Great concept. The aesthetics are very appropriate for the atmosphere it is trying to create.
However, I always run out of money with no reliable and renewable way to earn it. It leaves me with no mid combat options besides making my employees quit, escaping, or anticipating death. I just gave up after my 9th time running out of money.
I hope the current money dependent combat system will be fixed. Either give every character a free attack or create some way to reliably earn money. Something needs to change.
thanks for your thoughts, the base design has been tweaked before to better align with the game’s themes and is currently iterating on some combat design options for the full game.
If any significant changes are made, the Demo will be updated to reflect it as well
I played the Haunted PS1 Demo-Disc: Spectral Mall version of the demo. No idea if that's any different from the demo here, but here's my review:
Great pixel art and atmosphere. I appreciate the direction toward a hardcore capitalist numbers nightmare RPG. However, the current gameplay design leaves much to be desired.
In combat, you're forced to either use $ or your Manager's HP to attack. If you run out of $ and the enemy's still healthy, you're basically dead. On paper, this sounds like it would lead to tense decisions, and I think I was going through the intended level of pain for most of my playthrough. However, once I got exploded by the final fight of the demo, I figured out I could just repeat the Monday shift, which is really easy, and build up my wallet enough to steamroll through the last shift. Kinda ruined the "work is hell" vibe to be able to do that with no repercussions, and I'm wary of how prevalent grinding previous shifts to get through later ones will be in the full game.
Not to mention, presently, there is a very limited and unexciting pool of events for each shift. Once I memorized what does what, it was a no-brainer to pick the options that might result in my party taking a bit of damage or a status ailment over getting into a battle where I am guaranteed to lose HP and/or $ for little-to-no reward. It bugs me that this is an RPG where the bulk of interesting decisions are in combat, yet the winning strategy is to avoid combat as much as possible.
The battle balance isn't without issues either. I didn't see the use in skills that would make allies block or evade attacks as you can't predict enemy targets. Frankly, max HP totals are so low that ignoring everything aside from directly damaging the enemy feels like the way to go. As such, hiring the character who can only counter seems like a beginner's trap. Nausea damage also seems of minimal use for the same reason.
Lastly, I hate to bring up ludonarrative dissonance, but I do feel a disconnect between the mechanics and what they're supposed to represent thematically. Why am I bribing my staff to make them use skills in battle, even though I'm just as broke and presumably need my salary to live outside of work? Why does the Manager also have to pay to use their own skills, and where does that money go? Why does Goofing Off still get the job done, how do corporate repercussions get applied the moment we goof off, and what does it mean for those repercussions to kill my Manager? Why is my party completely unfazed getting bludgeoned by mannequins in a presumably supernatural manner? I haven't played "No Delivery" yet, but it seems far easier to maintain the suspension of disbelief in that game because I think you only control one human character in a more surreal environment.
Honestly, the most fun I had playing this demo was exploring the supermarket while on break. Being able to roam freely, find items, and do little sidequests throughout the store is far more rewarding than staring at the customer service counter and picking dialogue options. However, the fact that you have to deliberately go to the break room after finishing a shift and use your single industrial cleaner — which some players might be afraid to get rid of — to even know this part of the game exists seems like a failure in signposting. I've seen someone else play this demo for a half hour without discovering the areas outside the break room, so this definitely isn't just a theoretical problem.
I think if I were making this game myself, I would replace $ with "Motivation Points" for each party member as their primary skill resource, with the option for the manager to expend $ to raise Motivation. I'd also find a way to prevent players from gaining too much $ by cheesing earlier shifts and rebalance the game around the player not doing that.
As is, "Sorry, We're Open" is hard to recommend to anyone but the most brain-poisoned number-crunching "I like RPGs that kick me in the teeth" weirdos (me). I'm personally still looking forward to the full release just to see exactly what the heck is up with this spooky supermarket, but I don't predict that my future opinions will be much different barring significant overhauls to the core design of the game.
Not only does every attack require money, but the only way to get it is either by randomly getting items on shift or aquiring the limited supply of trash around the store. It seems like the game is constantly working against me and never giving me a chance. That doesn't make for a very fun experience when it feels like everything is out of my control because I know I will run out of money before the enemy dies.
This concept has a lot of potential but its killing itself right now.
Didnt like that much, its very hard to move to the next days, and its get very repetitive, the sames questions and rewards, well, at least the art and idea is good.
I enjoyed your demo & am extremely excited for the full version! I do think SFX and audio need a bit of balancing (some SFX are very loud and some softer), and the abilities need more clear descriptions of the target(s) & whether or not they make a melee strike or simply an effect.
But overall it plays really well and managing money and resources as well as staff felt super rewarding when I made it to the end without dying! RNG gods be with me!
Hey! I played this in the Spectral Mall Demo Disc and included it in my roundup video. Starts around 9:41 (if you only want to see this game). Best of luck with the development!
A very unique concept for a horror game. Interested to see where you take the other additional shifts with the full game, as i may have died many times across the first 3 i still experienced the text warping and tiny changes to the battles and other things. Overall a good game!
This demo is very, very interesting so far and I see a ton of potential in this. Obviously, this is just a demo featuring three shifts, but the possibilities for what this could be are expansive.
I feel like most criticisms I have with it are ultimately just a product of it being a demo, which is a good thing. (Those mostly just include a desire for more content or variety in certain places, which is of course common in demos)
Although healing your party seems maybe too difficult, at least for an early section of the game. I know that's the point, it's meant to be a challenging game where you're frequently being beaten down.
The idea of downsides with the healing items is cool. Cigarettes damage you once but slowly heal after that, expired energy bars are the reverse. There's lunches which can be used as healing but also there's other uses you want to hold onto them for. Then there's breaks.
But taking damage from battles, as well as just from random chance from performing certain tasks during the shift is inevitable, but difficult to plan around. The cigarettes and bars never felt too useful, as the regen of cigarettes ends at the end of a battle and takes away health so using them when someone is already very low feels too risky. These items can only be used during battles when you also need to manage whether or not you want to risk escaping, attacking the enemies to limit the damage you receive as quickly as possible, etc. so finding a good chance to use them is rare. Replacing dying party members with new employees is a possible solution, but like with healing at breaks it's unpredictable.
Then again, it's likely that it is entirely intended for there to be such a steep level of challenge and I shouldn't really be making this criticism. The oppressive atmosphere is apparent here, and that's one of this game's biggest strengths, the extremely limited healing can be frustrating but it contributes to it. I hope in the future a balance could be achieved between having a health system that can be better planned around and not watering down the challenge and atmosphere too much.
I wish you luck on this! I think everyone involved with this game is on track to create an extremely unique experience.
Me and my girlfriend (I'm a security guard and she's a waitress in real life btw) love your games, your work is like the perfect mix of Silent Hill, Earthbound and Darkest Dungeon, you're a genius
What can I say , I ABSOLUTELY LOVE THIS GAME. It reminds me of Earthbound so much, which is one of my favorite game. The weird enemy's you encounter are so funny and creepy and omg the truck fight was hard but PERFECT!!!!!! It had the same difficulty as if you was playing an Earthbound game. There secrets I wanted to find out and the progress is amazing. This demo is so much fun I really wanted to countinue the game so bad.
really great stuff! i only have a bit of a question abt the stored lunches in fridge thing.. idk if theyre meant to stay there for future use or be able to be taken out of the fridge but yeah they just stay there. literally other than that though this game is great! the art and dialogue is fucking awesome and holy shit the music is immaculate. honestly cannot wait for the full version :-]
I'm a bit stuck in a part of the game but so far the game's amazing! Pretty different from what I have been playing recently. It's nice to get out of my comfort zone from time to time.
I'm VERY intrigued by the world that's being shown here, and completely surprised by how much is actually in this demo! Absolutely love it and can't wait to see more!
Every once and a while the image on the screen would freeze and I would have to close the game and reopen it, but overall I really liked it! It would also be nice to see a message or an icon indicating when the game was saved
this reminds me of yuppie psycho, i am in love with it! ive been looking for a game with the same vibe for so long! cant wait for a full release for this
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Finally get to play the full game ;0 looked forward to this, feels a bit different too
HELL YES
day one purchase
This is so brutal! You really managed to capture the pain of not having the correct items/events within this experience!
Can't wait to see more!
I played your demo through the Spectral Mall, thus the thumbnail!
Great concept. The aesthetics are very appropriate for the atmosphere it is trying to create.
However, I always run out of money with no reliable and renewable way to earn it. It leaves me with no mid combat options besides making my employees quit, escaping, or anticipating death. I just gave up after my 9th time running out of money.
I hope the current money dependent combat system will be fixed. Either give every character a free attack or create some way to reliably earn money. Something needs to change.
thanks for your thoughts, the base design has been tweaked before to better align with the game’s themes and is currently iterating on some combat design options for the full game.
If any significant changes are made, the Demo will be updated to reflect it as well
Not my type of game and didn't get far, but so very unique I loved it :]
I played the Haunted PS1 Demo-Disc: Spectral Mall version of the demo. No idea if that's any different from the demo here, but here's my review:
Great pixel art and atmosphere. I appreciate the direction toward a hardcore capitalist numbers nightmare RPG. However, the current gameplay design leaves much to be desired.
In combat, you're forced to either use $ or your Manager's HP to attack. If you run out of $ and the enemy's still healthy, you're basically dead. On paper, this sounds like it would lead to tense decisions, and I think I was going through the intended level of pain for most of my playthrough. However, once I got exploded by the final fight of the demo, I figured out I could just repeat the Monday shift, which is really easy, and build up my wallet enough to steamroll through the last shift. Kinda ruined the "work is hell" vibe to be able to do that with no repercussions, and I'm wary of how prevalent grinding previous shifts to get through later ones will be in the full game.
Not to mention, presently, there is a very limited and unexciting pool of events for each shift. Once I memorized what does what, it was a no-brainer to pick the options that might result in my party taking a bit of damage or a status ailment over getting into a battle where I am guaranteed to lose HP and/or $ for little-to-no reward. It bugs me that this is an RPG where the bulk of interesting decisions are in combat, yet the winning strategy is to avoid combat as much as possible.
The battle balance isn't without issues either. I didn't see the use in skills that would make allies block or evade attacks as you can't predict enemy targets. Frankly, max HP totals are so low that ignoring everything aside from directly damaging the enemy feels like the way to go. As such, hiring the character who can only counter seems like a beginner's trap. Nausea damage also seems of minimal use for the same reason.
Lastly, I hate to bring up ludonarrative dissonance, but I do feel a disconnect between the mechanics and what they're supposed to represent thematically. Why am I bribing my staff to make them use skills in battle, even though I'm just as broke and presumably need my salary to live outside of work? Why does the Manager also have to pay to use their own skills, and where does that money go? Why does Goofing Off still get the job done, how do corporate repercussions get applied the moment we goof off, and what does it mean for those repercussions to kill my Manager? Why is my party completely unfazed getting bludgeoned by mannequins in a presumably supernatural manner? I haven't played "No Delivery" yet, but it seems far easier to maintain the suspension of disbelief in that game because I think you only control one human character in a more surreal environment.
Honestly, the most fun I had playing this demo was exploring the supermarket while on break. Being able to roam freely, find items, and do little sidequests throughout the store is far more rewarding than staring at the customer service counter and picking dialogue options. However, the fact that you have to deliberately go to the break room after finishing a shift and use your single industrial cleaner — which some players might be afraid to get rid of — to even know this part of the game exists seems like a failure in signposting. I've seen someone else play this demo for a half hour without discovering the areas outside the break room, so this definitely isn't just a theoretical problem.
I think if I were making this game myself, I would replace $ with "Motivation Points" for each party member as their primary skill resource, with the option for the manager to expend $ to raise Motivation. I'd also find a way to prevent players from gaining too much $ by cheesing earlier shifts and rebalance the game around the player not doing that.
As is, "Sorry, We're Open" is hard to recommend to anyone but the most brain-poisoned number-crunching "I like RPGs that kick me in the teeth" weirdos (me). I'm personally still looking forward to the full release just to see exactly what the heck is up with this spooky supermarket, but I don't predict that my future opinions will be much different barring significant overhauls to the core design of the game.
Full Playthrough with No Commentary here:
Hit the nail on the head here.
Not only does every attack require money, but the only way to get it is either by randomly getting items on shift or aquiring the limited supply of trash around the store. It seems like the game is constantly working against me and never giving me a chance. That doesn't make for a very fun experience when it feels like everything is out of my control because I know I will run out of money before the enemy dies.
This concept has a lot of potential but its killing itself right now.
Didnt like that much, its very hard to move to the next days, and its get very repetitive, the sames questions and rewards, well, at least the art and idea is good.
wheres the corporate dungeon?
You can reach it by dying 3 times (getting 3 strikes), then you will end up there when you die from then on.
oh! Thank you :D
I enjoyed your demo & am extremely excited for the full version! I do think SFX and audio need a bit of balancing (some SFX are very loud and some softer), and the abilities need more clear descriptions of the target(s) & whether or not they make a melee strike or simply an effect.
But overall it plays really well and managing money and resources as well as staff felt super rewarding when I made it to the end without dying! RNG gods be with me!
Hey! I played this in the Spectral Mall Demo Disc and included it in my roundup video. Starts around 9:41 (if you only want to see this game). Best of luck with the development!
this was such a unique take! The person yawning in the bathroom when you walk in was the funniest thing lmao
Full Demo No Commentary
This was a lot of fun, glad I could take part in the demo. I can't wait to see everything when its finished!
I've written a full review of the demo that I'll be posting onto my blog, so I'll share that when it goes live.
My Game-play ---- Employees dying? Nonsense, just wake them up! - Sorry We're Open - YouTube
A very unique concept for a horror game. Interested to see where you take the other additional shifts with the full game, as i may have died many times across the first 3 i still experienced the text warping and tiny changes to the battles and other things. Overall a good game!
Wanna play this so bad! I hope you do a mac version!
This demo is very, very interesting so far and I see a ton of potential in this. Obviously, this is just a demo featuring three shifts, but the possibilities for what this could be are expansive.
I feel like most criticisms I have with it are ultimately just a product of it being a demo, which is a good thing. (Those mostly just include a desire for more content or variety in certain places, which is of course common in demos)
Although healing your party seems maybe too difficult, at least for an early section of the game. I know that's the point, it's meant to be a challenging game where you're frequently being beaten down.
The idea of downsides with the healing items is cool. Cigarettes damage you once but slowly heal after that, expired energy bars are the reverse. There's lunches which can be used as healing but also there's other uses you want to hold onto them for. Then there's breaks.
But taking damage from battles, as well as just from random chance from performing certain tasks during the shift is inevitable, but difficult to plan around. The cigarettes and bars never felt too useful, as the regen of cigarettes ends at the end of a battle and takes away health so using them when someone is already very low feels too risky. These items can only be used during battles when you also need to manage whether or not you want to risk escaping, attacking the enemies to limit the damage you receive as quickly as possible, etc. so finding a good chance to use them is rare. Replacing dying party members with new employees is a possible solution, but like with healing at breaks it's unpredictable.
Then again, it's likely that it is entirely intended for there to be such a steep level of challenge and I shouldn't really be making this criticism. The oppressive atmosphere is apparent here, and that's one of this game's biggest strengths, the extremely limited healing can be frustrating but it contributes to it. I hope in the future a balance could be achieved between having a health system that can be better planned around and not watering down the challenge and atmosphere too much.
I wish you luck on this! I think everyone involved with this game is on track to create an extremely unique experience.
too much fun, hoping to experience more!
My YouTube (for anyone interested)gud
Me and my girlfriend (I'm a security guard and she's a waitress in real life btw) love your games, your work is like the perfect mix of Silent Hill, Earthbound and Darkest Dungeon, you're a genius
i like the game it's fun
actual masterpiece
will the full version be available on itch.io?
yes, the full version when it releases will be available here on itchio
What can I say , I ABSOLUTELY LOVE THIS GAME. It reminds me of Earthbound so much, which is one of my favorite game. The weird enemy's you encounter are so funny and creepy and omg the truck fight was hard but PERFECT!!!!!! It had the same difficulty as if you was playing an Earthbound game. There secrets I wanted to find out and the progress is amazing. This demo is so much fun I really wanted to countinue the game so bad.
lança na steam ai véi
Played this on my twitch channel!
Was incredibly fun! A super creative take on the roguelike genre. Can't wait for the full release!
Really cool game so far, I can't wait to see what you come up with in later updates!!
really great stuff! i only have a bit of a question abt the stored lunches in fridge thing.. idk if theyre meant to stay there for future use or be able to be taken out of the fridge but yeah they just stay there. literally other than that though this game is great! the art and dialogue is fucking awesome and holy shit the music is immaculate. honestly cannot wait for the full version :-]
thanks for playing
putting lunches back in the fridge is purely a matter of conscience for now
I'm a bit stuck in a part of the game but so far the game's amazing! Pretty different from what I have been playing recently. It's nice to get out of my comfort zone from time to time.
I'm VERY intrigued by the world that's being shown here, and completely surprised by how much is actually in this demo! Absolutely love it and can't wait to see more!
Wait, game not a sorry??
I am once again asking: does this game have jumpscares?
No jumpscares, just creepy atmosphere and scenes.
It was very, very interesting!
Please revive the bag and lunch bag and garbage when the date changes🙏✨
The enemy is too strong😭🥀
I want you to release the Japanese version.🥰💐
Every once and a while the image on the screen would freeze and I would have to close the game and reopen it, but overall I really liked it! It would also be nice to see a message or an icon indicating when the game was saved
This was a very fun and innovative idea. Keep up the great work!
This game is really neat! Just wish some of the "enemies" were easier to kill.
thanks for playing!
The latest v0.2 update of the demo addresses enemy HP, money rebalancing, and other changes to aid with gameplay if you’d like to revisit it
This was very great! I really liked the subtle horror nods :3
AMAZING atmosphere! I love how many little secrets the game has, it makes me want to know more about what's going on :)
Made a video
Really cool! Enjoyed the first minutes of the demo. I'm in love with the art style! <3
this reminds me of yuppie psycho, i am in love with it! ive been looking for a game with the same vibe for so long! cant wait for a full release for this
Have you played his other game No Delivery? It's so good
i havent yet, but ive been meaning too for a good bit. ill hopefully play it soon
It's not quite as brutal as this one, things don't kill you in 3 hits and the party members you get actually don't suck