Inside Out at The Top of the World
Working in a space defense force under an intimidating, workaholic boss? Scary.
Running into that same boss on a weekend at an amusement park? Scarier.
Being stuck right next to that same boss on top of a malfunctioning rollercoaster with nothing to do and no one else to talk to?
Terrifying.
Get a front seat view of a heart-pounding(?) situation in which Solaris, defense force trainee, finds himself stuck in the same car with his aloof commander at work Kaiser - on a rollercoaster that really chose the absolute worst time to be stuck.
A visual novel made in 1 month 2 weeks for the NaNoRenO 2024 Game Jam. Featuring:
- A linear, kinetic narrative that takes 10-15 minutes to complete
- More than 25 unique character expressions, ranging from embarrassed to even more embarrassed
- Two lovable (hopefully) helmetdudes
- 1700+ words of clumsy small talk and honest camaraderie
- Homosexual behaviours
CREDITS
Original Story, Illustrations & Programming
Kevin Minh
Sound Effects
bfxr, Freesound, YouTube recordings of rollercoaster rides made in No Limits 2
Music
shimtone
Download
Click download now to get access to the following files:
Development log
- Play Inside Out in Browser/HTML5!24 days ago
- Inside Out is Out!28 days ago
Comments
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A charming little tale. I enjoyed reading and getting to know these two and would love to see more! ^_^
This is so late but thank you so much for playing and making a playthrough video of it! I'm so happy you enjoyed it and gave it five stars even despite all the audio issues.
After some debugging, I managed to figure out why some of the sounds couldn't be adjusted at all (it was an issue with registering new sound channels/mixers!), I've fixed that as well as did a pass through most of the sound effects to reduce and balance their volume. I'll be pushing an update in a few hours for both PC and web!
Thank you SO MUCH for playing again! It's an amazing experience seeing people not only play my games and enjoy them but ALSO go through the efforts to showcase them with videos.
Made a video
Thank you for playing and making a video of the game! I appreciate it.
Loving the squishy thumbnail ahah. My boys, all SQUISHED!!! Unforgivable raaaaaaaah (/joking)
So adorable!! The characters kinda reminds me of the two royal guards characters from undertale :D so cute!
Thank you so much for enjoying!
The Royal Guards are super cute aren't they??? That kind of relationship dynamic is ultra-adorable aughghghhhhh
This is so adorable!! I loved it a lot!! I can definitely relate to Solaris' anxiety at the workplace and having trouble connecting with others T_T
I'm happy that Solaris and Kaiser were able to bond <3 Would love to see more from these two!!
The art is amazing too, I loved how we could see their eyes from the helmets!!
Thank you so much for playing, I'm glad you enjoyed the character writing and the art!!!
SO cute. Seriously I loved this and can't wait to see more
Thank you! Please look forward to my future work!!!
That was really cute! :D
I like how they were able to eventually have a candid conversation about how they were each feeling... after peeling through layers of awkward social conventions and social niceties — the dialogue felt very realistic with how forced and awkward it was, both characters heavily reluctant to openly share their true feelings.
I appreciate how you sprinkled in lore here and there while resisting the urge to explain any of it and break immersion with unnecessary exposition.
I'm rooting for Solaris x Kaizer!
Also, "Kaizo" is a great nickname LOL. I wonder how many frame-perfect conversations Solaris will have to have with him before he starts really warming up. xD
One small critique: The crowd noise at the very start of the game sounded REALLY loud to me, and none of the volume sliders in the menu seemed to affect its volume. The only way I could adjust it was Mute All (which defeated the purpose lol), or by adjusting the volume of my headphones and then balancing the Music/SFX/blips volumes accordingly.
Thank you for enjoying it! I'm glad you enjoyed the dialogue and also the little bits of lore sprinkled throughout. I do plan to explore the setting and make more games with these dudes, so please look forward to my future works!
The crowd noise loudness has been reported, though it not being affected by volume sliders is a new one. I have a sneaking thought that I know what's going on and will fix it sometime in the future when I get the postmortem out.
Thank you again for playing!!!
So after some testing, I'm concluding that the crowd noise not being affected by volume sliders is a web build issue, as on the PC download build you can set it with volume sliders just fine. It seems as if the web build has an issue with different channels using the same mixer; the crowd noise plays in a "BG_sound" channel which uses the "sound" mixer, but somehow the "sound" mixer on web doesn't affect any other channels besides the main sound channel (blegh).
In the upcoming update, I've reduced the volume pretty significantly, and I've also applied the bandaid fix of registering the crowd sound as music, which is weird but also you can adjust its volume in the menus now. Furthermore, I've did a full pass on most of the game's sounds, adjusting volumes and removing unnecessary sounds as needed. It should be pushed soon. Thank you for your feedback!
(deleted this once to fix a typo whoops)
Solaris and Kaiser's little heart-to-heart was adorable!! I hope relationship continues to grow! Very cute ><
Thank you!!! I’m glad you liked them! Hoping to make more games with them soon 😎❤️
This was SUPER CUTE AHHHHH! The art is ADORABLE, and so are the characters. I want to hug Solaris so badly, poor helmet baby needs one. And so does Kaiser (even if he might not want it at first).
Their heart-to-heart at the top of the ride was really touching, and I think the music that played really added to the moment. Solaris, someone who hasn't been able to find comfort in anyone as of yet, was able to finally find it in Kaiser, a fellow knight he admired but also found intimidating. Meanwhile, Kaiser, also found a friend in Solaris. To me, that was just so sweet and really heartwarming.
When they held hands, I SCREAMED!!! I'm super invested in these guys' relationship, whether it stays platonic or develops into something romantic I'M HERE FOR IT!!!
Thank you so much for creating such a tooth-rotting game. <3
Thank you so much for this lovely review, it really means a lot to see you enjoyed my writing and characters ;___;
The way Kaiser and Solaris' dynamic is built is that both of them want to be loved, but neither of them want to admit it (initially) for different reasons; Kaiser because he feels like his job and role requires him to put up a brave face of sorts (and accidentally ignore the entire communication aspect of it), and Solaris because he kind of just... is too reserved to ask for attention most of the time. I wasn't sure how to fit the entire, "opening up" part into a short word count (because oops! only started work 2 weeks into NaNoRenO), but I'm glad it came out well.
I wonder if Kaiser being the one to offer his hand first came off as a good hint that he wants to be intimate?
I'll be expanding on this more in my post-mortem/"the making of" devlog but the initial concept for the game all the way back in October 2023 (wow) was that you'd be playing as Kaiser and making various conversational choices to have Solaris open up. There would have been multiple endings and the choice to offer his hand would only be available/not grayed out on the route to the best ending, when both of them are fully comfortable with each other. As you can see the scope ended up being cut down to a short-and-sweet kinetic novel, but I think it's better off that way considering the jam time limitations.
The hand-holding scene made me blush as all hell when I drew and programmed the expressions + the dialogue into the game so I am incredibly satisfied to see it have the desired effect on you ^_^ The relationship Kaiser and Solaris end up forming is very sweet and does take a romantic direction further down the line, too. I'm not sure what kind of game I want to make next but I really want to include these helmetboys in my works more going forward!
Once again thank you so much for playing Inside Out!!! I'll definitely try to play Monochrome Pixels when I have the time as well, it looks absolutely stunning and has an insane scope for a NaNoRenO game! Good job to your team for finishing it too!