So I'm not quite the target audience for this game despite being childlike in nature - however, I do have feedback regardless!
Firstly, this is incredible - the game you've produced here despite worldwide carnage and the walls of reality breaking down like that one season of Doctor Who is seriously impressive, and it's clear that every part of this has been thought out in great detail. The art is consistent, the level design is great, and there's a general sense of cohesiveness in this that I've not even seen in some of the games I've paid money for. The music is great and overall it's a really solid game that you could honestly probably end up selling with some work.
The attention to detail is amazing, these are some standout things I noticed:
- Little icon in the taskbar as the game's running
- Walking sound changes places on surface you walk on (ie metal, stone etc)
- Little animations for things like lifting an object, diving through a portal
- The builders hammering away in Happiness
There are some things to be improved of course:
I agree with Charlie here on the control feedback, to a certain extent. Standard WASD controls might be too much for some kids, but it could also serve as a really good gateway into getting kids used to general keyboard and mouse controls. Weirdly enough, I tested the game with an Xbox 360 controller and it worked, but the sprint button was also bound to the punch button, and I found no explanation on controls for a joystick anywhere. Was this intended or are joysticks just a side effect of how your input system is set up?
General Feedback per level
Envy
A nice level, with a few flaws. It could be an idea to have a counter for how many objects you have left to place on the pedestal. The little blue guys that float around the level also seem to cause a lot of issues in terms of collisions, I got stuck on them a few times. Also, some kind of audible/visual feedback for how close you are to an item could be good.
Fear
Unfortunately this is my least favorite level of the lot, but it's still good. This is incredibly unforgiving (the dark souls of TDEMO games) for reasons I'm not really sure of. The ghost's spotlight movement was very unpredictable and unforgiving in terms of moving through the levels - I often found myself using the hide button to hide from the outer circle, but i would also be moving too slowly to outrun the inner circle. Having to completely restart when you get caught feels a bit much for a kid's game personally, and having to traverse the maze 3 separate times to collect all the keys could make this very stressful for a kid. Perhaps they could collect more than 1 key at a time, or when they get caught any keys they've already used remain used?
It's not all bad for this level though - in my opinion this has the most distinct visual style
Happiness
This is my favorite level of all of them. The visual consistency is on point here, and the level design thrives. The world in this level really feels alive.
Is the maze at the start necessary? It doesn't feel integral to the experience in my opinion. You could make it more a central set piece by having the maze be the way that players navigate between the different tasks, with the cage at the center.
I had some issues finding the apples for the same reasons listed in the Envy section, but this is probably due to me having played it at 4am like a weirdo.
The math part felt a little bit out of place if I'm honest - the game seems marketed as one to teach kids about emotion, so unless you're trying to teach them how to be confused, angry or just sad maths at this scale doesn't seem to fit in.
Also the main point of this level seems to be that collecting objects (keys) and doing tasks for others in hope of a reward brings happiness? This is me being really nitpicky, but that's only because I love this level a lot.
Angry
A really fun little level, hard to fault this one. The box smashing challenge gave me real Kingdom Hearts Coliseum trauma so thanks for bringing up those repressed memories.
The section where you have to hit the wisps at the end feels a little mean and out of character - maybe instead of hitting them, you have to pick them up and place them into a box of some kind? It feels unnecessarily violent, even if the levels of violence are minuscule anyway.
Sad
A short level, that I really liked regardless. One thing I noticed is that the platforming sections were a bit difficult due to the way your jumps work, and the lack of some kind of clear shadow under the character. In the final key section, when you drop the key in the water it seems to just respawn at another key point. Considering how long some of the bridge segments take to appear, this could be frustrating for some kids. Maybe you could have it just reappear on the same floor tile the player is on?
Overall this is incredible guys - the portraits at the end credits are really nice and you guys have obviously worked super duper hard to make this game. Some of the design in terms of the theme of teaching kids about emotions needs refining but I appreciate that none of you are child psychologists and if this was a real project you would have gotten a specialist in to help properly frame these themes. It's a targeting market you've taken on and I think you've done well!
I hope I haven't been too harsh in my feedback and I'm happy to elaborate further on any points should you need!