We spent more time on it than we thought at first. We played until day 40, but at that point there wasn't much variety. A bit more dynamic reacting would make it more compelling. Nice game
Play game
New Fear Unlocked's itch.io pageResults
| Criteria | Rank | Score* | Raw Score |
| Overall | #25 | 3.667 | 3.667 |
| Mechanics | #33 | 3.556 | 3.556 |
| Fun | #71 | 3.222 | 3.222 |
| Music | #72 | 3.222 | 3.222 |
| Story | #76 | 2.778 | 2.778 |
| Sound | #84 | 3.111 | 3.111 |
| Aesthetics | #99 | 3.556 | 3.556 |
| Theme | #114 | 3.000 | 3.000 |
Ranked from 9 ratings. Score is adjusted from raw score by the median number of ratings per game in the jam.
How many people worked on this game in total?
1
Did you use any existing assets? If so, list them below.
https://styloo.itch.io/2d-village
Comments
Really fun idea!
Felt like the beginnings of a new RTS game, where I don't really know what's going on but I know that I will still lose days of my life to. Really like the UI and the overall layout of the game. As others have said, could do with a little more information shown on screen without having to click into a house, but the color changes were enough indication once I was able to remember what each color meant.
Overall, awesome job. Looks like you have a solid foundation to build off of. Perfect result of a game jam!
For whatever reason, I found it funny that all the men in this town only watch TV, and all the women are constantly staring at the mirrors. That's some bizarre gender caricature. Also, what a truly grim game! I thought, as I was eliminating whole families with fear, leaving orphans left and right, crushing the spirits of the most spiritual residents, and ultimately transforming this idyllic suburbia into a dead town.
With that said, I think the overall concept is interesting, and it was executed quite well. The interface is nice and thought out; you have hints everywhere, all the stats are generally intuitively understandable, while leaving some space for imagination. I liked that each house had a different layout in terms of age/gender, and it kind of made sense: a young couple, a big family with kids and grandparents, a lonely grandma living with her grandson, and so on. It was a small enough detail, but it was enough to prompt my imagination to generate different Stephen Kingian scenarios of how exactly this family unit is being destroyed from the inside by my supernatural machinations.
In terms of strategic depth, this game, unfortunately, felt kind of shallow to me. There are no really interesting choices to make; you just have to micromanage all the houses each turn, it gets repetitive really soon, and the race to the end of the game felt like a slog. It would've been interesting to see some additional mechanical complications as the game progresses, like priests coming up with new ways to oppose you, or you gaining additional power from completely abandoned buildings, etc. But I understand that any of these changes is time-consuming, and the game as it is is already quite impressive for a game jam entry!
Submitted
Alien HermeneuticsThanks for playing! I love strategy games, but Its difficult creating a good one. I was hoping the resistance feature would add some strategic depth to it once the player started clearing out the city, but yeah, didn't land well.
I must say, I put some thought to how a family should look like, but my imagination was not as deep as yours! Maybe that's what I was lacking :D.
As for the bizarre gender caricature, I was going to add a full personality system, with different objects and different haunting mechanism affecting people differently, but in the end thought that would be too much for a jam. I settled with just different age and gender profile being affected differently which gave rise to this.
Hey — I just played New Fear Unlocked and I really liked your ghost-management spin on haunted houses! The idea of balancing fear levels among different residents gave it a layered, strategic feel. My only suggestion: adding clearer visual icons or states for each house (like “haunted”, “cleansing”, “safe”) would help players track progress without clicking each one manually.
If you’ve got a moment, I’d love it if you could check out my game and leave a rating: /jam/gamedevtv-halloween-jam-2025/rate/3971977
— thanks so much and best of luck in the jam! 🎃
A really cool idea, with great potential. I agree with some of the other feedback that some more work on clearly and quickly communicating different states and effects of each house will go a long way to helping keeping the player deeply engaged. Good work, will be interested to see if you keep developing the idea.
Submitted
Don't Wake The Dead!Great original idea.
Being able to select the population size at the start was a nice touch.
Icons above each house giving information on what going on inside would be a massive improvement.
Otherwise very good.
Submitted
Noise to SignalI really liked the idea — spent about 15 minutes playing it — but it really needs clearer visual feedback. Having to click through every house each turn gets tiring. Why not highlight a house in yellow when it’s scheduled for cleansing, darken it when it’s on cooldown, and show an icon when you can start haunting someone? The fear system for the residents also isn’t very intuitive. Am I right that women are more scared of mirrors, men of TVs, and children of toys?
I know I’ve added quite a bit of critique here, but honestly, I really liked the concept and the game itself. It just needs some extra polish — more effects, spooky sounds, and user-friendly touches. Add different ghost classes and maybe a “staff” system, expand the residents’ fear mechanics — and you’ve got a really cool ghost management game in the making. Fantastic work!
Submitted
House of Winchester
Leave a comment
Log in with itch.io to leave a comment.