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(3 edits) (+1)

Found it pretty frustrating and decide to give up after doing several runs and only reaching the stairs. Because of the lack of checkpoints I ended constantly running back to health station if I wasn't making progress which further made it less enjoyable.

I feel the health cost of every action is far too high especially with how rare the health station are and the fact you need to restart from beginning on death. Personally I'd redesign it to have hazards that cause the player damage (ex. visibly rusty walkway that collapses if you try to use it, or sharp metal debris on ground that injures you if you step on it) , so it's avoidable if player is cautious and better fits the urban-ex theme. You can still keep the slow damage over time to give a little time pressure. If you really don't like that idea then simply lower health cost of actions and/or make health stations checkpoints. 

The maze-like level design is simply not enjoyable, especially as even with replays it is still a challenge to recall exact path through especially in area like the  'pipe maze' which lacks any navigation aids (signage, landmarks etc). A puzzle focus would have been more enjoyable in my opinion, could be simple stuff like finding ways to 'unlock' a 'locked' path (ex. pipe leaking steam that kills player, find valve to turn it off or find path around it) .

Some more random thoughts;

  • I actually missed the health station in pipe area the first few times, should include nearby signs directing to it.
  • It'd have been more interesting if there were multiple valid paths rather than a single linear one.
  • Maybe consider including risky secret shortcuts that come with a high health cost.
  • You could add some randomization to the valid route and puzzles to add replay value (Assuming you make level less maze-like).
  • It may go against the urban-ex practices (leave only footprints), but you could allow player to leave persistent marks on walls. Like they draw a cross on a locked door and that mark will remain for every next playthrough. This way player can slowly make progress and avoid repeating mistakes. You could even give the game a supernatural rogue-lite aspect with blood trails and corpses from previous runs being visible (again serving as reminders for wrong paths taken).

Hi ! Thank you SO much for your review, it's greatly appreciated. 

This was our very first game, as such it has indeed a lot of problems that you raised, and probably more.

The difficulty is indeed an issue, sadly due to the time frame we allowed ourselves, finding a good in-between or even coming up with a difficulty setting wasn't on our minds yet !

I really like your ideas to improve on this game, thank you again for taking the time to play, but especially to leave a constructive comment so we can get better !

Happy new year !

 - Zola