u/leftypower04in

Hello everyone. I am reaching out because I handle marketing for Nova-box, an independent studio based in France. We specialize in narrative-driven games and interactive graphic novels with a heavy focus on hand-painted art and meaningful player choices.

We have five main titles on Steam right now that we are very proud of.

In Along the Edge, we follow Daphne as she moves to a remote village after inheriting a family house, exploring themes of identity and personal growth through her life choices.

Seers Isle tells the story of a group of initiates, including Rowan, who land on a mystical island for a rite of passage, focusing on collective destiny, shamanism, and the pressures of leadership.

Across the Grooves features Alice, who discovers a magical vinyl record that lets her explore alternate versions of her past, touching on themes of nostalgia, fate, and how music connects different timelines.

End of Lines is a more somber survival story centered on Camille and her family as they navigate a continent ruined by climate change, focusing on environmental ethics, resilience, and the morality of survival.

Finally, Echoes deals with an investigation into memory and the supernatural as a protagonist looks for the truth behind a friend's death, exploring how the past continues to haunt the present through themes of grief and legacy.

For more info, you can check our studio's page here: https://store.steampowered.com/developer/nova-box

Our studio is deeply committed to social and environmental values. We believe in telling stories that matter, and this is reflected in our themes, especially regarding ecology and human relationships. We try to run our studio in a way that respects these principles while supporting the indie ecosystem.

I am currently looking for other indie developers who would be interested in creating Steam bundles with us. We think that grouping games with similar themes or artistic styles is a great way for all of us to reach new audiences and support each other. If you have a narrative game or something that you think would pair well with our catalog, please feel free to reach out. I would love to discuss how we can collaborate. Feel free to ask anything

I wanted to share some character designs for our narrative project, After the Wane, focusing on Lena, our main protagonist. Since the game is a visual novel that deals with deep personal connections, we spent a lot of time making sure that both Lena and her potential romance interests felt grounded and expressive.

We decided to use a rotoscoped art style to capture more subtle human emotions while keeping a painterly aesthetic. It was important for us that each character Lena can build a relationship with has a distinct visual identity that reflects their personality and their place in the city.

It has been a challenge to balance the realistic movements of rotoscopy with the more stylized, atmospheric backgrounds of the game. I’m really interested to know what you think about the character silhouettes and the general mood we are going for with these designs.

Character art is such a huge part of how we tell this story, so I would love to hear your thoughts on how Lena and her companions look together as a group.

I’ve been using Big Picture mode a lot lately, and it honestly feels like a waste when a dev puts a high-quality, atmospheric piece of art as the "background" only for it to be 50% covered by buttons and play-time stats.

I know you can technically dig through the Steam files or use SteamDB to find the assets, but they’re often compressed or a pain to find in 4K.

Does anyone else wish we had a simple "hide UI" toggle or a "view artwork" button in the library? It would be such a cool way to appreciate the artists' work without having to go on a scavenger hunt for a desktop wallpaper version.