Make Rachel Your Girlfriend
Hopepunk City will be available in stores on October 1.
I posted previously about Ariane as a girlfriend romantic ending. Rachel becoming your girlfriend is also possible, though it is a bit harder, and involves some sci-fi adventure to get there, but she is “romanceable”.
There is also a third “romance” option where you get neither Ariane or Rachel, but you get on very friendly terms with the entire household. Early on, I wanted to have a theme where “friendship” is more important than “romance”, but that doesn’t rule out “friends with benefits”. I don’t consider this a “harem” game, because it is not about juggling lovers, but I am not against the comparison.
The idea of friendship is better than romance is a concept that comes from queer communities I hang out in. I’m aromantic, which is a much misunderstood sexual orientation. The third roommate, a dark skinned beauty named Maya, is also aromantic, and thus not “romance-able”, but she will be your friend. It was established in Rachel Meets Ariane that Rachel is asexual. The asexuality and aromaticism are not the same, which is why I have two characters representing. So yes this is a “queer” friendly game. Except for one scene where they come out to you, the topic is largely avoidable if you choose. It is not relevant to the plot, I just wanted that representation in this game since it is so rare.
Not that there is never representation of aromantics and asexuals in media, its just that it tends to be negative and/or stereotypical. I wanted positive and non-stereotypical representation. Asexuals are stereotypically prudes when it comes to sex; Rachel is not, she has almost as many nude scenes as Ariane. Aromatics are stereotypically sociopaths who are incapable of love; Maya is not a sociopath, in fact she has a big heart. It just doesn’t work in romantic situations.
The mere fact that you can play as a male or female protagonist pretty much establishes the games credentials as a queer friendly game. If you play as a “new character”, you can choose your characters orientation of gay, straight, bi, or ace. Warning: Picking an orientation that is not sexually attracted to women, pretty much guarantees the “just friends” ending, but I felt it necessary to give players that choice.
Here’s another music video, again not music from the game, just a “friendship” song that kind of exemplifies my feeling on the topic.
Date Ariane Games 
recently (maybe around June/July 2021) I’ve been downloading Renpy games that won’t play on my PC because I have WinXP and they need at least Windows Vista (or so my error message says). My current financial status won’t permit me to by a new PC, and my current PC’s limits are WinXP. These games never list that Vista-or-greater restriction in their system requirements section. Your Strip Crazy Eights is one such game. What about this one (and all your future releases)? I don’t expect you to make a version just for me; but it should at least be noted somewhere. Is there perhaps a workaround? I have found through experimantation that sometimes replacing parts of the renpy game code with older code (from the library section, for example) will work. Other times it won’t; especially when it comes down to unpacking rpa files. The resultant unpacked rpy files sometimes cut out when decoding, leaving me with only part of the file up to where the unpacking crapped out.
You answered yourself. Current games are not made with such an old operating system in mind, so your best option is to save money to buy a new PC, if that’s an option. As an alternative, you should try Linux. SteamOS is developed by Valve specifically with Steam compatibility in mind, and it is free to acquire.
Renpy games can run on Linux, but I don’t know nor can I assure that Ariane’s games will run on it, but that’s your best shot with your current hardware.
The PC versions of all my games will work on Windows (Vista or 10) or Linux. It makes the files a little larger, but I try to increase how many people can use them.
Thanks, all,… I imagine whether or not I can play a Renpy game will be determined by which version of Renpy the gaome was built with, Does anyone know which version numbers are WinXP compatable, and a what point they became incompatible?
Can’t wait to play. Big fan of your work.
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How can i make facile rachel my Girlfriend