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(1 edit)

What jumps out immediately is the charming pixel art attached to a haunted house horror game. Instant attention-grab. Do like the tutorial section, though I wouldn't have imposed a loss condition in there. On the topic, the loss condition (ghost captures) are far too abrupt to the point where you don't realize they happen before hitting a text-filled screen. 

Case in point, I was standing still reading a note, and the "game over" screen triggered.

This is also a symptom of the game design, where the player needs to be pointing the flashlight at the ghost NPCs in order to see them, so could easily be walking into an invisible NPC and triggering a loss without realizing it (especially considering the unnecessarily fast speed of movement).

Text could use some proofreading as well (and this is as simple as copying / pasting it into Microsoft Word or a free online spell-checker).

Also feel that the enemies appear too quickly and meaninglessly, considering the game is about exploring a haunted house. Slow burns work better in games like these, and feel it would be more apt to just have *one* of the ghosts serve as the main villain at the end of game, with a method of defeating them.

The loss condition spam was enough for me to quit my playthrough early, but from what little I read of the story, I really liked. Reminds me of recent classics like Sinister (2012) and The Conjuring (2013). Between that and the graphics, feel there's a strong foundation here to make a good indie horror. Just requires more refinement in the way of game design, and particularly, enemy spawn design. May even be a consideration to invert the mechanic, and have the flashlight eliminate the enemy instead of showing them.

(+1)

You're absolutely right. We unfortunately didn't have enough time to playtest and fix up the enemy AI. We're still very happy with how the game turned out, especially since it's our first-ever gamejam. Thank you for playing!