Hey everyone!
Here is Will The Man Get Frog, a chill little game about composing silly or sweet haikus (short poems) and sharing them with the world!
I wanted to make a game about constrained creation that felt easy to play, in the hope that people end up surprised by how fun it is to write stuff. It was my first serious project as an indie dev and it was published on Steam on February 14th 2024. Hope you'll like it!
If you do, consider following me on Bluesky or itch.io!
There are been many updates since the initial release, so here is the changelog:
Changelog
v2.4, 28/02/2025:
- A full French translation!
v2.3, 19/04/2024:
- Mouse support! Composing is now comfier than ever!
- A brand-new background and music themed around new year's eve!
- A not-so brand-new background and music with a big frog in it!
- A LOT more season words (more than twice as much)!
- the "..." punctuation mark, more mysterious than ever.
- "-ed" and "-es" suffixes. Add past tenses and plurals to anything.
- A delicate sprinkle of handpicked new words in almost every category.
- A few bug fixes and quality of life improvements
v2.2, 14/02/2024:
- Available on Steam for Windows/Mac/Linux!
- A brand new title screen!
- More words, and a specific rework on adverbs to make them hopefully more enjoyable!
- A few QoL improvements
- That's it.
v2.1, 10/10/2023:
- A brand new game mode, shared game! Challenge your friends to write with the same words as you!
- More adjectives, and more synonyms for every adjective!
- A new, dashing cover art!
- Automatic word sorting
- Some feedback and game layout rework
v2.0, 14/08/2023:
- 2 new backgrounds, for fall and winter!
- MUSIC! 4 awesome, soothing tracks by c.diffin!
- LOTS of new words
- Word sorting
- Punctuation!
- Prefixes and suffixes
- QoL Improvements
v1.0, 09/07/2023:
Initial release
Thanks a bunch! I have been wanting to make a game about poetry & writing for years. Glad it's done!
Haha, good ones, nice!
At the end, the game allows you to save a .gif of your haiku if you want (which btw is an awesome feature of pico-8 @zep).
oh, that's a nice touch! And a nice way to reward actually using the kigo :p
Ahah, thanks a lot! And nice ones, too!
I got a bit of feedback, and plan on releasing an update soon, probably during next week.
I aim to add more words, more backgrounds, and try to find ways to alleviate a bit the frustration some players had on expressivity, without sacrificing the randomness and playfulness at the core of the game. I have some promising leads, and I hope you'll like it!
Love this cart! The restrictions feel really good, and I like that there’s a “strategy” layer of picking the word types. It gives you something to feel you could improve at if you ever get frustrated with your particular set of words.
Would you be interested in some music as part of your update?
Thank you @c.diffin !
Hmm, I'm not sure about music yet. I have the feeling that making a music that suits the game theme and yet does not take too much space or distracts the player's focus would be very hard to pull off. Probably because I don't have very much experience with making chiptune.
Sorry @MarechalBanane I should be more clear- I was volunteering to make some music for your cart if you’re interested!
I agree it’s tough to make good ambient tracks in pico-8 but I took a bit of a pass at something this evening that I think could work. I’m on the discord with the same username if you’d like to talk.
I love it SO MUCH when someone creates carts that are so educative, pedagogical, or that can be used in the classroom. Congrats!
Haha sorry @c.diffin, I read a bit too fast.
Wow, sure, I'd be glad to hear what you made! Let's talk on Discord and see if we can work it out. :)
@DÁRYNSON Thank you so much! I had not thought of this cart as classroom-compatible, but that would be awesome!
@Verb, I'm well aware. Look into my history and you'll see that I enjoy interacting with bots to see how they parse posts, and how they respond to punctuation
I like the new backgrounds. I think the camera movement could be a little slower though to make it look less woozy.
Nice!
As I got numerous feedback from people wanting twitch integration or enjoying the social part of the game, I just released a new update with a multiplayer-ish game mode! I updated the post at the top of this thread.
Let me know what you think! I really like the idea that the game might push a bit more players to share their work or compose together, but I'm interested in your feedback!
Hello!
Just wanted to mention that I'm publishing Will The Man Get Frog on Steam on February 14th! It will include new words, a new title screen and a better controller support.
Check it out/wishlist here! https://store.steampowered.com/app/2658990/Will_The_Man_Get_Frog
Don't worry, I'll make sure the BBS cart is also updated when the Steam version is released.
The game just got out on Steam!
To celebrate I updated the version on the BBS with the improvements of the Steam version. All the info is in the first post if you want to check it out!
Aaaaand a final update with a substantial amount of content. Check out the first message to see the changelog.
I'm really happy with the state of the game now, it's more or less what I envisioned when I started it. It was a blast to make!
Hello again!
It turns out I'll have the opportunity to showcase the game at a local videogame event where I live, and I'd like to print a poster with a big mosaic of player-made haikus to promote the game. Would you be ok if I include some of yours in it?
@zep
@LokiStriker
@c.diffin
@kwikrick
@eriban
@goose2point0
@Charliedi
Sure, no problem. How nice that you get to show off your awesome haiku game!
Thanks! It's a bit late for this one, but who knows, I might make an even bigger one in the future!
Alright, community posters are printed!
Check them out!
Hey everyone!
I'm very happy to announce that the game is getting a french translation (my mother tongue), and quite soon!
Currently the dictionary is already 90% full, but I'd really like to get feedback before publishing the update.
Are there some French-speaking people here who'd like to beta-test ? :D
Aaaaaaand done!
The new update with the french translation is live! Have fun, hope you'll enjoy it!
dont know french could someone please translate my haiku for me 
Really fun to use! The limited use of words makes it very fun
Think I got something actually coherent. Couldn't figure out how to save the gif output, but:
Fresh golden fire burns
Sends the blind ice from the branch
Round and round we push
@KyutiPatuti It's actually beautiful!
Just kidding, it's gibberish.
If I attempt a literal translation:
"People smoke by saucetion.
Must smoke would proneck.
Sauce search at whose swift."
@PhasmaFelis Very nice! Were you playing on mobile? After the gif is recorded, a small frame with your gif appears on the top left and you can either right-click or touch and hold to save it.
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