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Back of House's itch.io pageResults
| Criteria | Rank | Score* | Raw Score |
| Horror | #5 | 3.651 | 4.000 |
| Theme | #8 | 3.834 | 4.200 |
| Gameplay | #9 | 3.104 | 3.400 |
| Overall | #9 | 3.499 | 3.833 |
| Story | #10 | 3.469 | 3.800 |
| Creativity | #11 | 3.469 | 3.800 |
| Presentation | #13 | 3.469 | 3.800 |
Ranked from 5 ratings. Score is adjusted from raw score by the median number of ratings per game in the jam.
How did you choose to implement the Theme: Theatre of the Grotesque?
The game takes place on a theater, and each character their own grotesque ways into play.
Did you implement any of the optional Bonus Challenges, and if so, which ones?
Some of the characters wear animal masks, (SPOILER) in the ending the characters follows a script during rehearsal.
Did you create your game in RPG Maker?
Yes
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Comments
Playing this entry made me nostalgic for some of the good 'ol classics such as Witch House and Mad Father, specially because of the puzzles. Gotta admit: I got stuck in some puzzles, but solving them was really satisfying. I think they were really well implemented, which can be one of the hardest thing to do (sometimes, as a dev, you either make a puzzle that you think it's clever but ends up being really tedious/hard for players, or you end up making an extremely easy and unsatisfying puzzle, but the puzzles in this game were really good and balanced, I really liked that).
Usually, I'm not fond of games that use RTP tilesets, but in this case, I dind't mind it and at times I actually forgot about it. Tilesets aside, the characters sprites and the portraits, as well as certain artwork (such as the title screen and the ending image) were really, really good (I love Marie's design). I think non rtp tilesets would have definitely complemented the characters and artwork better-
While I didn't really find the game particularly scary, the setting was quite unsettling, and the outcome of the strange man after you complete his task was really disturbing (and the anticipation of seeing his face was even more disturbing).
I found some phasable tiles, although they were very specific and they didn't break the game or something.
Overall, I really enjoyed the game, and I think theme was perfectly implemented. Great job and congratulations to everyone involved!
Thank you so much for the comment! I'm happy to hear you enjoyed the puzzles we came up with, as well as knowing it reminded you of the witch's house and mad father, those were actually our main inspirations!
We Will definetely make up some assets of out own if the game ever gets an update after the jam, and we also Will try to crank up the tension of the game, how it is right now most of the time feels more like a comedic game(which is also what we were going for, just not full on that).
Thank you again!
I want to start by saying the visuals intrigued me and liked how you use default assets but feel like they fit, plus the sprites are really nice. The characters got very cool designs and I think the only thing I would add is that the npcs had varied different body expressions, but the protagonist only changed her facial expressions, so she felt very stoic compared to the others (tho Im aware it could be because a limited time thing).
I was curious about where the story was going, and some of the deaths actually made me jump, like the necklace bust, which reminded me of classic horror RPG games deaths.
I honest didn't manage to finish because I got eventually tired of running around, it is hard to tell where to go next and most of the time I found myself spamming the enter key to find what I could interact with. I managed to get several items and move forward but most of it was me using all the items in every spot I thought could be used and hoped for the best (and often I wasn't sure why I was doing certain things).
Spoilers:
For items I got, rope, glass shard, brush, the phoenix seed, and I think that's it. I also managed to get the strange man to go to the stage but I got stuck after that, not sure what to do next. I got a message in the mirrored room that "Something downstairs changed" or something along those lines but couldn't figure what downstairs was.
I planted the phoenix seed on the pot nearby the horse and brushed it's mane, but not sure what I accomplished with that.
You almost have it figured out, there is ONLY One puzzle left! The last thing you need is to find a way to get the necklace from the bust to use on the Room with the horse!
I do agree the game needs some Direction after you escape from the bathroom, we were gonna put some dialogue with that but with the time running out and all the other puzzles we had to implement we sorta forgot XD
The noise from below was from the Strange man's Room, to tell the player the laundry chute was now Open to go to the basement. There is a text near the laundry chute in that room to explain what puzzle makes it Open, but i think you might have missed it, but were still able to solve the puzzle, which also makes the letter disappear so you never see the letter at all, that might need a rework...
I really like how out characters portraits turned out, in the future maybe we'll some more expressions to the characters, She did felt the more stiff out of the bunch.
It makes me happy that some of the deaths gave you a bit of a scary, was worried we would have missed completely in that department.
I'm glad you spared some time to try out our game and that you still enjoyed it despite of its flaws!
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SPOILER(In case you still wanna see the ending but dont wanna think more about the puzzles)
To get the necklace from the bust, first take the necklace, then after the necklace is on your inventory use the rope on the bust(the clue is the text near the bust).
ALSO there is a wall in the greenroom that you can cut to get a Key to the puppet masters Office, there is some more lore on there!
Haven't managed to complete the whole game yet, but I liked what was there so far. It uses the RTP assets well and the original sprites are a nice touch. The biggest issue on this front is that it needed a more cohesive 'art style', but it was alright overall.
Looking forward to what you make next and I hope you'll decide to participate again in one of these jams sometime in the future!
SPOILERS:
The part I got stuck on was just after escaping from horse mask lady. I found a Glass Shard at the toilets, but didn't really find out what to do with it during casual wandering. I might come back to it later.
Hi There, thank you for playing and for hosting this jam! This was my first time using RPG maker, kinda wanted to make a game with it for a while and this was a good excuse to do it! I still prefer godot, but I did think the way RPG maker handles cutscenes is so fricking intuitive, it was really cool!
The puzzles are a bit to the harder side, or maybe the clues aren't clear enough... I do think what we came up is cool to figure out!
SPOILER
After that sequence you should head back to the room where you found maggie mae for the first time, there are some directions and items there that allow you to open up the map a bit more. The glass shard used to be called SHARP shard to help figure out what it was for, but we ended up changing it.
ANYWAYS, thank you so much for playing and the feedback!