Good pacing, great concept, it's hard to talk about without spoilers. It doesn't get bogged down, not by worldbuilding, not by character development... the reveal at the end makes such an impact, even if you could see it early on. So on point for the theme, too. The paper CGs are lovely. Keep it up!

A very unusual VN, but I think I liked it. In particular, it represents the folklore theme really well, using folklore as a vassal for two broken people to connect with each other. It's a bit hard to understand what's going on, but I think the gist of it is that they're in a post-apocalyptic world, about to die of starvation or whatever, and Lucas used to know the wolf but has forgotten him? I might be reading this incorrectly, but the cool thing is that the story doesn't require me to understand what's actually going on. Instead, one has to focus on the folklore actually being told, and it's good stuff all around. This is a very short VN, but one that's packed with imagery and even tragic moments. The visuals are very nice, particularly how often it shifts art style depending on the story being told. This part was what clued me in to the possibly post-apocalyptic setting, as it shifts from a forest to like, some concrete or whatever? It's not explicit but it doesn't need to be. I enjoyed reading this VN and filling in the blanks.

short and very powerful! Probably one of the more focused and short Maywolves I’ve read so far, and definitely stirs feelings!

Unfortunately, the sparse world building and repeated lines might turn some away from this VN, and the vague ending would definitely make one want for more… yet  I wouldn’t want it any other way!

great job!

Honestly, I want to say as little as possible because I don't want to spoil anything, and I think this is a story genuinely worth experiencing on your own.

It's hard to parse my feelings about this one. The art direction is extremely evocative and conveys all the necessary emotions to the reader through its simplicity. I'm sure everyone's already mentioned it, but the sun breaking through the paper background was so genius, my jaw hit the floor. More than that, I immediately resonated with the isolation and loneliness that the wolf had felt, based solely on the black and white paper visuals you'd used during The Wolf and the Sun story; excellent work. I liked the writing style, but sometimes it felt very difficult to understand what was being said or the underlying meaning- I needed to reread a couple lines, before the lightbulb went off in my head, but some of that was probably just me being stupid. 

My favorite part, by far, was Lucas' undying hope, even when face-to-face with devastation. Even then, he believed that the wolf would eventually find his footing without him by his side, and something about that felt very... I'm not sure, uplifting? Inspiring. Truly, he was the sun.

A quick story with amazing presentation! I didn't completely understand what was happening, but it got the emotions across and I think thats what mattered.

Well, shit. 

There are a few issues with the writing style, which others have touched on and I will as well, but this is about as close to an unequivocal backboard-shattering slam dunk as I've seen in this jam. This is kind of the epitome of a jam VN - very short and limited in scope, but every frame is purposeful, intentional, and poignant. It provides just enough detail to convey the emotions at play without getting bogged down (mostly, and I'll get to that too) in worldbuilding it doesn't really need.

I said something along these lines during Novembuck for Proxima Protocol, but it bears repeating: I am seriously impressed with the massive strides you're taking with every new project. 

Going to break this down further, but this one warrants a spoiler warning:

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Implementation of Theme:

Yeah, I mean, take your pick. There's the rites of Forefathers' Eve themselves, the characterization of Wolf's deeply personal experience as another piece of folklore conveyed to Lucas, and even some other references to folklore thrown in during Lucas' closing internal monologue. Honestly, I'm not sure you really needed those last pieces - this story was already dripping in the folklore motif throughout, and adding new terms like "Likho" just a few lines before a very emphatic ending felt unnecessary. You could have had Lucas get to the same point in his musings without introducing new terms to make the language harder to parse. The requirement was clearly met here, though. 

Writing:

Speaking of language being hard to parse, that's maybe the one real issue in this VN. I understand the tone you're going for, but readability is important too, and there were numerous instances where the language really could've been simplified instead of going for the most complex syntax and vocabulary you could think of. Everyone and their brother has mentioned "saline solution" and purkka already listed about 70 other examples, so I'm not going to linger on this point for too long, but just as another quick and simple edit, you can take something like "Long, long before the grand crosses decorated the apexes of any chapel in any town." and chop that down to "Long before grand crosses decorated the chapels in town" without losing any of the immersion or general vibe of the narration. 

One other quirk that I noted here - perhaps I missed something since no one else seems to be mentioning it, but sometimes Lucas is referred to as "P" and I don't know why. Not sure if this was a placeholder from a previous draft that made it into the final edit.

Presentation:

Great. Good. Spectacular. I loved the subtle SFX throughout as opposed to more conventional backing tracks. The shift from the crickets and crackling of the fire to the buzzing of the wolf's tale to the distant popping gunshots of the ruined city was really well done and set the scenes well without being overbearing. Yes, the final effect was extremely loud, but I didn't necessarily mind that? To be fair, I was also playing through speakers and not headphones, so maybe it was excessive through certain peripherals. Even if you were to turn the volume down, I think it's a really effective full stop for the narrative. 

Art was similarly excellent from my perspective, and I thought the UI was unique. I like the immediate impression of the Start button on the pyre, but as someone who (perhaps ironically, given the previous paragraph) likes to adjust the sound before starting a game, I'm not sure how I feel about not being able to access the settings immediately. Art-wise, the middle sequence especially stands out, with the sun literally tearing through the paper the wolf is drawn on, though other images like the wolf's face being blurred out as he rushes towards Lucas are also very impactful, especially with the full picture of the narrative in mind. 

Besides the issues noted above, the script was generally well proofread, which is also always good to see. 

Story: 

As stated a few times by now, I think this was incredibly effective. I caught onto some of the story beats very early on, like Lucas talking to no one at the start, Lucas dying, and Lucas being the sun and all, but the actual reveal of the current reality was still a very well-delivered moment that I didn't really see coming. 

There are moments when the narrative might get a little too bogged down in the folklore aspect instead of just letting the relationship on-screen speak for itself, but really, this VN does a great job of getting its themes across. We have the pain of losing someone close to you, the pain of facing your own mortality and losing yourself, and the ability to find hope even when all hope seems to be lost, even if that's just through carrying someone's memory. It's beautiful in its simplicity and I think we get just enough about these characters to feel the weight of their emotions without disrupting how those emotions are conveyed. 

I usually have like five pages worth of notes for "Story" in these reviews, but I really don't here, to be honest. This was really tight and well done.

Creativity:

Wildly creative, down to the UI, the art style, the audiovisual imagery in general, and the way the theme was implemented. Aside from those minor points above, this really was exceptional from the top down. If you keep improving at this rate, the sky really is the limit for what you can produce. 

Final score of 120 sheets of graph paper out of 1 9mm shell casing. 

Pretty good: the pacing is steady, the concept works, and there's some very clever foreshadowing for the twist. If you want to come up with something to grumble about, I think the fact that the plot is so focused on explanations of the rites and the wolf's inner story kind of robs the finale of some of its impact. I feel like the story is so eager to surprise the reader that it doesn't take every opportunity it could to underscore the strangeness of what we're lead to believe is happening or provide development in the form of increasingly weird details.

Granted, I see what the VN tried to do with its sound design, but unfortunately, the technical implementation lead me to miss most of it as I read. The cricket sounds in the title screen were so quiet that I assumed it was – in line with the minimalist visuals – meant to be silent and neglected to adjust my volume, ending up not hearing most of the audio. (Worth noting: this is another reason to allow accessing settings in the title screen, since I guess not having the volume sliders available made me think sound wasn't going to be that important.) Actually, I'm not too sad about playing with a low volume, because that final sound effect is way too loud! Shocking the reader with an unexpected harsh sound suffices as a jumpscare; it doesn't have to also be loud enough to kill headphone users.

On the visual side, though, I basically like almost everything. The shifts in art style make sense and result in the presentation being quite engaging even with the limited amount of art, and the sun appearing as a bright hole in the paper in the sketch-style CG is an insanely cool visual idea. As far as the character designs go, I get that the simplicity is meant to communicate the ordinariness of these people, but I think there's maybe just slightly too much that and too little anything else. The color combinations aren't particularly pleasant, for example, and there just aren't any neat details for your eyes to focus on. I can imagine better ways to balance between the same fundamental vibe and creating attractive, interesting designs.

My biggest criticism, and what ultimately prevented me from really immersing myself in the story, comes down to the prose. I think the VN would generally benefit from a thorough editing round; there are many of instances of slightly confusing phrasing, and the style feels wordy but mostly because it goes so often for the long, clumsy way to say something. There are a lot of lines I like, but also plenty where the specific choice of words or the rough sentence structure prevents the intended emotion from coming through. Everyone already complained about "saline solution" in the comments, so let me grab some other examples for the sake of demonstrating what I'm talking about:

"A distinct lack of chatter still filled the arid air, only sometimes interrupted by steps shuffling somewhere near."

Here, two conflicting descriptions of silence are smashed together. If it's specifically a "lack of chatter", then it doesn't make sense for steps specifically, rather than chatter, to interrupt it.

"Somehow, the touch of the stranger flooded Lucas with a deeply familiar feeling, not unlike a scent recognized from childhood, long forgotten with time."

I think the "with time" part is totally extraneous here – I'm not too crazy about the "long forgotten" part being there either, as I feel like just "from childhood" might be enough to conjure a sense of nostalgia, but I'd cut at least that part. I feel like it's not too poetic and semantically redundant; time is automatically the cause when something is "long forgotten [from childhood]".

"All parts of the firmament fled, as the orbit dragged them to the safety of other skies. But the sun remained—firmly held in place—something subject only to the cruel whims of fate."

Here's another example of that first thing where two senses of the word "remain" are mixed up. If the sun stays in the same location as everything else goes away, it's remaining in a physical place, as the em dash addition says; on the other hand, to "remain subject to the whims of fate" is instead an abstract thing.

"The previously bitter cold of the air pushing against him—now left unwarded against— grew nauseating and hateful."

Now that I mention it, I feel like em dashes are kind of overused in the script, and here's another example of the part separated with them not really agreeing with the surrounding line. If I'm understanding this right, we're first talking about the bitter cold of the air, then the em dash addition focuses on him, and after it we're back to the cold (which "grows nauseating and hateful"). However, I'm not sure what the word "against" is doing. Is it trying to refer to the cold? I feel like you can't really do that syntactically, and I think the flow is bad in any case.

Also, as a smaller polish thing, the punctuation is messy throughout. Two different kinds of apostrophes (' and ’) are used at random, interruptions are sometimes done with a hyphen and sometimes with an em dash, and spacing around em dashes is also a little inconsistent. I don't know what kind of writing process produces these kinds of problems – maybe it's just pasting back and forth between different word processors – but I think it's worth the effort to make everything consistent.

All in all, I like the bones of what's happening here a lot, and the use of the jam theme is good. In the moments where the VN really works, it's a beautiful thing to read, but I feel like the writing issues were frequent enough to stop me from really loving it. With the minimalist presentation, it's largely up to the prose to do the work of setting the mood, and I don't think it quite gets there.

This is one of those FVNs that makes you want to cry if you're not a creative and makes you want to kill yourself if you are one. Not because it's bad or depressing, but because the pain of knowing you don't have the skills to make a game that can affect someone so deeply is too much of a burden to bear. Also, I'm being hyperbolic. Don't kill yourself, kids. I'm serious. Anyways, it's really hard to describe the game without spoiling it, as it's really short and really hard to describe in general, so I'll just say that it makes you think about a lot of things and about what you're doing in life. It's really good with its theming, in a way that I can't describe without spoiling everything. While the actual events of the story are easy to understand, there are a lot of ways you can interpret what the VN is trying to say. It's not as abstract as something like Clam Story, but what you get from the VN still depends heavily on the type of person you are, which is pretty cool since linear VNs like this are rarely able to achieve that. Some people might take away that this was a sad story, but for me personally, I really liked how hopeful Lucas was despite his whole standing; that's something that's really inspiring to me. The prose is cathartic, being intricate without being overbearing. It actually makes you feel the weight of how somber the situation is. The presentation, while not as impressive as some other entries, fits perfectly with the VN. The only complaint I have with the VN is that the sound effect that plays near the end of the VN is quite loud, in an obnoxious way. I understand why it's loud, considering what the SFX is supposed to be, but it didn't have to be that loud. Still, that's just a tiny nitpick compared to everything else. Just play it. It's short, it sticks with you for a long time, and it's really good.

Beautiful and emotional, but there’s a bit missing there. I see what this is going for and why many may like it, but this didn’t quite manage to make me care about those characters enough for it to really have the impact. The first half was shaping it really nicely though. The shortness of the story was both a strength and a weakness.

I like the left justified texbox, but it’s a bit weird that there’s never something in the bottom right corner (unless I missed it). The illustrations are gorgeous and fit the story very well. The music and sounds work well too.

Overall, it didn’t quite get there for me, but great job nonetheless!

Emotionally gripping and engaging from start to finish. I was worried the story would be far too short, but it was actually the perfect length. It was focused and didn't overstay its welcome. The presentation with the title screen at the very beginning and the abrupt ending do wonders to set the mood. The way the art "deteriorated" too as the reality of the situation set in was phenomenal. 

My only main complaints are minor, and solely have to do with the prose (saline solution to describe tears is a choice), but that's really it. Keep up the amazing work!

'Remember the Forefathers' is a dramatic tragedy that examines the purpose of folklore tales within communities and how they can bring peace of mind and hope to those dealing with uncertainty and fear. 'Absolute cinema', is how I'd describe this visual novel entry. It knows what kind of message and tone it wants to set, it gives just enough context and details to immerse the reader, and it develops in a way where the as the narrative goes along, the layers peel back and more and more of the what the reality of the situation is. It leaves a lasting impact, and is extremely effective and efficient with what it needs to convey to give a resolution to this story. It's highly recommended that you read this visual novel going in blind, just to get the authentic experience. I'll be spoiling the climax and the twists and turns as I talk about it, so last chance to go read it if you're looking at the reviews before picking it.

The story itself starts out as if the main character, Lucas, is sitting in a forest, lighting a small pyre/campfire being prepared to talk about a tradition of 'remembering the forefathers'. He seemingly is talking to no one in particular, which is odd, but goes on to ramble about what the traditions mean and what they mean to him. Then comes in the wolf man, who knows Lucas but something is wrong. Turns out that it's the wolf's time to tell a story, and it's about how he was depressed, apathetic, and suicidal, but there was someone who made him feel like he should live towards being alive, very much the savior backstory for these two. Cut back from this really nice flashback, and we're actually in a war torn zone, and not a forest, and Lucas is actually dying after being caught in some kind of collateral damage next to rubble, the pyre actually just a flashlight. The reveal that these are the dying thoughts of Lucas as he reconciles with the unfairness of life and death, and how he faces death with dignity despite it all.

I only summarize it cause it wouldn't do it justice to retell the whole thing, but this is an extremely effective presentation of this story. Everything from the way the start screen only has the start button right at where the pyre is starting, the very creepy and dramatically dark art work with characters having blacked out eyes, the way the CGs are then presented in this black and white sketchy form, to how so much visual storytelling is done through the art itself. Also, the audio design is on point, extremely effective in conveying what's going on with the ambient noises, from crunching leaves, the lighting of the pyre, the gun shots in the distance, it's all combines together into a package that is a multiplicative combination of it's parts. The writing too, it's very evocative, with so many good descriptors in it's prose. The emotion coming through for the wolf in the dialog, the resignation from Lucas. Even the quick cut ending, to really put a period at the end of the story, is just so effective.

The folklore aspect is front and center. In a way, this particular entry makes me scoff at all the folks who claimed that the theme was uninspiring because this is a great example of how folklore is an important aspect of the story, without it being just a simple retelling of a folk tale. It tells a particular folktale, but also gets philosophical about the purpose of them, which is quite a nice bit of introspection. The creativity to put this together and present it in a way is great. There's so many bold choices made for this one, the way that the start screen is built into the narrative, the choice of the sudden ending, the way to present the story one way only to reveal what the true nature was later. This is a great example of knowing what bits are important to the emotional arc, and which bits are important to the plot narrative. We as readers understand the fears of Lucas through what stories he tells himself, and we understand how much Lucas means to the wolf through the story that he told.

If there's any feedback that I would give this for the sake of giving feedback, I think maybe a little bit more detail in grounding the narrative in reality once the reveal has happened. This is more of a personal preference, since I'm sure plenty of the more artsy readers would love reading the subtext between all the details to determine where in the world this would be. The wolf's backstory could be used to help reveal a bit more of who exactly these characters are, rather than speaking in more emotional general terms (the classic 'I was alone, but you came along and made life worth living') maybe play more into the reality of being a war torn area, and that's what could really make it just a bit more impactful when the reveal comes right after. Otherwise, CMoon has made amazing strides in their visual novel entries over the past year, and it's kind of crazy how quickly they've improved in their presentation skills and honing in on their author voice. There's definitely a running theme of embracing the tragedy in his stories, and I wouldn't change that at all, it's a tough skill to be able to write emotionally tiring subject matter. Keep doing what you're doing dude, whether you want to keep doing these darker stories or branching out into other genres, you've got some solid chops.

Uhhhhhhh, what was that I just read? Very interesting, a good read. I felt a lot was not explained in story, thinned out, pieces missing. Was this post world war civilization, or a delusion of a dying person?  The Ending, yeah Surprise. 

Really good! I appreciate the statement, the tightness of presentation. 

my one, singular critique, is that saline solution is just. so out of place. I get trying not to say tears again but it was better to just keep it simple 😭

This one was one hell of an experience. I hesitate to say much more than that, because I think it's best to go in blindly, but it managed to both keep me incredibly invested and intrigued throughout the runtime, and to thoroughly surprise me with its twists and turns. A fantastic job, and a great example of a really compelling short story!

⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

Tightness may not be everything when it comes to short stories, but sometimes you come across something so lean and focused on all fronts that you begin to question that assertion. Remember the Forefathers knows what it wants to say and be to such an extent it can bluntly and confidently show its hand early on and still grab its readers for its whole runtime. A melancholic tale that blooms at the perfect pace is supported by just the right amount of audiovisual elements to make the greatest impact. Critiques are few and include a strangely placed UI and one sound effect that's too loud for the rest of the soundscape. Minor inconveniences detract very little from a package that, though short, achieves everything it wants.