This was excellent. I ended up playing for around an hour and a half, which probably says more about the core loop than anything else I could write here.
The combat feels extremely good, especially on controller. Once I switched over, the simple move / dodge / attack layout felt fast and natural. The spiderās attacks are also very readable: I could learn the landing circle and charge telegraphs, dodge them intentionally, and then move back in during the recovery window to punish. That telegraph -> dodge -> punish rhythm is probably the strongest part of the game.
I also really liked the progression system. Having your performance during the night feed into upgrades gives you a reason to keep replaying, and there are enough meaningful stats to let you noticeably change the character over time. I eventually filled the upgrade grid after somewhere around 35ā40 nights.
Thatās also roughly where I felt like I had reached the end of what the game currently had to teach me.
After learning the spiderās attacks, acid, and the smaller spiders, later nights mostly seemed to remix or increase the pressure of mechanics I already understood. The combat was still fun, but I wasnāt having to develop a new strategy anymore. If this were expanded, Iād love to see later nights introduce attacks or combinations that force the player to reconsider habits theyāve already developed rather than primarily adding more of the existing threats.
The glasses mechanic especially feels like an opportunity for that. The opening sequence where everything is blurry until you find them is memorable, but once I recovered my glasses they were basically permanent for the rest of the fight.
I kept expecting the spider to eventually gain an attack that could knock them off again.
I think that could become a really interesting combat state. If getting hit by a particular well-telegraphed attack knocked your glasses somewhere nearby, suddenly you would have to decide whether to recover them immediately or survive temporarily with reduced visibility while the spider is still attacking. It would take something thatās currently mostly an opening ritual and integrate it directly into the combat loop.
A couple smaller things I noticed:
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The game plays wonderfully with a controller, but keyboard/menu navigation felt less complete. I couldnāt find a reliable keyboard/controller-style ābackā action in some menus and occasionally had to reach for the mouse to click Back.
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A few of the centered notification boxes also felt slightly disconnected from the otherwise very cohesive visual language, and the flame effect after defeating the spider looked a little different stylistically from the rest of the effects.
Those are small criticisms, though. Visually this is one of the strongest jam games Iāve played so far. The lighting, fog, character work, combat effects, silhouettes, and overall nighttime atmosphere feel remarkably cohesive. The audio supports it really well too.
And the theme integration is excellent. This isnāt just a Halloween-looking game. The lantern, darkness, limited visibility, giant spider, surviving the night, and waiting for sunrise are all part of how the game actually works.
Really impressive work for the jam window. There is already enough here that I stopped thinking of it as āa jam prototypeā pretty quickly and just started playing it as a game.