itch.io Community » Tabletop Gaming » Resources » Playtesting

The Moonseed Parcel — 3 free playtests wanted for a six-puzzle paper adventure

A topic by javedhamas2-hash created 14 days ago Views: 103 Replies: 3

Viewing posts 1 to 4

A seed parcel has reached the wrong desk. Can you reconstruct its route, identify its courier and recover the delivery code?

I’m looking for three independent playtest sessions for The Moonseed Parcel, Free Review 1.1. Solo players and groups are welcome. Please try the one-puzzle sample first; continue to the full adventure only if it interests you.

Name of system: The Moonseed Parcel, a standalone cooperative paper puzzle adventure. No other game is required.

Number of players: Designed for 1–4 readers working together in English. For this first round, I’m seeking adult puzzle players. Player count and intended age range still need independent feedback.

Approximate session length: Not yet measured. Please spend up to 30 minutes on your first attempt, then stop if you wish. This is a requested time limit, not a claim that the full game takes 30 minutes.

Testing period: First round for Review 1.1; seeking three independent session reports. No appointment or live call is needed.

Other details: Six linked puzzles across eight play pages, plus an optional illustrated cover. Choose A4, US Letter or a low-ink version. You need paper and pencils; no cutting, host or app. You can also read the PDF on screen and write answers separately. Hints, worked solutions and the ending are in a separate PDF. The story is a gentle, fictional delivery mystery without violence or horror. Payments and donations are disabled. Participation is voluntary and unpaid.

What I need to learn:

What did you think you had to do when you opened the first page?
Which exact instruction or record made you hesitate?
Which hints did you use, where did you stop, and roughly how long did you spend?
Which puzzle felt rewarding, and which felt like busywork?
When, if ever, would you choose another paper adventure like this?

Please follow the printed instructions without creator coaching. Stopping early or deciding this is not for you is useful feedback too. No positive review is requested.

Disclosure: AI tools assisted the puzzles, text, artwork and layout. Independent human playtesting and physical printer testing are still pending.

Free sample, full files and actual page previews

How to contact: Reply in this thread or comment on the itch.io project page. Please mark solutions as spoilers. No personal contact details or recordings are needed.

Like Reply

archivetrail3 days ago

Six puzzles is a good size for one sitting. One print tip for testers: say in the description whether the pack is meant to be printed at 100%/actual size, especially if any puzzle depends on alignment or overlays. Fit-to-page scaling quietly shrinks things by a few percent and can break those. It also helps to say whether duplex printing is safe or whether any answers would show through on the back of a page.

Like Reply

lyra-sable21 hours ago

Blind run of the one-puzzle sample, screen only, no printing, about seven minutes. I got the right place and the right digit on my own and both matched page 2. Not posting the answer since you asked for spoiler marks, but the walk checks out. What I thought I had to do: sort the route notes by time, walk a coordinate grid from the night post, read the digit at the last square. That landed in one read. "Use the number at your final square, not a count of moves" did real work. I did not have to guess which number you wanted, which is unusual. The one place I hesitated, and it is the only one: which way the rows run. "North is up" is right, but on screen the only clue to whether row 1 is the front or the back of the grid is where A1 sits relative to A4 in the layout. On paper you see it. On a screen you are reading the text layer and I spent a minute on "is A1 the bottom row", then worked it out from the night post being the near corner. Two words kill it: "row 1 is the bottom row." Cheap, and it is the kind of thing only a screen reader hits, so your printers will never report it. Hints: none. The sample has nothing to hint with. I stopped at the end of the sample, which is where you asked. Rewarding: the sort is real work and a wrong order punishes you immediately at the next step. That is what makes a route puzzle worth doing instead of a reading exercise. Busywork: nothing in the sample. The thing to watch in the other five is repetition. If two more of the six are also "sort, then walk", the second one will feel like admin. The ledger, stamps, weights and telegram sound like four different muscles, so I suspect you are fine. Print note, since archivetrail raised alignment: the sample prints A4 in the corner but never says print at 100%. The 50 mm guide is in the full briefing, not in the sample, so anyone printing only the sample has nothing to check scale against. This puzzle does not care about scale. If any of the later records uses an overlay, a sleeve or a ruler, put the scale line on that page, not in the briefing. Would I choose another paper adventure like this: yes. Discount that a little, I write tabletop one-shots for a living. The 12+ guess reads right to me. The difficulty here is reading load, not logic. Disclosure so you can weigh the above: I have a free D&D horror one-shot on itch too. Not looking for a trade. If the full edition still wants another independent report I will run it and give you notes in this same shape, spoilers marked.

Like Reply

Arrow Out11 hours ago

Asking for a timed 30-min first attempt is kind to testers. Tip for the sample: ask each playtester only “what did you think the parcel was for on the first page?” — if that answer scatters, fix the opener before measuring full-adventure length.

Like Reply