NeuroNet: Mendax Proxy is the upcoming title from Dream Harvest, an upcoming choose your own adventure styled cyberpunk visual novel and it looks brilliant.

While Dream Harvest are also working on the strategy game NeuroSlicers (which will also come to Linux ), NeuroNet: Mendax Proxy will be coming out first but they're not giving a date just yet. NeuroNet: Mendax Proxy is also confirmed to be launching with support for Linux.

"You are an artificial intelligence charged with managing a city-wide augmented reality network known as the "NeuroNet". Embark on a journey of self-discovery as you learn what it means to be human in a world losing itself to technology."

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Features:

• A branching narrative that takes you across the city of Catena, exploring humanity's reliance on technology and its power to be both our saviour and downfall.
• Manage a variety of city resources tied to the state of affairs within Catena. Balance the city's financial prosperity, how the public perceives you, the axis of order, and your degree of power.
• Meet and build relationships with 23 diverse, fully voiced characters, each with their own wants and needs.
• 6+ hours of gameplay with over 5000 unique story cards.
• Discoverable mini-games and secrets.
• An expansive Codex packed with gorgeous character and environment art.
• A unique original soundtrack.

Definitely excited about this one. With some wonderful visuals backed up by what sounds like a thoroughly interesting story in a visual novel adventure style setting with a cyberpunk theme.

You can follow it on itch.io and Steam .

Scarlet Hollow, a rather excellent horror-novel adventure is getting a second paid episode that will enter Early Access with Linux support on June 11. This follows on from the successful Kickstarter campaign late last year, and the free release of episode one which you can play now.

"Trapped in the dying Appalachian mining town of Scarlet Hollow for the funeral of your estranged aunt, you quickly find yourself at the center of a dark mystery that threatens your life and the fate of an entire town. Who lives, who dies, and the fate of an entire town rests on your shoulders."

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Features:

• A heavily branching narrative where your choices matter . The relationships you forge and the decisions you make will dramatically alter your journey.
• Terrifying and funny. Charming characters and snappy dialogue flip to pulse-pounding horror at a moment's notice.
• A complex relationship system that changes how characters act around you. Characters don't just like or dislike you. Become friendly rivals, bitter adversaries, best friends, or mild acquaintances with everyone in town based on how you approach the story.
• Trait-based dialogue and role-playing. Scarlet Hollow's dialogue system is driven by role-playing elements that let you choose who you want to be. Are you quiet and observant? Hot and clueless? 21 different character builds change how you interact with the world and how your story unfolds.
• Original monster designs inspired by Appalachian myths and cryptids. You won't find any predictable vampires or zombies here.
• Five romance options. Whether you're into goths, dads, Youtubers, mysterious recluses, or lo-fi beats to study and water your plants to, we've got all your bases covered.
• Dozens of meticulously hand-drawn and traditionally inked backgrounds. Every background in the game is drawn by hand and inked on massive 19x24 inch paper.
• Hundreds of immersive sprites. Each major character has dozens of hand-drawn sprites that interact with backgrounds and capture a full range of lighting, emotion, environment, and outfit changes.

The plan is for the full experience to stay in Early Access until all 7 episodes are done.

Follow on Steam and play the first episode free on Steam too.

Love to curl up with a good book? Sarawak from Cowleyfornia Studios LLP is out now and it looks fantastic.

Text-based adventures might not be the most flashy genre but, depending on where you look, they're very much alive and well with plenty releasing all the time. Sarawak is a delightful piece of interactive fiction, so you're playing out a mystery game set in Oxford and Borneo.

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"Through dialogue choices, you interact with a whimsical cast of characters who help or hinder your progress. The more you unravel, the more conflicted you become as you start to question who's lying and who's telling the truth."

The developer mentioned it will appeal to people who enjoyed the likes of 80 Days, A Case of Distrust, LucasArts adventure games or Agatha Christie novels. While a text-based novel it's not all reading though, as it's very much like a visual novel with you picking answers and it also blends in some creative puzzle solving with discovering secrets, opening locks and doors, hacking into police equipment and more so it plays like a mix of things.

Visually, Sarawak is actually quite wonderful with it's soft pastel colouring that looks like it was all done on paper. The simple styling helpfully enables your mind to wander off a bit into the setting, just like you actually would while reading a good real-paper novel. What I especially liked about it is how each scene was setup on the technical side, as it just keeps on scrolling down giving you a chance to go back up to any point in the current scene you need to. This allowed me to really get into it, and for people whose English reading perhaps isn't the best - it would allow more to enjoy it I think.

Sarawak is a great experience to sit back with a coffee as you get pulled into the mystery surrounding the story.

You can buy Sarawak on Steam and itch.io .

After a brand new visual novel that does a little more than walk you through a story? Lotus Reverie: First Nexus looks like a good option taking inspiration from Devil Survivor and Persona. From the same developer who also created the positively rated One Thousand Lies, early user reviews of it seem pretty good overall.

Quite an intriguing story too which should make for interesting reading involving "the Incident" where nearly everyone vanished. During these time the "tulpas" appeared which look Human enough but "they are born through the subconscious mind of another human called the host, and their lives are linked in several different ways". Sounds like things got pretty wild. Check out the trailer:

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What's so different about these tulpas? As the story goes:

• Even though tulpas look human , they cannot die by normal means, but, in exchange, their lifespans are very limited.
• If the human host dies, the tulpa will also die, and vice versa . For this very reason, they are forced to cooperate with each other if they want to stay alive.
• The only way to extend their lifespans is by fighting and killing another tulpa and their host in a duel . This is the only moment where a tulpa loses its immortality and becomes vulnerable.

As for the actual gameplay it mixes in the traditional Visual Novel style storytelling with time management, exploration and there's even some turn-based battles. The battle system uses simultaneous turns, so you and the AI pick your options at the same time. Looks like the battle system is optional though, as the Steam page indicates three different modes of play so if you only want the story you don't need to bother with it.

You can buy it on Steam .

Developer CASE has given us the very latest in interactive entertainment with Bloody Service, a throwback to classic 80's slasher movies and it's worth a look.

Blending together a visual novel with a dark horror theme, along with FMV (full motion video), it's an experience you're not likely to forget any time soon. The developer said to "think of Carrie as if Carrie had a conjoined twin and loved to play tennis" so you know you're in for something weird and dark.

In Bloody Service you are a catering waiter serving rich people in an exclusive and quite boring party. But when the conjoined twins arrive…well, it can get a bit wild. Clearly not a game that's safe for work, or for a younger audience and neither is the trailer below (you've been warned):

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I have to admit I am a true sucker for FMV games, and Bloody Service doesn't disappoint with the curious mixture of gameplay elements. Having your inventory and where you equip items matter to your actions was a nice touch, especially after seeing the result with my first unexpected death. I won't spoil it but it was amusing.

Bloody Service is as much a nod to 80's slashers as it is to the classic FMV games from the 90's, if you like those then there's a high chance you will very much enjoy this. If those were before your movie watching or gaming years, it's still worth a look because of how unique it is and we really don't see much like this in modern times.

You can buy Bloody Service on Steam .

What looks like one to watch - NIGHT/SHADE is an upcoming romantic visual novel thriller from KingAsphy Studio.

"NIGHT/SHADE is a visual novel about overcoming the toxicity within interpersonal relationships as well as within oneself. This character driven plot explores the complexities of love and loss in the form of a romantic thriller through the eyes of our main character, Sasha, while he navigates life's darker elements and tries not to get caught in the crossfire of two ruthless crime syndicates."

Fair warning though, this is a game clearly aimed at 18+ with themes of violence, murder, blood, drug use, abuse and more. As a Visual Novel, it looks really high quality.

Check out the trailer below:

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Planned features include:

• 2D Animated Trailer/Opening
• Unique in game experiences
• LGBTQ+ Characters and Concepts
• Partial Voice Acting
• Choose your own adventure timeline
• Explicit NSFW scenes, also skip-able
• Multiple endings, good, bad, and neutral
• Fresh track list and amazing OST

Currently crowdfunding on Kickstarter it appears to have been quite popular. Against their $60K goal they're hitting above $40K right now and with 26 days to go they have plenty of time to push ahead. If they manage to reach stretch-goals of higher funding levels, they have plenty of excited additional features planned like an upgrade to full voice acting and 2D animated cutscenes.

If you wish to try the demo you can find it on itch.io and Steam .

To help fund it you can find it on Kickstarter , and they estimate a full release in late 2021 if they hit the initial goal.

What looks like it could be a really high quality romance visual novel, Tokyo Re:Connect from KONEKO now has a demo available and they're crowdfunding on Kickstarter.

"You play as the protagonist Shindou Touki, who moves from the countryside to Tokyo, to begin a new chapter in his life. Navigate through various choices and the life of a high school student in the city, as Touki learns what it means to connect with others. Including over 30 hours of gameplay, detailed CG, and a moving soundtrack – all in high definition – your choices will affect the path you take."

Linux support is confirmed, and it's already available in the demo. It's not a genre we often cover here, mainly due to personal preferences but visual novels remain ridiculously popular, and Tokyo Re:Connect does look rather pretty.

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Features:

• Episodic Writin g - Unlike traditional visual novels, Tokyo Re:Connect is presented in an episodic format. This makes the story more digestible, and also means that the player can replay from a specific point in time, without having to create extra save slots.
• Choice-based story - As well as the main episodes, there will be individual routes for each heroine in the game. The routes are dependent on the choices made throughout these episodes, and those thereafter will affect the outcome to the heroine's story.
• Modern Presentation - Many interactive and dynamic elements have been incorporated into the gameplay. From emojis displaying when characters are in a certain mood, to the CG Inspection Mode that turns a static background into a point-and-click scenario, Tokyo Re:Connect aims to deliver mechanics that go beyond the norm.
• Customizable Gameplay - Through the settings of the game, the player can change almost anything that is displayed, so that the gameplay can be tailored to individual needs. Don't like the CG inspection mode? Switch to the standard reading view. Not a fan of the default textbox appearance? Change the style to a different shape, screen position, and even color.
• Full 4K support with high quality artwork

KONEKO, the developer, are a 6-person studio based on Tokyo, Japan - so this is a proper Japanese visual novel, although it's going to be an English language novel. The team at KONEKO are looking to pull in at least ¥1,700,000 which is around £12,000 and they have until January 19, 2021 to hit it. Their crowdfunding campaign is off to a pretty great start too, as they're well over half way towards the goal, proving that there's clearly an audience for another high quality visual novel.

Made with the free and open source Ren'Py .

You can fund it on Kickstarter and find the demo there too. Also follow / wishlist on Steam .

Failbetter Games known for their fantastic games Sunless Sea, Sunless Skies and their popular narrative browser game Fallen London have revealed their next game with Mask of the Rose.

Acting as a prequel to their other games set in the Fallen London universe, it's a romantic visual novel set in 1862 months after London was stolen by bats. Failbetter say the art style they went for is inspired by Film Noir, Victorian photography and Blitz-era Britain with it being an evolution of what began with Fallen London but with more detail and depth to the style.

Check out their teaser:

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Taking place underground, you're stuck in a boarding house with a few other lodgers all with their own issues: "Archie, a medical student discovering firsthand that Death works differently here. Griselda, a close aide of the new Masters. Horatia, the landlady with a soft spot for the Neath’s native inhabitants. Harjit, the local constable looking for a missing person of his own."

"As you make a new life below, you may find yourself visiting the underwater ruins of Parliament; intervening in a murder trial where the victim is a witness; or steering a hooded, vocabularious Master through the subtleties of a London courtship. However you choose to live in the Neath, you have your own friendships – and your own heart – to look after."

I'm not one to usually play through novels like this, however, given their incredible style and story telling as found in Sunless Sea, Sunless Skies and Fallen London I will definitely be looking to give this a run through.

Their plan is to launch a Kickstarter campaign in February 2021, which you can follow along here . We spoke with Failbetter who confirmed Linux support, just like their previous games. Here's what they said in reply to Linux support:

Yes! For the Kickstarter, you will be able to pledge to get a Steam or GOG key, which will let you download the linux version from those stores. And then once it's out in the world properly, the same.

Additionally, a second project is currently confirmed to be underway with no details other than it being in a new setting with different game mechanics.

Werewolf: The Apocalypse — Heart of the Forest is a strikingly beautiful visual novel from Different Tales and Walkabout out now. With Different Tales continuing their Linux support just like with their previous games.

Set in the same big fantasy universe as Vampire: The Masquerade, it's set in the centre of modern Europe where you play as Maia, who comes to Poland hoping to trace their family roots. As you do so, you uncover dark family secrets and hidden truths about the last wilderness of Central Europe.

As someone who doesn't follow World of Darkness, I appreciated that Werewolf: The Apocalypse — Heart of the Forest is a pretty welcoming game to newcomers because it's a properly self-contained story. So it's suitable for pretty much anyone who enjoys a good choice-based visual novel. A genre I tend to struggle with but in this case with the seriously rich artwork, along with the compelling writing it made for quite an engrossing experience.

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If you've played the Vampire titles from Draw Distance like Vampire: The Masquerade - Shadows of New York and enjoyed the atmosphere and the way it's presnted, you can't really go wrong with Werewolf: The Apocalypse — Heart of the Forest. Honestly though, I found Heart of the Forest to be a much more engaging game.

What makes it interesting is you get a clear idea of who (and what) Maia really is, the game certainly doesn't even try to hide it or stretch it out in any way. That's what makes it so slick as a story as it's all about the journey, what horrors you will face and how you plan to react to it as your character grows and changes with your decisions. The decisions you choose reduce points from a few main statistics like Rage, Willpower and Health - while others will build them back up. Each of them being essential in their own way.

Even though some parts are clear from the intro, the way the story unfolds still caught me by surprise. The story and what happens may be fantasy but it's very much grounded in real life and current events, for better or worse. Forests being destroyed, protests, dealing with police and more with it being inspired by real-life protests from back in 2016. When it truly started breaking into the fantasy elements, things get very exciting and at one point I will admit to getting the chills and I could feel the hairs standing on the back of my neck - such a brilliant atmosphere unmatched by many other visual novels.

How it actually explores the idea of Werewolves is certainly…different. The way it describes transformations and different forms in detail, it's as much a learning experience about the World of Darkness as it is a story. It doesn't over-do it on the fantasy naming though, and when it does you get a nice tool-tip if you need it to explain what a few special words mean.

At one point I was a Werewolf carrying a bag of explosives. What more do you need in a novel?

Sadly, when you're really getting into it, you realise it's over. It's only a few hours long overall on a first play-through and I feel like I just need more. I want to test out more of the Rage mechanic and see what else you can do, and what decisions really change how conversations go and who sticks with you. Walkabout Games mentioned in an email to us that there's "200,000" different paths due to the extensive branching narrative and 5 main endings. It's pretty clear that from some of my actions, there were drastically different paths that could I could have gone through and I'm definitely temped to load it up again to do so.

Overall, it was genuinely great! Werewolf: The Apocalypse — Heart of the Forest was a brilliant stepping stone into the World of Darkness. I can only hope they plan to expand on from this. Well written, visually fantastic and it had some good ambient background audio along with certain audio-action that really comes together perfectly to round-out the experience. Headphones on, audio up, curtains drawn — it's a great way to spend your time. An example of how to do a visual novel to appeal to everyone who loves a good story. I'm glad there's teams like Different Tales and Walkabout creating experiences like this.

Available to buy from GOG.com and Steam .