The game got stuck in dialogue mode without there being an option to select several times, which made it difficult to get through. Quite a cool idea to have to social engineer your way around.
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The Week Before's itch.io pageResults
| Criteria | Rank | Score* | Raw Score |
| Characterization | #32 | 3.667 | 3.667 |
| Mental Engagement | #33 | 3.556 | 3.556 |
| Overall | #44 | 3.426 | 3.426 |
| Overall | #46 | 3.556 | 3.556 |
| Lasting Impression | #55 | 3.222 | 3.222 |
| Atmosphere | #55 | 3.778 | 3.778 |
| Emotional Engagement | #69 | 2.778 | 2.778 |
Ranked from 9 ratings. Score is adjusted from raw score by the median number of ratings per game in the jam.
Comments
"Don't worry, I've got this."
I imagine that these (or something similar) are the agent's last words. Because, unfortunately, curiosity killed the cat. The Destroyer seemed like such a nice guy that I thought to myself: 'I bet he's totally chill about getting riled up. Let's try it!' As it turned out, I'll never know if he was chilled about it. Probably not, seeing as he called me a traitor, but then the game basically stopped. There was no way to continue the conversation. The same thing happened with Goggles. Yes, I threw caution to the wind against my better judgement and tried the Don't-say-this option again. Had to restart on each occasion. Which made me wish for a save function.
The visuals and music make for a very nice atmosphere. Your storytelling and dialogue are really good. Immediately transported me into the world. More puzzles would have been nice, of course, but this works well enough as it is. It was fun to sneakily collect information from the NPCs.
Very entertaining game. Looking forward to more content :)
Submitted
Under the SeaThanks for playing, really glad you enjoyed the storytelling! I didn't have enough time to properly test all dialogue options (or, more specifically, revisiting some of them) so this feedback really helps me get another bug that had went under my radar. And yes, The Destroyer was gonna get a lot less chill after that. I do plan to update the game in the (relatively) near future with the mentioned bugfixes + a bit more story content and a puzzle here and there, so stay tuned! :D
I really liked the experience! :)
First, the overall theme of playing as an Agent, needing to be careful what to say so as not to uncover your identity. The characters development was nice too, especially I liked how manner of speaking resembled their characteristics and backstories, that was definitely a plus. I also enjoyed the way you've "smuggled" the tip regarding the order of correct digits, that was both smooth and kind of tricky!
Graphic design combined with music give the player the ability to "dive" into that nice, gloomy atmosphere, and in the end I *really* rooted for the Rebellion, wishing to kick the Emperor's arse. Looking forward for the next part!
On the downside, as few others have mentioned, there's a bug regarding one of Doctor Death's dialogue option, leaving no ability to continue. Also a few graphic glitches, and, personally, I think it would have been a nice touch to add some kind of ending screen to dialogue options that lead to failure, even simple "you failed the Rebellion" or "you died", because currently, after selecting them, it also seems as if the game 'stops' and nothing happens, the player doesn't have that feeling of "it's the end"
Submitted
Mia is MIAThanks for playing, really glad you enjoyed it :D! I have now patched the mentioned bug, but thanks for playing the full game despite it. I'm also very satisfied that you liked how the characters' backstories and personality bleed into how they talk - I'm still getting the hang of writing dialogue and kind of feel like everyone sounds like me? So it's reassuring to see that my intention does come through in the text.
Also, the plans were definitely to have a more robust ending and not have it just fade to black but time caught up with me 😅 But I'm kinda commited to the whole saga thing now so I will be continuing development on The Week Before after the voting period is over; keep an eye out for that! And kind of related, the 'next part' already exists! It's called Extracción (you can play it here) and I worked on it for another jam that finished a bit before this one. It has different mechanics and some characters reappear, but for the moment being it's only in spanish. However, I plan to continue working on Extracción too, including localization for both games.
Overall a good experience!
Movement and graphics are really smooth. I did run into some dialogue issues wher eI couldnt scroll in lists and stuff. but managed to get thru it!
Submitted
Shadows Of SerenityI ran into an issue while talking to Dr. Death, all the dialogue options disappeared and I wasn't able to exit out of his close up. Otherwise, I was really enjoying your dialogue and world building. The corrupt government full of internal subterfuge and slimy cops who casually talk about doing drugs in the hallways really had me intrigued.
Submitted
My Mother & MeNice story, with a cool theme and aesthetics, kinda lacking more engaging interactions for me. Personally, I prefer bigger walls of text instead of button-mashing dialogues but I guess it's just me :)
Overall enjoyable experience, and worth the time spent.
Submitted
Mia is MIAThanks for playing, glad you enjoyed the experience! I was definitely stretched a bit thin with time and didn't get to implement all the depth I would have liked for the character interactions, but I'm glad that the overall experience remains good despite that. In previous games I feel like I've gone too far in the wall-of-text direction with my dialogue so I tried to tone it down this time around but perhaps I went too far 😅 The feedback helps a lot, so thanks again!
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