Heron's Subway

2023-10-01 22:13

5 - Leaning on door;

7 - Suit lady

depression 2023-10-03 19:17

I talked to the guy in black shirt, then to the "medic" (the guy in hazmat suit lying under the seats), then the Light-blue T-shirt then the suit-guy but didn't get anything(

mnemosynevl 2023-10-03 20:32

@depression That is not the end of the quest. You need to talk to all people in correct order to get the right ending. Pay attention to posts and comments

miraculousmelon 2023-10-09 13:05

Cool looking game! I like the concept, but I felt it a little difficult. I got 1-4 as well as 6 (black shirt, medic, light blue, suit, UNKNOWN, soldier), but I couldn't find 5. Because there are only six on the train, I tried to guess, but wasn't successful. Perhaps a riddle or puzzle to help lead people to where to find things rather than just "outside the game" would be good. The game lacked sound, I don't know whether that was just for me though. Also, a pause menu would be useful, particularly for a game that requires you to go back and forth with other windows. A restart button would also be good (on that note, it was impossible to tell whether I was on the right track, so I don't know if restarting is actually necessary to complete the game). Overall, a good concept, but lacking in execution. Perhaps some additional prototyping and playtesting could help to iron out the confusion. :)

Also, in case you aren't aware, in order to get your game promoted to other players for rating, you need to play, rate, and comment on other people's games.

mnemosynevl 2023-10-10 08:13

@miraculousmelon, Thanks for playing, check the comment section

fernofai 2023-10-10 21:49

The grahpics are awesome. I couldn't beat the game though. Some kind of UI to help the player know if he is on the right track would be great. Maybe a counter for how many people you talked to in the righted order which also gets reset when you do something wrong. Another little thing could be to explain the task of the player inside the game aswell.

fabula-rasa 2023-10-11 23:01

I agree with @miraculousmelon that it would be better not to send the player hunting for clues outside the game. They are easy to find, but still - it takes you out of the world, out of the experience. Breaks immersion. Integrating the same clues in the game world would serve better, in my opinion - could sneak them in somewhere on those advertising banners and posters for players to find and figure out a proper sequence from that.

The game indeed looks very pretty, and it's quite an interesting concept. A little mystery on a metro train, very cool and atmospheric.

f1krazy 2023-10-12 19:05

I can see what you're aiming for here - an atmospheric narrative puzzle game - but I feel like you've missed the mark somewhat.

First off, there are two choices on how to play the game at the moment. You can either try and figure out the order yourself, which (judging from the comments) requires an infuriating amount of trial-and-error as the game gives you zero feedback on how correct you were, or you can simply hunt down the correct order from your comments here and on itch.io, and have the entire game spelled out for you with zero effort required.

I think this is your way of incorporating the theme, but to be brutally honest, the whole "game is too cramped to fit in the .exe file" meta-premise falls flat for me, since the game is already hundreds of MB bigger than every other game I've played this LD. I feel like there has to be a middle ground somewhere.

My biggest problem with the game, though, is that it desperately lacks any sort of context to get you invested in the main goal. We need to figure out this soldier's name, but... why? Why do I *care* what his name is? What's my motive? What's the payoff? Personally, I'm much more interested in finding out why nobody on the train seems to remember anything, or why the medic seems to be unconscious, or why the guy in the light blue shirt is cackling like a madman. Those feel like much more engaging mysteries, with much more story potential behind them, than "what's this guy's name". Maybe you're trying to make a point about getting to know strangers, but if you are, it needs to be communicated more clearly.

(**EDIT:** Having now finished the game, I feel like I was right: the answers to those other questions were much more interesting. The whole thing feels very arbitrary, to be honest. Why do you need to speak to the people in *that specific order* to trigger the thing that happens when you do so?)

One other thing: it's possible to be in talking range of both the lady leaning against the door *and* the lady in the suit at the same time, and the first-person viewpoint means you can't tell. I tried to talk to one and ended up talking to the other, and didn't realise until I got the same dialogue twice and realised I'd messed up the order. For a game that relies entirely on sequencing, that feels like a fairly major error.

mnemosynevl 2023-10-12 20:14

@f1krazy Thanks for your post. Fair feedback. I had a bigger idea in mind initially, and I had a personal goal to try as many features of UE5. While I managed to succeed at my goal, I didn't manage to finish the experience that I initially intended. I had a cool story that makes it all a bit of a detective simulator. It's good that the game made you ask the questions that I wanted to provoke. Thanks for playing.

volkolak 2023-10-14 17:42

Very atmospheric, I would also like to add train sounds for immersion. Unfortunately, I didn’t really understand what was going to happen, I tried different conversation sequences, focusing on the tips here, among other things. Overall a good job!