itch.io

Version 1.2

Feedback on improvements

Maybe I was just in a better headspace today, but I suspect you did a really good rebalance of the pendulum minigame! I was a little concerned when I realized I'd have to play it to see Sal's content, but it really was completely painless and quite relaxing.

Now that you've got it in a comfortably playable state, however, I realize I kinda missed the original point: I found myself looking at the center ring and waiting for the pendulum to meet it, rather than tracking the pendulum. To polish that minigame a little more, perhaps you could try making the center ring transparent (about 40-60% opacity) and simply pulse its opacity between minimum near the edges of the screen, and maximum near the center? With that setup, the center ring only comes into focus when it matters, and I'm sure you could play with the effect to make it quite interesting.

I didn't notice it last time, but the "wave tone" as you've called it is a really great addition to the game! In fact, all of the audio in this build is just really well assembled. The way the music fades in and out as one switches between clicking in the spiral generator (leaving said wave tone in focus) and navigating menus is a very nice touch.

Also, I like that note about there being "many, MANY" more future experiments with Dr. Faustus. ;3

Regressions, issues, and further suggestions

You really didn't leave me much to complain about! All of this stuff is fairly shallow, you've solved most of my problems already. ;3

I think I found a couple of typos - I hope I wrote them down correctly!

- diologue -> dialogue
- uninturrupted -> uninterrupted

I think it'd be worth changing the switch between progress and scene replays, as it'll be hard for new players to tell what it's supposed to "do".

I found that, if I read dialogue at a comfortable "speaking" pace, the printing would usually beat me to the end by a comfortable 30% margin. It might be worth experimenting with a slower default print speed.

The music will keep on fading in and out during interactions where the spiral isn't going in the background - just clicking on the dialogue box will do it.

Finally, I think that some of the "focused dialogue" (single statements in bold) could benefit from being centered in the text box. Similar to how some others have commented, having text so far from the center of the screen can somewhat distract from the main focus of an interaction.

Sal

Wow, just wow! Sal's whole design and personality is just great! As his initial uncertainty gave way to a more dominant streak, he was able to push buttons I didn't know I had! I don't have a Twitter, so please, pass along my compliments to limewah for their part in that. :3

The moments where he'd turn from his relaxed pose to directly face me head on were quite striking. The first time that happened - well, let's just say it was an impactful and surprising moment. Well done! :3

In fact, all of his character stills were masterfully done! Likewise, please, pass along my compliments to Gooeyroc! All of the art I've seen so far has seemed perfect for Hypnoscreen - I hope to see more of them in the near future~! ;3

(I also really like how they managed to capture Dr. Faustus in the promo tile - but that's not related to Sal ;P)

Final thoughts

Lots of exclamation marks and catfaces in this one! :3

I'm really liking the progress you've made in just one month. I don't think I can properly express how proud you're making me (a random internet stranger) with how well you've been doing with your work on Hypnoscreen. Seriously! I don't want to inflate your ego too much, though, so I'll leave it at that. ;3

Always looking forward to more content,

Extend, Unpack

(PS: You titled this release as 1.1! The filename is right, though.)

The lack of a response is no trouble; I understand you've had a lot on your mind! That said, Itch isn't great for lengthy back-and-forth; that's why I offered an alternative. ;P

No rush, though! I'm content offering my feedback where useful.

I can sympathize over technical ambition - I've bitten off more than I could chew many times in personal and professional projects. I'm glad to hear you'll be making the attempt! It'll be cool to see what you make of it.

Referring to the dialogue systems: I look forward to seeing their improvements! I can definitely sympathize with the process that leads up to getting something done the cheap way to save time. ;3

Good to know there's a workaround! I'm sorry that I can't help narrow down the issue much further than that; I'm not a game developer by trade, so I don't know enough about game engines to debug something odd like that.

That said... I may actually have some info that could help mitigate the issue. Most games I play use a Windows API (that I had to Google, as I'm not familiar with it) to prevent the computer/monitor from sleeping until the game is exited. It wouldn't work in an HTML5 version, but there's probably some other solution you could use from a browser; I believe YouTube may do something like that.

Finally - I'm glad that my feedback is useful! I'd very much like to help you succeed. :3

Edit: Ooh, I like the new art!

This is going to be a little more brief than last time; I just wanted to provide feedback on some of the major changes in version 1.1. Since I'm not that interested in King Cobra, I'll be waiting for more content with Dr. Faustus (or someone else) before doing a full playthrough/critique of the game again.

By the way, I think you may have missed my last response. ;3

Background Music

It's quite good, and is at a good default volume to truly be called background music. Well done! I look forward to more tracks; one thing I regret quite a bit is listening to songs I liked in a never-ending loop! ;)

An interesting idea I'm sure you've already considered: giving characters their own, unique themes during scripted interactions would definitely help frame the player's first (and subsequent) interactions with each character.

Depending on how ambitious you want to get with your audio engineering for this game, it might also be interesting to eventually incorporate layered audio tracks (especially during or between scripted scenes) in order to punctuate the specific mood of each interaction with a character. That's firmly in the realm of "polish," though, and probably isn't a top priority right now.

Dialogue / Voiceover

The pseudo-voiceover is a good starting point, but it could definitely use some work. :3

It seems like the audio snippet is just sampled in a loop while text is being printed; the current approach feels a bit weird. In my experience, many games will sample the audio snippet for every character printed. That said, you may have tested that approach and found it a little too frenetic and distracting; I could definitely understand that.

You can get a lot more impact by inserting pauses between sentences; for example, that semicolon and comma I just inserted would be great places for noticeable (but short) breaks. In addition, sentences spoken very deliberately or with much haste could be printed at different speeds and with a more forceful (or otherwise modified) variant of the usual snippet.

Playing with text formatting, print speed, and the voice snippet can really help add personality to dialogue! Little details like that are quite satisfying, and help indicate the extra time and effort the developer put into the game to make the experience that much better!

By the way: depending on the tools you're using, you might be able to write helper functions (something like

speakWithVoice(faustusVoice, "The first part of my dialogue,", speed=fastSpeed)

) to help make scripting lots of dialogue less tedious.

Other Thoughts

- It's a bit too easy to accidentally skip text; if you click while text is printing, it should skip to the end of the text, not proceed to the next message.
- I've noticed the game will shrink and no longer fills the entire screen if my monitor goes to sleep while it's open. (That happened while writing this comment, heh.)

> HOLY FUCK THANK YOU SO MUCH

Hehehe, you're welcome!

> I wanted to make a promise to myself that I'd put as much money as I get from the game back into it, [...]

I'm glad to hear that! :3

As I said before, I think having a website for your project (a quality one) is really important, and worth doing whether or not people have to download the game to play it. To clarify on my second comment, though, only you can decide whether an HTML5 (I assume) version of the game is worth the license fee. I didn't want you to feel locked into that decision by me for turning "someday" into "now".

> I have gotten varied opinions [...] which is good, and why I planned multiple characters in the first place.

Definitely a good choice! Different people are looking for different experiences. I'm looking forward to seeing what you've thought up!

> The subliminal message feature IS actually editable! I've been trying to figure out the best way to show this, [...]

I see! Maybe it's a little old school (and I'm sure you could find a better approach eventually) but changing the interface so that there are obvious "remove this item" and "add a new item" buttons might make it easier to realize.

I know tutorials can be an expensive suggestion, but it would be a good "eventually" goal, if you do want to flesh out the feature in the future. :P

> And sound is honestly at the top of my docket. [...] I want to do something very specific with music and binaural, [...]

Interesting! Please, feel free to take your time; I know better than most people that it's usually not worth rushing a project or feature, even moreso in a passion project.

> I love the idea of the pseudo-voiceover, even if I later decide that full voice acting will be included, [...]

I'm glad you find the idea appealing! It's a feature that really provides phenomenal value, imo. Across the board, indie and (older) AAA titles stuck with it for good reason - when it works, it just works!

As for later, I think a proper voiceover would be great. However, from what I hear, it gets expensive and complicated very quickly; it's most likely only worth investigating once most of the game is effectively finished and set in stone.

> And agreed about character stills, too! The more the better.

Definitely! :3

You've got a good design right now; I know I've already said so, but it bears repeating. I hope you can find a suitable artist who can refine your vision into the reality you seek!

On that note - I actually wrote my second comment when I realized you might prefer to use that money for commissions rather than licensing. ;P

> Which brings me to my final thing, which is, THANK YOU AGAIN!

I'm glad you appreciate it! It's rare for me to find a project like this; one in a niche I enjoy, and one where my money can make a real difference. (Plus, it was really late on payday when I tried it out, so it was an easier impulse to follow through on. ;p)

> Again, thank you, and please let me know if you have any other ideas, critique, or suggestions!

I didn't receive a notification about your response, and I don't think Itch has private messages. I'm happy to give feedback on anything you'd like to share (or just chat) on Matrix: @extend.unpack:matrix.org

Otherwise, I'll be following your progress, and may leave a comment now and then as I do so. Good luck! :3

By the way... please don't feel pressured to set up a web edition of the game if you think my donation could be put to better use elsewhere.

I think having a dedicated website is important to grow your player base, but I have no idea how much value you see in buying (or upgrading) your license. Feel free to use the money for whatever you need to! :3

Hey, I'm glad you're making this game. It definitely seems like a labor of love. I'm not usually into hypnosis, but I dabble occasionally, and this seemed interesting enough to check out. I'm glad I did!

I really like Dr. Faustus! She strikes a great, endearing balance between zany and welcoming. Her sharp but muted (dark?) character design really appeals to me. I'd describe her current content as "pleasantly relaxing", and would like to see more (and more varied!) content involving her!

On the other hand, the snake isn't quite my speed. I know there are plenty who would disagree; I imagine they could provide more helpful opinions. Regarding content warnings, when the player is about to make a decision that will enable potentially unwanted content, it might make sense to elaborate a little on just what they're getting into; you could probably do so without breaking immersion _too_ much. (Personally, it didn't really bother me, but I also generally don't get deep enough into trance to fall victim to that sort of thing... or at least, that's what I keep telling myself. ;P)

I found the pendulum and gem "minigames" to be somewhat distracting; that is, the mental effort they required to "solve" drew me out of my trance state and I ended up avoiding them entirely in the end. I can understand wanting to add a bit of variety to the game, though; I'm curious how you may end up experimenting with that goal in the future.

The subliminal message feature was a pleasant surprise. I think it would be useful to have separate controls for frequency and duration, and at some point support for custom phrase lists.

I think the game is definitely missing some kind of background sound. I think some combination of light trance music and/or simple tones/humming would be a good starting point when you get there; that said, I'm really discerning about sound, so I'd definitely prefer to be given the option to mute any background sounds if they're not to my liking.

On that note, I think some kind of basic pseudo-voiceover could be worth experimenting with. An approach like that can be cheap, flexible, and remarkably impactful when done with care. (For a high-profile example, see Undertale. :P)

Finally, I'd definitely like to see more character stills! Up to a point, the more variety you can provide, the more believable your characters will be, and the more they'll feel like people.

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Overall, you have a really solid foundation in a rare niche! I look forward to seeing more of your work; I hope my contribution helps! ;3

(PS: I recommend you try Hover or Namecheap to buy your domain, and Let's Encrypt for free and easy HTTPS to use with it! I can't recommend any hosting providers, that's outside my expertise.)