A downloadable visual novel for Windows and macOS

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a·tri·um

noun

1. a central hall or court in a building

2. each of two upper cavities of the heart




College student Amaranth ("Amie") was fired from her job at the library after making a major mistake, and she has been rejected from all the jobs she applied for ever since. When Amie is spontaneously offered a part-time job at Heartful Flowers, a small flower shop near her college, she accepts without much hesitation. Little does Amie know that the small shop's atrium conceals a big secret…




a(t)rium is a project by CosmicAlbacore Games (formerly known as Studio Dipper). The game is Pay-What-You-Want, and it can be downloaded for free.

The current version was created over the course of a month (and a few extra days) for the NaNoRenO 2017 game jam. An updated demo version will probably happen... eventually.


watch for updates at:




Thank you for your support. If you enjoyed this demo, please consider leaving a comment on any of the sites mentioned above and/or buying me a coffee.

Buy Me a Coffee at ko-fi.com




FEATURES

  • a protagonist who frequently jumps to conclusions
  • 3 questionable love interests
  • 4.7k words (15-30 minutes of playtime)
  • no choices, sorry!
  • 4 sprites with 150+ expressions between them
  • 3 backgrounds
  • 2 original music tracks
  • phone feature with a notification system




CREDITS

  • PRODUCED by Studio Dipper
  • WRITTEN by Alcor
  • CHARACTER ART by Alcor
  • BACKGROUNDS by Alcor
  • MUSIC WRITTEN by Alcor and ARRANGED by Caelem
  • GUI DESIGN by Alcor
  • PROGRAMMED by Alcor, with HELP from Windchimes
  • MADE USING the Ren'Py Engine



VERSION 1.1.1

  • Minor script changes
  • Minor changes to one of the backgrounds
  • Bug fixes for the notification system

StatusIn development
PlatformsWindows, macOS
Rating
Rated 4.2 out of 5 stars
(23 total ratings)
AuthorAlcorChannel
GenreVisual Novel, Role Playing
Made withRen'Py
TagsAnime, Dating Sim, Female Protagonist, Otome, Ren'Py, Romance, Story Rich
Average sessionA few minutes

Download

Download NowName your own price

Click download now to get access to the following files:

a(t)rium (short demo): MAC VERSION 49 MB
a(t)rium (short demo): PC VERSION 64 MB

Development log

Comments

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(1 edit)

This is cute! I really like the phone system in the game! (๑˃ᴗ˂)ﻭ Nothing says otome without the MC getting forced to do work then meet cute men after (¬‿¬ ) I don't know if the game is still being developed, but I hope to play the full version of it soon! If not then it's okay! I enjoyed the concept of this game! ( ´ ω ` )

Will wait forever for this to release, I really liked the demo!

Is this game still being updated?

At the moment it is shelved, but I do hope to return to it in the future!

Hello! I absolutely loved the demo and I was wondering when a full version of the game is planning to be released? May I also ask how much the game would cost? The story is really amazing and the options are so unique and fun to play around with, the love interests are super interesting too! Thank you for all your hard work!

Thank you, I'm very happy to hear that you enjoyed the demo! Currently there isn't any significant progress being made on this game, but I still hope to release it in the future (haven't decided on cost)! Thank you so much for your supportive comment :)

Really enjoying this game so far! The art is lovely and I think Hisaishi is my favourite character ^_^

Thank you so much, and glad to know you're liking Hisashi :)

Awh, it was so cute! I can't wait to see more ^w^

Thank you so much! :D

I just finished playing the demo, it was so good! I enjoyed it a lot. It got me hooked on the story already. The fact that I already love the characters probably helped as well. Great job, will definitely play the full game whenever it comes out! ♥

Thank you for leaving a comment! I'm really happy to hear that you enjoyed it, and that you liked the characters :D

Deleted 5 years ago

Thank you so much! I'm glad to hear there's a Kennith fan out there (kind of surprising, given how much of a jerk he was). :D

walkthrough?

There is no walkthrough for the current demo, but eventually we'll create walkthroughs as the game becomes longer and more complicated :)

Man, the demo was cute, both art-style wise and character wise. Amie's so adorable, when she was near tears, I wanted to wring Kennykens by the neck :)

As for the guys, I'd say I like Hisashi the most. He was pretty nice, but what has me interested in him is how much he smiles. 18 smiles, huh? Literally can't tell what the guy's thinking. Also, his fish clip is pretty cool.

Kennith's a jerk, but it's not like he was rude to Amie for no reason. Personally, I'm curious as to why he can't be at Heartful Flowers all the time, and why he doesn't like phones.

As for Ross, he seemed sweet, and he definitely knows what Heartful Flowers' secret is (I think) but we didn't see too much of him, so I don't have too many comments.

I liked the phone feature, and I really love the aesthetic of the game. I always found terrariums to be pretty, and I think this is the first time I've seen a game incorporate them as elements.

Overall, great job! I can't wait for the updated demo!

Thank you so much for your comment! It's really helpful to hear players' thoughts about the characters and story, so we appreciate that you took the time to write up your thoughts :D

Oooh, I love the art style! Still anime-ish, but so different from others!

I think I'm going to take this game for a spin...

Thank you! Glad to hear you're enjoying the style :D

I'm enjoying this a lot. I just got into it but, im going to be doing the whole play through. I swear the delivery guy looks like me before I cut my hair. (maybe that's just my imagination) I don't know his name yet!

Still hooked on this game here is part 2 of the series.

Hey! Thanks for doing a Let's Play of this; it was fun to see your reactions and commentary.

Hope you're enjoying the delivery guy :D

No problem thank you for creating this amazing game! I really am enjoying the delivery guy  (Hisashi) so far.
I imagine he will be the love interest as I do the play through. If anyone else strikes my fancy might go through it again!

Thank you once again Studio Dipper!

Next part in my let's play serious introduced to two more guys!

The extra option in the menu is so well designed and man I can't wait for the full story of Amie's adventure in this mysterious flower shop xD

Haha, thank you! Glad you enjoyed the phone feature :D

I really loved this demo - it was so short and I wanted to play more!

The characters seem interesting, especially Kennith, and the MC was likable too! The character designs are nice and the color palette is really soft and gentle while still colourful - I like that.

There seems to be a lot more to the story that just a college student looking for work, and trying to keep her job, so I look forward to playing the game when it's out!

Hello! It's really nice to hear that someone liked Kennith (a lot of the feedback I got mentioned that Kennith was too much of a jerk, and Hisashi has been the most popular by far). I'm also glad that you enjoyed the art!

Thanks for giving the demo a try, and sorry that it was so short. I hope you'll enjoy the updated demo when it's released :D

Noooo! The demo was too short! D:

This seems like a really interesting game, and I can't wait to play more! 

Thank you so much! Glad you enjoyed the demo, though it's a really small demo :'D

Just finished the demo! There's something very peaceful/cozy about the mechanics and storyline and characters, but I get the feeling that there's more to the concept that I think...right???

The MC is adorable (thinking about what she was gonna cook :) very relatable), as are the three LIs. Wanted to slap Kennith, but I have hope yet for him. ^.^ I also liked the phone feature a lot; it was so simply, but having the character profiles available and clicking through photos and emails was incredibly satisfying. And as a graphic designer myself I enjoyed reading the commentary on the website hahaha.

Of course, the art style was so pleasant and..cuddly? Is that a proper descriptive term? Anyways, I thoroughly enjoyed playing the demo, and I'm looking forward to future updates! Great job guys. <3

Thank you for giving this demo a try, and for leaving a comment! I'm really happy to hear from a fellow designer, and I'm glad you enjoyed the interface features and the art overall.

As far as whether there's more to the concept, there will hopefully be an updated sometime this summer (probably late summer), so I hope you'll give that a try then. Hopefully Kennith will be less abrasive then, too (probably not, he's just a jerk)! :D

I haven't played this yet (it looks super cute tho!!), but I thought you should know, it got caught by my antivirus the last time I ran a scan :v ([DETECTION] Is the TR/Crypt.ZPACK.Gen Trojan)
(oh & it was the pc version)

Oh gosh, I'm sorry about that! I have no idea what that is or how it got there, but will definitely look into it. Thanks for letting me know!

ross is interesed in the lifespan of roses, huh? and fujimoto is written with the kanji for wisteria. amaranth is obvious, though I'm stumped about kennith. my first guess was chrysanthemums, though that seems like kind of a stretch. regardless, i'm going to hedge a bet and say they're all dryads, with Amaranth being one without knowing it... explaining Hisashi's interest in her.

don't think I didn't notice the sketchiness of your story, my man.

Anway, this is an awesome teaser. I don't understand how you got this done AND worked on Booksleeper at the same time. The writing is good, the characters are good, everything is so active because of all the expression changes, and I really like that Amaranth's expression changes during narration. I had never thought of doing that. Actually, I just like Amie in general. Her jumping to conclusions is really funny, and it makes the story pretty lighthearted and fun...

Which really matches the art style. Oh! And the art is so cohesive! Everything looks so good together! Ugh, I would pay good money for a finished version of this game. Is this going to be a commercial release? It really should be.

Good work. I'll be watching this.

Hello, Glitterbark, and thanks for giving this demo a try! I can't (shouldn't) say much about your guess (theory? hypothesis?) right now, but I'm very impressed by your detail to attention. I do tend to make puns out of character names, and I didn't expect anyone to catch the plant reference in Hisashi's. Bravo on that! I wonder if I was being TOO sketchy ahahahaahha

This game is planned to be PWYW (which I pretty much consider "free, but players can leave a tip if they want to"), haha. I'm not quite ready to go full-commercial yet, though I'm really honored you think that this could be!

I hope the next demo makes this story less sketchy :'D

Amie's facial expressions alone would make me play this. I really enjoyed the demo.

Haha, it's awesome to hear that you enjoyed the expressions! Thanks so much for giving this a try. :D

I played the demo for the game and I really liked it! I made a video showing my experience with it. The artwork for the backgrounds and characters is very well done. I also apperciate having the "phone" menu on the title screen to show off extras and profile information for the characters in the story. I wish you luck on the rest of the development for the game!

Thank you so much for your comment, and we're* glad to hear you enjoyed this short demo! The video is very much appreciated, actually, since it gives us* feedback on how players tend to interact with the game features; will definitely check it out soon :D

*I keep saying 'we' and 'us', but the studio is literally just me. Whoops.

Just wanted to say that I've watched the video, and I really enjoyed your commentary! Hearing your reactions as you continued through the game was really quite valuable to me as a game dev. Thank you so much for taking the time to do this!

Thanks for watching and you're welcome! I hope it helps with the future development on the game in some small way.