Yeah, I saw that it was submitted a half hour before the deadline!
One of my favorite parts is how you did the "tutorial". Just something psychologically fascinating about putting the player in a room with a gun and other characters and the FIRST thing they're going to do is try shooting them. Then of course the player learns that they are NOT supposed to shoot them, and they have to question why they had the initial impulse to shoot them in the first place!
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Pretty close indeed, and actually we had to update the game 2 min before the deadline due to it missing important features, almost thought we wouldn't make it :p
That's super cool that you point that part out, because we wondered a long time on how to convey that you shouldn't shoot the characters and never really settled on a definitive solution. I think it's indeed interesting to have the player first go on a genocide run only for him to realize upon death that he should probably have spared them, but there was one scenario that had us worried:
What if a player decides to not kill the white dudes?
Once it becomes a challenge to avoid hitting them that's where he might start shooting them accidentally and not really understand/care that if he does that too much the consequence will be harsh! Then he might end up dying way further than usual the first time, which may lead to frustation. And in the end we never really solved that, so we just ended up posting hints in the description on itch.io to try and prevent that. Hopefully if we end up updating the game later we'll find a solution to that without having to use text because honestly I think "show don't tell" is definitely something that's worth striving for!
P.S.: sorry for the long message, might have went a bit too far here^^
I appreciate the long message! It's cool to hear the thought process behind it. I honestly think the way you have it setup is pretty good. Even if someone initially avoids killing the guys, they would likely notice the life bar and through trail and error figure out what causes it to decrease.
"Show don't tell" is one of my favorite aspects of game designs. When done right the player will feel real ownership over solving a puzzle or figuring out a mechanic. One of the most satisfying feelings a video game can convey imo