Post by HypnoChanger in Mindwipe Castle comments

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Sorry to hear the game disappointed you. ^__^; This was my first attempt at a mystery genre game. To address some of your criticisms:

1: For times when you object to truthful statements, I don't recall any of them off the top of my head. I do have autism, so it *may* be a case where my interpretation of a sentence differs from average people. So if you can elaborate on which lines this happens on I can try to fix them.

2: Regarding the amount of MC content, I did find it difficult to arrange extra mind control without it interfering with the pacing of the mystery. This may be an issue with my inexperience with the mystery genre. I tried to include a few extra instances of mind control beyond the trials though, such as Anne getting possessed and Olivia being charmed.

3: What kind of buggy navigation did you have? I can try to work on fixing any issues you've found.

4: Villain mode does break the established norms of trials, but my thinking there was that playing as the villain, your goals are different from the investigators. So, you wouldn't be playing exactly like the investigators.

5: Miranda mode has more than just the one new CG at the end. There are four new CGs throughout her version of the story in addition to the ending. You mentioned clicking through it so its possible you missed them?

I can't make any radical changes to the story, such as adding new scenes at this point, but I am definitely open to fixing any bugs or logic errors that I may have made due to being just one person. Thanks for the feedback, I hope you are willing to elaborate on the issues that need to be fixed so I can look into them.

Vandelorian66 days ago (1 edit)

Okay-I did not expect that to happen. You had a normal, not rage induced reaction. Alrighty then!

I wasn't aware this was your *first* Mystery Game-that was my error, I shouldn't hold that against you-lord knows my first coding modules were horseshit when I was getting into the hobby.

1: The First Case is clean of it. The Second Case-when Miranda mentions not seeing Silvia's Clothes anywhere-that is a Truthful statement, it makes no logical sense to object to it because that was the Truth in every case, to Anne and Miranda. It should have a "Yes But-" of some kind or not be considered at all in terms of the Gameplay. That is-by my four hours of gameplay-the one and only inconsistency, I made it sound much worse than it was, my apologies.

2. Pacing is definitely an issue-but a solution this would be, in future projects because you obviously can't massively overhaul this game overnight for this: Have *two* days between assaults. One where the Villain strikes, and the next day when its discovered, either via announcement or character, that something happened. That way you can have one day for just a little bit extra entertainment, character interaction, putting in pieces of the larger plot, etc.

3. The Perspectives in the hall ways can switch, sometimes the arrows would not register mouse movement above them. During the Miranda Mode, navigation in the bedroom area breaks-its arrows, and state, switch between Mirandas and Annes, changing which Rooms you have access to and what NPCs are there every time you enter the room, causing you to have to double back in order to interact with the single NPC.

4. Yes-playing different is one thing. Samantha's trial is the exact OPPOSITE of Annes trial, with a new perspective, and gameplay goal-but the general gameplay is still consistent. For Mirandas-you don't need to lower confidence significantly and can still win. Holis-lose. You just need to spam the wrong option until you lose. And that means you win. Ravens is the same as Samantha, but quite a bit harder-which is fine, its expected as the fourth Case. Mirandas is misleading in terms of Goalpost, and Holis makes Losing the Win Condition. Samantha's and Ravens were fun puzzles to figure out. Holis should be harder than 'Spam wrong button on first frame'. Mirandas should've been more complex.

5. The CGs I 'missed' were all Visuals of things that were described to us or happened off-screen and was later explained. Miranda being Bitten, Miranda switching outfits, and luring Silvia are all Non-Significant and the events they are Visually displaying are explained Verbally. They could've been injected between the text blocks during or trial, or the text and images displayed at the same time in the Main Game, and nothing would change, nothing special is particularly described in them. They are Non-Significant CGs and I should've clarified that prior to the complaint.

Oh also-tiny bug. The Villain Mode check boxes are bugged-when I completed Miranda's, the game said I completed Ravens As well. That means you have a Flag tripping somewhere it shouldn't or just a random bug occured.

HypnoChanger65 days ago

Yeah, some people take any criticism very personally... It can sting to get negative feedback, but I try to use it as a learning opportunity and not get too defensive.

1: I'll take a look at that trial. My thinking was that you object because you're questioning the detail, but agree may be more accurate in that moment.

2: Yeah, I think I went the opposite direction. I tried to make the villain attacks fairly close together to avoid having pointless filler. Same goal, kinda, but completely different methods. I can try spreading things out more in the future if I do another game in this genre.

3: Do you happen to recall when Miranda's bedroom turns into Anne's by accident? I likely have an incorrect pointer somewhere in there which shouldn't be too hard to fix. I'm not clear on what you mean by perspectives flipping though. Do you mean the stairs by chance? Those have a different appearance depending on if you are climbing up or down.

4: My idea for the villains was to give them unique ways to win depending on the villain. Samantha and Raven wearing down the group's patience by wasting their time fits each of their personalities, Miranda "solving the case" while pinning her target fits her being a detective, and Holi I thought losing on purpose would be an interesting twist, but then also worried that it would be too obtuse and so might have made it too obvious by making her mention that win condition out loud? Or it could just be a case of "interesting does not always equal good". unfortunately it seems like with the mystery genre, its harder for me to tell what will come across well to the player, since I cannot know what it's like to someone who doesn't know the answers in advance.

5: Yeah, the CGs in Miranda Mode are not "essential" in that sense. My intention with Miranda Mode was to show some of what's happening behind the scenes where Anne would not be able to see herself. Then I tried to add in some extra CGs to those moments to avoid it being only text. Its possible I over-estimated how much people would be interested in seeing those extra details though. ^__^;

Vandelorian65 days ago

3. Miranda's Room Access would flip any time I entered the Room. Whether I went from Mirandas Room to Sleeping Area, or from the Dining Hall Entrance to the Sleeping Area, it would flip between Mirandas and Annes version.

4. Okay I get it now-its definitely a case of interesting not being good.

5. Honestly, games like Danganronpa are great in this Genre-I'd look into them more if you pursue interest in this type of game again, which you totally could. Having a rotating cast of characters in a series of Mystery Puzzle games that are, in-fact, Political Ploys and/or Entertainment for the masses would be nice-and I'm not just saying that cause Danganronpa is basically a Dead Series at this point, nope, not at all.

:3

HypnoChanger64 days ago

I found an issue with that. Miranda's room was exiting to the main story version of the dorm hall rather than Miranda's version. I have a fix for that uploaded now.

I have seen a playthrough of danganronpa, and I think the style of debate in this game is vaguely similar (though not as involved, mechanically). I probably should give it a closer look before making another attempt in this genre. Probably will be a little while before my next attempt as art assets take some time to put together.

itch.io

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