Hi there!

I'm one of the 6 judges for this RPG Maker Game Jam 2025. I was one of the 2 judges assigned to your game, and we have been assigned to rate your games according to each metric highlighted on the game's main jam page, and submit these ratings to the organisers, who will then appropriate what happens with that. Please contact them in the Q&A if you have any further questions about the judging process. The judges will work on different time schedules, so even if I may have finished playing your game, the entire process might not be finished as of yet. Many of these reviews I am posting while still judging.

All that aside, I'd like to share my VOD of me playing your game, which contains up to an hour of gameplay, and some final thoughts at the end! Depending on whether I stopped the VOD early or not, it will also contain many of the thoughts that I say to you below, which may cause repetition. So just be aware of that.

I will also attach a review below this VOD. I will not disclose my ratings for each category as of yet, but those will be revealed in due time. Not all judges are required to post a review or VOD to each game, but many will do so even if it's optional, including myself.

Here's the VOD:

This was quite an interesting game! Its general vibe was quite hard to pin down... they were playful yet violent and they were hired and there was some sense of a conspiracy going on in the town... revealed through diaries and it's sort of non-linear. I liked the general aspects of it in theory. But maybe certain things I bounced off of a little? The way the tone was jumping around, and I think certain repetitive gameplay aspects might have hurt my experience of it. But I think there were also lots of redeeming qualities. Generally the strongest thing about it was that it created a unique vibe.

The vibes were pretty fun, actually! The characters' designs add to the endearing nature of everything, and their bickering, while sometimes a little repetitive (in my stale opinion), did add character to the whole thing that kept it at least somewhat engaging. By the end, I feel like the final 20% had the information that I deemed the actual interesting parts, to help set up a unique premise. But that's how you "set it up". The idea of a person controlling an entire neighbourhood via security cameras and inviting people in seems to be a good set up to have an hour dedicated to exploring why, and stuff like that. But I felt like maybe it was just a little too vague for most of the game to keep me interested in the narrative.

The portraits are the standout. The cute faces and how they emote are very good. Well, actually, there are 3 standouts. The portraits, the monster battlers, and the music. The battlers are very well done and fit really well with the mood of the game. The music reminds me of Femtanyl. It's very very high energy and fun stuff. However, mapping, while serviceable, felt sometimes plain in the outdoor areas (rows of houses, etc.) and the biggest flaw in the sound design, I feel, is the message box sound effect which sounds like a big banging noise that annoyed me within the first minute, where I had to turn it down and it still felt quite intrusive. So yeah, that was annoying. But overall decently presented, with room for improvement.

So overall, I appreciate this work and I think that every game is a gift, so I encourage you to keep making more games. There certainly is a unique vibe going on here, and I think the world should see more of it. Refined in maybe some of the gameplay aspects, I think, when it comes to creating strategic or interesting decisions (in my admittedly subjective opinion), and I think you can start churning out some good ol' hits! (If you haven't already. Forgive me if you have! I haven't looked into your dev history hehehe)

Keep making games! Every game is a gift. <3

The implication of the larger world beyond the game's story was interesting! The characters and their dialogue were fun in how snarky they were, and the overall humor of the game was on point. I really enjoyed how checking the fridge for diet tea even had some gags associated with it!

I do think combat was a bit too simplistic, however, despite also being technically fairly complicated by virtue of the formation system. I never chose any formation other than A because ammo always lasted for the full encounter and could be easily replenished afterward. Rogue's "Fanning" skill was also absurdly powerful, so I relied largely on her in every fight with little fear of enemies actually managing to take down a party member. Still, the hide-and-seek element offered some nice context to the battles and the enemy designs were excellent!

I think the game's combat could be readjusted to be more like the standard full turn system, but with more skills and tradeoffs (hit chance, status ailments, etc) included, since I'm unsure the formation system has much utility as it is currently implemented. I'll also add that the ending's fourth wall break felt somewhat limp--like it was meant to be unsettling but mostly came off as a superfluous twist. That said, I think the intro's setup for the fourth wall break managed to both effectively creepily and funny enough to be worth it. 

Aside from those critiques and the recurring typos, this game is really cool! The structure was straightforward enough to see it to the end with minimal issues and while the gameplay was simple, it still offered an enjoyable hunting mentality which fit well with the narrative! Solid work!

I normally don’t like turn based games, but the unique combat system was pretty fun. I did feel like I was just going through the process instead of thinking about what I should do after the first set of monsters though. Honestly, the last row of monsters somehow felt easier than the starting ones. So much so that I just kept spamming the headbutt? attack (the one where it takes hp to deal damage) without fearing that my character will die. I had all my smelling salts and never used the healing items after the first battle. Maybe increase the difficulty incrementally, and instead of making all of their attacks available from the start, add them as the player progesses, so there’s something new to keep the player’s attention?

Storywise, I really liked the character dynamics and their dialogue was fun! I did miss out on some texts because I’d accidentally click on a choice while trying to move on to the next text box. I personally use Galv’s choice pause plugin to fix that.

I also came across the softlocking bug mentioned on your page. It’s unfortunate because I was really invested up until that point and wanted to know what the story was about.

Aside from the issues already mentioned on your page, I really enjoyed it! The character designs and personalities were definitely the best parts.

Loved the art and writing, I couldn't get much out of the combat system, tho I appreciate the effort behind the different battle stances. Sadly I confess I lost interest due to the fights. I will an eye on it for after the jam. Nice work!

Awesome game! Loved the characters, each was unique, interesting and like-able in a short amount of time. Great art, the character and enemy designs are great. Little nitpicks, the text sound could be about 1/3 of the volume but I did get used to it by the end. Also I found a bug where on the final night if you go back to the tent it will play the dialogue again and then leave you on a black screen, so I had to load a previous save. Story was really cool, love the idea of looking for battles rather than them coming to you. The combat system was really cool once I figured it out and made me feel bad-ass when I could beat a monster without taking damage. For all your trouble I present to you some diet tea that I found (not sponsored). Well done!

Really liked the character and name trick, gameplay and combat part is fun and strategic. The only problem is that every single word sounds likes like a punch on my face XD.