Topic: Abscission - updated December 2020. +18 (Gore). Demo available!

[Yanek_Crispbread]

Hello all,

I am a first time developer (who carefully reads the tutorials and FAQs!) making a horror themed adventure (with Lovecraftian vibes) called Abscission.



The story centers around Will Stanhope, a detective in the fictional town of Ashfield in 1991. What begins as a seemingly routine (though savage) murder, begins to descend into a larger web of curious infections, body horror and tragedy. The player must progress through the story by talking to characters, combining clues, looking for evidence, solving puzzles, whilst fighting the effects of a dwindling sanity. August 2020 Update - A graphical and stylistic overhaul, along with an additional system of branching storylines and subplots has been added, which is influenced by Stanhope's actions and temperament. Characters will react differently to Stanhope depending on how he treats them.







Progress so far:

The story is 95% plotted (there is always room for improvement). I am also adding a lot of lore that can be found (such as old case files, news reports, etc) in order to enrich the world and increase immersion.
The story locations are around 50% completed.
I will add a journal system to keep track of story points, I have already added a map system for exploration (with locations opening up depending on player actions, connecting clues, etc), the ability to phone characters to build relationships and add to the story, and comic book style cutscenes.





The demo is available for free here - https://beyondbooleans.itch.io/abscission

I welcome all feedback as I want to make the best game I can, and it's the only way to improve. Thank you to the people who have commented, it's much appreciated

Thanks, Jake

[Kastchey]

Love the look of this, awesome to have another horror genre creator on board.
Best of luck with the development!

[BarbWire]

Hi Yanek_Crispbread

Earlier on this afternoon I was raving about an up and coming game called
The Adventures of Black Hawk.

I now find myself going into raptures again over Abscission.

I will be looking forward to the release of another old school game

Who needs technical wizardry etc. when far more interesting and fulfilling
games, such as yours, can be produced.

Horror rules OK! 

[FireFlower]

This looks cool. So it is a horror detective game where you have to look for clues and solve a mystery?

[SarahLiz]

This is looking really, really nice!  I can't wait to play it!

[Darío]

Very good looking art!

[SarahLiz]

Looking good!!

[Yanek_Crispbread]

August 2020 update added. 

[Click'd]

The missing facial features make your detective character look like a slightly higher resolution version of Francis McQueen from The Darkside Detective. I guess you both tapped into that stereotypical getup.

[Yanek_Crispbread]

I hadn't actually played Darkside Detective when I was designing Stanhope (though I have now). I'm a big fan of The Last Door and the ability of the games to convey horror through environment and atmosphere rather than the expressions of the characters, so that's what I'm hoping to get a smidge of in my game

[Laura Hunt]

Actually the protagonist reminded me a lot more of Rainswept than Darkside Detective. But I really like the art style! The crayon-like aesthetic has a very strong German Expressionist vibe, especially in the last two screenshots (we do have a very similar figure in our game to the one hanging by those red threads, hahah). Really looking forward to seeing where this is going!

(And The Last Door is so good! Happy to meet another fan )

[Click'd]

Sure, I played both TLD games. And when I saw DD first it reminded me of them, too. But the combination of detective and missing face, in addition to DD being more recent, is why I made the mental connection.

[The creature]

Looking gorgeous. Love the character portraits!

[ukz530]

I love your graphic style.

looks cool! 

[shaun9991]

This looks really great, I love the concept and art style. Best of luck with development

[Yanek_Crispbread]

Demo now available! - https://beyondbooleans.itch.io/abscission

[TheFrighter]

Looks great since now, Yanek_Crispbread!
Hope you'll complete it soon!
_

[Tampere]

I feel I am stuck — or a bug maybe? — after

Spoiler: ShowHide

discovering a body in Mark's place

I do not know what to do. I would like to

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wait for tomorrow to visit the bookstore

and tried to

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sleep in my comfy chair

but nothing works.

edit: so you have to

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use receipt on diamond hint and viceversa does not work (hint on receipt!)

Very enjoyable experience, UX (gui, bugs) needs some love, superb characters, scary enough: I will eagerly wait for the final version!

[selmiak]

longplayed it

[heltenjon]

Just played the demo, and this is really good horror stuff.  Very nice art style that fits the subject matter right on! There are some bugs in the demo, but the quality of the story, the writing and the character lore is high.

I'm wondering about the conversation system, though. Do you have a plan to avoid dead ends?  I saved my game and tried all four moods just to see what would happen at every conversation, but will it be possible to finish the game (or reach an ending) if you make the wrong calls in the conversations? It's a very interesting design, but probably also quite hard to do.