Self-Inserting and A Little Inconvenience
Hey y'all. I talked about the idea of self-inserting in my horror romance yandere visual novel, A Little Inconvenience over on itch and Bluesky. I figured it would be important to also talk about it here, especially since I've had the chance to listen to others' opinions on the matter and had time to think.
To catch you up to speed, I've been getting requests to toggle Sabrina off/make her invisible. When developing this game, I figured this was going to happen at some point. Fans of visual novels love self-inserting, especially those who play yandere games. However, my vision for this game was to create a set protagonist that was not only the object of a yandere's obsessions and love gone too far, but was also filling in space that we do not see in this sub-genre: BIPOC, chubby protagonists.
By giving the option to remove Sabrina, I am erasing the representation that's sorely lacking in this space. Not only that, but I'm hurting my vision. In this game, the POVs switch. You not only see the game from Sabrina's perspective, but Darius' as well.
Take the first CG for example. When Darius meets Sabrina for the first time, he sees her as angelic, beautiful, and there's an ethereal glow behind her (similar to what you would see in an romance CG in an otome game). You get into his brain and understand why his world has gone from murky, gray back to full color from this one innocent interaction in the store. With a self-insert, you wouldn't get this. The game's HOOK is gone.
Aside from the importance of having Sabrina there and being able to explore her as a character, her culture, and her story, removing her (even as an option) would also diminish my vision and the story both of which I cannot compromise. Because I know if I add the option to do so, I won't be 100% happy with the game.
That is why I will not be bringing the option of self-inserting to A Little Inconvenience. For a title like this, self-inserting doesn’t work. It works for other games, just not for this one.
Now, I understand if this will disappoint people. I know a large part of players in this community love self-inserting, and if this is a deal-breaker for you, I strongly suggest you play the other wonderful titles out there that let you do that. Give those developers your support and money! They deserve it.
But please do not come into my comments or message box and accuse me of not being inclusive when my mission from the start WAS to be inclusive. This was a comment I received a while ago, and it struck a nerve with me and I haven't been able to forget it.
