I made this game for The Icehouse Jam 2019:https://itch.io/jam/icehouse-jam .

RPG Maker Horror games have always fascinated me. Ever since I attempted making games in 2013, these games had an aura about them. The first RPG Maker horror I played was Dreaming Mary. What it lacked in gameplay made it up with its atmosphere in spades. The creepy music, the ways some characters talk to you it was quite chilling, but I enjoyed the experience nevertheless. After I started to take game development more seriously the thought of making a horror game floated in my mind. After the completion of my first I decided to try my own RPG Maker Horror game, I wanted to also challenge myself so I decided to use the Icehouse Jam 2019 as a framework for my game. Dreams have always fascinated me so I decided to incorporate the story of the Greek God of Dreams Morpheus into my game.

The average runtime for this game is roughly half an hour. This is an interactive narrative where you interact with the world and watch the story unfold. There are three puzzles in this game to break up the story so it can engage the player in a different way other than experiencing the story.

Aurora loves to dream especially lucid dreaming. She has some issues with her family so she escapes them by fantasizing of a better life. One day, while she is lucid dreaming she gets trapped in her dream. She will have to face her fears and confront her problems if she wishes to wake up again.

Characters
Aurora: She is the main character of this game. She loves her family very much but when trouble rears its head she usually runs away from it or tries to avoid it.

Candace: She is Aurora's mother. She is very strict and serious with Aurora but, she does this out of love. She wants to see her daughter become the best person she can be.


Controls

Arrow keys: Move and scroll through the menus

Space bar, Z key or Enter key: Interact with objects or people

X Key: Cancel choices/Open Menu

Thomas: He is Aurora's father. He is very care-free and likes to live life to the fullest. He wants Candace to loosen up sometimes because he wants her to be happy too. He tries to get Aurora to be more expressive and have some fun with her life.

This game won Second place in the The IceHouse Jam with the judges. This is what they had to say:

"Not my cup of tea but really well done. It takes quite some time to get down to business, but that's fine. Overall the realization is very good. The story lacks maturity but is in the theme of the Jam. The black spots for me are the graphics: pixel elements are fine, the portraits are ok but the general appearance (UI) is too generic, it lacks of soul. Still, to me, one of the best propositions for this jam."
"The Heart's Fallacy was ambitious and quite fun to play, with good ideas, but visually we didn't like it as much, the generic RPG graphics lacked a little of personality. (They were assets, right?)"
"I found this game very mesmerising and immersive. The artwork reminds me a lot of my step daughter's, very illustrative - and the game's game world graphics took me back to when I used to play my game boy colour. I was very glad I could play the game full screen too. What I found interesting was the slight 3D look to the objects in the scenes, seen from the top view perspective. What could be interesting to toy with is the technique of adding pre-rendered assets into the 2D space? This was used in games such as Firefly's Stronghold back in 2001, etc. This could enrich the game world more. However, I also love the anime / cartoon-style graphics too. With the help of the beautiful music, the game conveyed a strong sense of what was 'real' and what was 'dream' within the tone of the visuals. The intro was very intriguing and spooky, hooked me instantly. My favourite part of playing this game was entering the dream with Aurora's parents. The music here is so good. I would play the game just to listen to this piece of soundtrack. Very beautiful. Within the first moments of playing this game, the player has already experienced the dark vibe of the mysterious 'bad' dreams, the mundane mood of the miserable real world and the colourful prosperity of the 'good' dreams - but there's that feeling of when will it all shatter, and when will the spider-like create re-emmerge? Aurora's Dream scene with her parents gave me a mixed bag of feelings. There was the sense I was actually there within the dream, everything is beautiful and peaceful, happy, with the light twinkle of strings and piano fluttering around me ... yet is Aurora's dad in fact dead in the real world? If so, there was also a heavy sense of sadness in this scene too, a very interesting combination of emotion. And if so, how? Was it connected to the spider? The game made me ask questions which is fantastic. The dialogue sections are really well written, too. Voice overs would work wonders here, yet the music is also strong enough to convey the moods being generated by characters during such scenes. Overall, a very lovely experience which I would like to continue by diving deeper into the 'dream' with this gem