"Another bad day."
Toby & Blanca
White Sky is a rather odd, brief psychological horror game made with RPG Maker VX Ace in 2015 by "R_C Heal". The game follows a young schoolgirl called Blanca, or White, as she lives her everyday, monotonous life of getting up, heading for school and back home to do her homework and sleep, only to repeat this cycle the next day.
With her world being a literal one of black and white, people are heavily coaxed into leading a regular life and being upstanding citizens. Blanca hates the world she lives in.
That is, until a bright, pink house in her neighborhood catches her attention. As the only thing in this monochrome world made of actual color, Blanca becomes curious and enters it. There, she meets another colorful child by the name of Toby...
Contains The Following Tropes
- All of the Other Reindeer: Toby is ostracized and bullied in school by classmates, as well as being treated harshly by teachers, because he is colorful and won't comply with their standards.
- Assimilation Academy: The entire town does this by demanding its citizens to not stand out too much. Every NPC, except for Amy or Toby's mother - who have minor variety in their appearances, has the same haircut, clothes and wears glasses.
- Ax-Crazy: Toby, after attempting to assimilate himself has broken him beyond hope. He kills his mother and tries to kill Blanca.
- Break the Cutie: Toby is subjected to this, with society and even his mother demanding more and more that he stop standing out.
- Black Bug Room: Blanca and Toby attempt to go to his mindscape to escape reality when Toby is emotionally unstable. It doesn't work out; leaving them inside of a horrifying, black and red room, with the previously nice cube-rabbits all wheezing like they're struggling to breathe...
- But Thou Must!: The player has to enter the forbidden, colorful house in order to advance the story. Going to school and sticking with society's ways leads to a loop.
- Color-Coded for Your Convenience: Toby's happy world is blue. His world of misery and oppression is red.
- Come Out, Come Out, Wherever You Are: The final chase sequence with Toby is riddled with this.
- Deliberately Monochrome: Of the Limited Palette variety. Blanca and Toby's worlds are in black and white, with no actual color being visible. The fact that Toby and his house are colorful in this world is treated as a huge problem.
- Toby's imaginary worlds and his house are of the Splash of Color variety, by being the most vibrant locations in the game.
- Driven to Suicide: If the player chooses to head to school instead of head to Toby's house for the final events, Blanca says she 'cannot go on living like this' and it's implied she commits suicide.
- Left Hanging: The fate of Blanca's father is never revealed. It is mentioned that parents with disobeying children are 'removed from society', but it's never spelled out what exactly that means.
- Meaningful Name: Blanca means White, fitting in well with the whole black-white theme of her world.
- Multiple Endings
- Bad Ending: After Blanca kills Toby, she heads to the Radio Tower, wondering if she can still return home. Toby's spirit asks her if they are still friends. Saying No, Toby refuses to allow Blanca to return home and reveals that they are both trapped in his mind and he'll keep her here. He creates a world where she is hated by everyone and gets killed, only to be revived and killed again.
- Bittersweet Ending: Blanca does not kill Toby and heads to the Radio Tower. The injured Toby catches up to her and realizes that his hatred and anger has caused even the sky to be red. Wanting to change, Toby realizes that he cannot return to reality and cope with it, so he decides to remain trapped in his mind and imagination, where he is happy - leading to his being trapped inside the colorful house where Blanca first saw him. Blanca returns to reality, but runs away from society and heads into a flowery field.
- Good Ending: Blanca kills Toby and heads to the Radio Tower and Toby's spirit asks her if the two of them are friends, after all. Saying Yes, Blanca finds herself in an abyss and talking to Lenna, one of the blue bunnies from Toby's happy world. Getting all of the bunnies together, they and Blanca head to Toby's spirit and try to persuade him to leave his mind and return to reality, even if it is bleak. Toby gains the courage to head back and make his own life, with whatever colors he wants.
- Parents as People: Toby's mother, who is shown to be on her son's side for wanting a world full of color. But she is also aware that it goes against society and will lead to trouble, with it beginning to influence her career and home life. Even after she is fired for not being able to properly raise her son and begins to beat him into submitting to assimilation, she is obviously a broken woman that knows her family's existence is on the line.
- Trapped in TV Land: Blanca enters Toby's world by interacting with the TV in the room he is trapped in.
- Wham Line: There is a pretty big one during Toby's final argument with his mom.
Toby: I...I...I'm sorry. I... (pause)
Toby: Actually... ''No, I'm not''.
