A downloadable game for Windows, macOS, and Linux

Coming 2023! (Demo Available now!)

* Funded on Kickstarter *

The Game

In Blood is a gothic romance and lovecraftian horror visual novel with a branching narrative that explores toxic relationships and what it means to lose yourself.

Inspired by otome games like Demonheart, Diabolik Lovers, and CindersIn Blood is a mature story with engaging characters and plot.

The Story


After a night of drinking Eleadora "Ellie" takes a shortcut home through the woods. She’s angry, frustrated, and sad. At the crossroads she trips and cuts her hand on some broken glass. While looking over her wounds she mutters a wish out loud that calls upon an ancient and forgotten force that changes her life forever.


She wakes up in an unknown room, in an unknown house, on an unknown plane of existence. Surrounded by horrors and death she must attempt to find an ally among the other occupants of the house. It’s clear they don’t have her best interests in mind, and trusting them could be deadly.

Survive and try to maintain your humanity.

Escape, if you still want to.

Escape, if they’ll let you.


Features

  • 3 male and 1 female romance options
  • Over 20 endings (Some good, some bad!)
  • Over a dozen  unlockable illustrations
  • English Voice Acting 
  • Original music and sound design
  • Est 200K words long
  • Personality System that features art changes to Ellie and adds endings

Characters:

Ellie just wants to go home. Accidental blood pacts with weird old Gods be damned! (The protagonist)


Eris is the immortal servant of Nyarbalte. Willing to keep you alive and feed you, but not much else. Do not go into their kitchen. Ever.

Nyarbalte is the ancient and forgotten God of the swamps. Requires blood in exchange for granting desires and can be summoned at a crossroads.

Romance Options:

Tristin is the broody (fan favorite)  guy who claims he is human, even if that doesn't seem quite right... He wants to escape as badly as you do and could prove a powerful ally. 

Brenton, our dragon himbo, likes to hide up in his tower and hang out among his collection of junk- er his hoard.  He'll keep you safe, and treasure you.

Karon is more than the guy your mother warned you about, he's the guy the entire world warns you about. Wine seems to be the way to win him over, but what happens when you do?


Seta is so helpful, and so friendly. Surely she doesn't have an ulterior motive... right? This spider loving girl seems to know way more than she lets on. 

Personality System

The game features a personality system that can have big consequences for your actions. If Ellie goes into any 1 extreme she will start to change, and this can even lead to a unique ending if pushed too far. 

 The four opposing personality traits are: selfish vs selfless and then wild vs tame. Ellie must balance these opposing forces in order to maintain her humanity.

Ellie will have partial mutations that will be a warning to the player (and Ellie!) that something might go wrong if she continues down her current path. Each mutation is inspired by creatures of folklore.

Content Warning

This game is intended for an adult audience and contains the following:

  • Violence
  • Sexual content (text only) 
  • Upsetting situations and content
  • Alcohol use and abuse
  • Some dubious consent
  • Death
  • Spiders
  • Bad ends
  • Adult language

To view a comprehensive content warning you can go here, but beware spoilers

Credits

  • Writer, Developer, Programmer: Jaime Scribbles
  • Production Manager, Editor: PMscenarios 
  • Character Artist: Illuminate001
  • GUI Artist: Sitraxis
  • BG Artist: Saleha Chowdhury
  • Illustrator: Meagan Trott and Scherville
  • Additional Artist: Jen Bird
  • Voice and Audio Director: PMscenarios
  • Demo Audio Director and Sound Designer: Tim Reichert
  • Composer:  Kyle Mesce
  • Additional Music: Antriksh Bali

Voice Actors


Links

Twitter

Website

Patreon

Download demo

Download
In Blood DEMO - PC 199 MB
Download
In Blood DEMO - Mac 181 MB
Download
In Blood DEMO - Linux 187 MB

Development log

View all posts

Comments

Log in with itch.io to leave a comment.

(+3)

Is this abandoned?

(+1)

Is the game canceled?? It has been a while since the last update and i cant find any info on the release date.

How come i can't buy the game?

As far as I know, because the game hasn't been released yet. I mean, I know the kickstarter gets updates monthly, but I'm not a backer so I can't see them. Itch.io and Patreon I think have been silent for about a year.

All we can do is hope everything's going fine and that we get some news one day.

Hi there!
I am creating a collection of fully blind accessible games, and your game is listed under the "blind support tag".  The word "blind" means different things to different people, and within that wide spectrum their are various levels of expertise with visual UI's.  but as a fully blind gamer, I am wondering what features this game provides for those who can not see the screen at all.  Do you have "screen reader" or "text to speech" support?  Is your game fully playable with a keyboard or controller, rather than having to point the mouse at buttons on the interface? If the answer to those questions is no, it would still be great to know what options are provided for those with less severe visual impairments, so that I might make them aware of your game's usability for them.  Thank you for any information you can provide, it's very much appreciated! :)

Walkthrough?

We will try to have one for the final game when it's complete.

No android?

Sorry, we don't currently have a plan for an android release.

its okey ehehehe....thanks for answer 😘😍🥰

(+1)

Hello, was wondering where i can see updates about the release? I checked the website but didn't see anything!

(+1)

Hi! We have monthly updates on Kickstarter for backers, but if you didn't back (totally okay!) you can follow me on twitter and I tend to post progress on there more frequently than I do on itch.io

You can also join the official discord server :D

Development is still (very)  active and we're trying to get the game finished as soon as we can for everyone <3 

Why is this tagged lovecraftian??

(+1)

Some of the inspirations for the game comes from lovecraft-style gods and monsters, coupled with fear of the unknown.

Hi there! So, I'm actually commenting before playing the demo, but I have a reason! The game is extremely appealing to me, generally speaking (not to mention you talked about Demonheart and that's one of my favorite western indie VN/RPGs), but I found myself intrigued (and in a sense, worried) by the mutations concept.

So, on one hand I love the idea of these transformations, and besides, this seems to be like the kind of game I adore, with a ton of bad endings to collect and that would make the good ones even more satisfying when played last. On the other hand, what I enjoy the most in games with personality stats is having a MC with a VERY defined and often extreme personality, and you said the transformations were "warnings" about that. A warning usually implies the thing it warns against is... well... bad. And I find myself worried I'd be "punished" by playing the way I like to play (so, a very very defined / extreme in their personality MC)...

Obviously I know you can't say much about that without entering heavy spoilers territory so... I don't know, can you tell me ANYTHING related to if I'll be able to get satisfying endings with my playstyle? I know I'll get madly attached if I play even the demo only, and I would prefer to avoid the frustration of not having a single ending that I'd like.

If it helps you in answering without revealing story details (you know, so you can just tell me "you should be okay" or "you may not like it", without details), in any kind of stories about the MC being transported to another world, I like it when they stay in said world (sometimes I get really really upset IRL if they go back to their world, actually - that's legit a content/trigger warning I wish could be included in games!). I also like transformations, as long as it doesn't mean the character looses their mind. I tend to appreciate open endings, but I still do like it when the main couple can be happy together.

Okay, I think that's it. Sorry for the very extensive and weird comment that isn't even feedback, and for the questions. If you'd prefer not to answer at all, that's okay - I'll come back when the game is released and when telling me would be less spoilery!

(+2)

Hi! No worries on the long comment :D

To answer your questions I think there will be endings you like and ones you don't like. 

Let me go into a bit more detail below for you (beware minor spoilers??)

The mutations have special endings if any of the traits are maxed out, but we are trying to balance this because we want the game to be fun, and not hard. It's also set up so that no 1 trait is always the "right" or "kind" choice. Sometimes you'll want to pick the selfish option, and sometimes you'll want to pick the selfless and so on. It won't be especially hard to avoid maxing them out if you want to avoid those endings, though the endings with it are very fun I think. 

I know it's very opposing to what most games do where you're rewarded for maxing things out, so if that's something that really doesn't appeal to you I totally understand!

We do have an extensive (but with spoilers!) list of content warnings if you want to check them out. It's on our website so that we can update as needed. 

(+1)

Thank you!

I did actually check the content warning list, before I asked buuut... It didn't really answer my question. But well, if you think there are endings I should like, based on what I said, then that's okay, that's all I wanted to know. Like, maybe in the end I won't be a huge fan, who knows, but at the very least, it wasn't a situation where you'd say "no, you certainly won't like it", so that's fine.

I will play the demo later, then!

(+3)

I just finished the demo, and... WOW. It's incredible! 

I have always been a fan of romance and horror, but I haven't been able to find a game that includes both elements in a satisfactory way. But I think your game is gonna be what I've been waiting for.

I loved the demo: the voice acting is great, the art is pleasing to the eye, the story is interesting and the characters are so intriguing! I personally liked best Brenton and Tristin, I find them adorable and pleasant, so I'm looking forward to seeing their less agreeable side. 

Long story short, I'll totally buy the game when it's complete :D

(+1)

I'm glad to hear that! We've been working really hard on the final game :D I'm a big fan of horror and romance as well

Cowards! Let me romance Nyarbalte!

I loved the demo. Can't wait to play further. The art, voice acting, world-building... all so good. 

I'm VERY intrigued. 

I'm glad you like it! You're not alone in wanting to romance the angry cabbage lol

hiya, it's been a while. how is the game coming along? is it still being worked on 

(+4)

Hi! The game is coming along great. It is still actively being worked on. You can keep up to date with progress on the kickstarter page (if you were a backer) or on my twitter. The dev updates are a little slower on itchio.

I'll draft an Itchio update soon but in brief everything is on track for a December 2021 release (as long as nothing goes wrong/gets delayed!) :D

(+1)

I'm not gonna phrase this as a question, because an answer would probably be spoilers. I'm just thinking this through.

There are games like Alpha Protocol, where your relationship meter is how much someone else trusts you. No matter how high your relationship with someone gets, you still have the option to betray or abandon them. In fact, a good relationship can make it easier for you to outwit and outscheme them.

Then there are games like Girl in the Box, where your relationship meter is how much you trust someone else. At low relationship, you oppose them, and at high relationship, you support them. If your relationship is high, but they're blatantly going to be betray you, you're locked out of all the options that would allow you to defend yourself against them.

In the setting of In Blood, it seems suicidal to alienate all these dangerous people, but it also seems suicidal to trust them. I'm hoping the game allows some degree of tightrope-walking, rather than just picking your preferred flavor of Too Dumb to Live.

(+1)

Hi! This is something we've been aware of during planning, and have allowed choices for. We promise there we be other options than just going along blindly :D (Any other info might be spoilers)

I loved this Demo!!!! Karon and Seta are my favorites, I have to say. Can't wait to see how the full game turns out!!!!

Thank you!! I’m glad you enjoyed it :D

(+2)

I just played the demo, and I must say that I liked it! The horror elements were done in tastes and the characters are wonderful- I would also like to add the the visual design of the game is stunning, really gets you into the mood of the game. I think Tristin is my current favorite, although Brenton was cute as well. Can't wait for the whole game! 

(+1)

Thank you! I'm glad you liked it! We worked really hard on the atmosphere (and on Tristin who is a big fave lol) :D

(1 edit) (+1)

Alright so I can say I totally loved the demo, as soon as I read "inspired by games like Demonheart" I was *eyes zoom in* LOL. Tho I wanted to ask, since the relationships are on the toxic side, can we expect any happy endings with the ROs or not? I want to donate on kickstarter, but if there will be no happy-ish endings with the ROs (like Brash on DH1 is perfectly fine, or the endings of DH:H too) then I don't think I will.

If you don't want to answer to avoid spoilers that's perfectly fine! I am just a sucker of happy endings and get depressed if there aren't any lol.

Also, let me add: kudos to the voice actors! Usually I am not a super fan of it, but the ones working on this game are *chef kiss*

(+4)

There are endings where they end up together at the end, and I’m working hard to make them way more satisfying and fleshed out than my previous games (a common feedback I was getting). I can’t give too much away because spoilers, and it’s still in the draft phase where things can drastically change :D 

I also love demonheart! 

(+1)

Ohhhhhh sweet, that's it then, I'm sold! :rofl: 

I guess you got yourself another pledge on kickstarter lmao

That's wonderful, thank you so much :D

(+1)

I loved the demo. The characters are great and the voice acting is perfect. Very much looking forward to the full game! I think Brenton is my favorite. Who doesn't enjoy an awkward dragon boy? :p 

I'm glad you're looking forward to the game! <3

(+1)

Omg!

I'm hooked!

I love the story. It's very interesting. The setting just adds to the dark, dreary atmosphere. 🧐

The characters are unique and mysterious. I wonder if Ellie can trust them. I think Brenton and Tristin are harmless, but Seta and Karon seem suspicious. 😅

Still I look forward to playing everyone's route. 😊

I'm so happy you're enjoying it! 

(+1)

Oh my goodness, I've been following this since it was announced and the demo is so good! I am intrigued by all of the characters and the setting (though Tristin is baby!)! The VA is perfect and the art and writing are A+! Look forward to the full game, but wow this demo is great! 

(+1)

Thank you so much! We're working really hard on the game so I'm really glad people are loving the demo so far. Also, awesome icon!

Thanks for the demo ! I'll keep my eye out for the full version, count me in for a purchase.

(+1)

I'm happy you enjoyed it!

(+1)

oh my gosh the forest scene in the intro is so spooky I love it and Nyarbalte's voice is amazing! so far Brenton and Eris are my favs <3 looking forward to more!!

I'm so glad you're enjoying it! 

(+1)

The voice acting in this is phenomenal! It is clear there has been a lot of work put into this. The characters are all equally well written, the sprites are great and the story pulled me in quickly. So far my favorites are Tristan, Eris and Seta.

I look forward to the full game! :)

Thank you so much! I'm so glad you enjoyed the demo :D

Deleted post

I wish I did! I have the Draft of Tristin's route completed, and after I finish the writing we'll need to do edits and audio stuff. There will be a Kickstarter in July, and if I had to take a rough guess at a release date I'd say Oct 2021, but that will likely change depending on how long everything takes and if the KS is successful. Don't worry too much I write fast lol :D

Deleted post

I am so excited for this.

(+1)

I'm happy to hear it! Public demo will be out 5/23!

(+1)

Why can't I download it? 

(+4)

It is currently in development and there is nothing to download yet, I'm hoping to have a playable demo in a few months!

(+1)

This looks really good; can't wait to play it!!

Thanks! I'm really excited to work on it

oooh this looks cool :O

(+1)

Thank you! I'm working hard on it

(+1)

I'll wait :D

Hopefully it'll be worth the wait for you!

(+1)

I am already intrigued! 

I'm glad to hear it!