About
Stretch goals added! See below.
Playable game demo available on itch.io or on Steam.
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Son and heir of a European magical noble family, you have been raised in wealth and privilege. But what you want is the chance to be an ordinary teenager - to go where no one knows you and attempt to succeed on your own, just for a little while.
To that end, you have arranged to travel to the distant land of Vermont, in the United States of America. Using a false name, you will attend Iris Academy, a school of pentachromatic magic, and study alongside other wizards and witches. Maybe now you'll meet a girl (or boy) who likes you for yourself.
Iris Academy is filled with strange characters, secrets, and side quests - this is just a sampling!
- Stat-raising
- Dungeon-crawling with puzzles
- Visual novel dialog with branching choices
- 5 Main Character routes
- Over 200,000 words
- 75+ spells to learn
Every week, you choose what classes to attend in order to raise your character's skills and learn new spells.
Success raises both skills and stress, so it's important to schedule time off now and then, or your character will be too tired to learn.
Between classes, you'll have the chance to talk to your fellow students and make choices about how to interact with them. Your previous choices affect your character's personality and relationships with others, which can lock and unlock new options as the story progresses.
Throughout the school year, tests will be set in the school dungeons, where you will use the spells you have been studying to conquer monsters and obstacles and find your way to safety.
Dungeons are turn-based, first-person-perspective. Some are randomly-generated, some are fixed puzzles. Every dungeon can be solved in multiple ways. A wizard focusing on Black Magic might knock down walls in his path, while a wizard focusing on Blue Magic might teleport himself over a pit trap.
If you can't solve a dungeon test, or you run out of health and "die", you will be taken to safety and receive a detention. Sometimes this can lead to interesting new story paths. However, too many failures will end your school year, so pay attention in class and do your best in the dungeons.
Romance in Magical Diary is optional. You can choose to focus entirely on magic and dungeon-crawling if you want to and still have a successful school year. Some character routes also offer friendship options, if you want to get closer to them without engaging in a romantic relationship.
The full routes include three female characters (Barbara, Ellen, Minnie) and two male characters (Damien, William). There are also some options to flirt with a few other characters without a full romance route.
Want more? Check out the Side Romance reward tiers and stretch goals!
Colorful Characters - Unlocked!!! - we will add more options for customising your character, such as multicolored hair, pointed ears, and wings. Some options will be added to the character creation screen, others will be available in-game as items.
Bonus Side Romance - Unlocked!!! - All backers at Explorer level or above will get to VOTE on one character to be added as a bonus side romance. This is IN ADDITION to any characters purchased as reward tiers. (If those character reward tiers are not purchased, they will be included in the vote. If they are all purchased, the vote will be between a different group of characters.)
Theme Song - Unlocked!!! - We will commission a new song (with vocals) to accompany the game.
Bonus Post-Game Dungeon - Unlocked!!! - We will add a randomly-generated dungeon mode accessible after the end of the game, so you can take your winning character and play through a new set of obstacles.
Stretch Goal 5: Bonus Side Romance + Extra CGs - At this level, the top two characters voted on by the Explorer+ backers will be added as side romances. We'll also be able to add more art to illustrate key scenes in the story.
Stretch Goal 6: Downloadable Dungeon - At this level, we will create a separate multi-level dungeon crawl that can be played through with either Wolf Hall or Horse Hall characters. This will be sold separately, but available free to Kickstarter backers at Early Bird level and above. As this will require additional development time, it will likely not be available when the main game first launches, but will be added later.
More to come!
With this tier, you receive Steam keys for all the games currently in the Hanako Games Collection. This includes
- Magical Diary: Horse Hall
- Long Live The Queen
- Date Warp
- Science Girls!
- Sword Daughter
- The Confines Of The Crown
- Black Closet
- A Little Lily Princess
- England Exchange
This is the only tier that includes physical items! With this level, you will receive a spiral-bound journal with a gold Magical Diary logo, dedicated and signed for you by the game author, plus a set of stickers featuring the chibi versions of Barbara, Damien, Ellen, Luke, Manuel, Minnie, Raven, Suki, William, Professor Grabiner, and Professor Potsdam.
With this tier you can name and design a custom student who will appear in the game for at least one cameo scene. Designs must fit the standard student template, but can be from any of the six Halls. Characters are subject to approval, but we'll work with you to try and make your ideas fit.
With this tier, you can help to design and name a teacher who will become a permanent part of the Magical Diary universe. There's a lot of room for creativity here. Teachers can be male, female, or other, and they don't have to be human, although we do prefer that they wear pointy hats! Friendly, joking, strict, flirtatious, wise, secret video game addict... have fun with your ideas. Characters are subject to approval, but we'll try to work with your suggestions.
With this tier, we will work with you to add a short romance with the character of your choice. We'll tell you some of that character's secrets, and you can suggest things that you'd like them to do on dates.
Risks and challenges
In game development there is always a risk of projects taking longer than expected. However, we have a strong history of writing and shipping games, and a substantial amount of the game is already playable, so we are fully confident that the project will be completed.
Artist availability can be unpredictable, but there is sufficient flexibility in our scheduling to seek out replacements if necessary while we focus on writing and programming.
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