ahhhh! thank you so much! yeah a lot of people missed the dialogue, which is a shame because it kinda sets up your expectations and immerses you in the task you're about to do. i was really kicking myself, but i put in so many textboxes and each of them had separate wait times, so with the few hours i had left on the game, i couldn't go through and mess with the timing too much. seriously went down to the wire on just having them in at all. :')
definitely wanted to make sure i had a dense quality idea packed into the minimum 10 minutes the jam gave us to stream. i needed the concept to be one and done, because it's being presented for a mass audience and i wanted to make sure that it wrapped up quick. but in the full version, i'll make sure the player has a world to immerse themselves in for longer, and i hope that you appreciate it!!
but actually, you bring up an interesting point, i kind of have a clear idea of what the game ultimately ends up being about, i didn't really think of adding routes or alternative endings. i think it'll kind of be a video game version of a short film, i can see it becoming overcomplicated and losing precision in its story delivery if i tried to deviate the plot. i also think that the fuller version might have mechanics that end up taking much longer than a normal game, so i don't want to have people restart a route over and over. i think i'll probably prioritize making sure the player takes away one canon story with no alternatives. i'll pretty much be emulating some of the anime i watched where you help someone onto the path of moving past their traumas.
as for the gameplay, i will more or less have to do it in this minigame format i think. i struggle to think of how i would make sure there's mechanical symmetry between them all. i don't know if i want it to be super varied in control schemes and goals, or if i would make all the challenges you pass tied together in some way, even if it's just in how they control and what you expect from the inputs. i have experience in plugging together a lot of inputs to have signals passing between connectors, so maybe it could feel like that. like you're stacking on splitters and connectors and trying to make it work. but no, i don't think the game will focus much on rhythm puzzles honestly, that was kind of a flair that i added for this particular jam. maybe i'll try to focus on how the aesthetics of the world coalesce in the game around the signals you're passing, so it might feel naturally more musical or alive, kind of like with your game, but it doesn't strictly need to be tied to rhythm. funny that we have overlap there!
and thank you haha, the game was originally going to be called The Channeler, but i wanted to focus more on Teleco's escape, and i thought the weird-ass name would be more iconic. i'm really deeply satisfied with all the decisions the team made for the jam, and whatever the outcome, i think i can make something memorable and worthwhile for everyone. thanks so much for enjoying it as much as you did!