Oh really good. The light in the dark was a bit weak? and the long gaps of silence made me wish for a little more music here and there, but honestly overall great work. I love the art and the character design, the expressions are great, and the dialogue flows so well. Personally I think there needs to be more stories about deradicalization, and forgiveness, and the things you can come back from... like being in a hate group. I was definitely caught off guard a little by the like... Slop Monster Reveal? admittedly? It's the sort of thing I think would work better in a longer format, just to have more time to build it up rather than the few mentions here and there of Weird Stuff Happening. Especially since it happens so shortly after the big reveal about Zane. Still that's all nitpicking, when really I think it's an amazing piece about what you expect for yourself and the reality around you, and having to occasionally face unpleasant truths about the people around you, and about yourself as well. If it went on another 5000 words I'm willing to be it'd even follow up about what types of forgiveness you can find as well. Good work, definitely excited for what the team does next!

This was a pretty fulfilling story with twists and turns I wasn't expecting and a nice character arc for our bitter protag. Shame we don't actually meet his BF tho.

That was… weird. It took a while to get going. When that guy talked about Zane being in a far-right group, it felt like it was starting to go somewhere, but then supernatural monsters appeared out of nowhere! That was quite the whiplash. In the end, neither of those elements felt like they had a satisfying conclusion. Zane is an interesting character and the others are alright, too. The writing is fine. The sprites look good, with nice expressions. The backgrounds work ok. Most of the game doesn’t have music which is a shame. Overall, I’m not sure what to think. It was weird.

You portray well the atmosphere in the workplace, and how the MC is slowly getting along with the coworkers.

But I wasn’t ready for all the twists in this vn! Bit of sudden, but hey, it really surprised me lol.

Anyhow, good job for your vn, you all work well for the writing and all the art you provide!

I liked this one a lot! A few things didn't quite land for me, especially in terms of how some of the themes were handled in the second half, but the level of effort and ambition in even trying to manage all those themes were impressive. 

Working through each criterion, spoilers from this point forward:

Implementation of Theme:

As mentioned, there are a lot of themes at play here, but for evaluating this category we're focusing on the jam ones, and I don't feel like these were handled very convincingly for me. The primary "light in the darkness" here for me appears to be the sense of community that pulls the MC out of his negative emotional spiral (or I guess maybe doesn't depending on the choice you make at the end), but I think my issue here is primarily about how this fits into the "my wolf" theme. Obviously there's not a romantic connection between the MC and Zane here, which is fine, but even as a friend guiding the MC towards that "light" it's not really all there. Sure, he's the character we see the most often, but I'm not sure his role of changing the MC's mind of how to evaluate his life is really all that more important than Sarah's or Fern's or Forsyth's. He's just one part of the bigger picture. 

Story:

I thought the characters were mostly handled well, with each of our main cast feeling fairly fleshed out, even the ones that don't get a ton of screentime (there are some exceptions. You could probably cut Jean entirely and you wouldn't be missing much). Everyone has their endearing qualities, as well as their flaws, (honestly I felt like most of the cast besides Zane [backstory notwithstanding] and Sarah was kind of a prick, especially the MC - I'm glad he got called out for that at the end), and this did a lot for making them feel like real people rather than just tools to move the plot and themes forward.

One aspect of the MC I wish we had delved into a little more though was his relationship. From my closest experience to the events of this VN, I put way too much of the burden of coping with those changes on my partner, and that ended up leading to some strife in the long run. I'm not saying the MC's boyfriend has to be an integral part of the plot or anything, especially since it's a jam and time and space are limited, but it did feel weird that he was noticeably absent from the entire story after the first scene. Great job really capturing the anxiety of job searching and constantly receiving soulless rejection emails though.

Regarding the shift into spookiness, I did feel that this was telegraphed plenty with the swiping at the closet, the ominous red glow when the MC is trying to find a first aid kit for his dumb ass, and Fern's little slips about the teams. I certainly don't have a problem with the story going there; if anything I was getting a little antsy for it to get going after so much slice of life in the early stages. I do have a few issues though:

1) The grime gremlin (grimelin? Yes): If it was intended to be actually spooky, it kinda... wasn't? I feel like this was the intention with how casually Zane dealt with it, but it felt a bit anticlimactic from that sense. I thought where we going was more along the lines of MC discovers the threat contemporaneously with the other workers, and their reaction helps continue to change how he feels about them, but everyone just kinda shrugging the grimelins off felt like kind of a letdown. Also, if the grimelin leaves a trail of yuck everywhere it goes, why weren't there any traces when it tried to attack the MC on night 1?

2) Effect on theme: This is probably the biggest sticking point in the game for me. So much of the first half of this VN is built around the MC learning not to be a dick to people and assume what they do or don't find value in based on his biased notions of prestige. The absolute bludgeoning the MC takes from Sarah for assuming what he believes to be mundane and unfulfilling is necessarily mundane and unfulfilling for everyone especially stands out. Introducing the whole Buffy the Grimelin Slayer angle severely undercuts that message for me since the school custodians are objectively not doing something mundane and unfulfilling. They're protecting the world from some weird eldritch sewer demon. This changes the message from "MC receives a change in perspective by looking at his current circumstances in a new light" to "MC clearly did not have enough information to fully assess the situation," which comes off far weaker to me.

A couple other quick points:

1) I didn't fully buy the MC's reaction to the initial suggestion of Zane's background. I know he has plenty of preconceived notions and he's kind of a panicky dick and all, but I found it just a little odd that he'd take the word of a random dick at the bar that much on face value. Some of the other evidence presented didn't seem convincing either. I think it's certainly possible that someone, especially someone who may or may not have slept through a few history classes like Zane might have, might be familiar with the phrase "make the trains run on time" while being fully oblivious to the connotation. That sequence might have also benefitted from removing the text conversation between Zane and Fern since that kind of kills the tension in the scenes that follow because the reader is now aware that Zane is on the MC's side. I also think "he's part of my pack now" does not get enough attention as a massive red flag though... 

2) This is a complete tangent about an inconsequential detail that literally no one besides me cares about, but is having "red wolves" as a mascot like, racist in this universe? There would be such a weird parallel between the real world Arkansas State University changing their nickname from "Indians" to "Red Wolves" to be less offensive while "Red Wolves" is actually the offensive term in this universe. I don't think this was intentional, but I did find it interesting.

That was... a lot. I really did like this story a lot though! Seriously ^.^"

Presentation:

Liked most of it, sprites and CGs were good. Zane decking the ox was a particular highlight for the latter. Music was inoffensive but did feel conspicuously absent at times where it didn't necessarily need to be. Also, minor point, but this story appeared to take place in the U.S., but there were some terms like "ute" and "uni" that came up that are not parts of the American lexicon. They didn't like, completely break immersion or anything, but it did distinctly give the impression of a story that takes place in America written by an Australian.

Creativity:

As stated above, this VN was ambitious. Maybe not in terms of gameplay or structure, but we are covering a lot of ground in a relatively short time here. I think this does occasionally lead to some issues as outlined in previous sections, but as a general conclusion it still mostly handled what it set out to do in a very entertaining way. I really can't fault the team for their creativity here.

I'll give this ehhhh... 666 grimelins out of 3,455 mops.

You have no idea how long I’ve been hungering for something like this. It was a deeply emotional read for me, in large part because I was reliving similar personal experiences and projecting myself (and a former friend) onto Zane and Jake as the story unfolded, which amplified emotions tenfold x) Only wish it was longer, or there was a bit more satisfying conclusion since the story felt like it stopped, rather than ended - I can only presume you had time/word constraints to meet.

As for more general remarks, I found the lack of sounds/music very noticeable in some parts and the extreme technical details and American-specific terms occasionally made me stop in my tracks, but that’s more of a ESL me thing. On the other hand, I really liked the sprites and the creative use of transitions in select scenes.

Very excited for what you’ll release next!

I will try to be vague since I think this game improves the more blind you can afford to go in when starting it. I do like a lot the theme implementation aspect, the central point of people trying to be each other's light at the end of a tunnel. Couldn't see how dark said tunnel was until some late reveals and they probably hit me harder since I reconize one of the first flag planted and just assumed  that Zane was implying that one of his coworkes just wasn't pleasant to work with.

While the first reveal gets efficiently flagged and could be identified by a savvier reader, probably the second and major reveal could have used just a tiny bit more hints for. When it was happening my first thought was "dream sequence?" and while I apreciated the direction it took, it could be more of a rug pull for someone's else.

Presentation wise, honestly I really liked TFD's art so it put this immediatly on my radar, but the entire team did a good job. Is not the flashiest or the most technically intricated, but is charming, has good ideas and it simply execute them well. Good job, was a really pleasant experience, favorite jam submission so far.

Loved this. It's happening in a novel setting, a custodial shift at an elementary school, and doesn't hold back when it comes to fleshing out the side characters. Zane is such a weirdo but he's goofy and lovable. Quite novel to have My Wolf not be a romance too. The other characters are all quirky as well, but they're full of personality. And this is in the running for the Best Tail Wag superlative too! This VN does like to take its time and linger on the small details but I found myself enjoying it regardless. It's very well thought out and relatable. Though, to be honest, I think there were a couple of pacing issues. For example, the horror elements could have been foreshadowed a bit better, I think. As is, it drops out of nowhere, and ended up being a bit jarring. But there's a lot of other things to like, such as the fact that there's a very real story about redemption and finding your purpose beneath the wacky plot, so I think it's still pretty great in general.

I think my only big grievance would be that it feels like there's a visual dissonance between the prominent, numerous photo backgrounds that invite your attention and the fairly cartoony art, though both aspects work by themselves and you get used to it while playing. The subtle lighting effects also help; they were definitely a smart touch.

As for the story: a very unusual case in the sense that there are one or two extreme genre shifts that come off as sort of jarring but there's enough thematic continuity to smooth over the transitions and no aspect is uncompelling by itself but one still has to wonder if abandoning what the game was (very successfully!) doing in the first act was ultimately the right call or not.

I just like the beginning so much – the frank, down-to-earth subject matter is nice to see, the characters and the workplace as a setting are believable, and there's a lot of good discussion of the ambivalences of menial labor. I would have liked a VN that was just about that and nothing else with no hesitation at all. And then... to be clear, it's not like the story takes a bad direction or anything; the last part is similarly charming, and though the character drama takes a turn for the more extreme, it still feels like it's grounded in reality. I guess I can say that doing things this way was probably the more interesting option, and I can't bring myself to disagree with that. Maybe there's a case for reconsidering the structure & pacing a little – for how wild the final beat is conceptually, it has comparatively few words dedicated to it.  I don't know, man, great stuff in any case.