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ryan zone4 years ago (1 edit)

Hey, I'm super glad to see your story got a lot of good reception and feedback for this game! I think for a VN this is a really focused and consistent effort that is impressive in its scope for a jam. The story was long enough to allow for some character development and narrative progression and, if cliche, it told a fleshed-out story that had its own lore and depth that made it quite a polished effort. Congrats!

The backgrounds are visually consistent and have a fantastic pixel-art design that reminds me of those grainy but highly-detailed artstyles of late-80s computers (like the PC-98). I think some character portraits might have been helpful to clarify some interactions, but of course for action sequences the dark text-focused UI was effective in focusing on the writing. I think it was well done!

The writing is pretty good! The character interactions are handled well and it really does feel like the banter shared between a school friend group. I would say that it seemed more like a teenage cohort than pre-teens. I don't know how normal people respond to disappearing friends and monsters but there could have been a little impact from that - also being torn on whether to return to face the monster! On the upside, fleshing out the setting, the local urban legend, and the historical background to the story, added a lot of flavour and uniqueness to the game.

The choices could have been improved too. Given some of the antics that transpire the choices offered in the VN did feel a bit railroaded, such as being pressured into choosing whether to steal a car or commit arson to incite a distraction. Also, assigning the characters tasks is a cool idea, but other than getting a reaction from them it was hard to tell if this meaningfully altered the narrative branch.

I really like how many VNs jammers often make and think that this was a good one! I encourage you to keep writing and exploring the horror genre in your games because it's working really well for you!

Thanks for submitting this game to the SCREAM JAM!

- SCREAM CATALOGUE

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naver4 years ago(+1)

Thanks for the detailed response!

About assignments: There was initially going to be a final fight after burning George's body. The idea was the graveyard introduces you to their abilities (if you assign someone weak to push the statue, for example, they'll fail, and someone stronger will do it instead. Likewise, the crypt is a test of courage.)  in a harmless way. Then, in the final fight, if someone fails a task you assign to them, they die. The final fight got scrapped, though, so it defeated the purpose of that setup. With the exception of Brian. If you stress him out too much, he will leave the group before the farm, and wind up dead. That is assuming he survives the cemetery in the first place. It's a tough life for Brian.

There are a few things at the farm where who you have matters, but it's executed automatically. For example, one route involves shooting a window with a slingshot. Brian and Claire can do this, Satoshi and Andy will fail. But Tommy knows how good/bad of a shot his friends are, so it would be out of character to allow the player to potentially hand it to the worst shot. Another example is who helps with the fire, which is all done behind the scenes. In order for it to get done quickly enough for the fire team to be hidden before Scarlett arrives, you need to either give them the hatchet, or have Satoshi's fire expertise. If Scarlett arrives first, Link's companion will need to be fast enough to get some distance, meaning it must be Andy. Brian and Claire are too slow. Andy then additionally needs the walkman or slingshot to create a distraction to fully escape and hide. 

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