#nekodeito

With the upcoming Visual Novel “Nekodeito” which is about a catgirl living with you, I am glad that novajam of NoGood has taken the time to answer some questions for both NoGood and Nekodeito!

1. When did you start Studio NoGood and what was your motivation to do so?  “ It was late 2018 when I started fronting publicly as NoGooD. I'd been writing scripts for VNs as early as September that year, a lot of which got trashed or shelved but it was December before I registered a domain or anything like that. The motivation was to keep my VN game development activity under a separate banner from my online handle, but I integrated my handle into the company name so I don't know how well that worked. Ahaha”

2.  As an indie studio, what are your top priorities for both your games and your fans? “ I think quality is the first priority for both. Fans want good games and good stories so straight away it's in my interest to set the bar high. The very close second is communication though. Independent projects will live or die by the goodwill they can cultivate with an audience and I feel I've been very blessed to have such good reception already. It's a sort of symbiotic relationship. Provide what the fans want, what they're looking for, and they'll support you in return.”

3. Is Nekodeito your first game? “Yes. No!! Oh god haha no actually! I made a very budget looking version of Geometry Wars in University with Gamemaker ahaha. That's probably everyone's first game project, some kind of twin stick shooter or platformer. Before that I'd played with mod tools for other games, The Elder Scrolls Construction Set and such if you'd count that.” Sure, that does help in devwork so why not. Any other games I should know about?  “I just remembered making this platforming engine in Gamemaker Studio 2. It might look okay here but it was very buggy and the project it was intended for quickly became overwhelming so that's abandoned now.” 

4.  Who came up with the look/ personality of Nekodeito's Machiko? “ I came up with the look, and most of the personality but other experts in the field of catgirl engineering were consulted though, mainly my friend TMMTO. Parts of the personality changed over time and little traits here and there have been crowdsourced here and there from fans.  I made this collage and sent it to my character artist, critterpunk, as a reference when she was doing character and outfit designs for me.

It think it stayed mostly intact. The sizes are off and I think I made her a more responsible big sister type character than a lazy one in the end.” I can see her big melons stayed intact! “Big tunas” Speaking of big tunas!  For Nekodeito, would there be any features like headpats, tail fluffing, tickling, etc? “Of course of course! Nekodeito has a sort of dating sim style system where you pick what order to progress through story segments, and in between segments her sprite is interactive. I hope people will enjoy booping her on the nose.”

6.  As Nekodeito is developing over time, what is the hardest obstacle you have encountered? “Distraction. It's very easy to get sidetracked on Youtube or Twitter which is very annoying, but games too have been a problem. My productivity improved a lot once I slowed playing mobile games so much.” 

7.  Did you have any inspirations that helped you make Nekodeito? “Ha, dumbly enough, mobile games. Well you know about this, but for people who don't really play them, when you log in to Girls Frontline or Azur Lane or something you have a secretary character that greets you. I set mine in Girls Frontline to Mk23 and the greeting pulled my heartstrings a little. I really like the idea of being able to come home to someone who's happy to see you no matter what, so that's what the game is about. That kind of romance is what I want for the game, one that's very cozy.”

8.  When did your love of catgirls start? “Oh jeez. I don't think I have an exact date. But who really is incapable of loving catgirls? Spice and Wolf probably played a formative role, even though that's not about a catgirl.” I don’t blame you, floofy girls all the way!

9.  As a developer what goes through your mind for when you release it? Do you have any concerns? “Will people like the game? Will people even find it and engage with it? Will it be able to recoup it's costs? Will I even be able to make another after this Will there be some kind of problem with the software I'm incapable of fixing? Will I be able to deliver all I've promised in the first place? There are many worries. On the other side of that there's a good fanbase already and a fair amount of risk is already mitigated but the worries are always there nonetheless.”

10. Which types of Nekodeito merch are planned?  “Hell yeah! Alright so, we have a voice actress for Machiko, and we're going to go to crowdfunding to try and get the game fully voice acted by them. Merch rewards will be sticker packs and keychains, we're trying to get some of those "ergonomic" mousepads made too. We're seeing if you can get your own TUNA shirt too, just like Machi wears in game. Digitally, you'll be able to get an art and commentary book and the original soundtrack for the game.”

All them goodies! Let’s say the crowdfund went too well, like ultra succeeded, would you consider a limited edition figure of Machiko?                                                 “If I did that I think it would probably be an extremely limited run, and probably like a trading figure or nendo sized thing rather than a 1/7 scale, but hell yeah I'd love a little Machi fig on my desk! More realistically if crowdfunding exceeded expectations then we just expand the game, offer a free DLC down the line of an after-story or add extra CGs and scenes to the base game.”                                  DA CATGIRL FAMILY!                                                                                            “Oh god I gave Machiko ten sisters. That's so many sprites to get done...” 

11. To your current fans and future ones, what would you like to say to them in prep for Nekodeito?                                                                                 “Thank you all for your support, for telling all your own friends and groups about it and spreading the word. Thank you for all the fan art and nice messages, and most of all thank you for your patience and thank you for appreciating cute Machiko! I hope to have a demo ready in June for the public to try, so please hold on a bit more.”

Would you like to add anything else? “Additional thanks to everyone who's worked with me to create Nekodeito, all the artists (chlorophill, Rialyn KV, critterpunk, ds sans, Cheschorv) my editor (Cipher), my composer (Igneus) voice director (Sandra MJ) and soon to be debuting voice actress, Wolf and Alch at Team Watercress for lots of help starting out, reps from Degica for assistance with the engine (andre and Archeia). So many people! NoGooD is officially just a one-man show, but without all these people I'd have nothing to put my game together with. This is turning into the credits section!” 

A big thank you to novajam for taking the time to answer my questions! I really appreciate the game’s progress and I hope to see more!

NoGood Twitter:  https://twitter.com/StudioNoGooD NoGood site:  https://www.nogood.games/games.html   Nekodeito itch.io:  https://studionogood.itch.io/nekodeito Nekodeito Steam Page: https://store.steampowered.com/app/1072790/Nekodeito/