you can write stories. We couldn't possibly provide a bespoke art asset for every neighbor, shopkeeper, or rival you might envounter.
The solution was mindful constraint. By keeping the supporting cast visually abstract, we solve the production problem, but we also reinforce the theme that the future is clear in a way that prevents the past from properly connecting to it.
Archetypes, Not Individuals
Instead of trying to design specific people, we built a set of archetypes.
These aren’t characters with complex backstories. They are roles that the MC projects meaning onto.
Even without detailed faces, they remain recognizable because the emotional weight they carry is familiar.
And just like the rest of the world, these silhouettes react to the engine’s lighting system. They absorb the feelings in the scene. When the world is angry and red, they are too. When it’s cold and blue, they fade into the background.
The Carnival Mirror
The supporting characters have a specific job.
The MC is stuck in his own head. If something feels true to him, it is true. He needs something to disrupt that certainty.
The supporting characters act as reflective surfaces.
They don't have deep inner lives of their own. They exist to bend, exaggerate, or distort the MC’s beliefs just enough to create tension. Sometimes they reinforce what he thinks. Sometimes they show us a different perspective.
They're like carnival mirrors. They don’t pretend to show the objective truth. They just prove that the MC can't always trust how he feels.
Worlds Apart
As we were scripting the first few scenes, we stumbled onto a rule that surprised us. It felt strict, but it also felt right:
Supporting characters never share a scene with the FP.
- They never stand beside her.
- They never talk to her.
- They never even acknowledge her.
This isn't just because she might be imaginary. It's because she represents the Future, while the supporting cast represents the Past and Present.
These two worlds are pulling the MC in opposite directions. By keeping them visually separate, we reveal the core conflict without saying a word: The MC cannot hold onto his past and his future at the same time.
Eventually, everything will change, whether he wants it to or not.
Closing Thoughts
While designing these silhouettes, I kept coming back to one thought:
Not everyone who shapes our lives does so with clarity. Some leave impressions instead of memories.
The supporting characters in this VN are built from those impressions. They are the outlines of people the MC didn’t fully see, but still change the way he sees the world.
In the next devlog, we’re going to pull the curtain back on the final piece of the puzzle: The Library. We'll talk about how the Tarot system works technically, and how we built a collaborative labyrinth where every possible story has its own home address.