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I really enjoyed this game but for whatever reason, I could not attack the experiments. Not sure what I was doing wrong. I had no issue with navigating through the levels. (I did have to keep checking the map/player location callout, but that's just my lack of experience keeping that mental image in my head.
I really wanted to progress past the experiment though to see the rest of the game but no button combo worked to kill it (even after getting the key with stun gun)
I would love to hear how you get past this point to keep playing. I feel like a learned a lot about menu navigation from this game giving the number keys the options to help keep information organized is so functionally smart.
Thanks for sharing your game, looking forward to trying again it if it's further developed.
Thanks for taking a look! The inspection options on numbers were a gamble, glad to hear it worked out for you. I might move them onto the ZXCVB keys, or maybe make it customisable. But the principle looks like it's staying
Please see the following excerpt from the official Zero State Strategy Guide (£14.99 from all good book shops):
To zap the first experiment you need to focus on it. Use the arrow keys to inspect the cells in the corridor - press down until you hear A2 (or is it A1?) announced which will tell you that the experiment is on that square. Then press the space bar to fire your stun gun and zap it! You can do this once per room that contains experiments from any distance. Well... unless it's a particularly strong experiment that needs a point blank hit...
ohhhh that's what it meant by focus on the enemy. I thought it meant move to the location or the location next to the experiment then hit action. That makes sense now!
That's on me. I was aware I wasn't being consistent with my terminology but life admin was getting in the way and I'd rather eat my own feet than record myself talking again. If I continue the project I'll do some proper writing and tutorialising then find someone competent to record the lines! Useful feedback, thank you
Hi, great effort! I think it would be good if there's a little more ambience, or a way to know what rooms you've already explored. So insead of door at a1 it could say cabin b at a1, for instance, so you know which doors you have left to explore. There could be another caviat where perhaps some labs could be dark, so in those labs you don't get that description unless you have a light or something.
Thank you! I've seen another player mention naming visited rooms and I think it's a great idea that will help a lot. In 'canon' if you like the station is already completely pitch black throughout, that's why you are relying on your PDA. But I like the idea that in some places the PDA could glitch and not tell you everything. Maybe there could be a special type of experiment that you need to zap to make it work properly again. Hmmm... thank you for the ideas!
I like the voice acting and the general story! As others have mentioned, lots to build on top of if you wanted to keep working on it, but overall pretty cool!!
It very definitely needs more work to be a full game. As far as 'is it worth continuing?' goes, you and some other commenters have given me confidence that it just might be, and some thoughts on where to go with it. Thank you!
Fun game, and I think the navigation method worked relatively well for me. I too think a few more sounds would have added to the atmosphere, at a minimum I think a sound for killing an experiment would be good even from a design perspective because as it is I had to look around again to see if it had disappeared or not. But there's definitely a lot of potential here.
'Potential' is the word in there that makes me super happy. I approached this as a bit of a proof of concept and while it's lacking as a whole package I feel like there might be a good idea wanting to get out. It absolutely needs more sound both for atmosphere and feedback. Probably other work too but I feel very validated that you can pick out some promise. Thank you!
Like other players, I really enjoyed the voice acting, but got stuck with the navigation. For me, it wasn't totally obvious even after getting the room descriptions how to move around, and how to inspect the room. Audio cues that included "player" didn't totally make sense for me, and I struggled to get a sense of where I was - admittedly I'm not totally used to navigation-by-audio, so if this is more intuitive for other folks, I totally understand!
I'm glad someone enjoyed the acting, a small part of me dies when I listen to myself recorded... and then I put it on the internet?! The navigation etc was a bit of a gamble, an idea that's been in my head for years with no guarantee it would work. I think you have a point about familiarity with audio navigation being a factor. With some better sound choices and some tweaks I wonder if I could get something more intuitive to everyone. Your thoughts are a help with that, thank you!
Fun submission. It worked great for me with NVDA, and the voice acting was a nice touch. I don’t think I got pretty far, but I unlocked some doors and defeated some experiments to get the general idea. For me, the look controls and navigation were pretty intuitive. Beyond the calls for more sounds, I’d love for it to announce the names of the rooms when entering, or when pressing 3 it might name the doors by their room if we’ve already been there, so there’s less mental overhead in the navigation. Nice work!
Thank you, I appreciate that you found fun in there. It definitely needs more sounds, that sadly was something that got cut back when real life got in the way towards the end. It needs to be more atmospheric if nothing else. I like the idea of giving some detail about where familiar doors lead. I really appreciate your thoughts, for a first attempt at anything like this I'm pleased with them too
The idea is good, but the lack of sounds disappoints. I mean the sound of steps, opening doors, etc. I still did not understand how to find out on which cage there is a danger.
That's completely fair! I stopped quite abruptly when there was more I wanted to add, it definitely would have been better with way more sounds. I'm happy that you think there's an idea in there though, I'd like to have another try at it one day. If you press the arrow keys it should read some text via NVDA/TTS - if not I uploaded a new version on Friday with some missing DLLs. Thanks for trying it out and for commenting!
Declaring a change to the submission:
I am very grateful to zersiax who pointed out that I didn't bundle the NVDA DLLs making the game essentially unplayable so that I could fix it! Should be working now
Love the effort! :) Unfortunately I wasn't really able to get this to work very well; the arrow keys did not do much for me, I wasn't really able to hear where I was going and could really only trigger the initial two voice prompts to play. I did notice there's no NVDAController dll within the game folder unless you packed that in within the .pck, maybe that's why? I covered the game on my Twitch last Wednesday (same username) if you want to take a look.
Thanks for trying it out! I suspect you're right about the dll, I'll have to reupload it. I appreciate you pointing that out.
It's definitely not polished, I had to drop it a couple of days before I would have liked. And nothing I ever make is quite what was in my mind at the start!
Thanks again for the comments
I think that was the problem, it must have been completely unplayable! I have uploaded the DLLs as part of the zip and made a declaration that I have done so with a credit to you for pointing it out. Thank you once again