What is Hopepunk City?

The fourth game of the Date Ariane Remastered series. Set in a near future world where the United States no longer exists, jobs are automated and the economy is run by Artificial Intelligence. You play as a climate change refugee trying to make a better life in a small liberal city-state somewhere in the middle of the former US.

Do I need to play the other three before this game can make sense?

No, the game has an independent story not linked to the previous stories. There are “easter eggs” for people that played the previous games, but any knowledge you might need about the characters and what happened in the previous games is explained in this game. When you create a character, select that you have never met Ariane or Rachel before, and the game will treat you as a new player, and will explain the various character histories in more detail. Note: Maya is a new character to this game, as well.

Any bonus content if I did play the previous games?

Yes. You can select to be a returning player character from Something’s In The Air or Ariane in Paradise, and that will change the dialog of Rachel and Ariane based on their previous knowledge of you. The story and achievements are not dependent on your characters origin or gender.

Is the game interface similar to Date Ariane or Ariane in Paradise?

Ariane in Paradise, definitely. Date Ariane Remastered and Something’s In The Air Redux were redesigned with this same style. Every time the player character talks, an avatar representative pops up to remind you what you look like. This can be turned off in preferences. Each main character has a different color of text so you can identify who is talking. Ariane is always yellow, Rachel is always magenta, Maya is bright green, Leah is bright orange, and you the player is Cyan.

What romance options are there in this game?

There are basically four successful romance options: Everybody platonic friends, sharing a room with Ariane, sharing a room with Rachel, multiple friends with benefits. The gender you pick does not change these options, but if you pick a “new” character origin, you will be able to pick an orientation, which could limit you to the platonic friends ending.

What about sex and nudity?

There is both in the game, but in preferences, if you pick “easy” on the PC or Mac version, it will put you in censored mode. This makes the game streamable on twitch or you tube, or “safe for work”, though it will block access to some scenes and achievements. This option is not available on Android.

Where did the music come from?

The music is commercially licensed royalty free music from a couple of different sources linked in the game credits. It is copyrighted, and I do not own the copyright, just the right to non-exclusively use it in my game. Streaming the game with music turned on should not result in a copyright claim, but you can turn the music off in Preferences if you find it annoying.

Is there a walkthrough available?

Because of the way the game was designed, a traditional step by step walkthrough will not work, but there are 8 “Case Files” available on the Hopepunk City Wiki that act as a sort of walk through. Each one explains a different aspect of game play and how to score the most “likes”, and earn all the 70 achievements.

What’s a Visual Novel?

A Visual Novel is a story based video game. They are extremely popular in Japan. Think of it as a cross between a “Choose Your Own Adventure” comic book, and an adventure game with puzzles to solve. While comic books traditionally feature action stories involving super heroes, and computer adventure games traditionally feature mystery stories, visual novels are traditionally romantic stories. Visual novels (like comic books and adventure games) can really be about any genre, though Something’s In The Air is a romantic comedy. More info on my blog or on wikipedia.

Will this run on my computer?

Hopepunk City was written for Renpy, a well respected open source visual novel engine used by hundreds of games. Besides pictures and text, it can include music, sound effects, and voice (which I don’t use), as well as special visual effects not possible in HTML. Renpy also allows you to save games, auto forward time, run in windowed or full screen modes. This game is made in Renpy 7.4, which is not designed for Windows XP or older

Can I share and redistribute the game?

NO! The game is copyright and a commercial game. It is for sale on the site store or the itch.io store

Can I mod the game?

For your own use? Yes you can. There is a subdirectory in the download called “game” where you will find all the pictures and Renpy text files used in the game. As long as you don’t redistribute your modified game, you can customize it all you want. You may need to download the Renpy developers kit and a text editor.

How do I start the game over?

Saved games are located in two places, so you need to erase both to start over:

1. Not sure where to find it on Mac or Linux, but on a windows computer you can find it by typing “%appdata%” in your computer’s search field, then click, “roaming”, then “renpy”, then “hopepunkcity05”.

2. Another copy can be found in the game directory. Go to where you installed the game, open “games” then “saves”

In these directories, you will find a file called “persistent”. If you delete both of these files, all the game data will be erased and it will be like you are starting the game brand new. You can also delete old saved games as well.