Oto-hime
A downloadable game for Windows, macOS, and Linux
Story
Shimako, a socially anxious office worker, escapes the pressures of her company's beach retreat by fishing alone, only to stumble upon a trapped turtle by the shore. When she rescues it, Shimako is mysteriously whisked away to a hidden underwater palace, where she meets Oto-hime, a breathtakingly beautiful but enigmatic princess. Drawn in by Oto-hime's charm and her lavish hospitality, Shimako soon realizes there is something unsettling beneath the princess's kind façade.
In this gripping Yuri Horror visual novel, you control Shimako's fate through a web of choices. Unravel the truth behind Oto-hime's strange motives, explore their deepening bond, and discover whether Shimako will escape the palace or be lured into staying forever... in the clutches of something far darker than she imagined.
Features
Fully Voice Acted Heroine by Sky Santacruz
Heroine is based on Oto-hime
15.7k Words
3 Endings
Toxic Yuri
Aquarium Dates
Content Warning
This game contains kidnapping, blood, mild violence, passionate yuri eating, murder, hypnotism, gaslighting, blackmail, sweet yuri relationships and toxic yuri relationships.
The content in this game revolves around gaslighting and toxic relationships. While there is no explicit violence or adult content, reader discretion is advised.
Let us know if you encounter any bugs, and Oto-hime wil give you a hug.
This was a game completed under a month as an entry
for this year's
Meet the Team
| NAME | ROLE | SOCIALS |
| Maple | Scenario, Programmer | |
| Arkd3v | Co-Writer, Programmer, Project Manager | Official Website |
| Ess | CG Artist | Twitter, Official Website |
| Natsumen | Logo Design | Twitter, Website |
| Small Bunny | Programmer | |
| Cup | BG Artist, Character Design | |
| Justin Bender | Sound Design, Voice Acting Implementation, Sound Director | |
| Phen | Sprite Artist | |
| Saren | Editor | |
| Sky Santacruz | Oto-hime VA | Twitter, Official Website |
| Bark | GUI Designer, UI Implementation | |
| Trumpetguy | Music | Youtube |
PLAYTESTERS:
ayda
Alice
i support tomboy supremacy
Sulleta
sansmaeda
Additional Art Assets: MoonWind, Minchi Rie, Vita-chi Materials and Arimia
[Version Log]
29/09/24 - Version 1.0 Game Uploaded
30/09/24 - Fix ringing noise bug, missing Voice Acting is added.
02/10/24 -More voice acting polished, credit screen polished and fix minor text alignments.
03/10/24 - New textbox and minor bug fix
Download
Click download now to get access to the following files:
Comments
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I really loved this game! I played it back during Spooktober and thought it had a great sense of tension and general dread. The voice acting and art were very polished, and I thought the animated bgs were a great touch!
Alright, that was scary I loved it.
Wow I´m absolutely in love! My favourite thing were definetly the creepy sprites
I just finished reading this and I have lots to say:
Spoiler alert
Great
Oto-hime is well done. It's a well-done, very tame yandere. She's well portrayed and the voice-actor, most of the time, did an excellent job in showing the soft-spokenness of her in contrast with her actions (when it was not excellent, it was good). I like a lot how the fact she's yandere appears over time and how it's revealed, with hints since very early.
OK
The co-workers were portrayed as fake bastards which allowed an interesting back and forth between wether Shimako was actually telling the truth or not.
They were also a good tool to enhance and diverse Oto-hime's personality.
The ending fits well for the buildup that the story has been bringing.
The bubbles are a nice touch.
Art style is incoherent. BG art, sprite art and CG art are disjoint and, from my perspective, it's as if the artists didn't do any communication to make it more cohesive. It doesn't stand out a lot but specially Oto-hime's detail level vs BG detail level does stand out.
Too bad that the coworkers didn't get to have complete sprites besides a silhouette.
NOPE
Shimako is, in my perspective, quite, with lack of better word, stupid. The actions, the options available, the thought process... If it wasn't for how interesting Oto-hime is and how cutely she's drawn, I think Shimako is really someone I'd avoid because of how much of a non-person she is. Countless times I felt like screaming to the screen for an option that would make sense... But it doesn't exist... After some time, it makes full sense it doesn't exist because it wouldn't make sense to Shimako's personality.
So so many actions narrated and not coded. Camera movements that could have been done, character movements that were not done, a couple more expressions for Oto-hime (is it because of lack of time? I understand if it is... Art takes time). I remember near the end, Shimako runs away but instead of zooming the camera out, Oto-hime is zoomed out. Also near the end, when Shimako is pushed in by the water, Oto-hime is zoomed in, instead of the camera zooming in.
WTF
So many menus asking for a choice. So many not-a-choice. So many seems to be a choice but it's not. It doesn't feel like a design choice. It feels more like to make the kinetic novel not feel like a kinetic novel when only a technicality at two points in the whole text makes it not a kinetic novel.
Overall
I reached the end and, I confess, it didn't really satisfy me. Even though, there are some parts that satisfied me, specially Oto-hime's portraial. Shimako... not really.
5 out of 10
Thank you for the detailed review! I really appreciate it. I’m glad Oto-hime’s portrayal still resonated with you Sky is so awesome, and I agree with the choices, if we had the time I would have prob made it more immersive with the varying dialogues for each choice and making it more interactive and I want to improve my cinematography so much lol I’m still learning it rn, but finding out about renpy transform near the end was very scary and we didn’t have the the time to dive on to it deeply T.T and about Shimako I don’t know if our intentions work that well or not made clear enough, but I guess you got gaslighted by Oto-hime and love how you got frustrated over the choices lol, but I can see the issue your talking about though, we’re working on making it more noticeable and would love to have some visual cues and some dialogues for her fears and the effects of Oto-hime towards Shimako in the future, thanks.
Oh... I see... Lack of experience drove those cinematography issues. I thought with so many programmers, you'd be helping each other on that 🙂. Maybe I just overestimated, sorry. Check out https://feniksdev.com/. he has awesome tutorials. There's also lots of youtube videos.
I think I get it... In that case, I think that part of the story suffers HUGELY (and I mean "hugely") from "good intentions, bad execution". You are trying to show that Oto-hime is gaslighting all the time but, in reality, what comes across is that she's right all the time.
There's no content showing the truth. There's no "before" in the story. There's only a hint about shaved ice with Shimako's own rejection. You can only continue fishing or go to your colleagues.... Both are just "go to turtle" without anything else. Then, the first time the reader knows about Shimako's past with her co-workers is about them treating her very badly.
At that time, Oto-hime didn't have any real opportunity to gaslight Shimako into really thinking badly about her co-workers. But, just in the first scene with Oto-hime, I already go through a meaningless choice "move" and a meaningless choice "Why did you bring me here?". That already sets the tone for how choices work and will feel to the reader. Then when choosing what to eat being fully meaningless, cemented that tone. Even if you wanted to make it look like it's a "you don't have a choice because you are being gaslighted", you taught something else to the reader.
Was I able to explain it better from the POV of the reader? 🤔
IMO, this could gain A LOT from:
Also, I think this would be a good idea.
Thank you for your attention.
Thank you so much for this 😭. I will make a note on this. This will help us out a lot. I'm also trying to learn how to use ATL and making it much more cinematic so this is the perfect chance. Thank you again for your thoughtful reviews 🙏
You sound like a great person. Here's an offer: If you want, I can give you some examples with some of your work.
For now, you can find me on discord under the same username. You can DM me and I can give some practical help 😉.
Such a beautiful atmosphere and interesting story! I love marine themes and eldritch sea inhabitants so much! Uuu... i want more >_<
Thanks, I feel the same way. I want to see more of this kind of games 😭. I want evil mermaids and I want more yuri eldritch horror in general.
this game was absolutely breathtaking!!!! i am seriously obsessed with oto-hime, and i will be thinking about this game for a very long long time. i love it very dearly!!!
Thanks, we're happy that you like it so much!
Lovely art, and it was fun to get all the endings! Oto-hime's VA and characterization are great.
Haven’t finished the ending yet, it’s quite long, but it’s impressive how you managed to complete such a long story in this short time!
One small thing is that I think some lines don’t match the voice, but I didn’t take a screenshot still a nice game, and the art is really good as well!
Thanks for letting us know and playing our game. We might have missed those bugs.
I've had some bugs in my playthrough like the ringing noise doesn't stop and keeps repeating till the end, some dialogues don't have voice acting or loaded incorrectly, it's kind of a bummer that the main character only appears in CGs, I love the ending CGs so much, but sadly it's also the only thing that makes this whole experience worth it I guess? Still a decent visual novel imo, reminds me a lot of Aquatic Grave by LiminAce which has somewhat the same story lol (https://liminace.itch.io/aquatic-grave).
Thanks for playing our game! We will work to fix the bugs you mentioned!!!
Just poppin in to say thanks for letting us know about this bug. It was really helpful! Thanks again!!