I think this game has potential to be interesting, and it does have me curious about the mystery of what's causing the knocking. I enjoy a good detective game but atm this one feels a bit empty, like you could squeezxe so much more out of it or at least flesh out the story a little more. I do have a number of ideas/notes though which I'll need to put spoilers to describe properly.
SPOILERS AHEAD
- Having multiple endings is a great way to add replay value, I do think the code could be random each playthrough though and change the note, or the number on the bottle each time so once can't blast through the door in 10 seconds.
- There's several items around which aren't interactable, they don't all need to have a clue, but moving some stuff around to look for things can make it more engaging. Turning on the TV to see what they were watching last, checking under ornaments, turning on PCs, stuff like that. The more interactable things the better.
- It would be a more comfortable with a wider field of view and a v-sync option as the narrow camera and screen tearing made it a bit uncomfortable to play.
- The death animations when it hits 6pm is very buggy and honestly a bit cheap with that overly loud sound effect. As you can see in my video he glitches through wherever I'm looking. I think maybe having the character turn around at 6pm to see him there would be a smoother way to do the death? Or if you want to avoid the glitches of the model you could have an animation where the player looks down and sees he's been stabbed then collapses, and cut to the suspect walking out the building.
- I think the office at the start and the board near the end could use a bunch more information on it, sticky notes or something to add some lore to the game. You could even make it a small free roam area where you can find the clues the detective has currently gathered. I'd also like to know why he picked the people on the board so maybe small bios could even work.
- In the same vein of adding lore, we have a book to check the clues but I think you could add a 2nd page to the note book where we could read all of his notes leading up to the main location to fill in the current blanks in the story. Given it's said "same pattern" at the start I would guess it's a serial killer? How many victims do they have, what signs do they usually leave, etc.
- Since there's only 4 clues, they should be harder to find I feel, especially the bottle and audio recorder, there's a tonne of drawers and other inaccessible places that would be a good place to hide it. Under items in a bin, behind a shelf, etc. Like an escape room, doing a few steps for each clue would help flesh out the game more.
These are just things I've noticed and think can be adjusted to help reach the potential this game has. I know it seems like I may be bashing a bit but I genuinely would want to see an update to this where it's a bit more flashed out because I love this genre of games. Overall it's an ok base but with a few tweaks it can be a much smoother experience. Keep up the good work!