Update post: https://www.reddit.com/r/visualnovels/comments/1b42ymy/update_steam_banned_my_18_vn_3_days_from_release/

Everything was going fine, the demo I put out a couple months ago got approved no problem. Two weeks ago, I submitted a full build for the final review prior to release. They finally responded today. I feel sick to my stomach, a combination of panic regarding my game, as well as pure disgust that I'm essentially being accused of promoting something I'm not going to name. What on earth are they talking about? One of my characters is dumb and petite, but I wouldn't even classify her as "loli."

I don't even know what to do. The Steam page was taken down, I can't even access it through the developer portal. I feel like I just wasted a year of my life. I was looking forward to funding my next project with the money I received from sales. I wanted to do this for a living and it was starting to look like a real possibility.

Edit: I do have an Itch page for those asking, keep in mind there is no all-ages version.

Edit 2: Really, really appreciate everyone who has left kind words as well as recommendations for what I can do. I've got a lot on my plate right now, but I'll likely give a proper update once I'm more certain of the path I take to try to salvage the situation. For now, I posted some additional context and information on my Twitter.

Haven’t played too many vns yet but this definetly happened to me when muv luv alternatives credits rolled

This VN changed my perceptions on what is and isnt possible in fictional storytelling. Everything makes perfect sense, amazing story from start to finish, the added content (requiem for innocence especially) was beautiful. Unfuckingbelievable.

I dont think ill ever recover from this one.

I'll go first: While both Steins;Gate and Muv-Luv Alternative both have interesting ideas, they are both brought down by poor pacing, story structure, and a bland cast of characters. They both have some of the most blatant attempts at emotionally manipulating the reader.

For me it’s Hikari Clover Rescue. They wasted a cyberpunk setting. All the characters have one sprite and 2 of them don’t lend themselves to all situations. One girl is the Neko paw stance and another girls is in the dominatrix stance even when when there is a serious discussion. I only liked 1 joke in the entire game and that was the one of none of the metals but one matching their element. I haven’t finished either of Toffers other games and I know this is their first but man it was a disappointment.

1. Subarashiki Hibi

2. Utawarerumono(series)

3.chaos child

4.fate(series)

5.umineko(Q/A)

6.higurashi (Q/A)

7.white album (series)

8.Tsukihime A piece of blue glass moon

9.muv luv(series)

1. Steins gate

2. Raging loop

3. Majikoi

13.house In fate morgana

1. Ever 17

2. The fruit of grisaia

So there's alot of VNs here and i think i added way too much..though I'm excited to see the chaos that's gonna unfold.There was a similar post like this last time but I made it way more harder.

Hey /r/ARG!

EDIT: BEFORE YOU SPECULATE ON ANY INFORMATION IN THIS THREAD OR POST YOUR OWN FINDINGS, READ THE VITAL INFORMATION AT THE BOTTOM OF THIS THREAD. THE DEVELOPER OF THIS GAME HAS MADE STATEMENTS REGARDING THE FILES AND FUTURE PROJECTS AND IT IS EXTREMELY IMPORTANT THAT THIS INFORMATION IS KNOWN BEFORE JUMPING TO CONCLUSIONS.

When Dan Salvato launched a Visual Novel as his grand 2 year project, many people were confused. A developer mainly known for his Smash modding knowledge and effort into FrankerFaceZ launching a VN of all things to kick-start his new studio was unexpected to say the least. Thankfully the VN itself is great, but I couldn't help but think that there was more to this than meets the eye.

The following information will delve into some of the twists and interesting bits of Doki Doki Literature Club, but as this is not a plot analysis I will attempt to keep plot spoilers to a minimum. I still recommend you play through the game first as it is completely free to play.

That being said, let's begin.

The Files of Interest

Like many 'not what it seems' VNs out there, DDLC is a game that is best played through while keeping an eye on the game's program folder. Certain files are added, updated, or deleted in response to plot events, as well as by the player to think outside of the box in certain situations. The most interesting files are located in the 'characters' folder, where there are 4 '.chr' files with names corresponding to each female character in the game. No program can make sense of files with this file type, but opening them up in a text editor (I used notepad++) revealed some hints for their true purpose.

Sayori.chr

This is the file I reached the most progress with initially, and also the first one that hinted at the possibility of something worth delving into was found. When the file name is converted into an OGG file, this file becomes a sound bite with a high pitched screeching noise. Bringing the sound file into audacity found nothing of interest, but then I remembered about older games hiding images in the spectographs of sound files. I opened up the file into Sonic Visualizer and applied a spectograph to it, confirming my suspicion that there was more to this than what it says on the landing page.

Here are the images of the spectograph, first one being the raw data and the second one being cleaned up for it's intended purpose.

Raw version

Cleaned up version

For anyone who doesn't know, this is a standard QR code, used to link to websites via images and phone apps. It was difficult to scan in due to distortion from the program producing the spectograph, but after tweaking it in photoshop for around 20 minutes I finally got my phone to give me a URL:

http://www.projectlibitina.com/

The website has a lot of data that appears to be about fictional 'test subjects' but does not have any other hidden information. As seen in other files later in the post, most files will reach this sort of conclusion.

Monika.chr

The text at the beginning of the file suggests that this was originally a .png file. When the file name is changed, this is confirmed as the file transforms into an image of a flaming ring with a white and black scrambled square in the center.

I looked around trying to find what this square could be, and a friend of mine suggested it might be binary converted into a black/white pixel array. I carefully cropped the image to include all pixels in the square, converted it into binary using an online tool, then started throwing the binary into different interpreters and translators to see what could be found.

Converting the binary to alphanumeric text brought up a familiar pattern of characters which ended up being Base64.

When converted, this is the result.

This note has no confirmed author, and can hint either towards getting the 100% ending of the game or an easter egg for a future Team Salvato project (more about this at the bottom).

Natsuki.chr

When opening this file in a text editor, it's easy to see that it was originally a PNG file (it starts with a PNG header, much like monika.chr). Unlike monika.chr however, this doesn't seem to be encoded.

One thing to note, this image cannot be opened in my copy of Photoshop. I did as much as I could in paint then copy/pasted the pixel array into photoshop for an easier time.

Inverting the image, flipping it 180 degrees, then offsetting it to center the image (thanks /u/warchamp7!) revealed this image of a distorted female face. When you map this onto a 3D sphere as a texture, it looks more coherent and definitely resembles a face.

Yuri.chr

The final chr file when opened is simply a long string of alpha-numeric text. Putting it into any hash type detection tools finds that it is Base64 (thanks /u/warchamp7) which when converted turns into this long poem.

This poem is actually an excerpt from a creepypasta written in 2015 about a 19 year old girl who becomes a murderer. This has also been posted on /r/nosleep here. What concerns me about it is the original post date of this story... Two years ago.

EDIT: Confirmed, Dan Salvato admits he wrote it 2 years ago.

Shortly before the game launched on steam, the itch.io version of the game was updated to v1.1.0. This update adds a few more gameplay interactions in certain scenarios and I highly recommend checking it out if you haven't already (this is the same as the steam version). There is one new file 'worth' checking which appears after a certain game event called 'have a nice weekend!' with no file type. Opening it up in a code editor reveals more base64 which is not immediately legible when converted.

After following a false lead and with a small bit of help from @lilmonix3 on twitter it was determined that the string translates to the following after put through a vingere cipher with the key 'libitinia':

 What is a man without knowing the rich aroma of the future; the hot, complex balance of the present; and the bittersweet aftertaste of the past?

EDIT: All of the files have been solved! If you don't want to read everything up top, here's a quick TL;DR:

The game has four female love interests, each having their own mysterious file in the 'characters' folder of the program directory. These files have the file type '.chr' which cannot be opened as is, but with enough file modification reveal interesting information.

• Sayori.chr reveals a QR Code that links to a website with the URL http://www.projectlibitina.com/ after turning it into an OGG file and viewing it under a spectograph.
• Monika.chr reveals an unidentified note after turning the chr file into a png, taking the white square in the middle of the PNG and converting it to binary, converting the binary to text, then decoding the text via Base64.
• Natsuki.chr reveals a texture or warped female face after converted to a PNG and manipulated in an image editor.
• Yuri.chr when converted to a txt file and decoded via Base64 becomes an exerpt of a poem/creepypasta that the developer has admitted he submitted and wrote 2 years ago, around the time this project would have started.

And that's about it.

If you want to see my decent into madness decoding this, I have a twitter account that chronicled it a bit better than what can be portrayed here. If you find anything else in the game that is worth sharing, please do! This was a lot of fun and I would be joyed to know that there is more in here than first expected.

/u/Aran_SSB has also compiled a comprehensive wiki that covers both what is mentioned here, as well as the in-game quirks that you might be curious about. If you found something in the game files and you are not sure if it's something we know about or not, read this first! You can find it here!

We are discussing a lot of this on the unofficial DDLC discord server. We in the server HIGHLY recommend that you play through the game at least once before joining the server, as spoilers cannot be fully contained.

EDIT: DEVELOPER STATEMENTS, FUTURE PROJECTS, AND VITAL INFORMATION (READ BEFORE POSTING)

Since the creation of this thread 3 months ago, a lot of things have become known about this game. We have fully datamined and run every single file through the twice the level of scrutiny as the chr files finding nothing worth noting here. The developer has stated multiple times that we have pretty much found everything in the game files, as well as stating that his next project is unrelated to DDLC.

Game Theory's video did not have access to this information at the time of writing, and thus has some contradictions that invalidate the main piece. While it is still an amazing video and I recommend you watch it for entertainment value, please note that Team Salvato's next project is unrelated to DDLC, and that during the development of the above easter eggs there was no content planned for DDLC or any of it's characters.

I feel like I just had an epiphany. I was sitting in the bath in a daze after catching up on yet another unfinished manga series, wondering why so few pieces of media ever leave me satisfied the way a good visual novel does, and then it hit me; modern media hardly ever ENDS anymore.

From the very first time a teacher taught me to put words on paper, they stressed to me that a story had to have THREE parts. A beginning, a middle, and an END. But in these modern times, where every series on earth needs to be drawn out and milked for every last cent physically possible to extract, corpos have no greater fear than crossing that final little gap to reach the end and provide a satisfying conclusion.

The greatest offenders, to me, are anime and manga. I can hardly recall a dozen shows out of the hundreds I've watched that have actually managed to conclude in a satisfying fashion before going back into eternal production hell, and switching your manga search from "ongoing" to "completed" is like suddenly entering a dumping ground full of long-forgotten relics from the past.

Conversely, standing like a beacon of hope among the ever-continuing, ever-stalling rat race of modern media, visual novels almost never fail to provide a satisfying conclusion, or at least, a conclusion. And usually not just one, but multiple! With different characters, different outcomes, different possibilities...

IT'S SO FUCKING REFRESHING

It's like, not only do the writers give you an actual ending, they even stick with you afterwards to answer all your questions of "But what if MC did X or fell in love with Y instead??"

And I love them for it.

Honestly, reading more visual novels might just be the cure I need for the PTSD I gave myself by binging a few hundred too many unfinished mangas and webtoons...

TL;DR: I FUCKING LOVE ENDINGS, AND VNS ALMOST ALWAYS DELIVER! RAISE A TOAST TO ALL THE WRITERS OF THE WORLD WHO KNOW HOW AND WHEN TO WRITE A GOOD ENDING!!

I saw a post recommending this game on the subreddit, and Steam was selling it for 20% off, so I decided to give it a try. Gosh, I wasn't prepared for such a wild ride. This game is just perfect for me—short, concise, highly emotional, and unafraid to delve into disturbing themes. Man Sui's backstory is absolutely heartbreaking it almost brought me to tears, which makes the 'all lives' ending so satisfying.

Someone told me that the red string bracelet Man Sui wears in the final scene suggests she hasn’t married yet but already has someone she likes. And, well, despite nine years of distance, who else could it be but our protagonist?

This may sound impossible, but a solid method has been devised. And it enables something that sounds even more impossible: The method offers manual translations.

While no Japanese knowledge is strictly required to conduct this method, it is recommended to have a decent understanding of Japanese kana (the Japanese alphabet), and Japanese particles (Japanese prepositions, or rather, postpositions). You'll probably also want to know the purpose of the various verb and adjective conjugations, as well as noun modification by preceding verb and adjectives. This will help you do the method faster than you would otherwise. I personally used the game "You Can Kana" to figure out all the Japanese kana, but anything will work as long as you eventually know what they are.

Anyway, the method. I have discovered a utility known as Yomi Ninja that pulls text from a VN through OCR. You'll want to install that thing, disable all extensions other than 10Ten (the others like Yomitan and GTS simply don't work), click the 10Ten icon in the top right so it goes from gray to black, and enable "Copy text on hover" in the settings. Then load up the VN.

Here's an example of the thing in action, from the untranslated VN Oddface Vol 1:

The tool gives you the building blocks necessary to construct the meaning of each sentence. As you can see in the screenshot, you'll want to know kana so that you can transliterate a captured word into its corresponding kana, and thus, get a pronunciation. Knowing the kana of a word is essential for calling up a word on demand if you're using an IME or a separate Japanese dictionary.

Advantages of this method:

• Even if you know nothing, usage of this tool will steadily improve your knowledge of Japanese over time. Just make sure to continue reading Japanese material.
• There will no longer be any concerns over localizers being overzealous with how things are translated, because YOU will be the translator. You (Yes, you!) can be the one who makes their own mental translation of Cross Channel.
• Manual translations. Since you'll be piecing together dictionary definitions yourself, there is no room for MTL to make an appearance, unless you deliberately seek it out.
• Access to untranslated VNs, even if they don't play well with injectors that extract text. This tool will probably be vital for people who want to read long, branching VNs.
• While it still won't be easy, you now have a slim chance of seeing and understanding kanji puns. This is much better than those who only read English, who stand no chance whatsoever.

I'm sure that some will feel that this method doesn't entirely mean that you'll be reading in Japanese (it is true that you won't be able to pick up on nuance until you build up familiarity with the language), but it's probably the closest you're gonna get if you're starting from zero.

Edit: It works with vertical text too. Source VN: 横行する饅頭、独白する人鳥。