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A jam submission

warden: a (bug)folk horrorView game page

Ectocomp 2025 winner (Le Grand Guignol)
Submitted by Taterbug Games — 12 hours, 48 minutes before the deadline
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warden: a (bug)folk horror's itch.io page

Which category is your game in?

Le Grand Guignol (created in over 4 hrs)

What language is your game in?

English

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Comments

(+2)

This was possibly the cutest dark story I've ever seen. I'm intrigued to replay for the other endings. Glad I played this one.

Submitted(+2)

The worldbuilding in this entry was so impressive. Also, well done with blending parser and choice list response for a smooth play-experience.  I overlooked some details during my playthrough, and became overreliant on the walkthrough, but for more patient players, the walkthrough won't be necessary.  There are several additional endings I will try to reach without the walkthrough.  The ending I reached might not have been the "winning" ending, but it was well foreshadowed.

Developer

I hope it was more fun than frustrating! We definitely should've signposted some things more clearly, but it is good to know the walkthrough was useful. Really appreciate the comment about the choice/parser mix, that was something we fretted about throughout  development.  Thanks for playing and sharing your thoughts, we're always grateful for feedback!

Submitted(+2)

The gameplay was thoroughly engaging, and the attention to detail was great! Very immersive world-building. I have a pretty low tolerance for body horror, but glad I pushed through for this 😆

Developer

Thanks for playing! We tried to the worst of the horror for the final scene. Hope it was fun (and that your ending wasn't one of the more gruesome ones)! 

Submitted(+2)

I have all sorts of complimentary things to say about this charming (and at times disturbing) adventure, but I’ll skip them all and get to the important question — tatterbugs? You call them tatterbugs?

Here we mostly call them slaters, though woodlice, hedgepigs, sowbugs, and other names are also possible. But tatterbug is a version I’ve never heard.

Developer

Thanks for playing! Now for the important stuff: isopods get called all kinds of things in the US. Growing up in Oklahoma/Illinois we called them rollie pollies, but pill bug is common, and in parts of the US south and midwest there's potato bug/tater bug/taterbug. That one's common enough that bowlback mandolins are sometimes called taterbug mandos in folk music circles.

When choosing what to call them in the game, we wanted one that was 1) cute (aka, not at all scientific), 2) reasonably clear in what we were talking about, and 3) American. Taterbug felt like the best fit, but maybe it was distractingly folksy, haha. 


I do really like hedgepig, and sowbug has a nice agricultural vibe. "Slater" kind of sounds like the name of the cool kid from your high school, for some reason. There are some terms I find it hard to believe are real, like "butchy bois" and "chooky pigs". (I love chooky pig, but SURELY no one calls them that for real?!) I do love how many names they have, though; I bet other languages have some really great ones.

Submitted(+1)

Chooky pigs are new to me as well! My field guide to ispods doesn’t mention that one at all :D (A field guide I own, not one I’ve written, to be clear).

I think “taterbug” is a great choice, and very cute. I will tell my half a dozen IKEA isopods that one :D