The game page is pretty sparse with info and I think I will be here too.

This was a pretty uncomfortable read, for all the intended reasons. You suspect the entire time that something is wrong, and you are trying to figure out what exact kind of wrong, until it the other shoe finally drops. The whole time I kept thinking "they're not actually gonna go there, right...?"

That said, I think I liked the premise more than the execution. I think the story is too short to let the dreadful build up simmer enough. While the brisk pace is disorienting and fitting, I think it looses a lot of its bite cause it's just too quickly over. It did build up the feeling of unease well, but I think it should have gone much further. I also don't think we had enough time of the girls hanging out and bonding for me to believe that Lucy would lower her guard down, or for Mary to grow attached to her to have second thoughts. The brother was a sparse character but have a very strong presence. For a story about manipulation, it didn't really leverage Mary's explore with either character that much, and that's a shame.

The interplay of the two endings was done well. I like the idea of going with the plan remaining implicit, although I think I would have gone with more disturbing implicit vagueness here, and having the other ending be the one that reveals the whole grim picture.

Lastly, I wish the game touched upon the Greek myths some more. There is an entire very rich pantheon of stories regarding fucked up shit that this story touches on to draw parallels to.

All in all, an idea that could have been really strong if it committed to slow cooking the horrifying implications.

A very good read, cute artsy style, good writing, with a deeper darker topic, and a disturbing issue. Unique story, flows well and neatly written. Give this a read, but do check out the CONTINT WARNINGS! 

'Wolf in Sheep's Clothing' is an unnerving suspense drama that portrays some heavy and serious subject matter through a deceptively innocent looking veneer. It's an interesting effect of having this type of story be told through the stylization of an simpler and cuter art style as it does throw the reader off balance once the first sting of dread hits and suddenly the juvenile presentation starts to show that there's a darker story being told here.

That being said, I think the story here is actually really intriguing and has quite a few layers of it. To speak plainly about the plot is to spoil the reveal, but I'd like to talk about it, so spoilers for those that haven't played it. The narrative angle is really strong. Having the main story be about a sheep girl who's been sexually abused by her older brother guardian and then using her to lure other girls for him to then sexually assault is a very intense premise (the 'wolf in sheep's clothing' being a predator sheep). There's a lot of really evocative moments that really sell the intensity of the situation. The way Mary dissociates a lot, the rigidity to her thought process, the absolute deference of agency to her brother, the culpability in assisting her brother, and even the resentment to the other girls that her brother targets. There's even a weirdly sinister worshiping of the older brother as he's introduced, which helps paint the picture that while his actions are reprehensible, he must hold a level of charm and charisma that he's able to get away with seducing Mary's classmates. The introduction of the folklore theme being the Greek gods, especially with Zeus and Hera as a not so subtle metaphor for this story, does help confirm to the reader that this is 'that' kind of story. What I find interesting as well is how Lucy changes depending on how Mary answers her question in the one branching choice. If you pick Lie, the story proceeds with the luring and seemingly 'lamb to the slaughter' type of scene where Lucy gets deceived, while on the Truth side, you find out that Lucy is aware of what's going on and isn't actually completely against being prospected. On the truth end, it feels like Lucy then takes pity on Mary and we find out that Mary actually doesn't care about the girls who get prospected, but that she's got this possessiveness to her brother and doesn't want to share with other girls. It's a surprisingly candid and tragic take on the story dynamic. 

The presentation, as simple as it is, is surprisingly effective at showing the disconnect between the seriousness of the subject material and the way the characters treat the subject material. The audio cues work well in giving that change in tension whenever a new detail is revealed, and it uncovers the next dark layer to the story. I do think that some more care could've been put into the transitions between scenes, as they seem to just flash in an instant, as well as the initial music coming in without any fade in, though part of me wonders if that's intentional or a happy accident that it adds to the choppy perspective of the main character who dissociates. I would say the same thing about the writing and prose, which feels very unrefined. There's some weird sentence structures, and a couple of places where it feels like there should be commas are missing and it ends up looking like run-ons. Once again, part of me wonders if this is intentional or a happy accident that it adds to the deteriorating and juvenile thought process that Mary has. While I think that the story ends at the appropriate point for each of the two choices, the ending does come very abruptly and that's what leads me to believe some of these choices are more like happy accidents that benefited the story. Adding in some kind of slow fade to back into a credit sequence or a sense of closure to the narrative leading into the end would help a lot in signaling the end of the story instead of the quick cut to the main menu.

Creatively, the thing that stood out to me the most was the audacity of tackling a story line like this. It's a touchy subject and could easily come off tasteless if not handled well, and I think you handled it with the appropriate amount of depiction without glorification. Otherwise, there's not too much else here to judge on, but I do think that the sprites for Lucy and Mary are very cute, and the backgrounds do their job of placing the characters in a setting. While I could see the folklore reference with the Greek myths, it does feel more like a foot-note, since it's not entirely a one-to-one metaphor with the Zeus story, since while Hera does punish the women that Zeus sleeps with, Hera doesn't actively help Zeus with sleeping around.

It's actually quite interesting, because I remember the author's previous game jam work, and that also dealt with mature topics. This one feels like an improvement in the narrative flow and letting the plot develop more naturally. If I were to offer some feedback, it would be to look into finding different ways to enhance the reader experience. Title page art, utilizing the visual medium more with different scene transitions or moving the character sprites around, playing around with the text visuals. On the writing end, looking into single line edits to see if there are stronger ways to convey the idea you're getting across. This was a surprising entry, and there's a lot of room for growth and potential, I would just like to be sure that there are deliberate artistic choices being made rather than it just working out for this particular story.

Quite a fun story! Well, as fun as the subject allows it to be anyways, since it does attempt to tackle some heavy stuff. An interesting take on the trope of 'Popular girl tries to be friends with the Loser (tm)', with a pretty decent execution no less. It could certainly benefit from a bit more time spent on visual elements like transitions, but under the scope of the Jam it certainly had higher priorities, and it works well enough. It's hard to say I managed to predict the twist of the story when it wasn't trying to particularly hide it, but the direct reveal of it was still good enough for me to be surprised by some elements. Now, the abrupt endings are a bit unbalanced, since one of them works very well, and the other one comes a bit out of left field; however, again, as the game was made in a month, it's not as much of a criticism as a note. The writing is quite fluid and works quite well, and except for some grammar errors, no major issues arise, maybe minus the characters playing through the entirety of [what is implied to be] Portal 2, but that's more funny than disruptive~ Ultimately, it's a charming submission that managed to keep me invested for the whole story, albeit cut a touch short.

Wolf in Sheep's Clothing makes me uncomfortable in all the right ways. There's this overwhelming sense of dread that doesn't leave until right at the (good) ending. The abrupt transitions lend well to the constant disassociation that the protagonist experiences. The music also lends well to make tense scenes feel extremely tense. 

While the story itself is fine, I find that there are simple grammatical errors that can be rather distracting. While the abrupt switch to the title screen in the bad ending does well, I wish there was some sort of transition between the end and the title. More of a "fade out" ig

Overall, I like what's here! Most of my critiques come from minor technical errors, and nothing to with the actual story. Keep it up 

Powerful allusions, heavy subject matter, and super uncomfortable vibes. The writing could be cleaned up a bit, but overall quite effective at what it aims to do.

The storytelling was hella blatant (you know from the very start what is about to happen) so the conflict is pushed a whole level deeper. Is Lucy going to fall for it? Is Mary actually going to go through with this? Maybe someone will break this chain somehow? The fact even all the other highschoolers know about it is wild. Sure, the plot could be smoothed out with more subtlety, but I liked how the creator threw the typical twist right out the window and went for something darker.

I enjoyed my reading a lot! Short but pretty loaded with its themes. I liked the art style, it’s simple and really cute, which is much better since it contrasts with the darker themes the game manages. The detail of the BG changing according to the emotions of the scene is a nice detail and really helps setting the ambience.

The implementation of the theme was really good, using it as an excuse to make Mary bond with Lucy, making it actually important for the plot. And even better, giving an extra layer to the characters, giving them roles and dynamics that parallels their gods’ counterparts. Mary and Michael with Hestia and Zeus, in a constant circle of Michael ‘betraying’ her and she hurting the girls instead of him. And with Lucy as Hestia; being the goddess of hearth, she’s depicted as someone kind and benevolent, same with our Wolf, judging by her helping Mary and her care for the plants.

What I most liked is how the game cautiously keeps to itself the details of the events, just leaving context clues and dialogues with multiple interpretations. With it, I think the best character (at least conceptually) is Michael, the fact that he never appeared in the game sets an air of mystery around him, especially since you don’t even know by a fact what or is he doing what he does.

Lucy is genuinely a nice girl, which contrasts even better with the twist of the ‘Wolf in Sheep’s Clothing’ since she’s actually willing to help Mary in the ‘Truth’ ending. Which makes her fate much more tragic and gruesome on the 'Lie' ending; never really knowing what happened to her, and leaving us with just some cryptic final words from Mary.

And talking about Mary, similar to Michael, her intentions are never disclosed and you really never know exactly why she does that for her brother; is she scared of him, maybe she doesn't realize how bad it is, or even maybe she loves him? Questions that are upon the reader to answer. However, since she is the protagonist, and that is where the narration comes, it might feel a bit… Weird? Something like that, I don’t know how to explain it.

I get why she doesn't explain the situation thoroughly, since maybe it’s a defense mechanism, judging that she dissociates and gets distracted pretty easily. It was well implemented overall, except once you reach the ‘Truth’ ending, and that is where the writing fails a bit.

Since this game doesn't detail a lot regarding the characters’ reasons, it makes them pretty foggy. In this ending, she realizes that what she is doing is wrong and wants to change for better. However, at first impression could seem as a sudden change that came from nowhere, once you start to analyze you see the cracks on her resolution through the game, but that impression lingers.

That’s a skill that is tricky to master. You need to know how much exposition is required in each scene and character in specific moments, and not losing the subtlety of the scenes, neither without compromising the understanding of the situation from the reader in the process. As I said, it’s a really difficult skill to learn, and I even saw genuine experts fail to communicate the message by trying too hard to be mysterious.

Anyways, a good game overall! Just some detail that drags it down, but easily forgiven due to the time limit.

Alright, first May Wolf I read, let’s go!^^

The atmosphere is quite well done. I liked the backgrounds having different hues, that and the music complimented thed vibes in the writing quite well. The sprites are pretty simple, but they work. It’s a bit distracting not to have a sprite for Micheal (or is it Michael?) as he is a pretty critical character, but that’s understandable.

There are some typos and stuff, but the overall writing is good. I like how what exactly Micheal’s deal is is understated throughout the VN up to the “lie” ending. Only when Lucy gets to talk about it does it get cleared up.

The folklore angle is a comparison between the characters and gods from Greek myths: Mary is Hera, Micheal is Zeus, I suppose Lucy is Hestia (don’t remember much about Hestia). Pretty simple, but it works. And the title is a fun, if slightly common, inversion, since Mary the sheep is the titular “Wolf in Sheep’s Clothing”. Good stuff!

Overall, I liked reading this, good job!