"Just A Favour" is well paced and solid game, nicely fulfilling the jam's theme. I like the way it evolves from peaceful stroll to a challenging "bug fest" player has to crawl through. Here, I would like to commend the point of the experience eventually turning out to be a buggy game. :) Very nice connection of gameplay and narrative!
Presentation is nice and clean, with the intro providing a good start to a chain of puzzles of increasing difficulty and weirdness. Most of the art is consistent, the music supports the mood.
Puzzles are full of great ideas, be it the Mines or the "race" against the chess knights - authors have succeeded in lying out a good base for bringing in a lot of variety in such a small package.
Except of the few occasions noted, game's immediate reaction to my input hinted the way to pass through a particular puzzle.
Gameplay notes:
- The "altered gravity" puzzle was a bit obscure to me at first until one of the authors mentioned the gravity. I wonder how a larger sample of focus testers would deal with this one - if majority would fail at first, it might be good to provide some indication this should be handled as a platformer.
- Some of the mines were not provided with the usual "distance" hint, serving only as a nasty surprise. In an environment where player is to face puzzles, this does not feel entirely appropriate especially after killing player after they beat a more challenging part (while I admit it may be a one-time fun moment in right circumstances).
- Chasm passage using a fallen tree may be tricky - I only beat it because I saw one of the authors using the boulder to fell the tree, but I could be lost without the hint.
- What is the final "broken reality" part with mirrored avatar for? Does not seem to be a puzzle.
- Why did the plant eventually died although it was watered? A final "oops" point is surely due here, maybe just setting it up or explaining it better could work nicer here (e.g. watered by some cleaning agent by mistake).
I really appreciate the invention put into the puzzles and I hope you did not commit the last bug. I believe citing more games as creatively as you did with Mines and chess may lead to a very entertaining and interesting project, and I hope you will at least consider expanding on the theme you have discovered at Bohemia Game Jam.
Thanks for a boulder-solid bug-infested experience, I literally had a blast (stepped on a mine for about 5 times) playing your game!