Just a little passionate about this one. Included some music I listened to while writing at the top! (Yes drama informs 100% of my creative process and this devlog will be no exception😂❤️‍🔥)

I hold myself to high standards as an author. Not just as an indie game developer and narrative designer, but someone who has intensely loved quality writing since I was a little girl.

Practically living in libraries (hundreds of hours volunteering added up, doing it every week) and entrenching myself in reading classic books since I was a kid instilled in me a passion for epic stories, classic fantasy, richly illustrated worlds, and complex characters. This is not only from my deep love of books, but a fire for good graphic novels, movies, games, TTRPGs, and all other forms of storytelling!!!

I am so happy to have found my love of writing later in life, alongside many years of collaborative storytelling experience and fun. It should come as no surprise that I aspire to apply amazing writing principles, above all other things, to the creation of my visual novel!

Developing Catalyst: Blind Faith is an opportunity to uplift an unparalleled medium for narrative story telling. Visual novels are a joy, and whether or not a player is in a scene with choices or not, I work hard to exercise every last bit of writing muscle I have to give!!!

Let's be real I am very biased with game development, and writing is far and away my favorite skill to flex. Catalyst: Blind Faith is built on the bedrock of its script, and I am taking a minute to be proud of it. The game's writing has the heft and height of a mountain. I have put blood, sweat, and tears into its quality. We're deep into a narrative devlog series where I can scream about it, and I have an army of beta readers, sensitivity readers, and the best editors in the world (SHOUT OUT to knowledgedomain and cirno for all your hard work!!!!) to thank for its quality too.

I will be going in-depth in this devlog about all of the care and consideration I put into CBF's herculean writing endeavors. To do so, I'm going to talk about six (6!) complex elements of the game's writing total, and share many ways I aim to make the writing in this narrative game shine like the sun! This is effectively part one of two, since there's a lot to be said on the subject.

This is a devlog about universal writing considerations. You may have noticed I like to write a lot. I do have a big game to make and didn't spent countless hours editing this devlog to be as tight as humanly possible (it took roughly 8 solid hours to write and edit thus far), so while there will be some pictures later to better illustrate many things for this visual novel's development too, get comfy. Grab a drink, maybe stretch your legs idk lol. The scrollbar is accurate but we're all here for a game with reading as the primary skill to flex, right?💪😉

I hope this is a helpful read and insightful for other writers, game developers, and players alike to read about some of my methods here. It's not a tutorial, and this devlog will inherently contain some spoilers (though I will keep them to a minimum).

⚠️If you prefer to dive into CBF unspoiled⚠️, thank you for taking the time to check out this devlog today! If you like, before you tab out, you can also skip straight to the Outro for some updates the last month, with a summary of progress on the game's development! I have been absolute steamrolling through art, and shared a ton of progress with the Discord community in our anniversary stream!! ⚠️You can jump to those updates and more normal devlog content by ctrl+f'ing "OUTRO."⚠️

As previously mentioned, this is also part six (6!) of a long-running narrative devlog series. You do NOT need to read these other devlogs to enjoy this one, but if you would like some spoiler-free reading, or just to explore some of the many other considerations going into such a big branching game's design, feel free to check them out!

Sexy collection on Patreon here, where you can see or easily bookmark these all together for later reading (lol):

1. Narrative Design 101 and the Branching Structure of Catalyst: Blind Faith
2. Common Route Mechanical Madness + All Routes Preview
3. Merciful Game Design - The "Trunk" of Catalyst: Blind Faith's Branching Narrative
4. Punishing Game Design (VENGEANCE)
5. Timey Wimey Game Design (Yes it is complicated)
   
   

Pro gamers, if you would like to easily skip to certain sections or come back after a break, you can jump to them by ctrl+f'ing these headers below!

✨EASY NAVIGATION✨

✍️INTRO | Words: 863 | Images: 1 (<- You are here!)

🌎PART I: WORLDBUILDING | Words: 1,259 | Images: 6

🌈PART II: THEMES | Words: 955 | Images: 3

👐PART III: SYMBOLISM | Words: 620 | Images: 3

📕PART IV: STRONG, STAND-ALONE STORIES | Words: 1,149 | Images: 4

✍️OUTRO | Words: 354 | Images: 0

I hope you enjoy! ❤️

🌎PART I: WORLDBUILDING

BIIIIIIG DISCLAIMER: ALL OF THE GIFS WERE TOO BIG FOR ITCH.IO!! I could not crunch them down small enough, so I made flat images of a single frame for this crosspost. The post on Patreon has all images at full res, which is free for everyone here!

Cohesive, slow worldbuilding is the blood in my veins when creating an original fantasy setting.

CONSISTENCY in the setting and world can only come from a player who has rock-solid understanding of it.

This means putting lore through an eyedropper. I have a teaser in that gif of the continent where the game takes place, but we do not laboriously explore those numerous place names like a National Geographic documentary.

We don't touch on these proper nouns almost ever again.

We establish some scope for three seconds, then zoom in to the country the player will be playing in.

I do this with literally everything in the game. It's NOT about memorizing proper nouns. This game is NOT an encyclopedia or vocabulary test.

I'm accompanying a place name (not even read aloud by the narrator!) with stakes. The story. The reasons we care about places and the world the player, well, plays in.

Though the player is given these bits of info about the world sloooooooooooooowly

slowly

We keep zooming in. Worldbuilding, for me, exists as a frame for the characters in the game and the things that will resonate with the player. The story of Catalyst: Blind Faith is hugely involved with the deities in the pantheon, and we do spend a great deal of time with SPECIFICS. I use worldbuilding to give the player anchors in an ocean of original fantasy setting worldbuilding—but they do NOT get that ocean through a firehose.

They get it through an eyedropper, with ample time to process things.

I just show exactly what is needed for the scene. ONLY what is needed for the scene. Baby steps.

The player doesn't need to know more than this 15 seconds into the game. They can easily imagine how much worldbuilding lies under the surface, and their investment and interest comes from me NOT infodumping.

This amount of visuals might also feel like too much, even in the shortest possible strokes, in the couple of sentences we have covered, because scrolling through this devlog is not the video game. Thank fuck lol

It's frankly impossible to convey pacing for a video game through text alone, but bear with me for two seconds while I attempt to try.

Laugh with me at the dumb dictionary definitions, please. I moved heaven and earth to finish this opening cinematic before our anniversary stream. Pinky promise the build on Steam will be nice and sparkling clean code bahahahah

THE FOCUS HERE IS ON PACING and even these handful of images are given AMPLE room to breathe.

When I'm giving big chunks of information to the player, I let them breathe, and the rest can trickle down slowly.

Real slowly.

So slowly.

It's so much information to bring a player into a fictional world if you aren't careful, and I am going to try to convey the level of care and consideration I place into how this world is built up.

[slaps my chapter spreadsheet] WE CAN FIT SO MUCH INFO IN THIS BAD BOY.

This is a glimpse into the mouth of madness, AKA my list of chapters for the common route. You may notice there are multiple versions and names for each.

Regardless of what path is taken, no matter what choices the player makes, I account for every permutation of events they can encounter. I slowly build key information in the common route, to guarantee that the player has baseline understanding of the world no matter what.

"What the fuck, Alaric," you may be wondering. "This is a lot, Alaric."

I write for my best readers, brave reader. When it comes to writing, I do not want to hold back or dumb down my work for my audience.

You find yourself realizing I regard you as my best reader

Essentially, each "Chapter" the player touches delineates information I want to convey for the world at different times. It could be foundational, like the nature of the Gods and Goddesses in the pantheon (Chapter 1!!).

It could be something that builds context for that specific scene, like the nature of Magic in this world when meeting a spellcaster. (Every time you could meet a spellcaster for the first time, whether it's chapter 6, 7, or 8!!!)

Some of that information is not mandatory for storytelling, but is relevant only to branching, self-contained parts of the narrative. It would be remiss of me as a writer to not illustrate the world as these things are relevant. Maybe you take a shortcut, never stop to rest for the first 5 chapters of the common route, and then have no idea how demons work because you've ran from every battle.

You bet your ass I put a check in the entirety of Chapter 5, so that no matter where the player goes, players get that needed worldbuilding info before a huge boss fight. You need to know what you're facing, right? It just makes sense, if you think about it.

I really, really, really think about it. You have to. It's the fun of writing, to build comprehension and build on prior parts of the story too!

I track each and every bit of possible lore the player works so hard to get. These things come up throughout the game, and anything that takes a load off my brain (by trying to remember all this shit) is vital!

No eyestrain from squinting trying to read pls lol. We're reading enough in this devlog lol. It's intentionally illegible. You can guess why this is helpful so I'm not trying to simply remember everything!

To keep spoilers to a minimum in this devlog, I have zoomed massively out from a handy dandy spreadsheet I keep with a summary of this information! You know. Lore. That the player can find. In the common route.

It's thanks to having well established and concrete ideas of the world and its foundational elements that I can confidently and deeply entrench players in this original fantasy setting. The way this works is not only that new information is given consistently to players about the world they inhabit, but also the monsters they face, the abilities they possess, and that all the information they're fighting to uncover is cohesive...

By putting this lore through an eyedropper, and making information so hard-won, players gradually become very excited to uncover more info. You play as an MC who is obsessed with finding a cure for a metaphysical phenomenon, so the mysteries of the setting are truly all of the fun to uncover.

Creating congruence between the player's growing interest in the discovery of knowledge, and the player-controlled MC's relentless search for answers also creates deep immersion. The player's eagerness to take huge risks for info has tremendous overlap with the game's way of slowly unpacking info. The protag's joy and relief at getting answers is the player's joy. I live for this shit.

I do eventually give players the opportunity to seek out firehoses of information! Deep in the game, taking huge risks to read a book in a big enchanted library becomes a reward, not a chore.

I've spent many years on this setting, and though it is a joy beyond all measure to work on it, the game itself is what I hope to share its depth and complexity through.

Quality worldbuilding is about more than creating a nifty wikipedia page to me. It's about how you share the world with your readers and players. It might sound obvious when framed this way, but imo quality worldbuilding comes from giving a player a rich, understandable, consistent, living and breathing world to play in.

🌈PART II: THEMES

Many core themes inform the heart and soul of Catalyst: Blind Faith. It keeps not only its branching narrative cohesive, but elevates every facet of its development by having the same strong undercurrents.

Compassion and overcoming adversity in the face of impossible odds are the lifeblood of this game. No matter what choices the player takes, I strive to keep consistency in these themes. I ask myself when outlining and writing and editing EVERY single scene: "Does this service the game's themes of compassion? If the player has hardship, is it toward a better end? Is this a challenge they would want to overcome? Am I still writing a story that uplifts these elements?"

These themes were not something I picked out of a hat before writing the script. They are organic themes that emerged while writing a dark fantasy and horror epic.

Only after seeing the struggles and triumphs of its characters, the apocalyptic world they inhabit, and my desire to tell these stories with weight and meaning did I pin down these universal undercurrents.

This is a little outdated, as themes are a current I don't fight against! It's a visual I shared a few months back, polling patrons here for what route to write next! Themes are something I flow with as they emerge through the game's writing.

Beyond CBF's underlying, most core themes, I also give players the ability to choose the way that the story unfolds. THIS is what informs all other themes of the game, and even more than that!

Each narrative design element I work with, I strive to make them part of a cohesive whole. Foundational, rock-solid worldbuilding is mandatory in this game to introduce the player to the different deities in the pantheon. Beyond that, because the player-controlled MC is a polytheistic priest...

...and does much more than worship all of these deities...

....and does much more than be utterly enamored with each and every last one of Them...

The player has the ability to channel the abilities of these Gods and Goddesses through the MC's body. He is aware and eager to further his relationship with every deity, despite the extreme toll this takes on him. Alongside this theme (and lengthy, dark, and mature exploration of abusive relationships), the player's choices inform the nature of how each God and Goddess works through him.

If this sounds complicated and involved, it's because it is! Every other devlog in this series thus far has been about the mechanics and narrative design of these choices, because what the player chooses to do wholly shapes the course of the game.

lovely fanart by MariCore. (The game gets a little meta. Juuuuuuuuuuuuust a little.👌)

HEAR ME OUT:

It all boils down to how these things are executed. The writing itself. That means that the choices the player makes simultaneously:

• Give the player the opportunity to take actions which resonate with them.
• Informs me, as a game designer, of what actions (and THEMES) that player is interested in.
• Shapes the relationship of our MC in line with the deity (or deities) who embody the same themes.
• Improves the player's relationship with those corresponding deities.
• Can harm the player's relationship with the deities who would approve of different actions.
• And most importantly, gives the player content with themes they resonate with. I can confidently write from that choice with tones and themes that carry the types of choices made, and it just keeps building, for consistent themes and strong narrative.

I build trust with the player that their decisions are being taken seriously by doing this too. The consequences for their choices are handled with gravitas, whether it's burning through their limited light sources from frequent backtracking, or helping the MC feel more rested and stable after taking the time to rest. They don't need to know choice structure or anything more than the feeling they're constantly having their decisions respected.

And I'm going to pat my ass for a second here, and stress that is good writing.

By the end of the common route, the player learns about the nature of the game and has a strong understanding of more than these deities. Their themes are vast, and so is the game! I let the player transparently choose from there which relationship they want to further most, so that the game follows what themes matters to them most too.

It's as shrimple as that.

"This isn't shrimple at all Alaric," you probably want to say. "We're only halfway through the subjects you want to talk about in this post. This is diabolical. Wtf?"

I am not exaggerating when I put on the game's page to "follow your heart." It's cheesy I know but I am putting blood, sweat, and tears into writing a game where the player gets to choose the themes that matter to them most!

The common route helps the player connect to these things—the world they inhabit, how it works and why—so that when they come to THE MOST pivotal turning point in our troubled MC's life, they understand they're choosing the way his story will unfold.

That's the game. That's literally it. The player blindly trusts that the game is going to respect their choices. It's very meta and very overt when I talk about it like this, and I am so, so happy to be able to share.

It's a branching narrative, where the player's decisions inform the story they want to see. The consistency and delivery of all of these themes is a joy as a writer. It informs every atom of the game and I am just getting started!

[high-five to the writing and reading pro gamers who are reading this straight through]

👐PART III: SYMBOLISM

A narrative device that I absolutely adore is symbolism. This is often mocked in literary analysis, when readers will read too far between the lines.

An example of this is the jokey "the curtains are blue" analysis. An author will mention the color of curtains, and the author might not have a reason for it, but readers might really look into it. They're seeking meaning where there might be none. They could say the curtains are blue because of any and every assumption, and it really doesn't matter in most cases to the author.

Gamers I do this read-between-the-lines shit nonstop and there's a reason for it. I LOVE to give players things to analyze when they're reading.

All my homies love subtext but I'm actually really heavy-handed with it. I'm NOT talking about implicit meaning or subtext.

Using overt symbolism allows me to convey a lot of depth without using more words. It lets players draw connections on their own, and that's especially fun with an original fantasy setting.

Going to bring back that opening image, with the deities in the pantheon, just for a second to help me illustrate:

With that worldbuilding eyedropper, I establish to players over the course of the game different deities in the original fantasy pantheon.

They have time. There's no rush. It's a big game. The MC, Richard, talks a LOT and thinks even more about these Gods and Goddesses.

Please direct your attention towards the symbol literally shining light like the sun. 👐 The symbol is really crude, like a child drew it (by Alaric age 34). 💛 These are open hands, for the Goddess of Mercy. 👐 Mercy's hands are open. 👐 The person praying to Mercy has open hands. 👐 Open hands are Her symbol. 👐

I don't beat the player over the head with it, but the MC wears a pair of golden, open hands as his holy symbol. 👐 He thinks of Mercy internally when any allies hold a hand out to him. 👐 It's significant in the game for people to shake/join hands, as a form of compassion. 👐 Because Mercy is the Goddess of compassion. 👐

You can see how quickly this builds up. It's used metaphorically. It's in the imagery. It's in the color symbolism.

it becomes total brainrot for players and I absolutely live for it

All of this is to say if I make curtains blue 🪟 in Catalyst: Blind Faith📘, you can probably bet it's because Dream💤 is represented by the color blue💙, and interpretation is Dream's symbol.💤

Get it? Got it. Great! etc. etc. etc. lmfao

Quick little script teaser for one more example of how useful this is. It's a tour de force in original fiction when players get full comprehension not only of the world and its elements AND its themes and its symbols, but when these things all can work TOGETHER as strong narrative devices!

Fully edited!!! A whopping single word tightened up for grammar mueheheheheh. Very exciting to show a sneak peek at!

We're like 25-30 chapters deep here, and the player could plausibly recite this information about various symbols in the setting if truly put to it. Agriculture's symbol📗 is a scythe🔪, for the Goddess of poison🤢 and harvest🍏 and death💚 yadayada.

But these things are not there for trivia. They are not written just for a wiki page. They ONLY matter for my writing's purposes in the context of the narrative.

As fun as it is to meme about, we really wouldn't care much about the symbolism if it wasn't part of a bigger story.

[high five once more to any heroes reading this straight through, this devlog is kind of an epic in and of itself, hydration🥤 and stretching💪 and comfy chair check🪑, lets gooooooooooooooooooo]

📕PART IV: STRONG, STAND-ALONE STORIES

One more disclaimer: I'm sharing my process for this one game. Just my game! There is not only nothing wrong with games that require multiple playthroughs to get a complete experience, but that's a great narrative convention for tons of games.

CBF also has tons of love and heart poured into making repeat playthroughs rewarding, but we're going to talk about something beyond that.

FOR ME, PERSONALLY, FOR CATALYST: BLIND FAITH:

My absolute top priority when writing any part of the game is to ensure that every player gets a satisfying story the first time they play the game, from exciting start to satisfying finish.

"but alaric, what about that flowchart that looks like a string of christmas lights thrown into a washing machine, " you may be asking.

brave reader while it may be damn hard to write every possible permutation of events as a solid story, it is my passion. This is the assignment.

Let's look at a slightly more intimidating flowchart, to illustrate my last example for this devlog!

Great pains have been taken to keep spoilers to a minimum. I have also used pastels and comic sans to further underscore the horrors. c: hope you enjoy the smiley faces.

Here the main thing I want to point out is the narrative structure, and my best attempts at conveying the length of each one of these continuities. Worth quickly noting:

1. This is why I laugh when people ask me how long the game is on average. No one wants to hear "it depends," but at least now I have a cute pastel series of smiley faces to share bahahahaha
2. Two of these continuities are fully written. The rest are a WIP or are from my outline, so this all can change during the writing process. (Outlines are made to be broken if it is for the good of the story!)
3. Several chapter numbers are VERY ROUGHLY ROUNDED OFF due to many minor permutations not shown here. The length of each chapter can also vary WILDLY, with the shortest being a few hundred words, and the longest being over 11k words. (They generally sit around 3k words, but you get the point.)

I am illustrating the simplest possible depiction of major branch in the story, for the God of Vengeance's hard branch. This is if the player wants to pursue a relationship with the God of Murder above all other things. (Vengeance embodies murder, blood sacrifice, honor, justice, and many other lofty concepts that are often abstract. 🖤The absence of chill vibes is His symbol.🖤)

As previously discussed:

• The player will be aware of the risks of worshiping the God of Murder with all their heart, while inhabiting this game's dark fantasy and horror world.
• The very literal nature of this deity and the troublesome concepts He can embody are well understood 14 chapters into the game. The player understands if they fuck around they will find out, and you do not engage with the concept of Vengeance if you aren't willing to find out.
• aaaaand the player is given very ample warning about how seriously I handle these themes. More on that in our last 2 devlogs in this series, on the extreme content filter and other extremely sensitive content in CBF!🖤🖤🖤🖤

There are a handful of bad (and good!) endings earlier in this flowchart than the rest. I want to point out that to reach a single ending in this hard branch, the player is at LEAST 16+ chapters deep into this very serious game.

I very, very deliberately let players make terrible decisions. I think it's a joy for games to let players fuck around and find out, if they really want to—and to let the story continue from there.

I could certainly design CBF to have many abrupt endings, but that is not my style.

This design philosophy, to make each playthrough feel like a complete story and a satisfying experience, informs the entirety of the game.

In this example above, a hectic and life-or-death choice might come DEEP into the journey, a whopping 26 chapters in. Even if the player makes that decision (knowingly) that will lead to a terrible end, with my writing style, I'm accounting for their journey to get there.

It would feel really weird for me not to think of the choices they took to get here.

It doesn't matter where in the grand scheme of the game this choice lands. You will NOT have a handy-dandy in-game flowchart beside you saying "yep that's gonna be a bad choice chief. Yep chief you could potentially have another 20 chapters."

It's framed in the game when you're going to choose something that could lead to a fate worse than death. The player has had a book's worth of epic dark fantasy adventure to get here.

I want them to be immersed. I want their decisions to have gravitas. I want to give the player a solid story and a solid ending!

Their choice is infinitely more rewarded when I do, and my fun as a writer is massively elevated by me hard committing to writing this game with not just every ending in mind, but all the ways the story can intertwine.

These choices are NOT in total isolation. There's a common route to get here. The scope is kept sane with shared events, shared continuity. The world is consistent. The themes are consistent. The symbolism is consistent. I am not sharing all of the variables here for your sanity, brave reader. The image below is as simple as I can get this and not do a disservice to some chunks of the story.

Even when things get complicated—no matter how long the game's story goes on—I'm drawing from ALL these shared points of reference.

Writing CBF is not like writing 200 unique games end to end. The world is the same. The themes are the same. The symbols are the same.

The characters you meet and the places you go can change a hell of a lot. There ARE distinct continuities. The way that these events play out, and the way that I strive to make the player's journey feel like their own, is the fun of the game.

It's only possible because I treat every single event with the same care and love for quality writing, no matter how dark or terrible things get. 

Next time we'll get into how I maintain consistent characterization, when I write shit as crazy as the same MC being portrayed as an antihero, hero, or villain in the same game.

I'm going to do the fabled, greatly requested dissection of how I handle unreliable narration!

(I wanted to put all that in this devlog too, but it was way too much lol.)

Pinky promise we'll wrap up this devlog series with all the sensitivity concerns I've made along the way!!

✍️OUTRO

Well done, those of you who took a nose dive into the great writing rant of 2025 lmfao.

I hope you enjoyed some insight into some of the many considerations I make for quality when writing CBF!

For those of you jumping in via ctrl+f = "OUTRO."

I want to take a second to thank every last patron here so much for the support! I'm even harder at work at a focused job search than I am at game dev, making a swift recovery and looking forward to defeating the IRL horrors as well. 💪 Your support means the world, and is helping significantly with food and meds in the intermin. Thank you so much!!

Huuuuuuuge hype from the anniversary stream that was held in our Discord community server!!!! I got to share with them:

🎥 Our new opening cinematic, with its 10 new visuals, writing, music, and all in-engine transforms (the gifs near the start of this devlog are all from it!)

🏀The first frame by frame animation in the game, seen in the Prologue

🖌️A truckload of sketches, animations, camera work, and much more setup for the last of the art throughout my working build for the demo

💖Finished programming features and options for accessibility

✍️The totally completed writing for 4 chapters in the demo and maaaaany choices!

🎶A couple new songs, SFX, and a vast assortment of UI sound design!!

🎤We all hung out in VC for several hours to celebrate and had an amazing time.

WHEW!

I'm so hype to be back to making much swifter progress on game development. Feel free to leave in the comments below or in our community Discord any thoughts, hype, or other stuff you enjoyed!

I'm massively looking forward to providing patrons with behind-the-scenes and first looks at art as I ramp up for our Steam debut too! I WANT TO GIVE YOU ALL A PLACE TO WISHLIST ASAP 😭💖💖💖💖

Next month's devlog will be that big dissection of variable and consistent characterization, and how I write our unreliable narrator. I hope you have a great month! Thank you so, so much for reading!