Hey everybody. Welcome to this month’s Patreon Q&A. There were a lot of good questions sent in this month, and so let’s just get right into the set of them.
Do you think the kids from Our Life 1 would get along with the kids in Our Life 2? Going off of step one, I just think it would be funny to see their personalities clash.
Well, in the technical timeline of things, when Cove and the MC are eight, the MC of Our Life 2 and Qiu and Tamarack would only be six. And so realistically, they would not probably be friends or want to hang out that much. Cove and Lizzie would think they’re just too young and kind of in the way. And Qiu and Tamarack wouldn’t think they were that special either. So, I mean, if they were all the same ages, it would probably be different. But with the actual official timeline, no, I don’t think they would get along.
Do you know when the next beta is going to come out? If you don’t have a time yet, that’s totally cool.
And I don’t know, I’m afraid. We’ll see when we can get that finished up. But we are working on new betas.
What kind of books do the Our Life 1 and 2 leads like to read?
Um. Well, a lot of them aren’t particularly active readers. Derek and Qiu and even Tamarack really don’t aren’t super big readers. Cove can like to read if he’s more studious, and he doesn’t have that many particular genres he’s fond of. He just likes reading in general. Baxter is a reader, and he likes mysteries and thrillers. Tamarack probably might read some like fantasy, and maybe some slice of life stuff, but yeah, unfortunately that’s not a super common hobby among the leads.
What’s your favorite thing to write in games?
I guess it kind of depends on what you mean by “thing”. Like, do you mean like a genre or a particular part of the script? I like writing comedy and I like writing dialogue. Those are usually the easiest things for me that are, you know, a lot of fun to do. Not as challenging as other types of things.
I know they never really interact in canon, but what would Derek and Baxter’s relationship be like if they met? I can’t imagine they’d seriously dislike each other. But could they be friends or would they just be acquaintances? And we also got a second question about that, which is: How would Derek and Baxter get along? Would it be like with Terry and Baxter, where they’re friends pretty quickly, or would it take more time?
And realistically, they would probably always just be like a friend of a friend kind of situation, and not ever super hit it off themselves. But they wouldn’t ever really have the kind of friction that Baxter and Cove did. It’d be perfectly cordial and pleasant, but not terribly deep or close.
And the second question about Derek and Baxter also asked: How well does Derek get along with Miranda and Terry? We see all three together, but the focus is usually on Cove and MC.
And Derek does actually get along very well with those two. It’s just in his own story. The focus was on his family, and I already knew Terry and Miranda were going to be important in Baxter’s story. So they didn’t really show up in Derek’s story. And then obviously in Cove’s events, the focus is more on him than Baxter’s relationship with Terry and Miranda. But they are actually friends.
Our Life 1 had a good variety of dietary options. Will these and or others be coming to Our Life 2? I got to thinking about it since Qiu is lactose intolerant. Sincerely a vegetarian player.
And yes, we’re not going to take away any options that were in Our Life 1, and it could potentially be expanded even more.
Would it be too far off if some of our beloved characters in Our Life 1 to make a surprise appearance in Our Life 2, just like an Easter egg or whatever?
And no, the only life one character that will appear in Our Life 2 is Baxter. Maybe they could be referenced in text, but definitely not making an actual appearance. Sorry for that.
What do you think about 18+ artwork for your game characters? I found some while going through the tags on Twitter, and was wondering what a developer would think seeing art like that.
I mean, I don’t mind as long as they’re adult characters, that’s entirely fine with me.
Will we have the ability to change our MC’s nickname in later steps of the game, like Liz was able to in Our Life 1 ?
And yes, like your own name and your appearance, you can change details about your character in between steps. That’ll be totally fine to do.
We can become best friends with Tama in the prologue. What about Qiu? Can we become his best friend in Step One?
And yes, you can’t do it as fast as you can with Tamarack, but there will be chances to make him your best friend in Step One.
I know it’s still a bit early, but would prom be included in a possible future Step?
Uh, in Our Life 2, yes. We did already show that they were formal outfits for a dance, and it is a school dance type of thing. I can’t give any specifics beyond that. But yes, there is a formal little dance event in Step Two for Our Life 2.
And then there’s a second question in this comment, and it’s: When you get to pick, if you have a bike, skateboard, etc. I was thinking, will it be possible in the future to choose more than one of them?
And I’m afraid not. You have to pick just one ride that you use. And the reasoning for that is that Opal’s not going to buy you two. Sorry!
Hi. First, love the game. It’s one of my go to comfort games. Well I’m glad you like it! And I have multiple questions. And one of them already answered above. The other question is: In a previous Q&A, you said Baxter would want to make amends with people in Golden Grove in person. To build on that, would something have to prompt him to return like a wedding high school reunion, etc. Or is it possible that I should just decide to reconnect one day after growing some?
And if he went back, it would be of his own accord. It wouldn’t be because some outside function was happening.
Do you think Qiu and Tamarack would like dad jokes?
It’d depend on their age, but I’d say generally Tamarack would be more fond of them than Qiu, who is a little bit too cool for those, most of the time during most of the Steps.
Hi. I hope you’re having a good day. Thank you! And the question is, I was wondering what Baxter would think of a main character who wears only black, basically.
He’d think that’s very cool. What good taste they have!
I just want to say that I love all the options and new features that Our Life 2 will have. I’m super excited for it. Well, thank you. For my question. I was wondering if there’s anything specific that’s your favorite part about working on these games, the writing, the coding, etc.? Thank you again!
And my favorite part is usually sort of the pre-production stuff, when I’m able to just come up with all these new ideas and possibilities and thinking about how everything’s going to come together. It gets a lot harder once you actually have to start making it. So before that real work starts when I can just imagine anything and not actually have to do it, that’s usually the most fun.
Do you have an idea of how many characters will call Qiu, Autumn? I know we see Ren call them that in the prologue, and the MC can choose to, but I was wondering how confusing it might be to have an MC named Autumn.
Overall people called Qiu, Qiu more often than Autumn. But I really can’t say for you if you think it’d be too often that the name Autumn comes up for them instead of the MC. You could try it, but I could also definitely see how someone would find it too annoying to do. So unfortunately, you’d have to test it out yourself. Maybe playing as someone not called Autumn, seeing how it goes and then playing again with Autumn, if it seems like it’s not going to be a problem for you. I’m sorry that ended up being a conflict there.
Hi, my birthday is coming up in June, so I was curious, do any of the characters also have a birthday in the summer months? And thanks for all the hard work.
Well, happy almost birthday or belated birthday? Right now, the only Our Life character with a confirmed summer birthday is Miranda. Maybe Tamarack or Qiu or someone from Our Life 2 will have it, but I haven’t decided any birthdays for them yet.
Hello! First of all, I just want to say that I finally had the time to play through the Baxter DLC recently, and noticed a lot more humor sprinkled out. I appreciate the extra effort as it made the game just a bit more entertaining and full of personality. I’ve also really appreciated how much more time we got to spend with Terry and Miranda. Well, I’m glad you enjoyed Baxter’s story. The question is: It’s gotten me a bit more curious about Terry’s gender. I appreciate that he is generally a pretty funny, upbeat guy who wouldn’t bring up more serious topics, but I found myself curious about his process of discovering who he was, how and when did he realize he was trans?
He knew all the way back in Step Three as a teenager, though it didn’t officially come out until right before Step Four started.
How was his process of coming out?
It went really well. It was just sort of difficult for him to open up. But when he did, everybody was really accepting; it was a perfectly good time.
Does he plan to physically transition in the future?
Yes, he does. It just didn’t happen because he only managed to come out when he was like a fully grown adult and living independently. And that was right when Step Four was starting. So, it’s very early in the process, but he is going to continue on with that.
Does he relate to labels like “transmasc” as well as trans man?
And not really. He definitely prefers just trans man or just being called a man rather than “transmasc”, but it wouldn’t be super upsetting. It’s just not his general preference. He wouldn’t use it for himself.
Either way, thank you for the consistent inclusivity that your games provide.
No problem! I’m glad you appreciate it.
Is a contesting relationship in our life to mildly antagonistic? Like if you wanted to go for a rival crush relationship, or is it more like we’re still friendly, but I’m in charge?
It can be either or. It depends on the actual choices you make after having selected that dynamic. It is definitely always a “I’m in charge” kind of vibe, but you can make it more of an active rivalry or less so.
Will there only be a jealousy bar for the leads, or will the MC have a jealousy bar too? Or just choices to behave jealous? And there’s also a second question similar to this, which is: Hi! I have a question about how the jealousy feature is going to work. Is it like the affection level where it needs to be mutual, or is it more like the relationship dynamics where it can be asymmetrical?
And the answer is it is a dynamic option. So it applies to the main character and the leads, and it does not have to be the same feelings between those three. So the main character can be jealous and them not jealous, or they can be jealous and not jealous. It is a lot more flexible than the typical relationship standing. So in Step One, obviously the jealousy dynamic meter isn’t even an option, and the two leads are not jealous at all. But you can still make certain choices where the MC expresses jealousy as a kid. It’s just not a built-in part of the dynamic in Step One.
Hello. Thank you for doing these monthly Q&A’s. They are much appreciated and very interesting. Well, I’m glad to see that. Now this is a really silly question that perhaps can’t be answered, but I was wondering, in Our Life 2, hypothetically of course, could Cliff from Our Life 1 be the biological father of the MC? Or would that at least be possible to headcanon? And if it could be possible, how would Cove react to the news?
Like technically in canon, no, it absolutely could not be possible. Cliff would never donate sperm and he would never go out and, like, do anything that could potentially father another child after accidentally getting Kyra pregnant the first time with Cove. So I’m afraid it is definitely a very strong headcanon, if you do headcanon that, with no real potential of it being accurate to the canon. But it is a funny idea.
Hey, thanks for your hard work. I believe you touched on this topic before, but I don’t know if you’ve ever confirmed. Do you think there might be a Kickstarter goal to add Renee as a romanceable character in Our Life 2 ?
And the answer is probably no, almost certainly no, unless it makes like so much money and there’s just no other stretch goal I could fathom. And it’s not because I don’t want to. It’s just because the Our Life 1 Kickstarter happened in 2019, and people got the Baxter DLC last month in 2023. I just cannot have people fund something that’s going to take that many years to come out. And if I do, do a side character DLC, it’s going to be the same kind of thing where it takes years to actually happen. And I’d rather just wait for years to pass and then promise to do it, instead of promising to do it now and making people wait for literal years.
First, I wanted to say that Our Life is an amazing game. The storylines are so heartwarming without having to worry about stumbling into a bad ending for answering honestly. It’s wonderfully relaxing. Well, I’m really glad you enjoyed it. The first question of this comment is: None of the three Summer boys seem shy about displaying their bodies, chest in particular, but I wonder how bashful Qiu would be considering their struggles with gender identity. Does it depend on the stage?
And yes, it does sort of change with time for how they feel about that. But there are definitely points in their life where they would never want to take off their shirt to go swimming or to change in front of somebody else like the love interests in Our Life 1 would.
The second question is: Everyone seems to wear PJs in the game. I was surprised at Baxter wearing them. He initially struck me as a “sleep in his boxers” type of guy. Is it because of his tendencies towards formality?
Baxter. Yes, he is formal even with his PJs, and he also just likes clothes. He’s a little bit more fashion minded than the other guys. And even with his pajamas, he is kind of making a statement.
And it continues: Since I’m asking the question, for Cove, does it tend to be a texture thing like the bedsheets being uncomfortable against his skin, or is it for a sense of security?
And yeah Cove, he does just feel more comfortable sleeping in a shirt than topless. He considers that something you do at the beach for having fun and when sleeping, he likes to be comfortable and cozy and all fully dressed.
And the third question for this comment is: You mentioned on Tumblr that Baxter would only wear something other than formal wear if he was doing something sporty. What would that something sporty tend to be and what would he wear?
He’d probably wear like a polo shirt and sportier shorts to be like, going to play tennis or something.
I wasn’t around until the Derek DLC was in development, so I was curious how things are going to work with Now and Forever. Do you write all ten of a Step’s Moments before moving on to the next Step, or do you complete all of the base game stuff before going back and making the DLC Moments?
I do it one Step at a time. I finish everything for one Step and move on to another Step except for making like small previews. Like, I intend to do a Step Two sneak peek before finishing all the Step One stuff. But beyond that, I focus on a single Step at a time.
Would any of our life one boys be willing to play a tabletop RPG like D&D with the MC if they asked him to as well? Who do you think would enjoy it the most?
And all of them would be willing to give it a try, but probably the only one who really super enjoy it would be Derek. Cove does not consider himself an imaginary person, and would struggle greatly to do that, and Baxter would find it kind of interesting, but he wouldn’t be able to get that invested. He’s he’d rather be told a story than have to make it up himself.
The next comment has multiple questions and it says: Going to try to get the courage to ask questions. Thank you for making these games. Well, thank you for playing. Question one is: Obviously the khaki shirt was not supposed to be there. What would Baxter’s normal hiking shirts look like?
They’re mostly gray and buttoned down, but they would just have like a sturdier fabric than his typical fancier dress shirt fare.
Two, I know there’s no specific date for Moments in the Steps, but I was curious if there were any dates or timelines for Steps as a whole? Like randomly throwing ones out, but maybe Our Life 1 is May or late June to late August or early September. And for Our Life 2, I would guess September to sometime in November or early December.
And yes, I would say those are probably the timelines. It’s likely, you know, June, July, August for Our Life 1 and September, October, November-ish for Our Life 2.
Three, what exactly about Jude and Scott’s words to Baxter about the MC caused him to finally stop his avoidance tactics?
Nothing really. That was another sort of notch in the overall scheme of things. But that talk isn’t what entirely changed his mind. It was mostly the MC being there and the times they spent together, rather than what happened with Jude and Scott.
Where did Jude and Scott go for their honeymoon?
They went to New Zealand!
Thank you so much for all your hard work! Our Life 1 was a blast and I can’t wait to see more of OL2! Thank you very much. Now on to my question. I am curious about the best friend mechanic. In the 2023 May Q&A, it was said that the BFF system is to pick a favorite. Does it mean that if I want to romance one of the LIs, I have to pick them as my BFF first? For example, would I be able to pick Tamarack as my BFF, but pursue Qiu romantically? Or by not picking Qiu, I would potentially lose special scenes with them?
The best friend mechanic is to choose a favorite. The game does not put preference on romantic relationships above platonic relationships. So if you’re crushing on one and friends with the other, but then one is the best friend, then that will be the favorite above the one who is the crush. Now if you go up a level with one where say one is a friend, but the other is the person you’re in love with, then the person you’re in love with will gain preference even over a best friend. But then let’s say Tamarack is like family and then Qiu is the person you love. Then again, choosing someone as the best friend is how you pick a favorite between them. So if you want one to be the favorite, you either have to choose them as the best friend or not choose a best friend at all and then just make choices in the Moment of who you want to give preference to.
Bax mentioned that he hasn’t been in contact with his parents for a while now, and I’m curious when and why he started doing that when he was just fine with them in Step Three?
Well, in Step Three, Baxter just pretty recently turned 19. He was barely an adult, still entirely dependent on his parents, still very sheltered, had only recently left the single town – small town – that he’d lived in his whole life. And so he just didn’t have very much life experience or perspective. But being out on his own, he very quickly began to get that kind of perspective. And also having distance away from his parents, who he had this very sheltered, close relationship with, you know, having distance at all made it easier to see sort of the problems more clearly as well. And so just being able to get out of that situation and go somewhere and be around people who didn’t have their same perspectives on things sort of very quickly started to change his mind on that. But we just in Step Three are only seeing Baxter kind of the beginning stages of it.
I could have sworn Baxter originally had a cravat. Is this true or did I make that up in a dream?
And that is true. Originally, I wanted to be clear sort of right away that Baxter wasn’t meant to be, like, genuinely cool, and he’s kind of a weirdo. But it was just a little bit too far in the weirdness design, and so we took that off later on.
What instruments do you think the love interest of Our Life 1 would play?
Baxter might reasonably play the piano. I might have actually said at some point that he studied the piano when he was younger. Cove and Derek technically never would play an instrument. I mean, if they imagined themselves playing an instrument, Derek might pick, like, guitar because he thinks that’s cool. And, I don’t know, Cove might also pick the guitar just because they’re not very- they don’t know a lot about music and would probably pick like the most obvious, overwhelmingly popular option.
I’d like to express my utmost appreciation for Baxter’s DLC. It’s everything I never knew I needed. Well, thank you. Anyways. Do you go out of your way to read fanfics of your works? Would you read one if it’s directly sent to you?
And I don’t go out of my way to read Fanfictions I leave that to fans. That’s their space. If someone directly sent me one, I would sort of skim it to see if there was anything in it that I shouldn’t be sharing with others. But if it seems all right, like a perfectly nice story, then I will retweet that on social media or whatever. But I won’t sit down and sort of like really read for my own enjoyment the story. Because again, I you know, it’s for fans. Fans are writing it for fun and fans are reading it for fun.
Hello. Congratulations on the completion of Our Life 1. Thank you! I have a few questions about Baxter. The first is he’s afraid of the sea, but is he afraid of the universe with similar parts?
I don’t think so, if I’m understanding the question right.
Did his parents interfere in his relationship?
If you mean the relationship with the MC in either Step, the answer is no. In Step Three, obviously, they weren’t around to interfere. And in Step Four, they’re also not around to interfere, just for different reasons. And for his other relationships, they probably did try to meddle when he was like dating as a teenager, but as an adult, they never really got any say in that because he kept them too at a distance.
About his preference for kids, I wonder why his default is none?
And it’s just because Baxter’s not sort of an inherently family oriented man. He is definitely, you know- he likes adult things. He likes doing things you can’t do with kids and spending time with other grownups. And he’s just sort of never been like a family man type, probably partially because his own family life wasn’t good and he had no siblings. But again, he is at least open to having kids if he is with an MC who really wants to start a family.
Hello. Thank you so much for your hard work on the Our Life series. I’m sorry if these have already been asked. Question one: How do you come up with the love interest in your games? Are these characters your type/interest?
And it definitely depends on the character. Sometimes I’m making a character that is absolutely my type and I sort of want to share what I think is great with other people and hopefully convince them of how great it is. But then other times I do a character simply because I’ve never done a character like that and would really like to attempt it. And then sometimes it’s attempting to do a character that I’ve never liked in other stories and wondering like, “what would this character have to be like for me to like this character type?”
Question Two: Will Our Life: Now and Forever have additional love interest with DLC?
And currently the answer is no for the reasons I mentioned above. But maybe it will happen with Renee someday.
Question Three: What series (even the ones you’re currently working on) has proved to be the most challenging overall?
Honestly, I don’t think I can pick because the games have definitely been challenging in different ways. Like the first Our Life has been an absolutely huge challenge just because it’s so big and took so many years to finally finish. But each sort of individual part on its own wasn’t super challenging. Like I felt like I knew what I was doing and could handle it, but there was just so much of it. It was a huge challenge. And then Our Life 2, I haven’t been working on it for nearly as long, but it is more of a challenge because it’s a lot more complicated and perhaps, you know, a year from now I’ll be able to say that, “yes, this has been the most challenging thing I’ve ever done”. But then there’s also Lake of Voices, which was more challenging because it was trying to present this more complicated plot line over different routes. So hinting at things and having sort of your perspective change after learning certain things and reflecting back on previous stories. And so that was also a challenge. And then Project W, which I’m just in the brainstorming phase of, has been very challenging. Like I’ve never gone through and like thrown out and like reworked and changed ideas more than I have for this game. Like it’s been almost two years and I still don’t even have like the full plot, you know, planned out. I’m still perfecting the characters personalities again, and it’s been years! But, you know, I want it to be exactly perfect. So even though it’s not hard work to brainstorm, it’s definitely been a challenge to decide on everything.
And then there was a second comment that says: So sorry, I forgot to ask something if it’s not too late to add. Do you have plans or ideas to keep making VNs similar to the style of Our Life or making more Our Life branches? I really love the way you put the VN together and look forward to what you create. Thank you.
And no, currently I don’t have any plans to make another game in the Our Life series or a game that’s particularly like Our Life, depending on what you mean by being like Our Life. If it’s about like growing from childhood to adulthood, I don’t imagine I’ll ever make another game like that unless it’s like a decade from now. But if you mean in terms of being very customizable and having no bad endings, Project W will still have that element. It’ll still have a fully customizable MC. You’ll still be able to express yourself however you want and there’ll be lots of choices and things like that. But Project W will be a very different experience than Our Life in terms of what you’re doing, but it will also still have a very heartwarming, reassuring kind of vibe, even though it will probably be- well, there’ll be more strife in that game because it’s like an actual plot with problems you need to face and like stakes. But it’ll still all work out in the end, which is not a spoiler because you know, it’s that kind of game.
Hello, team. First and foremost, I can’t thank you guys enough. Your games are so important. I wish I had something like this when I was a younger teen. Thanks a million times over. You’re amazing. Oh, thank you very much. I’m so glad. It was a good experience for you. And sorry if these questions have been asked, but. Question one, As someone who loves creating characters and storylines, I’d love to hear a little bit about your process of Cove coming to be. He’s such a lovable and well written, relatable character. Did you start creating him a long time before the game, or did he sort of grow with the production of it?
Creating Cove was probably like the most unusual main character creating process I’ve had because the concept of Our Life was built first and foremost on the gameplay elements, sort of the concept of growing up and of being able to influence the person you were growing up with and all the ways you could customize your MC and interact differently with this person. And so I had to come up with a character who could work with all of these gameplay ideas that I already had. And at first, Cove was not a particularly well fleshed out person. You know, he was just sort of a vehicle to facilitate all these different systems. And it took a while for me to really get attached to him and see him as a person. And what originally made me get into Cove as a character was sort of the situation he ended up in, and his flaws, which is actually usually what always gets me into a character, is what are their flaws and what are they going through? And for Cove, it ended up being that his parents divorced and that he just moved to this town. And I also had my parents divorce one summer. I wasn’t an only child and we didn’t move, but my parents did have a separation and then eventually fully divorced. And so I was able to start relating to Cove and more sort of understand where he might potentially be coming from. And that’s when he really started to grow as a character. From that beginning of the plot, you know, he could be very grumpy and sensitive and emotional. And, you know, I liked that a lot more than just thinking about him as, you know, the character who could potentially be more sporty or more studious and more warm and more cold generally, which is, you know, what he started with, because those were the gameplay ideas I had come up with. And he definitely grew with the game. I felt I continued to understand him more and more as the story went on. I think it really took until Step Two for me to fully understand who he was and where he was going.
And the next question of this comment is: I would love to hear your personal favorite Moments of Our Life 1, whether with Cove, Derek, Baxter, or anyone. Hearing you talk about the things you enjoy is always really fun.
Well, thank you. And I really like the nighttime, heart to heart scenes with Cove, and there are actually many of those you might have noticed, because that is something I ended up really liking. You know, whether it’s the first meeting on the hill, or when he runs away in Step One, or the soiree scene in Step Two, or the firefly scene in Step Three, or, you know, the other scenes where you return to the hill at night at different ages. And I don’t know, there’s just something I always liked about sort of the feelings that came about through those scenes with Cove and the quiet night time atmosphere. But also like a lot of the scenes with Derek and Baxter as well. I like the scene in “Lemonade” where you’re hanging out with Cove and Derek making the actual lemonade. I think they’re a fun group. And I like when you’re playing Double Dash with his family and the dad cheats, which is something my dad would jokingly do. And I like all the scenes in the Ferris wheel with Derek. And for Baxter, I like when he just makes random things up. And also the times when he gets kind of like snippy and frustrated with the situation, like with Xavier and making the cake for a second time. And of course, in the mornings, that’s all very funny. But I also like the nicer moments where he’s finally able to let his guard down around the main character, like when he’s willing to go in the water with them, or when you can share the bed with him when you’re dating. Those are also really nice.
It ends by saying: Please take care, have some water, and don’t forget about a well-deserved vacation ASAP. Thank you again for all your wonderful hard work. You’ve brought me so many smiles.
Well, thank you very much. I’m happy we did.
Hello. Thank you for your hard work on these amazing games. It’s really been a comfort. Thank you. I’m glad you enjoy them. Mostly I want to know how the heck do you keep track of all the choices and interactions? This is mostly about Our Life 2, but I like it about all the games. Is this the power of Excel sheets? You got a red string all over the walls? How do you keep track of it all, basically?
It is entirely memory based. I don’t really keep track of it at all, anywhere. I just write the scenes and put down as many sort of alterations and references I can think of. And then I’ll usually – once it’s fully written out – I’ll usually start from the top and go back through and then add in more alterations, sort of making sure I’m like checking off different varieties and seeing if I think I missed something the first time I was writing through it. And then I’ll often add more during the programming process, and then after it comes out as a beta and more events are written later on, I’ll usually go back and continue to add even more alterations until it’s the final version that gets released everywhere. But yeah, I do base the alterations off on my own memories and sort of like what do I authentically remember and think would get brought up by these characters because it sticks out in my mind. So, it would stick out in theirs too. And that’s generally how it ends up getting done.
Next, we have two questions that are about the same thing: Thanks for all your hard work. I Love Our Life so much and it means a lot to me. May ask if there’s a way to have a voiced name in Our Life 2, and what I can do for that? And the other one is:Sorry if this has been asked. Will names be included in Our Life: Now and Forever as well? I wasn’t on Patreon at the time of Our Life: Beginnings and Always, so I missed it.
And thank you. I’m glad you liked the game. And there will be voice names for Our Life 2. Right now the plan is the only way to get a voiced name will be through backing the Kickstarter crowdfunding campaign that’s going to be happening in late September or early October, and it’ll run for 30 days and you’ll be able to support for a certain amount of money, and then be able to claim a name that gets voiced in the game.
First of all, I want to say thank you for all the amazing content. I appreciate everything you do. Thank you. And I would love to know more about your creative process. Where/how do you get inspiration for backgrounds, clothes, hairstyles, color palettes, etc.?
Usually, I just sort of already know what I want. Like when I know I’m doing a specific thing, sort of what I intend for it to look like comes along with that. But if I need help, sort of coming up with specific ideas, I’ll look on like different imaging sites, you know, like summer inspiration or fall inspiration if it’s for Our Life 2. But usually, I just get what I want to have and then I’m just sort of looking around on different image hosting sites for references that show what I’m already imagining.
When you create characters, do they change much over time? Like was Cove totally different in your mind than in the game now?
It depends on the project. For Cove I mentioned a bit before about how he came about and he never really changed. He just sort of definitely grew over time rather than immediately being fully formed. And sometimes characters are sort of immediately the way they’re going to be and they stay that way. And then sometimes they have like a drastic change, and sometimes they just get small changes and more refined along the way. And other times they do go through lots of changes. For XOXO Droplets, they’re a bunch of jerks, but originally they were going to be entirely reasonable people and it was only right before I started working on the script that I decided that they were all going to be ridiculous jerks instead. And for Project W, I’ve mentioned that I’ve gone through tons of ideas. Like I’ve just- you know, planned and replanned the potential personalities of these characters repeatedly. But then for a game like Our Life: Now and Forever, I don’t think any character has been notably different than what I originally imagined them as. I sort of knew all of them and who they were going to be right away. And so far, none of them have really changed from that. Although I can say I knew the personalities of a Tamarack and Qiu, but I didn’t actually know who would get which personality in terms of identity. Like, was I going to have, you know, the outgoing one be the female love interest or the gender fluid love interest, or vice versa? And obviously we know that in the end, Tamarack was the wild child who becomes more self-conscious and then grows into herself, and then Qiu is the one who starts out very outgoing and then becomes colder and then regains their outgoing personality. But potentially it could have been the opposite way.
I have to know: would Baxter be okay doing a cake smashing at his own wedding, or is that a big no-no?
He would definitely prefer not to do that. It’d have to be very important to the MC for him to go along with it, but ideally it would not happen.
I remember seeing a screenshot with Qiu where you can go from neighbors to friends depending on the choices, and how you can become best friends with Tama in the Prologue. So would that work with crushes too? Like can you go from friends to crushes in the middle of a Moment?
And yes, you can. It’s not in the Prologue, but there will be Moments where that’s an option.
What types of shoes do Xavier, Jude, and Scott like to wear? I really can’t guess in Xavier’s case because I can imagine pump sneakers or any kind of footwear suiting them.
Xavier mainly wears like comfortable flats because they’re very active and on their feet a lot for their work. And Jude wears mainly sneakers, and Scott wears a lot of sandals. Not like flip flop sandals, but like with actual like straps around the back and over the top of his foot.
Would Baxter’s parents try to crash the wedding if he and the MC decided to get married sometime down the line? This being a situation where they somehow found out about it and where it would be held.
No, they wouldn’t. Baxter’s parents are like- they’re very hateful in terms of what they think of other people, but they’re not narcissistic in terms of how they behave. Like they wouldn’t be able to convince themselves that they are justified in showing up to their son’s wedding when they were not invited. They would obviously not be happy about it, and they would think their son is going through something very bad and really needs help. And, you know, to figure this out and why he’s, you know, not being kind to his loving parents, but they would not actually force themselves into that space.
Hi, GB! Love everything to do with Our Life 2. I’m glad you like it.* I wanted to ask about the relationship dynamic system. I know we are only in Step One, but just in general. In Step One, you see Tamarack and Qiu act to the MC how they act around all new people. Is there meant to be a certain setting for future Steps that are how the characters “really” act, and the alterations based off players choices is more of our version. I guess how in Prologue and Step One, Tamarack is contesting and she will do what she wants without waiting for approval. But say Step Two, without player input, would that change?
And the answer is you can’t really have a single default for the MC because there is no situation where the MC is a new person. It’s always someone they’ve had years of experience with, so it will always be custom to your experiences with them. But how they would act to someone who’s brand new would be different. Like in Step Two, if Tamarack meant a new kid, she wouldn’t be contesting. Instead, she’d be deferring probably. So technically for the MC, no, there isn’t one way they would always be. But I’m sure we could sort of theoretically imagine how they would be with a new character if there was a new character.
Do the Our Life 2 leads mention stuff from the Prologue in the Step One moments? I know it said that the prologue will be skippable in the future, but is it still considered as having happened?
I think there’s a little confusion here. The gameplay tutorial is skippable, but the Prologue isn’t skippable. You have to play the Prologue no matter what, and the characters will reference things that happened in the Prologue.
Hi! I’ve had so much fun with Baxter’s DLC. It was life changing lol. Well, I’m glad you liked it. I was wondering, considering Baxter’s “leave no footprints” method, would he have been the type to avoid being in/taking photos during Step Three?
And yes, he’s not much of a picture taker. He would rather take pictures of, like, scenery or objects rather than of himself or other people. But he also wouldn’t get angry if someone like casually wanted to take a picture. He could take that in stride.
Not to be that person lmao, but would you ever make a Patreon exclusive moment for Step Four Baxter and Derek, or is that just for Cove, since he’s technically the main love interest?
I’m glad you’d be interested in that, but I’m afraid I will not be making any more Our Life 1 Scenes after the current Patreon moment for Step Four Cove that I’m working on. I’ve really for sure gotta be done after that, so unfortunately there won’t be any more Baxter or Derek Content.
I’ve noticed that in the Our Life/XOD universe, things like supernatural phenomena tends to be left to interpretation of the player. One example that comes to mind is Cala, the psychic that can predict and influence future events to some degree. Could one assume that Cala really does have supernatural psychic abilities, and if she does, would it be possible for other people in universe, like the MCs of the Our Life games, to have similar powers as well?
And that is right. The whether or not psychic powers are actually real is up to player interpretation. And if you want to interpret it as yes, it is actually real, then you could also headcanon that one or both of your MCs also have real psychic powers. That’s entirely- yeah, that totally works with the conceit of the universe.
Hope you are all having a great time team. Thank you very much. And there are multiple questions for this comment: How long do you think it would take for Baxter to be open to the idea of living together with the MC after Step Four?
It’d probably take a while, like at least a year.
How is Baxter with repair and renovation work?
He is terrible. Doesn’t know what he’s doing at all.
How does Baxter feel about the concept of pillow fighting? Do you think he would be good at it?
He’s not a fan. Baxter is usually not into getting very rowdy, and he’d probably be pretty bad at it.
Does Baxter have an interest in mythology?
He’d probably have, like, a passing interest. He’s definitely no expert, but he probably knows more than, like, a random person off the street.
In Our Life 1, if Baxter encountered the MC who shared a dance with him years later in Golden Grove when he’s 17 instead of Sunset Bird, would he have treated the MC as affectionately as Step Three?
And honestly, probably not. It might not have worked out as well if you’d met in Golden Grove at 17 year olds instead of a Sunset Bird as 19 year olds. Baxter’s not as pleasant as a 17 year old. He’s still growing more out of his brattier younger compulsions, and he also feels a lot less free to do what he wants in terms of getting to know people in Golden Grove than he does in Sunset Bird, where, you know, he’s only there for the season and he can do whatever he wants without having to worry too much about it becoming an issue because he’s going to disappear at the end of it. But if he’s living in Golden Grove, you know that’s where he’s going to be living. And, you know, he’s got a reputation there and a history there. And he can’t do things as readily as he can when he’s a tourist in some other town.
What is in Qiu’s bag in Step Two?
Various things. They’ve got their school stuff; they’ve got their ballet stuff often. They’ve got some- probably like some bike stuff. They’ve got extra pencils and pens and their phone, and all sorts of random things.
Does Xavier have a canon sexuality?
And Xavier is demi romantic and demi sexual.
Love your work and love your characters. Quick question regarding Derek’s crush on the MC. Does it still remain even if the MC is dating/in love with Cove or Baxter? Obviously, he’s not in love or anything, but do some of his feelings still remain for the MC?
And that is up to players to headcanon. Whether or not he completely gets over it, or whether or not there’s still some lingering feelings is something I think is better for players to decide for their own story, based on what they would be comfortable with.
Sorry for always having more than one question. I hope you don’t mind. Yeah, it’s okay to have multiple questions. For starters, were there any core concepts or motifs you decided on before designing the Our Life 2 protagonists? As sort of a follow up, was Qiu’s gender fluidity set in stone from the start? Or did the idea come up after the character had started work?
And personality wise, they the personalities did come pretty quickly and didn’t change very much. There definitely were sort of the core ideas that were always around. For Qiu’s gender, I did actually have considerations for that where I kind of waffled on whether they should be entirely agender, or whether they should be gender fluid. And obviously in the end they’re gender fluid. But there was a time where I was thinking they would be agender and not associate with anything at all.
How would Renee feel about the MC calling her “Wren” as a nickname, like as an offshoot of her regular nickname, Ren? Because this is Ren with a W, basically because birds are super cute and nature-y. It’d probably mainly be over text and in group chats, since Wren and Ren sound the same when spoken aloud, but she would know what the MC meant lol.
She definitely wouldn’t mind, though bird comparisons are actually more of a Qiu thing than a Ren thing. She is usually compared to turtles and foxes, but it wouldn’t be insulting to make a bird pun out of her nickname Ren.
I remember it said people could mod the game, so I would like to ask are fan made not safe for work mods fine? Since there wouldn’t be official ones for Derek and Baxter. And it is fine to share those mods on the internet if it was labeled “fan made”?
Yes. If people make not safe for work mods with the adult versions of the characters and share them around for free and for fun, I don’t have any problem with that at all.
And the next comment has multiple questions: One, Does Cove like bowling and what is his bowling score score like?
He kind of likes it, he doesn’t love it and he’s just kind of average at it. Sometimes he does pretty well, and then other times he does worse. But it evens out to be kind of average.
Two, Will Baxter remain single for his life if he doesn’t date the MC?
And that’s something that players can headcanon. There’s no official canon partner that he would end up with if he doesn’t date the MC.
Three, If the MC does not pursue a romantic relationship with either of them in their respective games, is there any chance that Baxter or Qiu will develop a romantic relationship in the future? I apologize for any mistakes in my English. I’m using a translation tool.
You don’t need to apologize for that. It’s totally fine thing to do, and I could understand all the questions just fine. For the last one, not canonically, the two of them wouldn’t ever develop romantic feelings and get together. But it’s not a super unreasonable headcanon that if they met again as fully grown adults, that they could potentially end up liking each other.
Is Scott’s hair dyed or is it just naturally like that? I suspect the blonde portion is dyed, but anything’s possible in the Our Life universe.
And the blonde part is bleached blonde. He is naturally purple haired.
What was Baxter trying to say with the “I wonder if..” line in the scene after they were baking in Step Four?
And he was mainly just going to continue reminiscing and talking about their relationship now. And he was like, “No, I need to stop doing that. We need to stop talking about things and refocus on work.”
So I was replaying the Our Life 2 demo, and I absolutely adore how excited Tamarack gets about her and the MC having stuff in common. So when I realized that both my character and her had names that were also types of trees, I was a little sad there’s no option to point it out. But it got me thinking What if we want a little more extreme? How would Tamarack react to meeting an MC who was also named Tamarack? Would she think it was super cool, or would that be getting a bit too similar?
Tamarack would like that a lot. She’d think it’s super funny and fun and would like doing lots of silly little jokes with other people about how you have the same name and like, “I’m Tamarack, but I’m also Tamarack!” And then when they think like that can’t be possibly true, they’d laugh about how it is actually true. And yeah, so definitely be all good with her. But unfortunately, we are not able to make it possible in the game to have it acknowledge if you have the same name simply because there’s so many characters, and there’d have to be so many alterations for every character to react to you having the same name as every other character. You know, it’d be hundreds and hundreds of variations. But it is at least funny to think about.
And that’s the whole Q&A! This is the longest one we’ve ever had. Thank you to everybody who sent in questions. I hope that was fun and interesting. And I will be back again in July with that month’s Q&A. Take care, everyone!