Elsaverse

The Elsaverse is an adult fictional universe created by Tora Productions, a team formed by American writer and coder Tlaero and Portuguese graphical artist Mortze, where several "story-based erotic adventure games" are set. It is named after Elsa, the main love interest in the first title set in this universe, Dreaming with Elsa, released on July 3, 2015. Most of the stories told in the Elsaverse take place in Sangrive, a fictional city located somewhere in a Western country (the actual country is never mentioned, although the city has European vibes), and apparently in a world similar to ours, but different: plots incorporate fantasy elements such as superpowers and parallel worlds.

The Elsaverse saga is a classic story of good versus evil, a story about ordinary people gifted with extraordinary abilities trying to oppose a big villain of even greater powers while sorting their very own affectional issues out. The focus on characters' development and emotional nuances, perfectly depicted in Mortze's renders, as well as Tlaero's magisterial worldbuilding and storytelling, set the Elsaverse apart from other western indie video games for adults, where sex is the main goal and driving force and story-related aspects tend to be forgotten. Usually, Elsaverse's main characters deal with some inner conflict while facing an external threat from an evil source, and they must trust and rely on their partners and friends to overcome these difficulties and grow; that way, despite the fantasy elements in the setting, human relationships end up taking center stage. This human perspective is reinforced by the fact that the graphic sexual content is subordinated to the narrative logic in a context of consensual and respectful affectional relationships between full-grown adults.

The Elsaverse is still in development; as of December 2022, 6 completed games (counting Darkness Falls as one single title, although it was released in episodic format and divided into two seasons, the second one remaining unfinished), 12 non-interactive short stories and 1 novella have been published so far. Originally written in English, all titles include in-built translations into French and Spanish, and some of them also include translations into other languages such as German and/or Italian. All the Elsaverse content is available for free on Tora Production's Patreon page.

Plot overview
Elsaverse's big picture isn't revealed until way down into the saga, when all those apparently unrelated stories and events depicted in the first titles start to fit together. More than thirty years ago, a man arrived in Sangrive: a powerful king from another world who was bored on his throne and decided to start again his rise to the top somewhere else. To achieve that, he orchestrated a treason against his own people and sealed a deal with his kingdom's enemies: he'd give them the throne away and, in exchange, they'd keep an interdimensional portal to his new playground open, so that he could run away and get back home in case his new endeavor went poorly. This king's name was Morland and, like many other people in his homeworld, he has a special ability: in his case, he can foresee the consequences of his words and actions. With that secret advantage in a world where those powers were absent and where he ages way more slowly than humans, he started to amass wealth and power in the city, dutifully assisted by his heartless assassin and grotesque sex doll, Crow, and a bunch of minions who do the dirty jobs for him. But the interdimensional portal Morland keeps secretly hidden in his mansion's dungeon as an easy way out has one side effect: it's slowly leaking powers from his homeworld, and some people born and raised in Sangrive since Morland's arrival are developing unnatural abilities too. Although, due to the irrationality of their situation, most of them just keep that secret to themselves, thinking that their case is unique.

Meanwhile, the last surviving elite warrior of the Morland kingdom's army, Xara, is also in Sangrive. As a cruel punishment for letting them escape, she's forced to relive every night the moment she was blinded by Morland's assassin until she can accomplish her mission of bringing both of them to their world's justice. But, despite her deadly fighting abilities, that's not an easy task for a blind woman who totally lacks the social skills needed to lead a reduced group of humans with powers she has managed to recruit: a group of young and broken females who don't quite know how to deal with their secret superpowers in addition to their miserable love life. Fortunately, those women will find caring, loving, and supportive men who will help them out; and, more importantly, they'll also find an insider's help from within Morland's ranks: despite all initial appearances, Chloe, his own daughter and minion, and the only person in this world whose reactions Morland can't foresee, is trying to do the right thing and take his abusive father down, if anything, to set herself free.

Working together, Xara's Angels finally achieve to help Xara bring Morland and Crow back to their homeworld, although she won't get her punishment lifted as she was originally promised. But, with Morland gone, things in Sangrive won't stay calm: as more and more people are developing unnatural powers, and since not everyone is using them for a greater good, the Sangrive Police Department must set up a secret team to chase those criminals down and cover their actions before powers' existence becomes of public knowledge - all while Morland's son, Charles, tries to follow in his father's footsteps, building his own squad of gifted humans.

Video Games
Games are the main narrative vehicle in the Elsaverse. In each game, the player takes the role of a different male character who, except in Darkness Falls, tries to start, resume or strengthen a love relationship with a non-player female character (NPC). It can be argued that the female NPCs are the actual main characters in each title, while the player's character (PC) adopts a supporting role, sometimes acting as a plot catalyst. As those male PCs are, initially, external agents completely unaware of the overarching storyline, different aspects of the fictional universe are unveiled in each game as a new PC starts to get sucked into the plot. This lets players get the Elsaverse's big picture by putting all pieces from different games together, and contributes greatly to the worldbuilding, which is developed organically without resorting to large chunks of exposition text, with the short stories filling the gaps and foreshadowing new conflicts and characters.

Except for small interludes, the games' action is narrated in the first person and from the player's point of view; however, due to the heavy focus on the development of the plot and characters' personalities, the player's agency is limited, as PC's actions must drive the story toward the expected ending. Each title offers slightly different gameplay features, mostly based on dialogue choices where the player is presented with 2 or 3 possible answers or actions to pick from. Games tend to reward mature and understanding behaviors and penalize selfish choices or actions that go against the limits set by the female NPCs.

Like superhero movies, all games incorporate a post-credits scene, dropping hints of some aspects of future plots. They also include an achievement system: when the player gets all of the achievements, a bonus scene is unlocked. This bonus scene is usually a sex scene, although sometimes it can also explain some storylines.

All the Elsaverse games originally created in HTML format (from Dreaming with Elsa to Darkness Falls) were officially ported to Ren'Py during 2021, and then put together in a bundle called Elsaverse Omnibus Vol.1, publicly released on August 5, 2021. This bundle also includes Ren'Py ports of all the visual short stories in HTML, as well as all the text-based stories still in that format.

From a pure gaming point of view, these titles offer a very diverse experience. While all of them are pure "Visual Novels" and share some common elements, like dialog choices and even some 'point&click' elements, each game has a distinctive flavor, as players must behave or shape their character differently. The developer team has been constantly hearing players' feedback and trying to improve things title after title, without forgetting that there's an overall narrative that must be told, which goes against giving significant agency to players. Walkthroughs for all of these games can be found here.

Short stories
Elsaverse's short stories offer more complex narratives and contribute greatly to the expansion of the fictional universe. Usually written in the third person, they tend to focus on several characters, shifting from one to another and showing events from their respective point of view, expanding some events and other details seen in the games, and explaining what was actually going on in those situations, as well as foreshadowing some aspects of future titles.

Some short stories could be labeled as non-interactive visual stories (DwE: Learning to Fly, DwE: Dreaming with the Dead, DwE: Multiplicity, Royal Guard, FM: Alpha, Elsa's Nightmares and Elsaverse: Transitions), as they follow the same aesthethic pattern of the Elsaverse's games, with a slideshow of pics illustrating the scenes narrated in them. The rest of short stories are either fully text-based (Demon Guard) or include some scarce pics (Beginnings, Dream Master, Won: Darkness Within, and FM: Hope). All but Elsa's Nightmares and Elsaverse: Transitions are available in the Elsaverse Omnibus Vol.1 (2021) bundle.

The game Chasing Beth (2021) includes a visual short story as a post-credits scene, titled Stand Up.

Novella
AAA (2018) is a special case within the Elsaverse, as it's an actual novella that contains more than 28,000 words, with no pics at all, and just a couple of sex scenes. Divided in 10 chapters, the story links the events narrated in Redemption for Jessika (2016) and the first season of Darkness Falls (2018). AAA is included in the Elsaverse Omnibus Vol.1 (2021) bundle.

Next Projects
On February 2023, Tlaero announced on Tora Productions' Discord server the planned roadmap for the next stories set in the Elsaverse. According to her, she has already written a 3-4 episode short story called Elsaverse, Past, Present, and Future that will follow the events in Elsaverse: Transitions (2020-2021) and Chasing Beth (2021); after that, the team will focus on a game titled Dream Corps. However, these projects are still on an early phase of development, as Tora Productions is currently working on other stories outside the Elsaverse. Therefore, there's no estimated date of release.

Abandoned projects
In April 19th, 2019, Tlaero unexpectedly announced her immediate retirement from erotic gaming creation. That left Darkness Falls Season II, as well as the text story Demon Guard (2019) that was becoming a new novella, unfinished after just 2 chapters. Eventually, Tlaero came back some months later to keep expanding the universe, and those projects were officially put on hold. However, it's highly unlikely that they will be ever resumed: Demon Guard can work as it is, as a short story with an open ending, and Darkness Falls characters and stories are being incorporated organically into the new titles. Moreover, while being officially retired Tlaero already wrote Won: Darkness Within (2019) to tell Detective Won's background, a storyline that was originally planned to be a key part of that unfinished Season II, this limiting from a narrative point of view the actual interest of carrying on with that episodic format.

Shortly after Tlaero's sudden retirement, Mortze paired up with writer Iksanabot and began to work on a different game set in the Elsaverse, titled The Science of Lust. However, after releasing the first beta on May 28, 2019, Iksanabot also stepped down due to real-life professional reasons, and the project was abandoned.

Intended Order of Play
Each game and non-interactive story can be played and enjoyed as a standalone title. However, to avoid spoilers and get a full grasp of the whole universe, it's highly recommendable to play and read the full Elsaverse in the order listed below. Every title ever published from Dreaming with Elsa to Won: Darkness Within is currently accessible from the Elsaverse Omnibus Vol.1 bundle. In the future, a second bundle will contain the newer titles originally made in Ren'Py, since different image ratio aspects advise against creating a single and universal bundle for all the existing content.

Fictional timeline
According to the events and time references included in them, Elsaverse's titles follow this timeline (games are framed in red in the figure, that should be read from top to bottom):

Origins
Assuming that the Elsaverse's historical evolution is similar to that of the real world, Dream Master can be placed around the 17th Century. Events and stories surrounding Dreaming with Elsa occur in the modern-day, but no time references are explicitly mentioned beyond that DwE: Dreaming with the Dead is set on Halloween, followed by DwE: Multiplicity. This detail could place the events of what can be called the Elsaverse's Main Week in early December, since Redemption for Jessika is said to be happening during "late fall". However, it's possible for RfJ to be taking place one year later, depending on how much of a fast-learner Elsa actually is, and when exactly Chloe met Xara: in Saving Chloe, Xara is said to have been in Sangrive for a little more than a year, and they met before Chloe was forced by Elsa to stop using dream spells in DwE; if that first meeting took place right after Xara's arrival, RfJ can safely start on next year's fall, giving Elsa several months to master her skills and stabilize her relationship with Jason after DwE: Multiplicity. Anyway, what it is actually known is that things start to get complicated on a certain Wednesday, when Finding Miranda prologue takes place and the AAA novella begins its own course during Mayhem's dire concert.

Main Week
Five weeks later, on Thursday, Finding Miranda actually starts, with Redemption for Jessika doing the same that Friday (that's also the day of the FM: Alpha incident). On Saturday it's time to enter Darkness Falls territory, and during the next week, the three games are intertwined with the novella's chapters 8 and 9. All titles converge around the events at the Mayoral rally on Thursday, one exact week after Lucas' first date with Miranda in FM. Then, two weeks later, both Darkness Falls first season and AAA reach their own, shared climax.

End of the First Story Arc
After the last incident covered in Darkness Falls Season I, there's a small break, with the last part of AAA's Chapter 10 taking place sometime during those 2 quiet weeks. Then Saving Chloe begins on a Friday and it's over by that Sunday, with Demon Guard telling what happens to Xara immediately after those events. That's how the first story arc ends, with Darkness Falls Season II starting a couple of days later.

Transition Period
While sorting out her personal issues, Tlaero still found time to start writing new stories in the Elsaverse, wrapping up Michelle Won's personal story in Won: Darkness Within, and then creating Elsa's Nightmares and Elsaverse: Transitions, that pave the road for Chasing Beth. None of those titles has established a precise timeline for their stories, except for them happening in that order, with the only explicit time reference being a vague comment from Jason that places Elsaverse: Transitions "some months" after Elsa's Nightmares. From the state of other love relationships depicted in Chasing Beth, it seems that many months have passed since Saving Chloe's events, but, again, there's no exact timing yet for this new story arc, aside from Chasing Beth covering 5 days and taking place immediately after Elsaverse: Transitions (or even colliding with its last couple of episodes).

The last title released so far, FM: Hope (2022), takes place in the period between Elsa's Nightmares and Elsaverse: Transitions, although its main storyline refers to an event that likely occurred before the start of Dreaming with Elsa.

Characters
For a complete list of characters, see Category: Elsaverse characters.

As the Elsaverse keeps expanding, the main characters appear in different games and stories, sharing the spotlight and weaving a web that allows the player to witness the same events from different points of view, which enhances the understanding of said events and the universe as a whole, as well as the characters' real motivations and personal evolution, challenges, and desires.

Love, friendship, trust, honesty, empathy, and respect are the core values of the protagonists, as well as braveness not only to face evil, but also to support their loved ones when needed, and even to seek help for themselves. Female characters, while broken, are depicted as intelligent and independent women; males, at least on canon routes, are emotionally mature, supportive, and caring.

Visuals
The visuals' quality is on par with the narrative. The Elsaverse uses pre-rendered 3D still pictures created with tools like Daz3D, Blender, IRay, and Photoshop. Although the older titles' pictures are grainy and seem a bit dated if we judge them by current day standards, the human-looking realism in character's physical features, their uniqueness, and facial expressiveness are the most outstanding aspects of the art, together with the care for the lighting and the almost cinematographical composition of the scenes. Depth of field is broadly used to emphasize characters' actions and emotions, and models and backgrounds look organic, without that "plastic-shining" effect often seen in this kind of 3D rendered games. In addition, the image compression ratio is remarkable, as any full game in the Elsaverse has a considerably lower file size than other similar adult games, without any noticeable quality loss on screen. Some basic animations can be found, mostly in sex scenes; although they were totally dropped in most recent titles.

Engine
The first titles set in the Elsaverse were created with 'Adventure Creator', a software designed by Tlaero herself, and were originally released in HTML format. However, all games and short stories published in that format (from Dreaming with Elsa to Won: Darkness Within) were officially ported to Ren'Py in 2021 and released in a bundle named Elsaverse Omnibus Vol.1, publicly released on August 5, 2021. Starting with Elsa's Nightmares (2019-2020), Elsaverse's games and visual short stories are natively made with the Ren'Py game engine.