Visual Novel / Twofold

Front: Club leaders Millie and Caprice.
Rear: Olive and the leaders' roommate, Hayley.

There's going to come a time when you feel all alone. When the world feels too big and you feel too small. I want you to remember one thing: no matter where you are, if you can make a friend, the world is a whole lot less lonely. It doesn't even really matter how you reach out, so long as you put your best foot forward.

Make small talk. Offer a helping hand. Join a club! It can be scary to take that first step, but you'll be amazed at how much things can change for the better once you do.

That's my hope, anyway. You deserve it.

— August Penn

Once an overachieving high-schooler, Olive Penn's busy schedule and refusal to burden their mother, August, with extra shifts at The Bellhouse leaves them with a 1.5 GPA–and at risk of expulsion should their grades fail to improve by the semester's end.

Upon cutting a deal with academic advisement and receiving yet another Rousing Speech from August, Olive is presented with two choices: a writing class or an art class. Neither seem viable until rival club leaders Millie Clarke and Caprice Shiften offer a helping hand to the wayward student, provided they join the club.

An outsider embroiled in a feud between Childhood Friends, Olive must navigate these groups' delicate bonds to survive the semester, and hopefully, repay their club leader's generosity.

Twofold is a sequel to the free visual novel First Snow (2020), and a collaborative work by Salty Salty Studios and Studio Coattails published under Studio Élan's Bellhouse wing. Its development began as early as 2012, but saw key additions such as full voice work, an additional in-game story, and several short-stories within in its artbook and physical edition before finally releasing in October 2023.

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Twofold provides examples of the following:

• Apathetic Student: Deconstructed by Olive's busy schedule affording little time or passion for academia—their grades eventually slipping to the point of near-expulsion.
• The Big Damn Kiss
  • In the Millie route, the two share a passionate kiss after their house date, in the same spot Allison and Eileen reconciled in First Snow.
  • In the Caprice route, the pair shares their First Kiss while walking home from their first date, Caprice raising her cap over their lips in a downplayed Discretion Shot.
• Beta Couple: Allison and Eileen's relationship has significantly less focus here than in First Snow.
• Book Smart: Near the end of Act 1, Allison frets over whether she'll maintain her 4.00 GPA whilst the college is late with posting final scores. She keeps the GPA, and wishes Olive luck before celebrating with Eileen.
• Brick Joke: Hayley and Millie allude to a horrific "egg incident" that left Caprice banned from cooking. In her route, she eventually learns to make omelets under Olive's tutelage.
• Break-Up/Make-Up Scenario: Acts 2 and 3 focus on the strained relationship between Millie and Caprice, the writer's grief leaving her less than pleased with Mike and Charlie's engagement.
• Cast Full of Gay: The main characters, most of the art club, and Darren Baker are all queer people.
• Creative Closing Credits: Both routes close with Olive and their partner walking together as sketches of their future lives scroll past, meeting the other club leader as the credits end. Which direction the couple walks also depends on the route.
• Childhood Friends: Caprice and Millie were friends almost since birth thanks to Charlie and Adelaide's Platonic Co-Parenting, and the two befriended Hayley in high school.
  • In Perfect Circle, a young Olive, Millie, and Caprice, are reveled to have played together after a chance meeting following Adelaide's hospital visit.
• Do Not Spoil This Ending: Downplayed with a not-so-hidden WARNING.png file which reads: "YOU WOULDN'T RPA EXTRACT A GAME", implicitly requesting readers refrain from delving through the game files (or at the very least, disseminating them).
• Establishing Shot: The story opens with a CG of Olive lamenting their poor academics before calling August to deliver the bad news, establishing both their characters and dynamic, the story's tone, and Act 1's narrative hook.
• Family of Choice: Hayley views Millie and Caprice as family, even confessing to Olive that the pair "saved" her back in high school.
• A Friend in Need: Should Olive join the art club, Hayley will join the writing club to prevent its dissolution.
• The Friend Nobody Likes: Once good friends with Wallace, Heather's cruelty towards Millie and disdain toward the writing club leaves her despised by much of the cast.
• Friendless Background: Olive begins a cynical loner whose only connections are their mother, and Darren, a guy they happened to shared a few classes with in high school. This lack of experience with friend groups makes Olive hesitant to reach out in fears of overstepping boundaries.
• Jerkass: Heather goes out of her way to belittle Millie and undermine the writing club, even attempting to turn its remaining members against her despite negotiating to keeping the club afloat out of spite.
  Hayley: "I'm not really in the mood to listen to you brag about how much you screwed the club over.
  Heather: "I did no such thing. My target was exclusively Millie."
• Linear Visual Novel: The only choices of consequence are the club you decide to join, and which member you elect to hang out with in Act 1.
• Manic Pixie Dream Girl: Averted with Caprice, whose eccentric persona belies her low self-esteem and fear of being The Friend Nobody Likes.
• Precision F-Strike: A frustrated Caprice drops one during Millie's attempt to reconcile with her, prompting Charlie to intervene.
  Caprice: "Then why did you come all the way out here!? Why even bother if you don't know what you want, just that it isn't me?".
  Millie: "Because I'm scared of losing my best friend!"
  Caprice: "Well join the fucking club!"
• Relationship Upgrade:
  • In the Caprice route, they become an item days after Olive passes their courses, the pair reconvening in the art room and stumbling through Crush Blush-laden love confessions before agreeing to a first date.
    Caprice: "You—you interrupted me! You can't just get the jump on me like that! That's no fair!"
    Olive: "Wait, hold on, you told me to go first—with how much you were trying to force it out of me... I figured you'd caught on."
    Caprice: "No! Ahh! I was just saying things! I've been psyching myself up for a while!"
    Olive: "So it's a yes?"
    Caprice: "Obviously!"
  • In the Millie route, their Fake Relationship becomes real after Olive comforts a distraught Millie at the bridge in Act 2's closing, the writer professing her love and the pair reaffirming their feelings the day after.
    Millie: "I don't feel like I have a home to go to anymore".
    Olive: "You can stay with me if you want. For as long as you need".
    Millie: "..."
    Millie: "... I think I love you, Olive".
• Shout-Out
  • Caprice's room has a drawing which reads "Please Be Otter", a reference to the publisher's 2022 visual novel, Please Be Happy.
  • The Bellhouse, a family-owned diner Olive and August work at, doubles as a reference to the coffee shop in Please Be Happy, and a nod to Studio Élan's Bellhouse publishing wing, which helps smaller teams release their own visual novels.
• Sickening Sweethearts:
  • Inverted with Charlie and Mike, who refrain from displaying their affections publicly to avoid upsetting Millie.
  • Allison and Eileen are seen being flirty with one another before entering The Bellhouse and realizing Olive works there.
• Sliding Scale of Gender Inequality: Level 5. Though a good deal of the main cast's troubles are caused by absentee fathers (especially in Perfect Circle), the men present in Twofold are no less kind, capable, or empathetic.
  • Everyone respects Darren and Olive's identity and pronouns, even without the latter introducing themselves as non-binary.
• The Stinger: Both routes feature post-credit scenes of Charlie and Mike's wedding, and Perfect Circle closes with Millie, Caprice, and Olive having read the journal entries depicted in its short stories.
• Tragic Keepsake: Millie keeps a journal filled with advice, Q&A, messages, and other writings from her late mother. After reconciling in Act 3, she lends it to Charlie and Mike so the couple may read the messages Adelaide left for them.
• Wham Episode: Act 2 closes with Christmas going horribly wrong after Millie rebuffs Caprice's attempt at reconciliation, saying in no uncertain terms that she'd rather the Shiftens out of her life.
  Millie: "Oh, sorry, guess it's only "dumb" when it's important to me. Lesson learned."
  Caprice: "Mom and I LOVE you, I just want you to talk to us!"
  Millie: "And I just want you both out of my life!"