Even if it happens to be generic in structure, it's written well - the presentation, though, I thought was a bit lacking. The music is great, but the lack of expressions hurt...

The first half is lighthearted. Like going on a nice walk with too many limbs, so it takes longer. We get flashbacks, but I got a dark feeling. There were some other dark, humid feelings later in the half, but it made for a great lunch.

The second half is much more serious. Depending on how cowardly you are, you'll either get a terrible ending or a terrible ending or a terrible ending.

It's very real in contrast to the first half, and I greatly enjoyed it; real, grounded. The problem is that I got a dark feeling from the flashbacks, but it was only because I felt it being at all was doing that. If I didn't do that, it'd mean the first half wasn't setting it up... wait...

The two are at odds...

I loved reading this novel, but it wants to be pulled in both directions until it can go any farther. It's straining to love the earth.

I hope to see you again soon!

In a jam full of DND-related stories, The Tale of Drac de Na Coca surprises by… not being that, in spite of really, really feeling as though it ought to be. More than anything, the first half of this feels like a DND campaign to me - the meandering over seemingly pointless conversations, the traditional party composition, and the very blatant eldritch blast references. Honestly, when the story got to the more serious bits, I found myself getting somewhat surprised by the lethality of it all, given just how decidedly non-lethal DND tends to be what with the omnipresence of healers and whatnot.

The first half is slow, and it feels somewhat in conflict with the more grim latter half, but I can certainly buy it as a representations of the characters sort of ‘repressing’ anxieties relating to the looming disaster of the fight with the dragon. And I think it does do a good job of representing that disaster - both in the leadup at the camp, and during the moment-to-moment action of it all. At the end of the day, after spending a good couple thousand words getting to know these characters, it certainly does feel sad to see what occurs - even in the happier endings.

That said, I do think the beginning half is the story’s weaker half - it feels like a somewhat arbitrary collection of conversations - you get the conversation to introduce the MC, then the scene to introduce the My Wolf, then the rest of the party members, etc… The flashbacks felt especially out of place, and I’m ultimately left wondering if a more natural way of providing these introductions could have helped bridge the gap between the story’s two halves - to provide more hints towards the impending doom of the characters, or maybe to better introduce the ‘secondary adventurers’ who show up in all of the endings.

Speaking of endings - I really liked them all! Both the ‘bad’ ending and both good(ish) endings were quite effective (though I’ll admit that I didn’t really understand how the choice of sticking with the bard mattered all that much in the grand scheme of things given what was going on), to the point where I felt compelled to check out all three - and I greatly enjoyed doing so. At the end of the day though, I’m still left with the feeling that if both halves of this story were better bridged together, then it could have been even better.

This starts off being a standard epic adventure tale. I can't say much that's bad about it, really, other than the fact that it does little to break the mold. It probably doesn't need to, this was still enjoyable enough to read as is. One does have to wonder how much folklore it actually represents when it reads very much like a standard DnD campaign, down to the warlocks and dragonborns and what have you, but it does have enough Spanish inspirations where I can accept a merger of the two genres. The sprites also could be better, as their lack of expressions do bog down the experience a little bit. It's a bit of a shame though, since I could tell the writing attempted to give the characters a lot of life, and it probably would have been more successful if it had been given more time than the jam allowed. Regardless, the adventuring party is enjoyable enough to read about. Personally, I think the fact that they're already in established relationships takes a bit of romantic thrill out of the story, but it was never going to be the point anyways. At least there's a sex scene, which... is just fine, without the accompanying CGs. What's worthy of being focused on, however, is definitely the latter end of the VN, with its multiple routes and variations. I was pleasantly surprised by the multiple endings going on for as long as they did. I think that part did a great job at expanding the lore of Palmensis. There were also several great emotional moments throughout the story, such as everyone's deaths (in the good ending, which I hesitate to even call a good ending). The story might have lacked that little bit of spice to make it stand out, but it still built up quite well to a very satisfying conclusion. A solid fantasy entry in this jam.

This is mostly good, really, but is dragged down by a few issues. The writing is mostly competent with some mistakes here and there. Some scenes drag on a bit, notably in the first half and the endings a bit too. The main characters are well fleshed out and interesting, however it takes too long to really understand their quest: the threat posed by Coca remains vague for too long. I like the different endings, how you establish that Coca is very dangerous and deliver on it. The choice of leaving Valenti or not feels a bit hollow though, since you end up doing it a bit later anyway if you choose to help him.

On the presentation side, the new sprites are nice, but lacking in expression. Coca feels like he should be bigger based on descriptions. The backgrounds were well chosen. The visual effects accompanying the patron talking are cool, but the green text is a bit too hard to read. Also, the tentacles don’t always appear. The music is really good, and sound effects are used judiciously. Too bad about the neverending footsteps…

The folklore theme is mostly Drac de na Coca himself, with a smattering of other stuff with the patron and magic. Too bad the wikipedia article only exist in catalan.^^

Overall, I said a lot about the flaws but I did like reading this VN. Good job!

This one's... weird. First off, the art and character designs are good, but I do find the lack of character expressions to hinder the game's presentation. Speaking of presentation, there's an audio issue where the footsteps sound effect will keep playing even when the party isn't walking. You can fix this by saving and quitting the game, but it's still annoying to deal with. Outside of that, the music's quite good. I'm a sucker for songs that use a Spanish guitar, and this one has it in spades. The writing's also pretty competent, with flowery (Sorry if you're a Deltarune fan) prose that doesn't overstay its welcome.

I'd divide this VN into two parts, with the divide happening somewhere after the sex scene. The first part is enjoyable if a little generic. It's a basic DnD party adventuring to defeat the evil entity (dragon in this case). The characters are pretty interesting and likable and have good chemistry with each other. Oriol is an endearing knight, while Valenti is very fun. The tone, while not cheerful, also felt like a bunch of friends just shooting the shit while adventuring. It's overall a fun ride.

Now the second half. I will get into spoiler territory, so I will put it in its own section. So, read at your own discretion.

The second half is significantly darker, as the stakes are a lot more in the forefront. There are three endings depending on what choices you make after the sex scene. I'll go from worst to best, in terms of how the heroes die. The Possession ending does a good job of showing the consequences of Robert being selfish and not wanting to take responsibility. It's pretty well written, especially with how much Oriol suffers. The Catalyst ending is interesting with how we see Robert turn into the Unity and how Coca brainwashes his victims. It's unsettling, but it's also well written. Then two characters, one of whom wasn't even in the first half and the other just a minor character, defeat Coca themselves and become the heroes instead. I'm mixed on this. On one hand, I like that Robert's party was essential to getting Coca defeated, even though they only played a small part. On the other hand, the main difference between this ending and the last ending, as far as I can tell, is that the two characters killed Coca in one ending and didn't in another, which is a bit anti-climactic. It makes you feel like there's not much of a difference between the two endings. I also feel like the scene with the two characters in both endings also drags on for too long, since we don't have much reason to care about these characters. The last ending, which I forgot the name of, is good, the two characters I mentioned aside. I like how climactic the party went, aside from Rodan, who was done dirty. It definitely was the bittersweet ending you were anticipating since the first choice.
Now, I do want to talk about how there's a bit of a mismatch with the two halves. The first half wants to be a fun adventure with friends, and the second wants to be a serious story that ends in tragedy. I don't think these two halves gel well together. I would get it if the point was that it starts light-hearted but then becomes serious, but I didn't get that impression, as the transition between the two halves is a bit abrupt. Like, I could think of a few stories that do that significantly better, but I also don't want to make any unfair comparisons. The first half wants to end with the heroes having a glorious victory where they all return home and live peaceful lives, while the second half wants set up for a heavier story. As is, the two parts are at odds with each other.

Overall, this was an interesting read, but I think the sum of the two halves leaves a bit to be desired. Hopefully you find this feedback useful for your future projects. Thank you for the VN!

Unique, well written story, kept with the theme, with wonderful characters.  All bad endings, I didn't like, that. 

'The Tale of Drac da Na Coca' is a fantasy adventure story, told through the lens of a DnD campaign and the flavor of Spanish folklore. I think what really appeals to me about this entry is the abundance of the Spanish culture imbued in the visual novel. From the little touches of Spanish traditions, the terms of endearment used, and the aesthetic flair, it does a great job of putting it's viewpoint front and center, and showing of all the small moments that this adventuring party has.

The story is fairly straight-forward DnD fair, an evil dragon is planning to brainwash the city and a group of adventurers bands up to go stop the ritual. You have the party members, the warlock, who is compelled to go on his patron's orders. The paladin who goes as a warrior of good and light, wanting to stop the evil dragon on principal. The bard and the rogue, who each have their own code of honor to put their lives on the line for the defeat of the dragon. There's the march up the mountain, the camp, the ambush, the calm before the storm, the infiltration, and the final battle. It follows the logical progression, even taking the time to flash back to how the group all met in the first place, as well as pair up in their romantic ships. The visual novel actually has choices, where you can get bad, neutral and technically good ends! Sure, they're based on whether or not you follow the script of the hero or turn tail and run like cowards, but the fact that the bad ends actually exist and really take the time to hammer in how badly you fucked up, by making your potential new life a hollow one, and still getting controlled by the dragon in the end is so good in leaning into the bad end. The good end, while technically a good end, is more of a tragic heroism, as while you're able to prevent the major catastrophe, you end up sacrificing your lives in order to do it. At least you got to have one final romp in the tent and the city puts up a mural and statue in the town to remember you by, and the tales of your heroism inspire others to do the same. Nothing too cheesy and sweet, which some folks like the bittersweet endings or the ones where not everything works out in the end. Mature. That said, I did feel like there wasn't a lot of plot momentum, and it tended to meander a bit. The walk up the mountain was slow, we get two separate flashbacks, a scene to set up camp, a scene to fight a guy, a sex scene, a slice-of-life scene with breakfast, the final action sequence scene, and then a scene with two townsfolk that we suddenly focus on in the epilogue. Remember that each scene should set up the next scene, and try to focus on the details that are either going to  give more context or are answering a question that the plot has presented. Like, for the flashback scenes, we already know that the characters are all friends and companions, so needing to see how they met is a little redundant, however entertaining they are. Consider trying to utilize those flashbacks as ways to also support the main plot, like, more information about the dragon instead of having the players talk about it for the reader's sake.

The presentation is really fun. I dig the character designs for the sprites of the heroes, very good at conveying what classes they were. The way the text was manipulated for emphasis in certain ways, the way the screen would darken when the warlock patron would talk was always fun, and even all the little animations that the sprites did helped to immerse the reader more. There was even the inclusion of the axolotl knight from the pre-rendered sprites, but you re-drew it in your style for consistency, very fun.  Plus the backgrounds being mainly self-taken I assume, as you were hiking is such a fun personal touch, that while at first it took a while to get used to it, actually gave it a distinct sense of area and mood. The writing did start to feel a little bit mechanical as it was going through the motions of describing the action scenes and how everything is filtered through Robert's (the main guy warlock) perspective. The dialog and banter was top notch through, as each character had their own personality, and there were some funny lines in there to liven up what was otherwise a pretty tragic story. There were a few technical issues, stuff like names not fitting in the name box, some of the darker green text being tough to read, and the two bad endings having some error in their code that doesn't hit the epilogue or something. Did I mention the great audio and music direction? It also really gave a great Spanish flair to it.

As for folklore, it's always fun to learn about interesting myths and legends, and then adapting that to a DnD campaign feels like the prescribed route to take for this kind of game jam. I won't fault it for doing so, since the jam invites it, so I'll say that it does the genre right by leaning into portraying it as the story, rather than as everyone playing the game which is the story (it was the angle I took in my entry last year). I enjoyed the Spanish flavor to a DnD campaign, so I'd say that that part is pretty creative.

I want to say that the overall theme trying to be expressed in this story is the sort of classic "face your fears, because if you don't you'll regret it more if you ran away." Part of me wonders if having the bad endings be the routes where you survive with your wolf would feel worse if you ended up with survivor's guilt, as not only did Robert have to mind control his wolf, but the city still fell to corruption, and he would have to live with that hollow victory. That being said, I thought the team that put this together did a great job for a first time entry. Lots of character moments, some real stakes, and while I don't think any of them had a particular character arc, it's still good to read about heroes doing heroic things. For a first time go at a visual novel, this is really good stuff especially with the time constraints. I'm sure in the next one, you'll start seeing all the little things you can do to up the polish.

I am a little embarrassed to admit that I did not realize it was the Dragon of Palma until we got to the actual dragon of Palma. 

I think this is something to be proud of, making a game in the course of a month, but ultimately it leaves me wanting. It seems like it's an ambitious goal for the amount of time you had. The writing is charming, but needs a second pass. The combination of dnd classes and the og folktale I think kind of robs either of their identity. The biggest place the game suffers is in the art, and the presentation. The designs are charming, and the choreography does it best to makeup for it, but each sprite only has... one sprite. they're locked in a single expression, which is just absolutely fatal. The visual aspect of visual novels is huge, and the lack of CGs and sprite variation really puts a hamper on things. It ends up feeling tired and monotonous, especially with all the backgrounds being relatively dull desert colors for most of the game, followed by more dull color interiors. The lack of visual diversity starts to wear after awhile, especially when combined with the presentation. I assume it's coding errors, I know nothing about coding, so I can't recommend fixes, or claim to have done better, but oh my god the walking sfx gets pretty old even when it's supposed to be playing... and then... it just keeps going... forever. 

It's not something to be ashamed of, this is only my second jam, and in both I've also definitely felt the "here's where the limitations are vs. the expectations I had," and it's been a learning experience both times. But in this case it's especially important to bear in mind what makes good visual novels good, and to make sure to prioritize incorporating them instead of shooting for the moon and going way off base. 

It honestly feels almost criminal to me that, at time of writing, we're four days into the review period and seemingly no one's touched this yet. There were some issues here and there, especially in presentation (and I'll get to that), but for a brand new team's first effort this was excellent. 

Breaking things down further:

Implementation of Theme: 

Yeah, sure. Requirement met, box checked, etc. I don't know anything about Mallorcan folklore and wouldn't have guessed this had any basis in real world legend if you hadn't said so, but even aside from that we have our quest to stop the dragon and our heroes themselves becoming the folklore as their tales are told through the town in the good and less good endings. I'm quite satisfied here.

Presentation:

Yeah let's get this one out of the way early because this area had some issues. Before I get to those, I want to acknowledge that there were still highlights in the presentation: the sprites you provided for the main cast, though limited, were well done and captured each of their respective personalities, and the music choices were all spot on. I especially appreciated the spicy battle theme. Love me some guitar-focused soundtracks.

Some of the effects were really well done here as well - I thought the purple fading into the screen as Robert is possessed in the bad ending (and maybe the mid one too?) was really effective and the first dragon roar kinda made me jump.

One big issue here is what I think are some missed "stop sound" cues. Very early on in the game, I had the footstep SFX continue all the way through the flashback to meeting Valenti and Roldan and back to camp. At that point I figured something was wrong, and saving, closing, and reloading fixed the issue, but it happened again with fire crackling SFX in the good ending route. Definitely something to look out for since that was quite annoying.

The bad and mid endings both throw an error - for the bad ending it's before the credits and for the mid it's after. Might want to double check your labels here. Also in the bad ending, there was a reference to fighting "Josep"? Maybe that was Lambert's name in a prior draft and accidentally made it through, otherwise I have no idea who that is.

There were quite a few proofreading errors throughout, at least one instance of text running outside the box in the mid route, and sometimes colored text could be hard to see with the transparent text box. This was especially true for name tags and Patron's lines in the bad ending (I'd guess this was supposed to happen to some extent to signify Patron's connection with Robert slipping, but it was really hard to make out and might be something to consider for accessibility purposes).

I know it's very difficult to produce a lot of assets during a jam, especially when you're still figuring out how the whole process works, but if you had more time, this would definitely benefit from more sprites with varied expressions as well as some CGs for key moments. Your writing for the sex scene was good, but it is a little awkward to just be staring at a static image of a tent the whole time, and if we got an image of Magdalena's mural that would've been a great coda to end the story on.

Story/Writing:

Based on some comments I've read on other entries, I'm a bit worried this VN starts a tad slow for others' tastes, but I generally thought this was really well done, with some of the best character work I've seen so far this jam. The banter feels genuine and natural with all of the main cast maintaining their distinct personalities instead of dissolving into generic quip slingers, and I bought that this was a party that actually cared for each other and had some chemistry. 

I think introducing Patron right out the gate is a great hook that builds intrigue even when there's not much action happening on-screen. Even though the VN is on the longer side for a jam entry, every scene feels like it has a purpose and no scene really feels like its overstaying its welcome. Each scene feels like it's building on the characters and their relationships with each other, which makes their inevitable demise feel all the more tragic. Said demises also feel weighty and dramatic without slipping into melodrama, which is a difficult balance to achieve.

Writing felt pretty solid across the board, though there were times in action scenes where I lost a sense of where everyone was positioned, and this occurred at one point during the sex scene where I wasn't sure what position Robert and Oriol were supposed to be in. 

For critiques, while it's always nice to see branching paths and player input, I'm not sure I feel about how the bad and mid endings were implemented.

Addressing the bad ending first, I just didn't buy that Robert would completely turn the way he did. Like, sure, he could have doubts and want to run away, but the shift into full psycho just didn't really seem in line with how the character had been portrayed to that point. Thankfully that branch was pretty short so it didn't linger long, but it felt a bit like having a bad ending just for the sake of having a bad ending.

My issue with the mid ending is more in the choice itself; we're giving the option of making the cold, logical decision to leave Valenti and Roldan behind to cover your advance or stay with Valenti despite his urging. First, it's something of a pet peeve of mine when stories have characters dawdle or argue when another character is sacrificing themselves to buy time because it's kind of wasting their sacrifice (a former partner pointed this out to me and I just can't unsee it now), and second, the difference between the two choices barely feels material for the massive effect it has on the outcome since even if you stay, you have to leave Valenti and Roldan almost immediately afterwards anyway. Like, if you choose to leave Valenti, you become a thrall until the B team can save the day, but if you leave Valenti two minutes later you win. To be honest, I didn't get much out of either of the alternate endings and I question how much they added to the experience.

For other minor gripes, I did feel like Na Coca's compound was ridiculously easy to get into compared to how Roldan described it in the previous scene. Like I don't even know why they had to use the ruse on the kobolds, I feel like any of the techniques they had used against Lambert would dispatch them before they had time to sound the alarm. For that matter, I'm not sure if Lambert was just supposed to be really good, but the party seem to be able to take down thralls much easier in the compound than they did in the first fight. Like, yeah they all eventually get overrun, but they take down quite a few and it took a coordinated 4v1 to beat Lambert.

Creativity:

It's still early and I have like 30 of these to go still, but I highly doubt I'm going to see Mallorcan folklore featured again. The plot itself is straightforward enough - fantasy RPG party goes on a quest to defeat the big bad and they get their bittersweet victory, but I think the way these characters were realized added a lot to the formula.

As stated above, for a first time effort, this really killed it, and I look forward to seeing what you can do with more time for polish. I will be watching your career with great interest.

Final score of 15 sick flamenco guitar riffs out of 12 perfectly fried panades.