Minotaur Hotel

Minotaur Hotel is an in-development romance visual novel produced by Minoh Workshop. It tells the story of a player character as he inherits a magical hotel where he finds the minotaur from the Greek legend, Asterion, sentenced by the gods to spend eternity there.

Plot
The story begins at an unspecified train station where the player meets an old man. After asking a few questions, including their name and background, he gives the deed to a hotel. A few weeks later the player character arrives at the seemingly deserted and damaged hotel. Upon further inspection, he finds signs of a struggle, which lead him to opening the hotel's cold room where he finds a gravely injured minotaur who introduces himself as Asterion, the minotaur from the Greek myth.

As punishment for allowing an Athenian hero to kill him Asterion was sentenced to be tortured in this magical realm under a human master, but as centuries passed the place was converted into a hotel for those who are lost and have nowhere to go. The last master kicked out all the guests and shot the minotaur, leading to the place's current state. Asterion becomes the player character's servant and the two are tasked with restoring the hotel to its old glory.

In order to achieve this goal, the player must heal Asterion from his wounds. This is the complicated by the appearance of a snake called Argos, who calls himself the labyrinth's foreman and is tasked with incentivizing the player character to torture Asterion. Shortly after the first guests arrive at the hotel, some of which become permanent staff members.

Characters

 * Asterion, the minotaur from the Greek legend, sentenced by the gods to remain in the labyrinth. When the story starts he is in an injured state as a consequence of the previous master's actions. He is Minotaur Hotel's only romanceable character and, alongside the player character, the story's deuteragonist. His main goal is restoring the hotel to its former glory to provide shelter to those who have nowhere to go.


 * The player character's name and background is picked by the player during the game's introduction sequence. Unless the player picks the Speedrunner background the player character is portrayed as a generally competent and potentially kind man. In the original Minotaur Hotel draft he was named "Anon" as is customary in 4chan quests.


 * Argos, a snake and the labyrinth's foreman, tasked with torturing Asterion. He tempts the player to send Asterion to the valley where he can be tortured by the monsters that lurk there.


 * A Japanese dragon traveling the world in search of someone. Has an uptight and proper personality. Arrives at the hotel during the events of the second build. Depending on player choices can take the role of the lounge's manager.


 * A boisterous American griffin. Is promiscuous and cheerful, but is prone to bouts of melancholy when his affairs fail to produce lasting relations. Much like Kota he arrives during the game's second build and can take the role of the lounge's manager.

History
Minotaur Hotel began as a quest on 4chan's /trash/ board. Quests are an interactive storytelling format where a quest master (QM) writes a story and readers suggest what should happen next. Readers could suggest ideas for guest characters, which were subsequently worked on by the quest master and introduced in the story. Shortly after growing enough to become a general thread on its own, production began to translate the original draft into a visual novel format. Multiple writers came together, with nanoff acting as the programmer and artist.

The game was released on September 7th, 2019. Updates were released sporadically, with a few months of wait time between them. By its third update, Minotaur Hotel had reached Itch.io's Top 100 Highest Rated games and as of August 2020 it stands in the Top 20.

The development process of Minotaur Hotel has been documented publicly through DevLogs with resources like the Gay Furry Visual Novel Audience Survey and the Minotaur Hotel Writing Manual made available to the public.

Gameplay
Minotaur Hotel affords the player a number of choices on how to treat the minotaur, Asterion, which are also integrated as mechanics. As of the third build the player can send exploration parties to search the valley, a place where monsters lurk. Asterion can be sent multiple times, which has an effect in his mental health and influences the path the story follows.

Beyond the exploration mechanic, the player can also manage his staff towards performing research and development to improve the hotel's facilities.

Asterion's appearance changes as he heals from his injuries and can be customized. Community consultations were done to collect suggestions.

The player can pick from among six backgrounds for the player character: Humanities, Tech, Leader, Arts, Math and Speedrunner. Each one offers different advantages in stats and unique dialogue choices. The Speedrunner background, however, is a joke route.