Friendship Test - Demo

What's the story?

Friendship Test is a game about a Program (which is how robots are called in this universe) who goes on a journey travelling a mysterious laboratory. This laboratory has a series of tests prepared, however these are not regular tests, they are challenges meant to test out your level of friendship. Our program is a Friendprogram, which are designed to be good at friendship, so we are in luck!

This friendprogram, who refers as themself as just FriendProgram, will meet different Programs in their journey, some better at friendship, others worse. But F.P. is as kind as they are mysterious, nobody really knows much about them or their objective. In fact, there is a lot of story surrounding this 'abandoned' laboratory...

But oh well! No time for that, you are too busy trying to be a good friend! Good luck, try to not get rebooted!

What's the gameplay?

Friendship Test is a RPG Maker game without any typical RPG fights. The game does include 'battles', but they only require you to figure out what to say to your adversary, to convince them not to kill you. How nice of them.

The demo does not include puzzles, but they will be present later in the game.

The game is heavily story focused, if you are looking for a more gameplay-focused videogame this is not the one for you. Thanks for reading anyway, friend!

What's the game about?

Friendship Test explores different relationships and how it affects different people. The difficulties, challenges and complexities of connections. 

However as the story develops, Friendship Test primarely focuses on the topic of lovelessness.

-There are multiple characters in the aro spectrum: from romance repulsed to romance favorable, from parterning aros to aros that prefer to not have any partner, among many others. The game also include other aspec identities like asexuality, aplatonicism, etc.

-Other LGBTQIA+ characters are included in the story as well.

-While aspec themes are a big part of the story, neurodivergency plays an important part on the narrative and characters as well.

The demo is only the beginning of a bigger story, so it does not get to explore these themes a lot, aside from a couple of hints. The themes get explored much better later on.

Is the game fun even if I don't know much about a-spec stuff or the concept of lovelessness?

I hope my game is fun overall! But yes, you do not need to have in-depth knowledge about the topics discussed in the game, as the story keeps in mind there are people that might have never heard/don't know much about these identities. Hopefully my game can even help more people find out or understand different aspec identities better!

How long is the demo?

About 2 hours - 2 hours and a half long.

Music

This is a project made out of fun and passion. While I am able to draw (maybe not great, but I draw) and I was able to program a videogame (maybe not great, but it's playable), one talent I lack is making music.

The game includes free-to-use music made by many talented people. I know this is not ideal for many, and there is a lot of music repetition, but it is what it is. 

I think it's good to know your limitations and do what you can with them. And well, the way this is going, this might end up becoming an 8 hour long free videogame, so I'm allowed to have limitations.

Visual Warnings:

Interacting with the game with your mouse creates flashing boxes when you click on a character, object or tile. It's adviced to play with your keyboard or controller if you wish to avoid this.

When navigating through the menu or choosing a dialogue, there is a flickering light that highlights which text you are currently positioned in. Should not cause too much trouble, but a warning just in case doesn't hurt.

There is an issue on characters with multiple text box sprites, as they flicker for a second on occasions. This happens less on the demo, since there is only one character with multiple text box sprites, but I think a warning is necessary just in case.

There is a running option, so it can show some fast movements on the screen. 

Two scenes towards the end have a shakey camera effect.

There are some scenes with dark backgrounds and brighter colors to make objects and characters pop up more, which may cause eyestrain for some.

Overall Content Warnings:

The demo has characters that have gone through very intense situations in the past, which has affected their mental health. These events include: 

-Death and murder

-Implied ableism

-Implied abuse

-Animal experimentation and animal abuse

You do not see these events play out on screen, but the characters discuss them from time to time.

The rest of the game includes other topics like unreality and derealizations, animal death, abusive friendships, self-deprication, ableism, aphobia and suicide. These are not present in the demo.

Warnings will be provided in-game, and it will be handled as tactfully as possible, nothing too triggering will be shown on screen.

The topic of suicide is heavily implied in one event of a character's past, and it's implied later on the character still suffers from suicidal thoughts. However, it is kept very brief. The story does not show a suicide on-screen and does not discuss suicide on-depth.

Viewer discretion is adviced. The game let's you skip dialogue and fast forward scenes if you hold down the (X) key on your keyboard or hold left click on your mouse.

Compatibility

I have only been able to fully test the game in Windows, so there could be problems with the game in other platforms. I wanted to at least upload the files, but again, they might have problems. I'm very sorry for the inconvenience.

If you're not able to play, you can watch a full playthrough of the demo on the official Friendship Test youtube channel.

But most important of all...

I hope you enjoy the game! Thanks for reading!

Keep up with Friendship Test's updates through its official Youtube, Tumblr and Bluesky accounts!

https://www.youtube.com/@Friendship-Test/videos

https://friendship-test.tumblr.com/

https://bsky.app/profile/friendshiptest.bsky.social

Support me on Patreon!

patreon.com/Mar64ds