only played through the first puzzle and looked around I'm short on time right now so I might play more later
the art and style are awesome I can pretty much tell immediately if something is a clue or not I will say I think the blue boxes you fill your answers in should be like little torn scraps of notebook paper or something
also when going through dialog I feel like there should be a button to go back to the main dialog options (there might be one already sorry if I missed it)
Graphics and art direction remain immaculate. The writing is on the high note still, even with Em to whom I was initially somewhat sceptical, loony girl but she grows on you. Exploring different branches of conversation is a nice touch. Locking out parts of conversation was a novelty, a good one if it doesn't soft-lock anything important.
Detectives got good dynamic, I do hope as the case progresses your partner becomes a tad less snarky and sarcastic. Obradinesque track for confirming section of your work hits hard. Adding new ways of interacting with evidence - Viggo and the car's frequency/wave-meter. enriches the game and provides more depth. Love the reconstruction mechanism.
Now for the bad.
I understand your underscored importance of paying attention to the detail. I do think it works 90% of the time, figuring something out, especially without any external help feels rewarding. I appreciate that game doesn't hold my hand 90% of the time. The 10% is a low point in the game. I've failed to find the cotton, it just didn't stand out enough for me to notice. In response to that I've bagged all items I could find, used scanner, viggo, talked to each character, before one of the forms ensured me that there's a piece of evidence missing. I've strolled through the entire map 4 times, finding each exit, every batch of leaves, every displaced barrel, hell even a gap in the fence that I thought for a second, contained some key takeaway. But the cotton didn't show up on my radar for a second, I knew that something was there, but after scouring the grounds not once or twice I started wishing for some sort of pity-timer hint. What would I give for a soft audio cue, enabled only after no progress has been made for some time. Or your partner saying something like 'There's cotton on the bushes mate, gee golly I feel like I'm back in Alabama'. I suppose once the game ships people who get stuck will be able to get information they need from the internet, and it won't be much of a hassle.
All in all, can't wait to see where the game actually progresses, it's unique, it stands out, mechanics are solid and the mystery does lure one in. As described above, unapologetic commitment to not holding hand has its drawbacks, but I have no doubt it will be a massive success.
I'll explain some things so that you have some peace of mind, not because I feel like excusing the demo. The demo is a sliced off part of the whole of the full game which is one continuous process with nearly no hard blocks. The demo is not a good demo, but it's a great introduction to the entirety of the game. I've accepted that and I prefer it that way. You successfully progressed past this section of the game and were allowed to continue. The issue of players sticking around the grounds too long only exists in the demo, and it's because some players want to try as hard as they can to 100% the demo, which was never intended to be the experience and it's why there's several warnings throughout the demo that give you an out. It's possible, but like it's said in the beginning, it's more difficult than it should be. That warning is there for a reason, because I know what tends to happen, and the game is designed to discourage brute forcing.
There are 20+ progress triggers around the grounds. After only 7 the museum can be 'entered'. If you imagine you're playing the full game there is no mandatory wandering around the grounds for 2 hours (unless the player really really wants to) and this is the point where the game hits you with 5 more puzzles in rapid succession, making it clear that puzzles are almost never immediately solvable.
I'm assuming you unlocked both sections and I'm assuming you know that they get marked red when you have the info to solve them. Different clues are differently difficult to find. The cotton is not supposed to be easy to find. Some case pieces appear in multiple places for a reason. There's dialogue that nudges the player to end the demo if you have found enough things. I believe in free wins but I don't believe in making the demo unnecessarily easy to guarantee as many players as possible just accidentally solving everything solvable. I wouldn't play a game like that and would feel like it's playing itself and treating the player like he's dumb.
The stylized aesthetic helps with highlighting clues, but like many similar games I still often have the issue of walking around like a headless chicken trying to find things that I've missed. Also I wish I could freely explore other area instead of having to clear a stage entirely before I can progress but I understand it would have been too complicated to design a non linear exploration.
One major gripe for me is how unnecessarily slow the movement speed is. I am not asking to be Usain Bolt but the "sprint" feels like a fast walk to me, and the garden area is massive.
(Sorry, screwed up the initial part of the recording, but I guess that early part is very straight-forward anyhow.)
If the itch version has more content, please let me know…
Still hugely enjoying the game. Your demos keep on only teasing the "truth" so I still don’t know whether the solutions in this game will be natural, or supernatural. Or both? In any case it seems very nice how some clues in that park seem to be less immediately relevant, while still intriguing.
You can see me somewhat brute-forcing the solution to the final puzzle – I think you are being slightly too autistic here, or need to phrase it better. The "Loud Bang" to my mind clearly belongs to the immediate time frame of the attack; since it seems to have ended the attack, from what we know? But it’s an incorrect answer. Meanwhile afaik the cotton in the brush we did not even 100% relate to the attack (the girl should tell us "oh yeah I have this torn piece of clothing"), yet it is a correct answer.
The world building is very cool, the dialogues are entertaining and neither too serious nor too funny. I don’t know what your plan is for the final release, but it’s very nice in these demos to be just thrown into the story, and we, the main character, are for some reason intrigued and concerned about what happened to this woman, and as a player one actually has no idea WHY that event is so concerning, one has no idea WHAT the protagonist actually suspects may have happened here. We just get the emotion from the protagonist and it adds to the suspense.
I see you caved in and made walking NPCs, I gotta say the previous solution of triggered teleports fit in more with the general spookiness, in my humble opinion. But it’s understandable.
Looking forward to the release.
edit: After reading the other comment, I remembered, I was quite annoyed with the slow movement and hurting my pinkie having to hold shift just to make it bearable.
Thanks for the video feedback. It's probably better if you understand that no player has a 100% satisfying process and that's kind of intended because it's a necessary part of the game's commitment to player freedom. Some players get to 95% satisfaction but it's not possible for any player to naturally get a perfect experience. The game always demands some work. A lot of your questions have answers in the demo if you think about them hard enough. Nearly every single line of dialogue is some kind of loaded sentence. If you think of the game as one huge onslaught of a thousands little pieces of information that combine into bigger pieces of information you will see that the game has a lot of hidden information that rewards not making snap judgements about something based only on its first layer of information. If there's a contradiction somewhere, it's put there to make you ask yourself what that means. A piece of negative information like confirming that something doesn't have a scent that leads anywhere can also tell you something. This is a game that's all about challenging your own assumptions.
Comments
only played through the first puzzle and looked around I'm short on time right now so I might play more later
the art and style are awesome I can pretty much tell immediately if something is a clue or not I will say I think the blue boxes you fill your answers in should be like little torn scraps of notebook paper or something
also when going through dialog I feel like there should be a button to go back to the main dialog options (there might be one already sorry if I missed it)
this games super cool
keep up the good work
Graphics and art direction remain immaculate. The writing is on the high note still, even with Em to whom I was initially somewhat sceptical, loony girl but she grows on you. Exploring different branches of conversation is a nice touch. Locking out parts of conversation was a novelty, a good one if it doesn't soft-lock anything important.
Detectives got good dynamic, I do hope as the case progresses your partner becomes a tad less snarky and sarcastic. Obradinesque track for confirming section of your work hits hard. Adding new ways of interacting with evidence - Viggo and the car's frequency/wave-meter. enriches the game and provides more depth. Love the reconstruction mechanism.
Now for the bad.
I understand your underscored importance of paying attention to the detail. I do think it works 90% of the time, figuring something out, especially without any external help feels rewarding. I appreciate that game doesn't hold my hand 90% of the time. The 10% is a low point in the game. I've failed to find the cotton, it just didn't stand out enough for me to notice. In response to that I've bagged all items I could find, used scanner, viggo, talked to each character, before one of the forms ensured me that there's a piece of evidence missing. I've strolled through the entire map 4 times, finding each exit, every batch of leaves, every displaced barrel, hell even a gap in the fence that I thought for a second, contained some key takeaway. But the cotton didn't show up on my radar for a second, I knew that something was there, but after scouring the grounds not once or twice I started wishing for some sort of pity-timer hint. What would I give for a soft audio cue, enabled only after no progress has been made for some time. Or your partner saying something like 'There's cotton on the bushes mate, gee golly I feel like I'm back in Alabama'. I suppose once the game ships people who get stuck will be able to get information they need from the internet, and it won't be much of a hassle.
All in all, can't wait to see where the game actually progresses, it's unique, it stands out, mechanics are solid and the mystery does lure one in. As described above, unapologetic commitment to not holding hand has its drawbacks, but I have no doubt it will be a massive success.
I'll explain some things so that you have some peace of mind, not because I feel like excusing the demo. The demo is a sliced off part of the whole of the full game which is one continuous process with nearly no hard blocks. The demo is not a good demo, but it's a great introduction to the entirety of the game. I've accepted that and I prefer it that way. You successfully progressed past this section of the game and were allowed to continue. The issue of players sticking around the grounds too long only exists in the demo, and it's because some players want to try as hard as they can to 100% the demo, which was never intended to be the experience and it's why there's several warnings throughout the demo that give you an out. It's possible, but like it's said in the beginning, it's more difficult than it should be. That warning is there for a reason, because I know what tends to happen, and the game is designed to discourage brute forcing.
There are 20+ progress triggers around the grounds. After only 7 the museum can be 'entered'. If you imagine you're playing the full game there is no mandatory wandering around the grounds for 2 hours (unless the player really really wants to) and this is the point where the game hits you with 5 more puzzles in rapid succession, making it clear that puzzles are almost never immediately solvable.
I'm assuming you unlocked both sections and I'm assuming you know that they get marked red when you have the info to solve them. Different clues are differently difficult to find. The cotton is not supposed to be easy to find. Some case pieces appear in multiple places for a reason. There's dialogue that nudges the player to end the demo if you have found enough things. I believe in free wins but I don't believe in making the demo unnecessarily easy to guarantee as many players as possible just accidentally solving everything solvable. I wouldn't play a game like that and would feel like it's playing itself and treating the player like he's dumb.
I trust the vision, can't wait for the full game to play.
The stylized aesthetic helps with highlighting clues, but like many similar games I still often have the issue of walking around like a headless chicken trying to find things that I've missed. Also I wish I could freely explore other area instead of having to clear a stage entirely before I can progress but I understand it would have been too complicated to design a non linear exploration.
This is fantastic! Keep it up!
One major gripe for me is how unnecessarily slow the movement speed is. I am not asking to be Usain Bolt but the "sprint" feels like a fast walk to me, and the garden area is massive.
Played your demo on Next Fest: https://www.twitch.tv/videos/2486711632
(Sorry, screwed up the initial part of the recording, but I guess that early part is very straight-forward anyhow.)
If the itch version has more content, please let me know…
Still hugely enjoying the game. Your demos keep on only teasing the "truth" so I still don’t know whether the solutions in this game will be natural, or supernatural. Or both? In any case it seems very nice how some clues in that park seem to be less immediately relevant, while still intriguing.
You can see me somewhat brute-forcing the solution to the final puzzle – I think you are being slightly too autistic here, or need to phrase it better. The "Loud Bang" to my mind clearly belongs to the immediate time frame of the attack; since it seems to have ended the attack, from what we know? But it’s an incorrect answer. Meanwhile afaik the cotton in the brush we did not even 100% relate to the attack (the girl should tell us "oh yeah I have this torn piece of clothing"), yet it is a correct answer.
The world building is very cool, the dialogues are entertaining and neither too serious nor too funny. I don’t know what your plan is for the final release, but it’s very nice in these demos to be just thrown into the story, and we, the main character, are for some reason intrigued and concerned about what happened to this woman, and as a player one actually has no idea WHY that event is so concerning, one has no idea WHAT the protagonist actually suspects may have happened here. We just get the emotion from the protagonist and it adds to the suspense.
I see you caved in and made walking NPCs, I gotta say the previous solution of triggered teleports fit in more with the general spookiness, in my humble opinion. But it’s understandable.
Looking forward to the release.
edit: After reading the other comment, I remembered, I was quite annoyed with the slow movement and hurting my pinkie having to hold shift just to make it bearable.
Thanks for the video feedback. It's probably better if you understand that no player has a 100% satisfying process and that's kind of intended because it's a necessary part of the game's commitment to player freedom. Some players get to 95% satisfaction but it's not possible for any player to naturally get a perfect experience. The game always demands some work. A lot of your questions have answers in the demo if you think about them hard enough. Nearly every single line of dialogue is some kind of loaded sentence. If you think of the game as one huge onslaught of a thousands little pieces of information that combine into bigger pieces of information you will see that the game has a lot of hidden information that rewards not making snap judgements about something based only on its first layer of information. If there's a contradiction somewhere, it's put there to make you ask yourself what that means. A piece of negative information like confirming that something doesn't have a scent that leads anywhere can also tell you something. This is a game that's all about challenging your own assumptions.