Loved it and am insanely excited for the finished game :) though I have a couple things that I feel should be considered when going through the development of the rest of the game, I'll try to word it how I discovered things chronologically before kinda summarizing it at the end
(for clarification I did not know there was gonna be more to this project and that this was a demo. I straight up did not read a thing and just immediately downloaded and delved in which kinda altered the way I played and perceived the game... also note its like 6:30AM and my brain is not functional atm, my memory of this like 10-15 minute experience is already slipping through my fingers but I hope this message is understandable and regardless)
The intro/"title" screen is amazing, I love the simplicity, It immediately sells what kind of world you're gonna be diving into and how you should interact with it which is perfect, no complaints there
The first room, like everything else in this gem's absolutely gorgeous. I woke up and was a bit confused at the controls, but eventually started walking around and interacting with stuff. I checked out the fridge and had no idea what was wrong with it, same with the door (which I assumed was locked). I think that if you're going to have a world full of beautiful narsty grime you should make sure that the grime of which is essential to ingame progression REALLY pop out (the stupidity of the gamer is a sight to behold... like my goofy ass originally assumed the ice on the fridge was some kind of mucus or goop for some reason, as the general moldy vibe of the whole room and the fact that the lower parts of fridges don't get cold enough to make ice IRL made me think some snail just slimed that shit up or the food inside got so rotten it started splurting out at the seams,)
Small issue but definitely something I feel should be kept in mind
I then messed with the door and upon realizing it couldn't be opened walked down the stairs to the washroom. The stairway down is absolutely beaudiful, every part of this dudes domicile stings my nostril in just the right way.
I checked the strange ornament on the sink and assumed it was the food that the dude was trying to get to (not on anyone, just my own silliness) and began interacting with other stuff.
I picked up the lighter and checked the toilet, unsure of its purpose. I then walked back up and tried to figure out what to do.
It took me a while to melt the ice off, it took me a REAL long time to figure out that there was something under the table.
I didn't know there were any controls beyond walking and interacting with stuff and only figured that out when I tried to exit the game assuming I fucked something up then discovering the gobpod touch, finally getting a look at the controls of the game.
(I think that a way to remedy the fact the player doesn't know they have it on them is have the main character pick up the phone from the side of his bed or something before standing up and being able to interact with the world,)
The phones UI and general look is awesome, and the controls menu is very concise in showing how things work, I messed around with switching items after learning things could be combined, accidentally dropping them in places that made them hard to see without the presence of the floating hand. This could be an issue but I might just be reaching as the hand symbol is very helpful.
I feel the controls with picking things up and dropping them is a little bit finicky, I got a little bit annoyed with it at times but got the hand of it after realizing the Q and E buttons are for each hand. the zoom in for the items was a bit annoying as well but the gorgeous models more than make up for it
After that I crawled around a bit while stuck, unsure of what to do. I tried crawling under the table but it didn't seem to work until my friend who was playing alongside with me actually confirmed it was possible and required in order to progress.
It was a little bit frustrating, I feel its a very tight squeeze and can upset people trying to find, also there's really no indication there's anything of importance under it that would be worth investigating. This made me assume that there was some weird fucked up way to combine the lighter and the straw-less wd40 can in order to burn down the door or light up the toilet, just absolute out of the box stuff when the solution was right under my nose.
Anyways, after finicking around I managed to put the straw on the can and sprayed the rust off the door that I didn't even know was there when trying to combine it with everything because I was initially unsure why the door couldn't be opened in the first place. When interacting with it the largest most promiment part is the door knob, which doesn't have a lockhole making me think I was trapped in there by some malicious individual or something silly, I really wasn't sure because that definitely isn't the vibe the games going for. I think the rusty part should have more reds or greens in order to help differentiate it from everything else because it did not render in my brain whatsoever
After being stuck in there for a while, finally managing to get outside was a really nice feeling, the art is, like every other part absolutely fantastic and made me really excited to explore. I attempted to walk to the left but the chair got in the way and I assumed it was one of those goofy ass invisible wall situations so I went the other way to the locked door and got fucked up for another couple minutes, I think I went back and kept checking the toilet and messing with the sink ornament (which I now realize is actually a piggy bank) until I found out you could actually get past it.
I climbed down and interacted with the vending machine, attempting to type in the codes assuming money wasn't a concept in this dimension until I gave up and through desperation investigated the single pixel of light in the corner obtaining the key from the beautiful lil kitty candle. My only gripe with it is its not really a puzzle, as you'll (probably, unless dropped somewhere and forgotten) have the lighter on you regardless and won't need to do much searching around in order to progress but that doesn't really matter. I feel you gotta have the hunt in order to make discovering a new item satisfying if that makes sense
(also, you'd just be able to pick up a candle nearby to light the kitty one making the lighter redundant)
After that I did pretty much everything smoothly without getting clogged until I dropped the coin in the gutter. I NOTICED the symbols but didn't think much of it until my friend unintentionally hinted towards its significance. Inputting it in the vending machine was really great, I mentally associated the symbols with numbers based on the content of their shape in order to remember what it was on the long arduous journey to the machine right next to it... I crawled into that hole in the wall with a happy lil smile on my face. Genuinely a really great game and I'm beyond hyped to see how you manage to pave the rest of the world, the part where you can see faint glimpses of the natural world outside has got me insanely excited,
TLDR
- It'd be nice if the main character picked up the phone before standing up, making the player aware they have it in their possession (yeah they'll find out about it eventually but yknow quality of life)
- Grime of which is important for puzzle purposes should stand out more and be generally eye catching, as it can be hard to figure out what the mystery of a couple of screens actually is
- It can be easily assumed that the table cannot be crouched under, though that could just be on me
- It can be difficult to get by the chair, possibly making the player assume there's an invisible wall/ it leads nowhere resulting in them wasting time looking for other solutions
- picking stuff up and dropping it can be finicky,
- erm.. sprint buttons kinda pointless as there's no reason I'd want to miss out on staring at such gorgeous areas
- The button you press to inspect an item should be the button that makes it so you stop inspecting the item, as pressing esc is a bit annoying whenever I accidentally press e or q
The only glitch I really encountered was this strange visual effect that'd happen where the particle effects would enlarge and become extremely high contrast random colours, here's a vid of it happening.