I’ve made a lot of progress. I’ve implemented the ability to take pictures with a camera, and have the game recognize what the player has taken a picture of.
After taking a picture, the player has three options: Save, Send, and Delete. “Save” stores the image as a .png. “Send” sends the image to a sidekick character who can provide you with assistance if you send them the right pictures.
Collecting Student Information
If you snap a picture of a student, Sidekick-chan will provide some information on that student:
Depending on what club the student is in, they will be able to tell if you’ve stolen something. (If you’re not in the Music club, but you’re carrying around a guitar case, and a member of the Music club spots you, they will be able to tell that you’ve stolen property from the Music club. However, members of OTHER clubs won’t be able to tell that you’ve stolen something.)
A student’s personality determines how they react to murder (flee the school, tell a teacher, hide amongst other students, fight you, express gratitude, etc).
Knowing a student’s crush can help you play Cupid and get two NPCs in a relationship with one another, which is a non-lethal way to stop your current rival from confessing her love to Senpai-kun.
Panty Shots
Sidekick-chan is VERY sleazy, and sells panty shots to perverted male students. You can provide her with pictures of girls’ panties in exchange for favors.
The game remembers who you have already taken a panty shot of, and what type of panties you’ve already collected pictures of. This opens the door the panty-related Achievements.
Yandere Vision
By holding down a specific button, the player can activate “Yandere Vision”. While Yandere Vision is active, the player can see the location of specific students. Your beloved Senpai-kun will be visible as a pink silhouette, and your current rival will be visible as a red silhouette.
If you snap a picture of a student and have Sidekick-chan send you information about that student, you will learn that student’s schedule. As a result, that student will appear as a yellow silhouette during Yandere Vision, since you always know where they are:
Yandere Vision will also highlight weapons, corpses, and incriminating evidence.
Using photographs of Senpai-kun
Every time the player performs a violent or criminal action, the character’s “Yandere Meter” will increase, causing her to appear more suspicious and dangerous to NPCs. One method to lower the Yandere Meter is to perform an evil laugh, but the player can also snap pictures of Senpai and then “use” them to lower her stress level and the Yandere Meter.
There is currently no animation for using a picture of Senpai, but the functionality is there:
Sidekick-chan Responses
Now that the game can identify what the player has taken a picture of, I’m going to have a lot of fun writing Sidekick-chan’s response to every weird thing the player might send her a picture of.
Some people have expressed an interest in collecting “trophies” of their kills by snapping a picture of their victims’ corpses. This is actually unwise, because if the police become suspicious of you and ask to have a look at your phone, they will instantly discover evidence that you’re linked to the murders.
Think twice before you take a picture of that dead girl’s panties! But maybe there will be an Achievement for completing the game while brashly carrying around tons of incriminating evidence…
Ghosts
I’ve always wanted to include a “ghost” easter egg somewhere in the game – the victim of a murder that takes place before the game begins. I figured out how to make a character invisible during normal gameplay, but visible during photographs.
I’m really happy with how the camera features are coming along! I hope players find the camera useful and fun to use.