Visual Novel / Shale Hill Secrets

From left to right:
Haley, Emily, Valerie, Leah, Sam, Maggie

Shale Hill Secrets is an episodic adult visual novel developed by Love Joint Studio, and a Stealth Sequel to their previous game Double Homework. The first episode was released in 2021, with new episodes being released every two months. Episodes up to 10 are available for free on Love Joint Studio's Patreon and itch.io pages.

The protagonist (MC) is a student at Shale Hill University who works at the campus IT department and rents an apartment with his childhood friend Leah. Having lost his voice while campaigning for student council presidency in high-school, the MC communicates mostly via a text-to-speech app on his phone. One day, the MC notices a new program called RECENTLY has been installed on his computer, and discovers it can access the last five minutes of activity on the phones and hard-drives of anyone logged into Shale Hill's network. While searching to uncover the mystery of what RECENTLY is and how it came to be installed on his computer, the MC uncovers a sinister conspiracy related to the disappearance of a student, while also building his relationship with Leah and several other young women around campus.

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This game provides examples of:

• Academic Alpha Bitch: The MC's ex-girlfriend Emily is a haughty and ambitious young woman whose father is a wealthy software developer, and who pushed the MC to join the campaign to lead the school debate team in high-school. While they can be Amicable Exes and even rekindle their romance, in general Emily is aloof towards him despite being mutual friends with the enigmatic Valerie.
• Accidental Pervert: In Episode 7, Leah walks in on the MC fantasizing about her while in the shower, and is so shocked that she drops her towel. This only furthers the MC's angst about his feelings towards her.
• Alpha Bitch: The snobbish, air-headed, bad-tempered, and promiscuous cheerleader Alexis is dismissive and condescending towards the MC due to his inability to speak... and is also a "sociopathic, codependent, attention-addicted nymphomaniac" who'd happily throw her friends and even her own brother to the wolves to join the Fraternity in Episode 8. However, this bites her in the ass in Episode 9 when it's revealed that the Fraternity set her up and intended to have the MC mutilate her as part of his initiation into the organization. After being rescued by him in Episode 10, she starts following the MC around like a baby bird due to being afraid of being alone and not knowing how to process her emotions.
• Amicable Exes: The MC can maintain a friendly relationship with his ex-girlfriend Emily, and even rekindle their romance. However, Emily accusing Leah of stealing sensitive information from her father's office sparks tension between them.
• The Bartender: Haley is one of the two bartenders at Sevigny's Bar, the other being Dante — the self-proclaimed World's Straightest Man. Both of them prove to be good friends to the MC, though Haley harbors ambitions of becoming a singer and Dante is far more competent and multi-talented than his eccentricities would suggest.
• Big Damn Kiss: At the end of Episode 6, the MC and Leah can give into their repressed feelings and kiss each other.
• Blackmail: Haley is revealed to be significantly in-debt to the university due to the conspiracy targeting her, though Stan — the man who stole her money — returns it out of guilt, having befriended her while drowning his sorrows at the bar.
• Break His Heart to Save Him: In Episode 8, the MC cuts himself off from his friends for several days out of desperation to catch SILENT1, spending the nights in the IT room scanning RECENTLY for any sign of the Fraternity and the days sleeping at home. This damages his friendship with Linus and deeply hurts Sam in particular, especially if the MC has romanced her, but the MC views it as a necessary evil to protect them.
• Bunny-Ears Lawyer: Dante is a self-proclaimed "hetebro" — a portmanteau of "heterosexual" and "bro" — whose main personality quirk is insisting he's the World's Straightest Man to everyone he meets. Despite this, he's not only a skilled bartender but a veritable Renaissance man who provides the MC with sound advice and assistance.
• The Caper: In Episode 10, the MC and Leah execute a carefully-planned break-in at the police station to steal incriminating evidence that she's Nightingale. To the MC's surprise it goes off without a hitch.
• Casual Kink: Episode 9 reveals that Sam is rather kinky, dressing in risqué lingerie while having the MC tie her up, spank her, and choke her while they're getting it on.
• California University: Shale Hill is a fairly prestigious fictional university that most members of the main cast attend classes at, with the MC, Valerie, and Haley also working there. For bonus points, the MC, Emily, Leah, Sam, and Valerie all attended Annette Taylor high-school and were friends — or at least acquaintances — with one another.
• Clingy Jealous Girl: If the MC romances her, Sam is irritated by other girls expressing attraction towards him and the suggestion that the MC is cheating on her.
• The Conspiracy: Over the course of the series the MC discovers that RECENTLY is at the centre of a deep-rooted conspiracy at Shale Hill, and finds himself matching wits with the sinister hacker known as SILENT1. In Episode 8, the conspiracy deepens when a man named Amiran Ojadian comes to Shale Hill looking for his missing daughter Balenka, whose phone has somehow had access to RECENTLY for the last ten years. Episode 9 reveals that Sandra Vazquez is party to the conspiracy has been working for the Fraternity ever since she faked her own death, though she's deep in denial about having been tricked and used by Silent1.
• Covert Group with Mundane Front: In Episode 7, the MC discovers that the conspiracy at Shale Hill uses the philosophy club as a front and infiltrates it with help from Kristen, the snarky comic store clerk.
• Deadpan Snarker: The MC's boss at the IT department, Hank, possesses a dry sense of humor he communicates exclusively through text messages.
• Evil Cannot Comprehend Good: While not evil per sae, Alexis is a ditzy narcissistic Alpha Bitch who is initially antagonistic towards the MC and seemingly only capable of caring about herself. As such, when she is saved by the MC in Episode 10 she's completely confused by feeling gratitude towards him—to the point where she assumes that "empathy" means doing nice things for people so they'll have sex with them. The MC has to spell out what empathy really is, leaving her even more confused than before, and she starts following him everywhere like he's a member of her Girl Posse.
• Evil Teacher: Mr. Rogham, one of the MC and Sam's professors, sabotages the latter by lying that he never received an assignment from her and giving her a failing grade, sneering that she's lazy and doomed to fail anyway no matter how much effort she puts in. In Episode 7, The MC and Leah vindicate Sam and blackmail Mr. Rohham into giving her a passing grade and letting her back into his class... but in the process it's revealed that Mr. Rogham is part of a secret cabal vetting ambitious and talented students who are willing to do whatever is necessary to attain their goals for high-ranking government and corporate jobs, and that this group has its eyes on the MC.
• Faking the Dead: Episode 9 reveals that Sandra Vazquez faked her death and has been living at Shale Hill University under the alias "Hank", managing the IT department from her office. She maintains she's just following orders, but doesn't specify from whom even when the MC catches her lying.
• Farmer's Daughter: Maggie Castle, one of the game's love-interests, was born in a rural town and grew up on a farm, but ran away from her abusive fundamentalist Christian parents to attend university. While very shy and not used to the big city, she makes ends meet as a dog-walker and eventually befriends the protagonist, who helps her take steps to overcome her shyness and stand up to her family.
• FBI Agent: Lidia's government agent handler, Kestrel, very much looks and acts the part of a stereotypical FBI agent, though to the MC's incredulity he actually works for the US Postal Inspection Services — which has discovered RECENTLY and has press-ganged her into acting as a spy. He assumes that the MC and Leah are involved due to the former's access to the malware and the latter's criminal record for amateur espionage, even if he lacks the evidence to prove it.
• Frame-Up:
  • Leah is framed for the theft of Emily's father's top-secret hard-drive, with Emily refusing to believe the MC's protests that she's innocent.
  • It's revealed that when he was in high-school, the MC tried to frame Sam for possession of illegal drugs to disqualify her from running for student council president. Guilt-tripped by Leah, he removed the drugs but still feels guilty years later, while Sam — none the wiser — sees him as her best friend.
  • Cedric uses RECENTLY to frame Emily for the possession of illegal drugs as part of his initiation into the conspiracy.
  • In Episode 8, SILENT1 attempts to frame Haley for extorting Stan by using RECENTLY to plant fake texts on her phone, but is foiled by the MC.
  • In Episode 9 it's revealed that Sandra Vazquez was accused of plagiarism after someone claiming to be Silent1 stole a sorting algorithm she'd been working on and published it before she could, ruining her life.
• Friends with Benefits: The MC can befriend and have casual no-strings-attached sex with several women, namely Haley and Valerie. Some of the other girls don't mind sharing him, but others — like Sam — are hurt by even the suggestion that they aren't exclusive with him.
• From Roommates to Romance: The MC and Leah are housemates and have been living together at least since they were teenagers. While they do have feelings for each other, whether or not they act on them is up to the MC, who is nervous about possibly ruining their friendship.
• Half-Witted Hillbilly: Played with. Maggie's family are abusive fundamentalist Christian rednecks who are livid at her having moved out to attend university and send her brother Floyd to do whatever it takes to drag her back home. In Episode 6, Leah is able to trick Floyd into leaving Maggie alone by convincing him to convert to a fake religion called Yahwallahodinganeshism, with the MC as its prophet... at least until the events of the next episode, where Leah is caught off-guard by Floyd's sophisticated philosophical and theological inquiries, causing him to realize he was tricked when she accidentally says too much. He even comments that he's smarter than he looks and dislikes people assuming he's unintelligent because of his rural background, and goes right back to harassing Maggie until Leah pulls out all the stops to convince him that Yahwallahodinganeshism is legit.
• Have I Mentioned I Am Heterosexual Today?: Dante's main personality quirk is repeatedly proclaiming himself to be the World's Straitest Man and insisting that — despite his flamboyant personality — he is very much not gay. Not that he has a problem with gay people, of course.
• Heroic BSoD: Mr. Rogham's gaslighting of Sam causes her to drop out of Shale Hill in despair and get a dead-end job at a fast food restaurant, which happens to be managed by the MC's boss, Hank. However, with Leah's help, the MC is able to rekindle Sam's determination to succeed.
• Hollywood Hacking: RECENTLY is a program that bypasses encryption software and gives the user access to the last five minutes of computer or phone activity for everyone connected to Shale Hill's computer network. In Episode 8, SILENT1 makes the point of showing the MC that they can use RECENTLY to hack and impersonate anyone they want to who's connected to Shale Hill's computer network.
• Intrepid Reporter: Leah is studying journalism at Shale Hill while also engaged in some less-than legal sleuthing on the side, and jumps at the chance to help the MC investigate the missing students and RECENTLY when she learns about them. Episode 9 reveals that this has a habit of getting her into trouble ever since she was in high-school, as she has zero compunctions about breaking the law if it means exposing the truth.
• I Will Find You: Professor Carmen Vazquez's quest is to find out what happened to her missing daughter Sandra, who was a student at Shale Hill before she mysteriously vanished.
• Legacy Character: In Episode 9, Sandra states that Silent1 started as an urban legend and has been used as an alias by several hackers in the years since.
• My Greatest Failure: It's revealed that when they were rivals for the spot of high-school Student Council President, the MC planted marijuana in Sam's locker intending to frame her and win the spot for himself, telling himself that he was only doing what he had to and that Sam would fail sooner or later. His guilt — exacerbated by Leah's disapproval — led him to remove the drugs and throw them out before they were discovered, but he still feels bad over it — especially since Sam not only considers him her best friend but has feelings for him.
• Machine Monotone: Due to the MC relying on a text-to-speech app, several characters note that it's hard for them to gauge his emotions.
• Making Love in All the Wrong Places:
  • In Episode 7, Sam can coax the MC into having sex in the school library, the two of them nearly getting caught by some browsing students.
  • In Episode 10, Alexis tries to give the MC an under-the-desk handjob to help him destress, and confused when he turns her down.
• Malevolent Masked Men: At the end of Episode 9, the Fraternity members who ambush the MC do so wearing hooded black robes and metallic masks, intent on making him sacrifice Alexis by branding her—ruining the beauty she'd been so haughty about.
• Near-Death Experience: In Episode 5, SILENT1 ambushes the MC at a Halloween party and almost garrottes him, causing him to pass out and have an almost-Dying Dream.
• Never Found the Body: Sandra Vazquez was a Shale Hill student who disappeared without a trace a year before the MC and his friends started attending, and is presumed dead despite her mother Carmen — a professor at Shale Hill — desperately clinging to hope due to the police never finding a body. In Episode 6, the MC and Leah find Sandra's car abandoned in the forest off the road out of town, further adding to the mystery of her disappearance. Episode 8 reveals she's not only alive but has been at Shale Hill the whole time as "Hank" — the MC's snarky boss.
• Obfuscating Insanity: Moe Mortelli from Daughter for Dessert appears as "Toasterman" — a seemingly out-to-lunch homeless man calling himself "Batman" — and is still lugging around the formerly-stolen toaster. Moe insists he's not actually a crazy homeless man but is deep undercover, but the MC dismisses Moe's claims despite the hints that he's telling the truth.
• Polyamory: While the MC can initiate optional romantic and sexual relationships with several women, in Episode 8 Maggie and Halley are revealed to have been friends as teenagers, separated due to Maggie's father walking in on Halley kissing her. Once the MC reunites them, they decide to pick up where they left off and can invite him to join them as thanks for helping them reconnect. In Episode 10, Halley tries proposing they do it again sometime, but only makes things awkward.
• Power Perversion Potential: The MC can use RECENTLY to peruse the other students' phones and computers to see if they've taken any nude photos.
• Ready for Lovemaking: In Episode 10, Alexis breaks into the MC's apartment and waits for him in his bed, naked. He doesn't initially notice her. When he finally does, she tells him she's there to be his personal plaything and begs him to have sex with her.
• Relationship Upgrade:
  • Sam Hunter starts the game as the MC's high-school rival turned best friend, though in Episode 4 she confesses she's had feelings for him for years and asks him on a date, where they can consummate their newly romantic relationship.
  • Leah has been the MC's best friend since high-school, but he can start developing romantic and sexual feelings for her that culminate in them kissing at the end of Episode 6. In Episode 9, they can kiss again — though Leah cuts the make-out session short when she feels they're moving too quickly for her comfort level. In Episode 10, after successfully stealing the evidence incriminating her as Nightingale and destroying it, Leah gives the MC eyes while heading into her bedroom, and if he follows her they consummate their relationship.
• Right Under Their Noses: While investigating the conspiracy arounding RECENTLY, the MC is contacted by Professor Carmen Vazquez to look for her daughter Sandra, who's been missing for a year. It turns out that Sandra has been at the campus the whole time, living and working under the assumed identity of Hank.
• Samus Is a Girl:
  • SILENT1 is assumed to be a man by the MC and Leah, but is revealed to be a girl in the Halloween party episode.
  • In Episode 8, Hank, the MC's snarky unseen boss, is revealed to be a woman — none other than Professor Carmen Vazquez's missing daughter Sandra.
• Sex for Solace: In Episode 10, Alexis is left traumatized by having been abducted by the Fraternity and propositions the MC, who has the option of sleeping with her or rejecting her.
• Shout-Out:
  • In Episode 9, Sandra remarks that a volleyball with a face on it would make a better friend than another human.
  • In Episode 10, the MC finds a clown Halloween mask when helping Leah pull a heist on the police station.
• Sibling Murder: Discussed in Episode 7, where Maggie states she intends to turn her brother Floyd into "watermelon dinner" with her shotgun if he comes after her again, quipping that she can make what's left into snacks for her dog Plato. In response to the MC's horrified reaction, she says she was just kidding... kind of.
• Stereotypical Nerd: The leader of the Shale Hill Philosophy Club, Albert, is a balding, bespectacled, overweight man who is prone to ostentatious outbursts of eloquence and utterly flabbergasted to be in the presence of an actual flesh-and-blood "female". He has to be reminded by the MC that Kristen and later Alexis are people to be respected rather than objects to be gawked at.
• Stripperiffic: When finally making his debut at the end of episode 8, Hank or rather, Sandra Vazquez, is wearing nothing but a midriff-exposing t-shirt and panties.
• Tears of Fear: When the Fraternity attempt to force the MC to brand her in Episode 10, the terrified Alexis sheds tears of fear as the brand inches closer to her face.
• Their First Time:
  • In Episode 4, Sam Hunter confesses she's had feelings for the MC for years and invites him to a lakeside picnic where they can have sex on the beach.
  • In Episode 10, the MC can consummate his relationship with Leah, who—to his surprise and honor—turns out to be a virgin... or at least he hopes she is.
• Three-Way Sex:
  • In Episode , the MC can have a threesome with Maggie and Halley as thanks for helping them reconnect if his relationship values with both of them are high enough.
  • In Episode 9, Valerie proposes a threesome between the MC, herself, and Emily—saying that while she's not usually into girls she'd be fine with it in that instance.
• Unexpected Virgin: In Episode 10, the MC is surprised when Leah hints that she's a virgin, though he muses that it might just have been a long time since she last had sex and that she's just be saying she's one to turn him on.
• Unseen No More: For the first seven episodes, the MC's boss at the IT department, Hank, remains hidden behind a locked door and only communicates through text messages. The Wham Episode moment at the end of Episode 8 reveals that Hank is actually Sandra Vazquez, the missing student who the MC and Leah were looking for.
• Unperson: In Episode 8, Stan is revealed to have gone missing after returning Haley's stolen money to her.
• Women Prefer Strong Men: In Episode 10, Emily notes that she was attracted to the MC's confidence when he was able to speak, but that disappeared when he lost his voice and they drifted apart as a result. However, she notes that she's come to recognize that in its place he's developed something even better, though it's a quality she can only describe as danger.
• You Have Outlived Your Usefulness: It transpires in Episode 7 that the moment Cedric became a liability to the conspiracy he was disappeared, and is implied to have been killed.

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