I sold my soul to the company store, now the reaper wants it back . . .

Midnight Oil is a deduction-based visual novel, with the correct solution randomized each playthough. Players will need to question and observe a crew of four railway-bending gandydancers at the turn of the 1900s, to determine which one of their number has been replaced by DEATH itself - guess wrong, and they may well be condemned to an eternity on the tracks . . .

The game was created in a single month as part of the 7th Annual Spooktober Jam - be sure to vote and check out all the other wonderful entries this year!

Midnight Oil has multiple solutions to solve for, and three major endings. 

The "culprit" you'll be solving for is randomized on each new playthrough, so be on the lookout for inconsistencies in character's responses . . .

A typical playthrough will be somewhere around 6k - 10k words, though our spectacular writing crew created over 33k words total. The game is available for Windows  and Mac, as well as a browser version - though we recommend downloading for best performance!

Features

This game also has LOAD, SAVE, QUICK-SAVE, and FAST-FORWARD options, as well as further audio volume (both MUSIC and VOICES), and text speed configuration settings.

There's no Back option, though scrolling up while in-game will bring up a BACKLOG of the most recent lines (also accessible via the menu!), and scrolling down will scrub FORWARD through the game.

Credits

Midnight Oil was developed by the FeatherBoy team & friends! Specifically, Benjamin Feinstein was the Project Head (+ sprites, some assets, backgrounds, writing, programming, sfx, and some etc.!), Fluffnight (Tammy) was Project Manager (+ Writer and Audio Assist), and Kiera Rhodes was the Voice & Casting Director and Manager.

Other members of the crew include: Kamaleon70, Programmer | Eli Hersh, Writer and Editor | Fabrice Richaud / Nyx Musicae, Composer | Caleb Feinstein, Backgrounds and CG | Marcus Roman, Title Track Artist | Biz, Dialogue Editor | EdgesSystem, Editor

The game's cast features: Shawn Cadieux as Conall | Jahmal Wray as James | Allain Armean as Liam | Anna Gąsecka as Steffie (+ Polish Translations) | Jackson Zappa and Zoe D. Lee as DEATH

The title and end credits track of the game were written by Benjamin Feinstein and Marcus Roman, sung and performed by Marcus Roman, and produced by Will Gillman. 

Midnight Oil was created using TyranoBuilder. No AI was used in the creation of this project.

Content Warnings

Midnight Oil follows the stories of marginalized rail workers in the early 20th century. Much of the story takes place with the characters playing a game to win back their lives, following a incidentally-depicted storm and train accident. No gore or violence is depicted on-screen, though injuries are discussed or implied. 
While there are no pejorative terms used in our script, the characters do have frank discussions of the difficulties of marginalized life at that time. This includes topics such as racially-driven policies and laws, slavery, loss of parents, loss of sovereignty, forced cultural assimilation, coerced labor, financial pressure, and blurred self-identity.