Deity

[Toimia]

Still stuck:

Spoiler

Placed blood soaked paper in water,
it then disappears.
Placed book on stand, inevitably get killed

What am I missing?
Still no use for the quill ....

[close]

Spoiler

Interact with the book once Bobby walks onto the pentagram.

[close]

[Ian Aloser]

Moved to the hints and tips section

[Ian Aloser]

Is there a way to survive the end ?

[Toimia]

Is there a way to survive the end ?

Spoiler

Use the bloody tissue in the holy water, then go to the attic and use the book when Bobby's standing on the hexagram.

[close]

[Snake]

Hello, there!

VERY interesting game. I've only played for about a second (I tried going upstairs and then I went into the dining room all the way into the kitchen and I quit). I think I may want to wait until you change your descriptions when looking at stuff. I don't like being made to feel like an idiot when I look at whatever I look at.

I want to play, but please fix the descriptions. Horror games (or any game) shouldn't treat the player like they're an idiot

[Khris]

It definitely could use some more polish but it's pretty descent for a first game, well done!

One major grievance though: When in the inventory, I constantly click the exit button after selecting an item instead of the OK button because I'm so used to the latter being in the bottom right corner.
(Also, the inventory graphics could do with a few more pixels.)

Minor issue: When the zombie first chases you, clicking away the text quicker makes a serious difference in terms of his distance to the player when one gains back control of the game.

[Toimia]

First i'd just like to say thanks again for everyones feedback, Every opinions been noted and i'll do my best to address the issues.

I want to play, but please fix the descriptions. Horror games (or any game) shouldn't treat the player like they're an idiot

Minor issue: When the zombie first chases you, clicking away the text quicker makes a serious difference in terms of his distance to the player when one gains back control of the game.

Please be aware that them responses aren't for specific objects but rather the generic responses to insure that every hotspot and object has dialogue rather then nothing, I didn't mean to treat the player like an idiot.

As for the zombie creature, I was aware that clicking the text would make a serious difference to the distance when play-testing it. I left it in purely to make it easier to escape if the player found it too difficult to click fast enough. (E.g playing on a trackpad)

I'd rework the "I'd rather open it than look at it" type comments to be something informative and descriptive. For instance, when looking at the cabinet you could say "It's a large mahogany cabinet, the door is slightly ajar". That tells the player that it can and probably should be opened.

The same with the paper on the table, I looked at it and it said something like "It obvious what it is" and I was like, uh. I don't know what it is by looking at the graphic. Easily fixed and more immersive if you put "It's paper, with some writing. I should have a closer look."

Remove any and all generic responses if you can. With a small game like this, it should be easy to control every object interaction.

As I said above, i'll make sure to remove all generic responses and re-word the current ones to make it more immersive.

[vertigoaddict]

I just finished it a couple of days ago.

Nice little game, I found it irritating at the end though (not gonna spoil anything) but the fact that there was an option to "interact" with Crowley (the character sprite), yet interacting with the main character achieves nothing, made it hard to achieve the ending for me because he would get in the way of a certain hotspot. Or was it just 'pixel hunting'?

Or maybe you purposely made it so it would be a little harder to finish the game?

NB: love the Alister Crowley reference.

[Cogliostro]

I enjoyed this game, and since your looking for feedback, I'll offer some up.

Spoiler

I have to agree, being able to interact with Crowley was annoying and got me killed at least once.  Also, the rooms were too large for the most part.  A normal sized dining room and a foyer the size of a small warehouse seemed odd. 

I liked the bit where Crowlety paniced and tried to get out the front door and discovered it was chained shut.    It added nicely to the panic/atmosphere.  However, why did Crowley's back story go into the README?  You have the talent to work it into the story.  DO IT! 

Now for the elephant in the room, 5 Days a Stranger.  That game still represents one of my all time favorite AGS games.  So basing your first game on that is understandable.  However, the similarites between your game and 5DAS didn't add anything to your game.  Using the random creaking is nice, but there's a lot of royalty free music which might have accomplished more.  Additionally, there was no reason to use a similar layout to the house.  Finally, making Crowley a thief...  was one similarity too many.

As a thief, the moment Crowley realizes he's not alone in the house, he should have bolted.  The moment he realized there was danger... ditto.  But no, he escapes from the homonculus, refuses to bust out a window to escape, but instead uses ancient magic to banish a supernatural entity.   This doesn't fit with Crowley as a thief.   Even after he escapes, he still plans on investigating more.  You clearly laid the groundwork for a sequel, so Crowley needs a personal interest in the supernatural. 

A common device is to have the main character be a paranormal investigator or a family member.  Both of these give him reason to show up at the house and stick around.  You could use a different profession and have the homonculus *mark* Crowley so that supernatural threats will plague him for all the sequels you intend to create.  Think up Crowley's history and decide how he ties into this family's history.

[close]

Hmmmm..... Let me sum this up.  The game shows promise, but you need more of YOUR ideas in it.

Just my two cents,
Cogliostro

[Bobby]

Hi, I'm enjoying the game so far and will post feedback once I've completed it, but could do with some help in the meantime...

Spoiler

I know I need the blue book from the library, but can't seem to get Crowley to pick any of them up!  I've tried going on a pixel hunt for the right one, but to no avail - which particular blue book am I looking for?

[close]

[LRH]

Use
[ hide] to start the spoiler and [ /hide] to end it. Those, only without spaces.

[Bobby]

Use
[ hide] to start the spoiler and [ /hide] to end it. Those, only without spaces.

Cheers, fixed it.

[Toimia]

***SPOILERS!***

I know I need the blue book from the library, but can't seem to get Crowley to pick any of them up!  I've tried going on a pixel hunt for the right one, but to no avail - which particular blue book am I looking for?

Spoiler

Bottom row, around the middle. Heres a picture to help if you're still stuck http://img70.imageshack.us/img70/6008/72689217.jpg

[close]

I enjoyed this game, and since your looking for feedback, I'll offer some up.

Hmmmm..... Let me sum this up.  The game shows promise, but you need more of YOUR ideas in it.

Thanks for the long and detailed feeback; I initially wanted to use a tried and tested formula to create my first serious AGS project and as a base for a potential series - Which will feature much more originality. As for the plot holes you mentioned I was aware of how quite alot of things didn't seem to fit Crowley's persona as I was finalizing the interaction dialogue with objects and hotspots. Unfortunately I considered the task of reworking his character, the plot and the dialogue so late into the devlopment too hard without scraping some if not most of the stuff I just mentioned; And as you've seen I do have plans for a sequel so I didn't want to give too much infomation away about Crowley in just the first game.

Thanks again to everyone who's playing it and taking time out to give me well thought, constructive replies.  

[Bobby]

A really great first effort! Good work. I enjoyed this game bar a few niggles with the interface.

Spoiler

Things I liked:
1) The sequence where Crowley tries to escape, but his exit is barred by the chained up doors. This reminded me of the first Resident Evil game, and was a nice little touch that helped set the atmosphere for the game.
2) Something I enjoyed was the way that towards the end you could use the book, but have nothing happen. The first time round I was fully expecting the monster to disappear as soon as Crowley had stopped reading from the book. I was genuinely as surprised as he was that the monster kept on coming!
3) The two points above helped convey a nice sense of fear - Crowley isn't an unfeeling hero, he's genuinely scared of the monster, and that makes him a much more believable character. While there were a few times that this illusion was broken, they can be easily remedied (see below).
4) The scene where Crowley is chased into the freezer, then is told he has 2 minutes to escape was pretty nice. I think the simple addition of an onscreen countdown in the top corner of the screen would be great for this sequence, adding to the dramatic tension.

Areas for improvement
1) Just to reiterate a point people have already picked up on - issues such as having to click walk to do down ladders while having to click use to go upstairs. Being able to interact with Crowley is another problematic feature that you should be able to easily remedy.
2) Another point that has already been mentioned is that the text descriptions of some of the items are very generic. This was particularly apparent when Crowley was locked in the freezer. Clicking on the bodies in there gave a response something along the lines of "It's a dismembered corpse". This is a very casual response! A slightly more freaked out message would have helped to keep the sense of immersion going here.
3) I felt the death where Crowley looks into the mirror was a nice touch, but somewhat unexpected and unfair. To quote from an article on a Hardy Developer's Journal, "All dead-ends... should be adequately tipped." In adventure games, there is usually no good reason not to try clicking everything unless you are specifically warned not to, or it is blindingly obvious that it is not a good idea to do so. I don't remember being warned that looking into a mirror would be a bad idea. Some kind of note about not looking into mirrors could be inserted into the diaries Crowley finds everywhere to give players a warning about this.
4) The random creaking noises were a nice touch, but sometimes they occurred in unexpected places. They put me in mind of old floorboards creaking, so I was surprised to hear them both inside and outside the house. Perhaps this could be changed by having a simple boolean value for each room of the game to determine whether a random noise happens there or not? Perhaps indoor locations could have certain noises (creaking, dripping in the cellar, etc) while outdoor locations could have others (owls hooting, gusts of wind etc)
5) A few of the locations were a little too dark for me - for example, after going down the ladder I didn't notice the archway first time round, simply because it didn't show up for me because it was too dark. This could perhaps be fixed by using a slightly different colour pallet.

[close]

Thanks for making this game. It shows a lot of promise, as it would only require relatively minor tweaks to be made great. I look forward to seeing more of your work in the future!

[SuperDre]

when uploading a new version, please add versionnumber to the package (deity12.zip or something like it) instead of just repackaging it to a new file with the same name..

gonna try this game real soon when I've got the time..

[GuyLaDouche]

Whew... that game was hard and not in the intuitive sense.

Not to offend the creator, but it has a lot of unfriendly design, including such annoyances as:

Spoiler

The main character thinking everything is so obvious as a default response to my clicking 'look' on things.

[close]

Spoiler

There are some really awkward pieces of dialogue in this game. I don't imagine they were intentional either. When I think about this game I will never forget about the term "Homosexual Necrophilia" and how hiding in a freezer is somehow "a good idea as the door can only open from one side." The character is either sarcastic or mind-numbingly stupid, and I honestly can't tell which was intended.

[close]

Spoiler

Having to 'walk' up a box, or 'walk' down a ladder, when both things really require hands to do in reality. This is actually more severe of an issue than you'd think because the 'walk' action in AGS is really sensitive about where you have to click in order to get to where you want to be.

[close]

Which leads me to another issue:

Spoiler

The serial killer baddie that follows you is both too fast and too stupid at times when the intention was the opposite. Character following in AGS is a little awkward and is a bit unpredictable and uncontrollable from the designer's end. This sort've leads to dumb events such as getting killed mid-sentence because the killer walked up to you and is waiting for you to finish talking (in this game), or the fact that I managed to escape getting killed by staring into the mirror (in this game)

[close]

These really cripple this game and need a fixing. Without these issues, the game itself isn't hard and is a little fun (though short). I will address one more issue though, I can't get anything BUT the good ending, and I can't seem to find two of the rooms shown in the screen shots. They seem to be completely missing from this game.

Before I leave, there is one feature I have to give kudos for:

Spoiler

This game is really good at surprising you. I did not predict the mirror to actually kill me. At first, I thought something was going to happen, but the moment the main character said "how disappointing" I let my guard completely down, only to be stabbed in the face. Personally, I think that was a great touch.

[close]

Thanks for that!

[sidrotten091]

What an adventure game you have created. A tad bit short for my taste but if this is your first attempt or game I applaud you. The one pro I have to say about this game is definitely the

Spoiler

Part with the mirror where when you touch it he makes a remark and gets killed

[close]

That made me giggle, and think "Teehee...nice..." As for the bad...The rooms were extremely large. I found myself needing to switch constantly between walking and grabbing just to get to the next door. Also the fact that when a certain door was open...I still had to grasp while others...I just walked down. Imo I would make it one or the other. The other issue I had with the game was one of the puzzles.

Spoiler

The fact that when you are in the freezer and you can't look at the motor...it's right there!!! How can you not see the motor...instead you MUST look at the box and climb up it, which seemed hard at times seeing as there was a timer. After that you MUST look at the motor to plug it up. After words the timer still kept going...I died more than once from this...extremely annoying...

[close]

One last puzzle that angered the hell out of me was the

Spoiler

After you get the book the blood and try to do the ritual, you cannot click on the book. I of course thinking well hey this room is big I will just walk to the back, led me to just hump the book and awkwardly stand near it closer. Making it overly impossible to just move out of the way and click the book!!! Finally I had to slow down the speed after dying more than 8 times and walk TOWARDS the monster trying to kill me, just to actually get out of the way of the book. Might wanna fix and or improve on that...how it so you can actually TOUCH the book and quit trying to 'touch yourself' or get the "RUN!!!" statement.

[close]

Other than a few minor flaws like those...and somehow "walking" up a ladder instead of just using the hand tool. The game was quick and somewhat enjoyable. Hopefully you take this review well and you make an even more impressive game.

[lluizvieira]

Well, isn't a bad game after all, unfortunately have some cliches and parts thats looks like from another games but at some point, the game have your originality and some goods (and funnys) speechs.

[Toimia]

Version 1.4 is here!


Fixes


- Fixed bug where Crowley would execute a sequence mean't for when Bobby first appeared.

- Tweaked a few ingame mechanics. (More specifically being now able to use ladders and being able to use the box in the freezer room aswell as being able to walk up them)

- Now you can also USE the pentagram aswell as the book in the attic.


Download here:

http://www.adventuregamestudio.co.uk/games.php?action=download&game=1287

(I also named it V1.4 from the suggestion)

Thanks guys for all the feedback, I really do appriciate it.

- Toimia