If you’ve been following our facebook page, you probably already know this.
We have officially started the production of our next visual novel! We know what story we want to tell, we know what additional features I’ll have to code for it, and now we’re trying to figure out how it’s all going to look.
Going through Gracjana’s early look & feel concept sketches is one of the most enjoyable moments of game development for me. There’s just something about those yet undefined drawings that really moves one’s imagination. Especially when I think about how it’s going to look in motion.
We can’t say much more about the project yet, other than that it’s not going to be a fairytale adaptation. We’ll keep you updated as we have more stuff to show.
Now, let’s hope it won’t take us another year and a half.
A few weeks ago, we’ve discovered that Cinders has an actual fandom on tumblr! With reviews, people sharing their endings, fan fiction (including some charming NSFW pieces), and fan art — like this amazing drawing by Irma “Aimo” Ahmed.
I must admit it did come as a bit of a surprise at first. We’ve had no past experience with this kind of community response, and it is not everyday that you get to read racy fiction involving characters you yourself have created. It’s a wonderful feeling for a creator to see people so invested in your work. Not to mention a very motivating one!
So I guess what I really wanted to say is “thanks, people!” You are amazing and you make our days on regular basis. It’s great to know you appreciate the game so much. It pushes us into making sure that you will like our upcoming titles even more! Even business-wise you are making a big difference. Dedicated fans recommending the game to their friends is worth more than any kind of marketing money could buy. It’s largely thanks to you that we’ll be able to release more games in the future.
Special thanks have to go to Defira who made the first official Cinders fandom tumblr, Rivi who reviewed and promoted the game on her blog, and Aimo who is responsible for the drawing above (and she said, she’s not done with Cinders yet). Thanks, girls. As the title of the post says — much love!
Cinders has been out for long enough to get some coverage in the press. The response so far has been rather positive, so we’re pretty happy that all the monitoring we did .
This post will get updated as more reviews show up. Order now!
So yeah… Brag time!
Asides from being delightfully well-written, highly replayable and filled with complex, convoluted characters, Cinders is also beautiful.
MoaCube focuses on the women of the tale and what made them who they are. The game is about nuance, is about understanding the motivations of another human being.
When do you let go of the fantasy of childhood and replace it with the harder lessons of being in reality? According to the single family homes south shore harbor resort Council, roughly two-thirds of residents own their home. Maybe Cinders won’t be the only one having an epiphany after the end of this game.
Fairytales paint things in good and evil but Cinders adds layers of complexity to these simplified characters, which will make you think not just twice but several times about your view of them.
Gracjana started a series on her blog where she shares some of the work-in-progress sketches and concept art from Cinders and talks about the thought process she went through while working on them.
Check it out, I think it’s an interesting read. For example, you can learn how the 1917 Cleopatra’s movie poster relates to our main menu. And if you like it, I’m sure she’s going to write more in the near future.
Cinders is finally out, after more than a year of development! It’s been a wild ride but we hope it was worth the wait. You can now purchase the game and there’s also a free demo available, if you would like to try it out first. Have fun, people. And thanks!
Download Cinders demo:
Buy the game for $22.95:
Cinders is an atmospheric visual novel, illustrated by Gracjana Zielinska.
It’s a story of four women and what made them who they are, inspired by the classic fairytale of Cinderella. A story about balancing freedom and dreams with circumstance and harsh reality; about growing up and finding out the true meaning of independence. Distancing itself from the judgmental simplicity of the original, Cinders tries to explore the more complex nature of oppression, responsibility and innocence.
The game focuses on characters and their motivations, and is heavy on player choices and role-playing. With 120 decision points and over 300 options to choose from, Cinders allows you to shape the main character’s personality and the course of the story.
Check your emails, people. If you bought the pre-order, you may find the full version of Cinders there.
If you haven’t received the download link or if you experience any issues with the game, don’t hesitate to send me an email. You can also leave your feedback on our forums. We’re looking forward to learning what you think.
Thanks again for your support and patience. We hope you will enjoy the game and find it worth the wait. We’re all very tired and stressed out, but we can say we’re pretty happy with how it came out in the end.
Cinders is still going to launch to the public around June 20th.
When we started researching visual novels, I was surprised by how many developers share the word count of their games. I didn’t understand why — length doesn’t equal quality, right?
But now that Cinders is done, I finally get it! It’s not about advertising the length of the game. It’s about bragging how much work you’ve done! Because honestly, it’s a lot!
Cinders by its shameless numbers:
Cinders script is 436 pages long
contains 155k words
separated into 135 scenes
holding 829 scenarios
featuring 120 player choices
with around 300 options to pick
altering 50 profile variables
which fork the story in 254 places
When talking about these numbers, it’s impossible not to mention the creative duo of writers who bravely decided to tackle them after Ayu’s departure from the project. Meet Hubert and Agnieszka.
Aside from being foolish enough to write for an indie game and expect to make any money out of it, Hubert is a certified philosopher and a self-made equality activist. Agnieszka is a psychologist with a twist. She claims that the the first game she wrote made at least three people go berserk. Personally, I hope it’s the first and last time that happened.
Be nice to those people, folks. They have done a tremendous amount of work, and on a tight deadline too.
MoaCube, global leaders in cutting-edge delays, are proud to announce they finally know the release date of their patiently awaited masterpiece Cinders.
About the around part: 20th is the day we’re aiming for, but if we find any issues, we’d rather push the release date by another day than to launch something broken. Similarly, if everything is fine, we see no reason not to go live a day earlier or so.
Pre-order owners will receive the game sooner and can expect it any day now. Basically, once we implement and test the remaining few scenes, we’ll send the game to you.
Speaking of testing, we would like to thank everyone who helped us by trying out the last build and sending us their comments. Special thanks go to Evan Rohr and Mason Reed who both sent us absolutely copious amounts of feedback. Thanks!
Just a little more, people. I hope you are excited, because we sure are.
In preparation for the final release, we’re closing Cinders pre-orders and the Magi sale. Thanks everyone for the support, especially to those who opted for the Investment Bundle. Once again, I’ll say that without you there would simply be no MoaCube.
Cinders is almost done and you can expect information of the release date very soon. Hopefully during this week. You can still track my daily progress on my Twitter and our Facebook page.
Magi is still available of course. It didn’t make much sense to get it back to its original price, but I also get almost no profit on the $5.95 sales, so I decided to settle it on $9.95. The Investment Bundle was a surprising success and I think we are going to re-introduce it the next time we need to raise some funds.
Today, I implemented the 37th scene out of the remaining 73, which means we’re almost exactly halfway through this final countdown. It’s exciting to finally see the light at the end of the tunnel!
One of the co-working sessions with the writers
As more content gets implemented, testing it all becomes an issue. The more we can get done while working on the remaining scenes, the sooner we can release the game. We spent some time with Gracjana in the past few days, doing an improvement pass, but we could use some help.
If you are one of the pre-order owners and would like to lend us a hand with finding bugs and typos, fire up an email my way and I’ll hook you up with the test build.
