ABOUT THE GAME
In Love Potion no. 9, you play as a nameable vampire protagonist. During an impromptu scuffle one night in the woods, you're scratched by a werewolf - and after some frantic searching, you find out that a wolf scratch can lead to an irreversable transformation. The only cure? A potion blessed with true love by a witch!
This leads you, naturally, to a three-week October vacation in the sleepy town of Salem, with one main objective: find a cute witch to date and ensure they can make the cure for you before it's too late.
Love Potion no. 9 features:
♡ Five dateable witches!
♡ A semi-customisable protagonist: enter your own name and pronouns, and choose from three appearance options
♡ Three full dates per witch, with good and bad endings depending on your choices!
♡ Extra events between dates, so you can get to know Salem and its residents outside of your chosen romance path
work in progress screenshot - not indicative of how the final game will look!
The game is coded in Ren'py, a free visual novel engine using Python. The demo will be released for free on itch.io in 2023. We currently expect it to be around 10k words/20 minutes long, featuring a short introduction to the protagonist, setting, and romanceable characters.
The main game will be much longer - with three choice-based dates for five characters, several events, and multiple good and bad endings, we estimate the script will come out to ~80k words overall, with tons of detailed backgrounds, sprites, and CGs. Ideally, we're looking at a year-long development with release in 2024, but this is naturally subject to change!
CHARACTERS
Love Potion no. 9 features a colourful main cast of five romanceable characters and five side characters that will pop up often during your adventures in Salem.
Check back soon for full introductions to our cast!
PS: If you'd like to find out which character you should date, take our uQuiz!
MEET THE DEVS
cute art of us will replace this soon! for now, have our totally-not-self-inserts, lilith and esme.
MEG!
pronouns: they/them
team role: writer / coder!
when i’m not working on the game, i’m: studying english/creative writing at uni, baking, playing other funny little visual novels
fav lpn9 character: solid tie between esme and slayter!
MJ!
pronouns: she/they
team role: artist / coder!
when i’m not working on the game, i’m: studying animation, drawing cool shit, making awesome little videos
fav lpn9 character: lilith!
A... KICKSTARTER?
Okay, not yet. Right now, we're focusing on getting the demo of Love Potion no. 9 released (for free!) on itch.io. And the full game, with five love interests, fun events, and awesome secrets, will be out eventually regardless.
We originally developed the concept for LPn9 with way more in mind. However, we aren't a pro gaming studio - we're two broke college students, and as much as we'd love to pay out of pocket to make our witchy dreams a reality, that's just not doable. That's why a post-demo possibility is a Kickstarter campaign, so we can raise funds to expand the game to its full potential!
So let's talk specifics. Funds from a Kickstarter campaign would allow us to add tons of cool shit to the game, including:♡ four more romance routes: Esme, Pippa, Flea and Tabby.
♡ partial voice acting, to bring the characters to life!
♡ a full original soundtrack, with songs for every scene!
♡ more events between dates, to add more depth to the world of the game and expand on the characters' stories
♡ additional protagonist appearance options, because who doesn't love more customisation?
Of course, a Kickstarter is nothing without cool rewards for the backers! Some ideas we have for those include^:♡ a pin badge set, so you can take the lovable witches of Salem out and about with you
♡ a booklet of early concepts with WIP art and script extracts showing the game's creative process
♡ exclusive merch: from prints to charms to t-shirts
♡ the opportunity to see yourself in the game as an NPC, or to design a date with one of the additional characters!
^ these may change in the future - they're just concepts for now!!
If this sounds good to you, make sure to follow and support the project on social media and keep an eye out for updates.