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Not sure if I was able to finish or not, but I'll leave a review now based on what I've played so far.


Story: The setup is already pretty interesting. The dialogue in some parts were a little hard to follow, at least for me, though it did help set up the world very well. I was also pleasantly surprised by the voice acting in the introduction, which I don't see often in jam games.

I liked some of the subtler details in the world-building, such as the scenes where the kids make fun of Marianne or when you talk to Acrom and if you try to go the route that Marianne suggested (flattering him too obviously) he gets upset. Little things that help you begin to doubt if Marianne is in the right or if she's blinded by revenge, I don't know if that was the intent but I found them pretty interesting!

Some parts were a little hard to follow though, I understand that Marianne's grandfather had a falling out with the community and that they have a weird relationship with some sort of golden god? But why Marianne continuing her grandfather's mission is the same as her getting revenge, or if the golden skull is related to the same god the community worships or if it's a different god, things like that were a little confusing to me. I'm sure playing through more of the game would help me figure it out, but with the little I played I was having a hard time keeping up with some of these details.


Artstyle: I enjoyed the artstyles, though I wonder if maybe there's a bit too many? I really like the faded RTP assets and the hand-drawn portraits, both of which I felt fit the game very well! However, some of the RTP assets seemed like they had errors where they had white pixels surrounding their hair or stuck in their clothes, some sprites were smaller and looked a little too out of place or were used in a confusing way, and the illustration of the skull broke the immersion a little for me (though the skull illustration was lovely!). The smaller sprites in particular, it was the same type of sprite used for children and for Franz, and I wasn't sure if Franz was a child or if he was just meant to be shorter person.

Nothing too major though, and I did enjoy the artstyle overall, I only wish there was a bit more of it! (Specifically portraits such as for Grandfather and Franz, though I understand those can take time to make). I also really liked the character designs, particularly Marianne, the balding man and the man with one white eye.


SFX/Music: The voice acting was an interesting touch, I would have liked to see more of it in other scenes but it works well enough just in the introduction. Some of the sound effects were a little strange to me, I didn't understand why the grass footsteps sounded different when you were going up and down versus left and right, and why there weren't other kinds of footsteps like when you were in buildings, but it didn't bother me too much.

I appreciated the music, though it didn't leave too much of an impression. I think overall, maybe having music that is a little spookier, or more little sound effects would have really helped make the atmosphere more immersive ad scary. Maybe using pitched up voice acting to create a track of children singing/taunting, or some piano, organ, or choir inspired music are things I could see fitting well with the setting of the game?


Gameplay: I don't usually like games that involve a lot of walking, though the maps in this one were fairly short and there was a good amount of cut-scenes and story mixed in, so gameplay-wise it wasn't too bad. I think I got something almost like a puzzle towards the end, but I got stuck and so wasn't able to complete it.


Overall, a neat little game. From what I played, it's not exactly scary, though the story and art does have the potential for a very unique kind of horror experience. I liked a lot of the elements here (art, voice acting, story, character designs), I only wish there were a bit more of them!