Scares on Schedule

@matt-giuca Thanks for the detailed feedback. We did not have time to do extensive playtesting, and those who did test the game just so happened to pick up on it quickly, so the difficulty is admittedly rather high. We're working on figuring out a good set of balance changes to make once the rating period is over. The game is intended to be difficult, so more heavy changes like a health system are probably not on the table, but I'm planning on increasing the lenience of the minigames to make them less frustrating. (I _knew_ the candle game was too hard! I kept increasing the hitbox and reducing the speed throughout development, but I guess it wasn't enough. Testing the game constantly just made me too skilled a player to judge difficulty.)

I'm assuming the majority of people here are playing the web embed on this site, which is rather small, so I suspect that may be where some (albeit not all) of the difficulty is coming from. The itch.io version already had a fullscreen button, since itch.io provides one by default, but I've gone ahead and implemented an equivalent button for the ldjam.com embed, so people are no longer required to play the game at only 2x scale. Hopefully this can help reduce frustration.

@kamuniaft Perhaps that one is somewhat non-obvious. You can hold down the mouse on the objects to make them levitate. The trick is to not let them acquire too much downward speed, since the more they have the longer it takes to accelerate them back upward.

@norabacu It's a timing game. You need to click the button right at the end of the countdown, which you can see via the light-up ghost icons and hear via the beeping. The timing will probably be made more lenient in the future, but it's not especially tight right now if you stay on beat.

First, I echo everything positive and negative that has been said so far. And I just wanted to add two things.

When I was playing the music game, I thought that coloring or numbering the chimes/bars would have made it much, much easier for me. Maybe that'd make it too easy, but it always seemed like I'd know which one was hit but after following the sequence through, I couldn't tell by length alone if it was that chime or its neighbor, so I would inevitably mess myself up before completing the tune.

Second, someone before made a good point, but since not many people brought it up: I think the game would benefit from more and clearer feedback when the player does something wrong versus right versus just incidental stuff happening. A couple examples are the sound cue for a new villager entering. I didn't know what this was during the game and only learned about it in the comments, but it messed me up a few times because I thought it was a signal I had done something wrong and was about to fail a minigame or something. Second in the Boo game, there's no indication I've done the right thing, that I just need to do it three times, so I as a player assume I'm doing it wrong but am being gifted a second chance--until suddenly I'm pulled out of it because I have failed or time or ? Again, not clear what failure is or how exactly it happened. I think there's a gamedev term for this--legibility (if I'm remembering correctly). Your game is quite good and quite polished and has lots of content, but both the difficulty and the lack of legibility counteract all the good stuff the game has going for it.

Eager to see what the post jam version is like though!

Great atmosphere that feels like classic games. Loved it!

The minigames were a bit challenging for me—took a while to figure out the cup puzzle. But the seamless gameplay loop and instant restart after failing were fantastic. Excellent game!

@oter Thanks for the feedback - positive or not, it's useful to have more information on what works and what doesn't with the game.

We're working on a balance patch that will be released after the rating period. Some of it is increasing the lenience of the minigames (larger hitboxes, more generous timings), and some of it is readability. Much of the problem with the game right now, I think, is that it is not immediately clear to players what the goal of each minigame is. I didn't notice this during development because, having programmed each minigame, I already knew exactly how each one worked and did not fully consider the experience of someone who didn't. We will try to work on a solution to explain the controls and aim of each minigame more clearly.

Numbering the chimes might work to aid readability. That is perhaps the hardest minigame right now; being familiar with the minor scale definitely helps, but the majority of people aren't, and seven notes is admittedly a lot to remember. The other memory game (matching) is easier as-is, but I've also tried to improve readability there for the post-jam update by sorting the matching cards above all the others, making visually tracking them easier.

The intent of the Boo minigame is to force the player to react to the different speeds of the countdown, so for that game to work properly it has to repeat multiple times. We can see about perhaps adding some kind of indicator that progress is being made. I've already gone in and heavily reduced the downtime in that minigame for the post-jam update, to make it less time-consuming (it now resets considerably faster, though not too fast as to be overwhelming).

Visual cues for both villagers entering the castle and villagers nearing the staircase were intended to be in the game, but time constraints prevented us from implementing them. I will make sure they are added to the post-jam update. The sound could also probably be replaced (or even removed), since it seems to many players it is unclear. At one point in development sounds in the hallway itself were panned to match their source, which I removed since it sounded off to me but perhaps helped connect the villager arrival sound to what it represents a bit more.

Thanks again for the detailed feedback! As frustrating as it can be to see players not having a positive experience with your game, these kinds of comments are extremely valuable. This game certainly could have done with more playtesting and balance prior to release. The one playtester we had just so happened to pick up on the game very quickly and seemed to enjoy it, which I believe is what convinced me the difficulty was fine. The game _is_ intended to be difficult, and the score numbers are not high (a "good" score is around 10 scares, I think; my best is 15), but it is not intended to be demotivating, and I apologize for that. Perhaps we spent a bit too much time on polish instead of design... but hindsight's 20/20!

Don't get me wrong, I do like the game! I think that's why everyone is giving so much feedback, because we can all see the potential this game has, and because you are going to update it after the fact. Thanks for going through your plans and thought process, if anything it reminds me just how much work went into this game in the first place (especially for two people, I forgot your team size til now, holy cow that's a lot of work).

Sorry if my or anyone's feedback was too harsh or demanding or anything, I didn't intend to give the impression I'm negative on your game :sweat_smile: