Skip to main content

Indie game storeFree gamesFun gamesHorror games
Game developmentAssetsComics
SalesBundles
Jobs
TagsGame Engines
(+2)

I would like to share more thoughts and suggestions. Again, any innovations, corrections and additions are more work. But the developer wants feedback and suggestions - I've been allowed to open my mouth and I'm doing it. Again, this is not something that needs to be dealt with urgently, and I do not want to upset the author in any way - I am not an expert, these are just amateur observations and thoughts.

1. Change fonts in buttons and title. Later it will be possible to stylize them and find on the net some beautiful ones that look like runes, for example.

2. I guess you can hide all the buttons in the big one, like a stone tablet, scroll or notepad or other object - when the player clicks on it, the buttons will unfold on the screen either vertically (in a column) or horizontally (in a row). This avoids the problem of buttons blocking too much beauty on the screen - when hidden, they block almost nothing.

3. Add the ability to open this menu of buttons when moving between locations. Now it is only available in dialogues, and this is a bit uncomfortable.

4. Add pop-up labels (tooltips) to all foot icons (change locations) explaining where these icons lead.

5. Add an undo option to choices. For example, I have the ingredients for all the essences, but I don't want to craft any - if I click on the chemical instruments (alembic, retort, etc.), the game offer me to create the essence with no option to refuse.

6. Add a task log, where both the task itself and specific details will be indicated. For example, the task "I need to prepare a salve" and the explanation "For the salve I will need the following ingredients: ..." and you can even add new details that you can learn from one of the characters, for example, "Never use sugar instead of honey".

7. It may be appropriate to change the trading screen. I was confused at first when I went to the market and couldn't interact with anything other than the letters in the center. The images of items for buying and selling both on the trade screen and in the inventory are very small. I don't have very good eyesight, so it was hard to see the icons and be sure what they were and what they might be used for. There was a good suggestion here to add tooltips when hovering over item icons in the inventory or other UI windows.

8. After pressing the skip text button, the game starts to automatically scroll the text at a very high speed in all dialogues and scenes, which is why the skip cannot be disabled (or it's just difficult). Perhaps there is a button on the keyboard for this by default, but the player cannot find out the control anywhere in the game. A solution needs to be found. Options:

a) reduce the message skip rate or add a configuration that allows you to flexibly adjust the message skip rate - the one that exists now is already extremely high;

b) limit skipping messages only to the dialog in which it was enabled (new dialogs, scenes and texts will start without automatic skipping);

c) remove the skip text button and leave the automatic text scrolling, but make the automatic speed more flexible in the settings - x2, x3, x4, x5, x6 (this will allow you to use the automatic function for quick skipping).

There are probably other solutions, but I haven't come up with them.

9. Frequent change of poses of characters during a conversation is a plus, it gives dynamics and goes well with 3D graphics, you need to use it more often (for comparison, 2D graphics are much better combined with immobility; 2D - "frozen" comics, 3D - live and moving theater). For example, the scene when Britt gets dressed at the beginning of the game while talking to Borg looks great, thanks to a good change of poses - more like this is needed. From an erotic point of view, this scene also looks beautiful. A turn of the head, a slight change in posture - all this will be a plus in different dialogue scenes.

10. Now the facial expressions are fine, and I don't see the point in doing much more expression - it can ruin the narrative and make it comical.  The ending of the demo is a little blurry - immediately after dinner, the scenes move at a frenetic pace; backgrounds, places and people change over and over again. I guess it's because the author wanted to show the idea of "to be continued". Therefore, it would be great if in the future both this fragment (the beginning of the first chapter) and the subsequent narrative went a little more smoothly.

That's all. I don't have any other comments or questions yet.

<3

(+1)

Thanks! Great suggestions - some of them I can fix on Tyrano, more varied poses etc. I would need to speak to a Ren-py programmer to see if the rest are implementable (cost and time wise). Thanks again, for taking the time.

The new fonts and cursor are fascinating. Love them! The size of the buttons in the dialog box is a bit small, perhaps there is a way to either make them bigger or add a slider in the settings to change the size of the buttons and fonts in dialogs for people with poor eyesight.

Also, the location change buttons have become quite tricky and mischievous. You altered them in a very interesting way - unexpected but original. It doesn't seem to be what I had in mind, but it's also what I wrote. It's still hard to figure out where a player is going, but at least the signs are different now.

I can't say anything about the change of gender. I was originally interested in the game because of the gay theme, I'm not attracted to women. So I have zero interest in the breasts of the feminine protagonist. Despite the fact that I have often been mistaken for a girl since childhood, and the fact that I strictly adhere to the "receiving" role, I have never had any desire to change gender. There is a chance that I will drop half of the game's routes at once just because I am not interested in an outcome in which it turns out that I played an otome. And I don't know anything about transgender topics: for example, if a guy became a girl, but dates guys, doesn't that make her straight in the end? I don't know.

The changes on the body under the skin of the masculine protagonist also cause mixed feelings. It looks beautiful and frightening at the same time. Although I find the idea of changing the character's appearance interesting, I catch myself thinking that ultimately I'm only interested in routes that won't contain any triggers. And that ends up discarding the masculine ones, too, even though I'm extremely attracted to men (not muscular ones, though).

Either way, I'm still interested in the game. I am surprised by the enthusiasm and unusual ideas of the developer.

(+1)

Hi there, thanks for your great feedback! The option buttons will be bigger in the Ren'py version (especially so, for the mobile/Android players). Label/tooltips will also be added for locations in the Ren'py version update. If budget/time allows, the crafting/trading system will be improved too.  Version 0.1 demo is a quick fix in Tyrano so that I don't have to update the assets separately in Ren'py later.

The gender/physical change is optional and is a small part of the game/specific endings in the later chapters. Players have to pursue a particular route to transform physically. It is entirely skippable.