It was a nice demo! I see I’m not the only one going with many chapters!

Overall feedback

Story

I like the retake on the classic, to be honest I didn’t know much besides “there’s a living nutcracker doll” so I checked the original story “The Nutcracker and the Mouse King” and I see where the different elements have gone. But the star quest is original, I’m curious about how it’ll go!

Background

Quite simple, but to the point. They each give the right mood and there are enough to cover all the presented situations.

Character art

I like the style, and there are many expressions with subtle changes of eyebrows. Maybe only changing eyebrow is a bit too subtle though, I had to rollback sometimes to confirm the expression changed. The eyes and mouth could change at the same time for a stronger change (when applicable).

UI

Nice revamp! Too bad the game menu has not been adapted too, it would look great with Christmas decorations!

Audio

I really like the tracks, some adapted from the ballet (maybe all of them but I don’t know the ballet enough to tell).

Issues

Story

When Clarise is sent to another land, she doesn’t seem to worry about not being able to go back to her home, nor that if she does at the end of the adventure she would have still been away for 6 days. In fact she reacts to the Prince saying he doesn’t know how to go back home, but the sentence feels like he’s talking about his home (the castle).

Typos

The King promised to return Christmas morning => on Christmas morning?

A companion of like no other => A companion like no other

Tense: starting with “The figure laughs, then gestures…” tense suddenly switches from past to present. I suppose the introduction was meant to be in past, and the Clarise side of the story in present? Or should it be past/present everywhere?

You brace yourself for what the weather permitting changes may mean for Christmas plans. => not sure about this sentence, I understand “weather permitting” alone at the end of sentence, or “what the weather changes may mean”, but I’m not sure what the mix of both means

I’ll call again when we are heading on our way Christmas Eve. => on Christmas Eve?

Placing away wrapping supplies … reminded you of the present your uncle mentioned was placed on the shelf for you. => wait… that’s actually correct. I thought some word was missing, but after reading it three times, I realised it’s just some elaborate construction, right?

Although, looking around nothing matching … was in sight. => Maybe “Although looking around, nothing matching …” (mind comma placement) would be clearer, but maybe that comma is optional, I’m not sure.

Distrupted by the sound => Disrupted

Event the scent of the breeze carries a foreign sweetest => sweetness?

You politely try to curtesy the best way you know how => Actually, I just researched this and this is the full form of “the best way you know”, so this is correct!

It would probably be helpful if I give some context… => if I gave OR It will … if I give

… not realizing the chilliness from forest walk the outside. => from the forest outside? => Also, realising for UK spelling, but I admit at this point I didn’t monitor which spelling you used in majority so I’m not sure what was the target spelling.

You look at Oren sheepishly … and including me as well. => Mix of you and me in narrator text. The rest of the scene is using “you” so I suppose it should be “including you as well” (didn’t pay attention to the whole game if it was using you/me, my understand is that when Clarise’s head appears we read her mind and she says “I”, otherwise the narrator addresses to the player as “you”) It seems that the end of the sentence was copied from “The Prince opens his mouth … and includes me as well.” (if you choose Friendly introductions) On this particular sentence, there is no “you” so there is no inconsistency. Nevertheless there should be consistency of “you” or “me” across the whole story, so maybe this sentence also needs to replace “me” with “you” (if you decide to go with “you”).

Then it is a honor for me => an honor

Didn’t know slang “voluntell”, “voluntold”! Funny!

Remark: I had a lot of spelling and grammar issues fixed by Google Doc, but any spelling fix service should work if you want an automated check for the most common mistakes (services using machine learning are really good at common mistakes, although they had a number of weird false positives… but it’s less problematic, as you can have these particular sentences be re-read for confirmation).

UI

• No Exit button on main menu
• Text input for character name (to replace Clarise) is dark red on red, hard to read
• Choices are white on bright beige, not easy to read
• “Exit the story?” on loading save during game is a simplified version of “you will lose unsaved progress” but it’s less clear, as it seems player mistakingly clicked on a button to go back to main menu (maybe you copy-pasted the text?)
• Right before The Prince says: “Then it is a honor for me to be here”, there is a long wait and the textbox doesn’t disappear. It’s a bit weird as there seems to be no reason for the Prince to hesitate.

Dialogues

On the news choices, if you select Bad news last, Clarise still says: Maybe getting the bad news out of the way would do some good.

Audio

Just after chapter change, advance to next sentence then roll back to previous sentence (the first one after the Chapter banner). You’ll hear the Chapter banner SFX although the Chapter banner animation is not shown! Rolling back again with go to the last sentence of the previous chapter.

Maybe if Chapter banner had its own “block”, i.e. rolling back was actually showing the Chapter banner, it would also fix the SFX issue.