095. A Few Things I Know About the Script, Part Two

While Shiina Mashiro was still deep in thought, Akihisa Yoshida suddenly looked as though a light had gone on in his head and said, “That’s right! Senpai, that’s probably exactly what I meant.”

“The story is great, and the characters are well drawn, but after hearing what Aki said just now, and based on my own experience with gal games, the problem is that the psychological descriptions are too heavy. As a novel, it’s excellent, but as a script, it isn’t quite good enough!”

“Still, this is your first time working with a game script, senpai. It’s only natural that something like this would happen. But I can’t shake the feeling that...”

He trailed off there, hesitating, as though the rest of the sentence refused to come out. In the end, he said nothing at all.

The frown on Shiina Mashiro’s face had never once relaxed. At his words, she turned toward Akihisa Yoshida and said with quiet seriousness, “You don’t need to worry about my feelings. If you have something to say, then say it, Yoshida-kun.”

“Uh... all right. B-but I still can’t put it into words. It just feels like the problem isn’t only that one thing...”

Akihisa Yoshida finished in a stumbling whisper, looking thoroughly troubled.

“Isn’t that enough, Akihisa? At this point, you’re just being stubborn for the sake of it, aren’t you?” said Eriri without the slightest courtesy.

“Stubborn... for the sake of it...?” Akihisa Yoshida froze.

“You said once that it wouldn’t work, but you can’t even explain why it won’t. Then, after your companions give you an answer, you still say something like that? You’re just refusing to back down, aren’t you?”

Eriri spoke sharply.

It felt as though she were simply venting, from the creator’s point of view, her irritation at an outsider lecturing them with no understanding of the craft. Or perhaps she was trying to support the silent Shiina Mashiro and persuade Akihisa Yoshida.

Akihisa Yoshida was left speechless, and instinctively turned a pleading gaze toward Kazuya Minami.

Seeing that, Kazuya gave a light cough and stepped in. “Senpai, do you at least agree with the problem I mentioned just now?”

Shiina Mashiro let out a small sigh and nodded. “Yes, that is a problem. It was a failure of my experience. I’ve been so accustomed to writing scripts as though they were novels. I’ll revise that part when I get back.”

Kazuya nodded, then continued, “Still, we can keep this version as well. As I said earlier, it may work well if we later release it as a novel. But as Akihisa said, there is another problem.”

The brows that had just begun to ease on Shiina Mashiro’s face tightened again. As a bestselling author, it was only natural that having her work picked apart from every angle would not feel pleasant.

The reason she had not yet lashed out in pride was probably because the person criticizing her was, after all, someone who could at least be counted as half an insider, and because she acknowledged his creative ability to some degree.

“If you’ve got that many complaints, then why don’t you write it yourself?” Eriri suddenly said, leaving everyone present momentarily speechless.

“Eriri, that comment...”

“You’re beyond saving if you say something like that, Sawamura-san.”

“Wha...?”

Hearing Eriri say that, Kazuya let out an awkward, helpless laugh and was just about to say something when, unexpectedly, someone else stepped forward.

“For example, a producer must not behave in certain ways toward a creator, and a creator must not say certain things to a producer. What you just said was one of those things.”

“Shiina Mashiro...! Y-You think I’m trying to help who here, exactly!”

“At the very least, that remark didn’t help me.”

“Ugh...!”

Even so, that did not mean Shiina Mashiro agreed with Kazuya and Akihisa’s point that there was “another problem.”

The reason she spoke up may simply have been her own pride, or the part of her that could not compromise, or perhaps a boundary in her approach to her work had just been touched by Eriri’s words.

As expected, Shiina Mashiro straightened her back. Even though fatigue still lingered in those wine-red eyes, ruby-bright in their depth, she stared directly at Kazuya and said with grave seriousness, “Then let’s hear it. The other problem.”

Kazuya could clearly feel the pressure coming from Shiina Mashiro, or rather from Shashi, perhaps. As a bestselling author whose debut alone had sold five hundred thousand copies, Shiina Mashiro clearly had her own pride.

And it was precisely because of that pride that she was gradually shedding the immaturity of a high school student, beginning to look mature in every respect, almost like an adult. Yes, in every respect, she was certainly quite mature.

To be repeatedly nitpicked by a junior in the very field she excelled at most was, by any measure, something impossible to accept. That was why her words carried an unusually emotional edge.

Still, as an adult who had experienced both university and the working world, Kazuya calmly bore that pressure and said with clear eyes and a steady voice, “A successful script needs, first of all, the right balance in its dialogue and psychological descriptions. But it also has to be strong enough in its narrative tension.”

“Ah, of course, I’m not saying Senpai’s script is bad. But perhaps my proposal left the wrong impression, and as a result the story you wrote became too tightly packed. It’s very good, but as a game, players may feel the plot moves forward too hurriedly.”

“What I had in mind was this: within plenty of leisurely everyday scenes, we could include explanations of technical terms and gradually convey to the player what we want them to understand. Then, through the first major story shock—the death of Shiina Mayuri—we would tear open the cruel truth before their eyes.”

“Of course, I’m not asking Senpai to intentionally write a lot of meaningless slice-of-life scenes. But as a work whose later plot will go into a massive spiral, there has to be enough foreshadowing laid down in advance. Only then, when the mystery is finally revealed, will the player not feel like it came out of nowhere.”

“Besides, as our circle’s first release, as the work that gives outsiders their first impression and puts our group’s name on the map, I think everyone would want to present something of real quality, wouldn’t they?”

“After all, this is the circle with Shashi and Kashiwagi Eri, isn’t it?”

At last, Kazuya concluded with a smile that was half sincere and half teasing.

“Hmph! Who do you think you’re talking to? Of course it is!” Eriri, who had listened in silence to Kazuya’s explanation, huffed softly, lifted her chin, folded her arms, and said so in a proud tone.

“The twist you’re imagining is rather bad taste. Still, classic works that define an era always include some surprise element that sends the story suddenly veering off course...” Shiina Mashiro gave a faintly bitter, faintly helpless smile and let out a soft sigh, without clearly agreeing or disagreeing.