Part One has been out for three weeks now, so I wanted to write up a little post about my inspirations for Quaint. (and to show you my more or less embarrassing concept art 🫠) (Also, spoilers are hidden, but if you haven’t played yet, proceed with caution.)

So everything started one fall, as fall always makes me nostalgic for stories about magic. I was reading stuff and playing games to scratch that itch (still waiting for Witchbrook, btw) and making up scenarios in my head, just for fun. (‘cause that’s just what I do)

So I came up with this basic magic school romance and, at that point, I had no intention of making it into a game. But then I thought it’d be fun to mix it up a bit. From the very beginning, I had this vague idea of some enemy organization that would clash with the Society but it wasn’t anything specific.

I figured that a mix of magic and secret agents would make for an interesting story.

And man, I LOVED that story. So much so, that I started thinking about showing it to other people. I entertained the idea of making a comic first, but I wasn’t convinced I could see that through to the end. There’d be a lot of drawing involved, and I’m not very quick about art, so that wasn’t going to work. Then I thought of making an RPG-style game but quickly gave up when I realized how much I’d have to learn first. (I’m a subtitler, not a programmer) In my last effort to make it happen, I looked up some visual novel engines and found Ren’py. And that was it. I could draw some sprites and code a simple scene. I decided to give it a go.

As for the story, there are three major influences I can think of.

• The Franchise That Shall Not Be Named

Okay, let’s get this one out of the way. For better or for worse, I loved the books and games growing up (the movies, too, though to a lesser extent) and I’ve read/played each more than a few times. (well, except for the fourth book, as it mysteriously disappeared one day and was never found 🤔) And so, naturally, I made up my own stories inspired by that world. (this is middle/high school territory, btw, long before the controversy started)

Here are my two OCs from back then. (I cringe when I look at them now, but oh well 🫠)

I don’t remember their names or most of their stories (just that it was set in the times of the first order and that there was a little conflict of interest because one of them was from the snake house), but some of their personalities and relationship dynamics can definitely be found in Milo and Q’s characters. There’s even at least one line from that old story that I actually used in Quaint. ^^

There are, of course, other magical/fantasy franchises that had some impact on the game’s story and world (like the Worst Witch or Fire Emblem to name just two) but I feel like this one had the biggest influence on me and it’s the easiest to pinpoint. (and I’m now using that influence to make a very queer game, so yeah)

• The TV series La Femme Nikita

Man, I couldn’t tell you how many drawings and stories I made in my teen years because of this series. ;A; There was just something fascinating about being forced into being a secret agent against your will (and morals, possibly). LFN created a baseline for how I imagine this kind of work and I think there are quite a few similarities between the Organization and Section One from the series. (especially in terms of structure and aesthetics) (And yes, I know I haven’t shown a lot of the Organization in Part One, but I’ll make up for it in Part Two ^^)

Other spy/secret agent genre inspirations: Joker Game, Gunslinger Girl, Persona 5 (kinda?)

• The visual novel/anime Togainu no Chi

This one will only make sense once Part Two is out, but I feel like a good chunk of Q and T’s relationship, as well as certain parts of life in the Organization were influenced by this story. I was OBSESSED with it for a while and the VN was actually one of the things that inspired me to study Japanese. (and I’m sure there are traces of TnC’s art style in my own art style, too)

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And here are some of my early designs for the characters.
 

Fun fact, Milo’s hair was supposed to be blue at first! (kinda like the OC above) They had a completely different outfit, too. Q looked pretty much the same from the start (maybe a bit less tired), and so did Wren (no early sketches of him, sadly). June is probably the one who changed the most from the initial sketch (even though she retained some of that smug vibe 🤭).

And just as a bonus, here’s the scene where Q learns about the shield for the first time. In the end, I only used their sprites, but I thought the sketch looked cool, so take a look.

  And that’s about it! Check my Twitter  for extra art and let me know what you think. ^^