Save the Villainess: An Otome Isekai Roleplaying Game News

Dear Villains and Villainesses,

This is Tanya and Emily, the developers behind Save the Villainess. We’re here to end the month of May with an update on the development of our game. We’re also celebrating the birthday of our exquisite (if rather poor) Duke of the North, Izel Kuzey. Come bask in his tales of life in the cozy, charming, only slightly deadly North!



This month, we completed programming the very complex scene 18, which is a multi-part puzzle that draws upon information revealed to you in scenes 16 and 17. If you love the idea of interrogating three gorgeous suspects to make logical deductions about their secrets, this puzzle will delight you! If you’re not, you can always turn on story mode or use our free game walkthrough to complete this program and enjoy the dramatic end to the scene. We hope to keep you as invested in Jane’s survival as Jane herself!

Plus you get some great safety tips from Izel. Remember not to mix fire with phosphor!

We also wrote scene 20 (which gives a pay-off to your decisions in scene 18) and revised the existing outline for the upcoming interconnected scenes 21 to 25. These scenes contain a great deal of important world-building and context for the strange, fantastical kingdom of Carcosa. We revised these scenes to deepen your understanding of Carcosa and the powerful, ruthless noble families who lead it. After all, the more you know about the dangers of the people and creatures around you, the more capable you are of saving your villainess.



This month, we’re celebrating the birthday of Izel Kuzey, our beloved Duke of the North. Enjoy a video of him speaking about his birthday below!

[previewyoutube][/previewyoutube]
Izel is our subversion of the classic Duke of the North character. When you think of that character, you typically think of a cold, hard man who has three words and two facial expressions a week. Yet while Izel is not the most emotionally expressive person and (like any good Duke of the North) has his fair share of family tragedies in a harsh, monster-infested land, we wanted to make Izel a far more entertaining and unusual character.

Between the feet fish and the werebear assassins, it's a wonder that Izel didn't die years ago.

Izel is as neurodivergent as Jane is… and like her, his skills shouldn’t be underestimated. After all, you can only survive a land as horrifying as the North if you think in ways that no one else can anticipate. If you pay attention to Izel’s words, there are very interesting things to discover about him. So keep listening to what Izel has to say… and what he doesn’t say.

Izel also might have an unexpected amount of romance in his soul!

Are you ready to go on your tour of the scenic North? Just remember to get some gold to tip your friendly Kuzey hosts and avoid eye-contact with the feet fish…



We were also featured in the Indie Assemble event on Steam, hosted by Excaliber. Indie Assemble features over 1,000 indie games from over 600 studios across the world. Thanks again to Giorgio Catania for organizing this great event for small indie developers like us!

Finally, please remember you can always catch us at the various sites below:

• Our discord server - come chat with us and hear what other players have discovered about our game!
  
• Our mailing list - we send free cards featuring new banter from our main characters every month. This May, Jane, Edmund, Izel, Ben, and Servant wish Izel a happy birthday - with the best/worst pun we've had so far!
  
• Youtube, Bluesky, and Tumblr - our main social media accounts
  

Thanks again for joining us for another lovely month and update, friends. We’ll see you in June with more fun updates on our game!

With Much Love,
Tanya & Emily
Best Laid Plans Productions, Inc.

Dear Villains and Villainesses,

This is Tanya and Emily, the developers of Save the Villainess. We have a lot of fun game updates to show you this April. We're celebrating Jane's birthday, showcasing the end of the Dream Lovers tournament, and have footage of a special ‘date’ with the tournament winner. Stay tuned for more mayhem and madness!



This month was a great month for those who love to delve deep into intricate plots with plenty of suspense, character interactions, and mysteries! Our writing and programming focused on our game’s mysteries, with us first revising, editing, and then programming Scene 16.

Scene 16 is a complex and fun multi-part puzzle that will lead to an upcoming in-game climax. For this scene, we edited and reworked items from our existing bedroom background so that they could be used as part of a point and click puzzle.

As is a key goal of our game, both the correct and incorrect choices in the scene offer something interesting for your play of the game. If you make the incorrect choice, you’re one step closer to a bad ending but might discover some easter eggs and clues to the larger mystery. If you make the correct choices, you’ll be rewarded with very special scenes featuring characters you already know…



We also completed the writing and programming for Scene 17, which features Jane and a special guest while providing hints of dark secrets and surprises.

Additionally, we worked on writing and editing Scenes 18, 19, and 20. All these scenes needed to be co-edited together because the mystery deduction choices that appear in Scenes 16 and 17 are linked to the outcomes you experience and the deductions you can complete in Scenes 18, 19, and 20. Ultimately, we set up a complex set of interwoven conditional deductions that will allow you to learn much more about the relationships the villains had with her possible former fiancés. This newfound knowledge may be touching or troubling, depending on how you interpret it…



This April 6th, we celebrated our villainess Jane’s birthday! Jane is our loving tribute to all of the many neurodivergent women we have known and loved. She’s a little bit of Katarina Claes from My Next Life as a Villainess, a little bit of Princess Mia from Tearmoon Empire, a lot of our own experiences as neurodivergent women on the autism spectrum… and her own weird, complicated, brilliant, and very subtle self.

Ultimately, Jane is a person who is trapped in a terrible situation who can still finder her way to freedom and justice with your help. We hope you can see a reflection of yourself in her desire to survive no matter what horrors the world tosses at her.



As you can see, Jane is determined to love herself on her birthday despite the forces against her. You can join our mailing list and email us for this month's character cards to learn what Edmund, Izel, Ben, and Servant would say to Jane on her birthday!



This month, we had the pleasure of seeing different people play through Save the Villainess’ demo in great detail.

First, Chirkrasia played through our entire demo. She brought her beautiful voice and a brilliant artist’s eye to the game and discovered some recurring motifs and details we hid into our backgrounds and character designs. Tanya also spent about an hour chatting with Chirkrasia and other viewers in each stream. You can see more of her Save the Villainess streams on her twitch videos page.

Second, Amyseekmeout is creating a detailed playthrough of our demo under the [Save the Villainess → #stv-playthroughs-threads → Amy’s Demo Playthrough] section on our discord server. She and other brilliant players have discovered several hidden secrets, including food choices that shout out to Marie Antoinette (one of our major inspirations), hidden themes of revolution, and the importance of bear traps. To help her discover more secrets, please check her playthrough thread on our discord.



This April, we completed our dream lover contest with a final round between our two most popular love interests – Izel Kuzey, Duke of the North, and Servant, the mysterious maid/butler of the House. They had a fierce battle but in the end, Servant won the vote for the Dream Lover among our non-villainess cast.

Izel had an interesting response to his defeat.



Won’t you please donate a few gold coins to a Kuzey grandmother and save a three-headed raccoon today?

Meanwhile, Servant was initially puzzled by your desire for them… until they decided they understood just what you meant.



Even better is that Servant’s reward for winning the title of Dream Lover was a ‘date’ with Jane. So what happens when a slightly terrifying maid meets with a survival-minded villainess?

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All hail the two best lovers in the land!

Finally, please remember you can always catch us at the various sites below:

• Our discord server - come chat with us and hear what other players have discovered about our game!
  
• Our mailing list - we send free cards featuring new banter from our main characters every month. This March, Jane, Edmund, Izel, Ben, and Servant talk to you about their favorite reading materials in honor of National Reading Month!
  
• Youtube, Bluesky, and Tumblr - our main social media accounts
  

Thanks again for joining us for another lovely month and update, friends. We’ll see you in April with the winner of the Dream Lover tournament and with more fun updates on our game!

With Much Love,
Tanya & Emily
Best Laid Plans Productions, Inc.

Want to know more about Save the Villainess? Watch OtomeAddicted play a slice of our demo!

Dear Villains and Villainesses,

This is Tanya and Emily, the developers of Save the Villainess. We are excited to bring you the first official update of the spring. We had a lot of fun preparing writing and programming updates, as well as letting you know about a Dream Lover tournament where you get to cast the final deciding vote on who is the dreamiest love interest in our game!



One of our major goals in our game is to allow players to spend quality time with characters even as we introduce more complexities and complications into our murder-mystery plot. Understanding the characters brings you ever closer to unraveling the mysteries of the game - who wants to kill the villainess and how can she be saved?

This month, we balanced character interactions with the mystery elements of our story as we worked on scenes from our Common Route (CR). Specifically, we wrote and edited scenes CR 14 and 15. These scenes give Jane the chance to receive vital information that will assist with a major point-and-click mystery sequence in scene CR 16.



Note: If you consider the dangers of wainscoting, cushions, and asking for food other than apples, perhaps postcards too conceal sinister secrets. Why do you think that Servant hates them so?



In Save the Villainess, you are in charge of keeping your villainess safe from harm. Thus, you must investigate every possible object that may cause her harm… including the rooms of the murderous and possibly sentient apple-loving House where she is stranded.

Our point-and-click and mystery deductions are inspired by games like Unavowed, Grim Fandango, Sweet Fuse, Contradiction: Spot the Liar, and Even if Tempest. Just like these mystery games, we put our protagonist’s fate in your hands. Her survival depends on your cunning and detective skills.

We are currently developing the major point-and-click deduction puzzle of scene CR 16. Our goal is to create a puzzle that is more complex than the “beginner” puzzle in the the demo. Fans of mystery games will find this a fun challenge! However, if you would ever like more help with the mysteries, you can always turn on Story Mode or use the free walkthrough we will release when the game is out.




Note: Did you think the cushions were the only furniture you had to fight to secure your villainess' freedom?



Since March is a great month for tournaments, we’re excited to announce that we’re in the final bracket of our own tournament… and that you have the chance to cast a deciding vote!

A few weeks ago, we began the Save the Villainess Dream Lover tournament, which featured fierce fights between the love interests of our game.



Our characters have gone through seven rounds of fierce fighting, with each round accompanied by personal cards from the characters in both victory and defeat, as well as a special Youtube video playlist.

Finally, we are at the finals, with Izel Kuzey (our Duke of the North) and Servant (the extremely normal servant) making their final appeals.



Will Izel’s passionate words about love sway you?



Or has Servant’s success at… parties stolen your heart?

Cast your vote now and remember… the ultimate winner will be declared the fan favorite dream lover and will be featured in a special ‘video date’!

Finally, please remember you can always catch us at the various sites below:

• Our discord server - come chat with us and hear what other players have discovered about our game!
  
• Our mailing list - we send free cards featuring new banter from our main characters every month. This March, Jane, Edmund, Izel, Ben, and Servant talk to you about their favorite reading materials in honor of National Reading Month!
  
• Youtube, Bluesky, and Tumblr - our main social media accounts
  

Thanks again for joining us for another lovely month and update, friends. We’ll see you in April with the winner of the Dream Lover tournament and with more fun updates on our game!

With Much Love,
Tanya & Emily
Best Laid Plans Productions, Inc.

Dear Villains and Villainesses,

This is Tanya and Emily, your friendly developers of Save the Villainess. We hope you are having a fabulous end to your month… and we are excited to bring you a special Valentine's Day-themed update. We wanted to celebrate the season by programming one of our most gorgeous characters and talking about a plethora of romantic writing!



This month, we finished the base programming for the amazing Raymond Alpin! Raymond is the royal cousin of Crown Prince Edmund Alpin, which means that Raymond is directly in line for the throne should Edmund pass away without any children. If Raymond has his way, that possibility might not end up being so distant either…

[previewyoutube][/previewyoutube]

As you can see, Raymond is a very… confident man. He’s convinced he’s the best potential ruler the kingdom of Carcosa has… as well as a good candidate for being the most arrogant man in Carcosa.

Then again, is it arrogance if you really are that good?

So far, we have completed the base body programming on Raymond’s character model, which means we converted the Adobe Photoshop (aka PSD) file containing his art into hundreds of layers, the base of which we animated within the Ren’py engine using a combination of traditional animation, math, and coding.

In future months, we will animate Raymond’s individual facial expressions so he can show off his joy, rage, sorrow, and even his sweetly blushing face. As we’ve mentioned previously, the complete sprite process can take upwards of one hundred hours. We look forward to showing you more of Raymond when this process finishes!



Save the Villainess is a choice-heavy game that puts our villainess’ romantic fate in your hands. You get to determine not only which lover she chooses… but if she should be with a lover at all! Thus, the game features several romantic routes you can go down… including 5 romantic happy endings with each of the love interests and 3 different single endings, as well as several different secret endings you must unlock for yourself.

In honor of Valentine’s Day, we wanted to further enrich the romance in the game. Therefore, we revised all of the post-demo romantic choices in our common route. Now, when you choose affection raising and lowering choices, you will get longer dialogue skits and a deeper understanding of our love interests. The game will also remember these choices and use them to shape some later conversations in the game.

If you choose the affection raising choices, you’ll generally get sweet, affectionate moments that display more of the chemistry between Jane and her love interest that would make them work as a couple. If you are brave enough to choose the affection lowering choices, you may discover secrets about the characters’ lives that you might not otherwise discover until much later in the game.

Below is an example of an affection lowering choice that allows you to learn more about Izel, Duke of the North.



What choices will you make throughout the game? Play it for yourself and watch the mysteries unravel through your decisions…



This month, we had the great luck to be featured in two different Steam festivals that celebrate the power of storytelling and the creativity of women in gaming!



First, we were featured in the Storyteller Festival run by Two and a Half Studios, the creators of Date with Death and the upcoming Willowmist Emporium of Antiques and Curiosities. This festival celebrates the magic of amazing storytelling in a wide variety of game genres. Check out the festival page here!



Second, we are being featured in the Women’s Day Sale, which supports women-led games in a variety of ways. During this festival, we are streaming part of our demo with the amazing OtomeAddicted on our Steam page. Please see it on our Steam page!



We wanted to end by raving about Silent Kingdom, an amazing otome RPG!



Silent Kingdom is a dark, gorgeous, and beautiful game that has you play the role of Princess Erinys, whose kingdom has fallen under the yoke of a sorrowful curse. In order to save everything you have ever known and loved, you’ll have to stand against the entire world - and even defy the Goddess herself.

Along the way, you will make many impactful decisions that will lead you to be loved or loathed, to slay or be slain, and to either save or damn your kingdom forever. The game also features a thrilling RPG battle system where you must work with your partners to overcome terrifying monsters.

If you love dark fantasy, beautiful hand-drawn art, and thrilling battles, you will truly enjoy Silent Kingdom, which is available in early access on Steam now.

Finally, please remember you can always catch us at the various sites below:

• Our discord server - come chat with us and hear what other players have discovered about our game!
  
• Our mailing list - we send free cards featuring new banter from our main characters every month. This month, Jane, Edmund, Izel, Ben, and Servant tell you about what romantic gifts they would give you!
  
• Youtube, Bluesky, and Tumblr - our main social media accounts
  

With Much Love,
Tanya & Emily
Best Laid Plans Productions, Inc.