Vesna

This is a long and complex Twine game with some interesting mechanics.

You come upon an abandoned place with a single resident. Together, you rebuild a mighty city, primarily by telling stories to attract new residents. This lets you build new buildings.

At night, you visit another city, one that is grand. But there is trouble...

The storytelling mechanics have you pick a genre, a format, and some sliders of emotions. You then get what seems like a randomized mini-review from one listener and then an overall critique based on your choices, as well as 15 money.

It was hard to find new genres at first, and money seems to never have any use, despite me building a bank and a marketplace (it said I needed to make an account, but never had a chance). So those parts seemed underdeveloped to me.

Overall, this is a rich story. It uses written French dialect, dropping several vowels, and has some circumlocutory tendencies. So I'm sure I missed a great deal of nuance. As far as I can tell:
(Spoiler - click to show)There was a large town dedicated to immortality through knowledge. They had a library that was a temple to a God, and one day that God and its sibling decided to destroy the city while its leader was out on a trip. They sent a dragon whose flame condemned the city to the dream world. Some of that flame lived on in the house of Luv, who tended it in their fireplace. Due to the flame's continued existence, the dream city was still falling apart, in due measure as the city grows. Luv represents something--maybe a reincarnation of the dream-city's leader, or maybe the dragon, or maybe a god, or something. Eventually you get the choice to extinguish the flame and return the city of old, or keep it).

It's one of the better games of the year I have played so far.

Cherchant le calme dans un village (presque) desert, le personnage principal se retrouve chargé de redonner vie au village de Vesna de l'aube. Pour ce faire, il va devoir raconter des histoires afin d'attirer de nouveaux habitants.
Explorer les environs nous permet de découvrir de nouvelles formes de récit et de nouveaux sujets, tandis que l'arrivée de nouvelles personnes et la mise en place de nouveaux bâtiments nous permet d'en apprendre plus sur l'ancien village.

Un très bon jeu qui prends son temps pour nous faire avancer.

Vesna is a fantasy Twine games about stories and telling stories. Wanting to leave everything behind, especially other people (because l’enfer c’est vraiment les autres…), you stumble upon the empty village of Vesna. Between the dilapidated buildings, and the clear signs of abandonment, you happily settle yourself to enjoy the peace and quiet. Until… you find Liv, the village’s chief, who promise you an easy-going life and fixed up village, if you attract passers-by with your stories. As you do so, breathing new life into the village, you will learn about its past, how it came to end up in this state, and a mysterious secret…

The game revolves around two fun mechanics: telling stories and exploring the village’s surroundings.
. In the first, you are able to craft stories by picking the genre, moving sliders to find the correct balance of emotions, and choose some themes. The first and last options are limited at the start. Recount your story under a tree to passers-by, who will either tell you that you should definitely give up and be ashamed of yourself because you have no skills or ask you if you were blessed by the Gods and oh please take the bard’s spot because your stories are absolutely perfect. You will also gain some reputation (which will attract more people) and some coins.

With the second, you can start mini adventures around the village, meeting people (and <S>recruiting them into your cult</S> inviting them to live in the village), items to decorate your house, and maybe find inspirations for stories (like new genre or themes). The adventures are random but varied (I did about a dozen I think, and it might not even count for half of those), some seemingly inspired from old tales. And this helps avoid the grind-ness of the story telling mechanic.

When you gain enough reputation, you are able to upgrade the village - like adding a market square or old temples. Some of these locations can be visited, with a few having extra interactions and collectibles. While you cannot build everything (which made my completionist heart sad), it is fun to see the description of the village change, as you see more people settling in. I do wish there would be something to do with every unlocked location rather than a few of those, like buy things at the market or pray to other gods, or even talk to the characters you recruted.

I’ve quite enjoyed playing the game, and discovering the secret of the village, getting there bit-by-bit (or page by page) through talking to the different NPCs, and see my reconstructions pay off.