I just want to tell you something: you have gold in your hands, Chris! Explore more of this amazing mechanics in a longer game and you'll have an instant success! PLEASE DO IT!
Greeting from Brazil!
Thanks so much. A sequel is going to follow but I'm going to probably do a couple of other things first. I want to really spend some time getting Maere 2 right. I made this in a week so imagine what I could do with longer.
I also have to be very careful not to sacrifice the scariness whilst trying to make the game bigger. I think if I'm making another it needs to be even scarier than this one. I've got a lot to think about.
wow, great news! It's kind of crazy to think that you managed to create this atmosphere in just one week. May you have many free weeks from now on then!
Can I make suggestions? You could add a clock, starting at midnight until morning. The tension and paranormal activity could increase (peaking at 3am, maybe?) and make the fear bar fill up faster. The player would have to manage the game mechanics (perhaps with some elements such as praying, covering the head etc.). You could also add temporary sleep paralysis, causing the player unable to move or perform any actions for a while. And, of course, think about a game over if the bar breaks. Something like "you will never sleep again" hahaha
But, yeah, you have a lot to think about. And I'll be waiting for it!
Thanks for the suggestions!
I'm working on figuring out what a "lose" state might look like in this game as one of the biggest criticisms of this game is that there isn't really any way to lose. Its interesting you bring up sleep paralysis because I considered putting that into this game but due to the limited development time on the game jam I ended up leaving it out.
I just want to add that I really enjoyed your video and thought you analysis was really interesting. One other thing that will help me to improve on this game for the next one is watching how people play the game. Understanding the way players approach situations in this one will help me to craft a better experience next time around.
Like I say theres a couple of different things I want to make first whilst I think about exactly how Maere 2 is going to play out. But when I finally do get around to Maere 2 I hope it'll achieve a similar level of success. One of my biggest problems is I'm bad at communicating what I'm up to when I'm working, so perhaps I will try to keep a dev log for this next game to keep people informed of progress.