itch.io

Thank you so much again—your support honestly means a lot! 😄

Yeah, you’re totally right about the matches clue. I think the storage room clue could work, but only if the player had a stronger reason to go back there. I’ll definitely keep that in mind and try to make future clues either more compelling or better hinted through dialogue or events. And adding an extra minute or two of investigation time is a good idea—balancing time pressure with exploration is definitely something I’m still learning!

Haha, I love that you tried to open that suitcase in the brothers’ room! 😄 It was meant to just be a prop, but now I kind of wish I had hidden something inside! Maybe next time… 👀

Really glad to hear you like the updates to the Itch page too—LET’S GOOOO indeed! 🔥

Thanks again for being so helpful and enthusiastic. Feedback like yours is super motivating and honestly helps me grow a lot as a developer. Looking forward to what comes next!

Hey, thank you so much again for the kind words and thoughtful feedback—it really means a lot to me, especially since this was my first fully finished game and my first game jam!

Yeah, finding that balance in a mystery story turned out to be much tougher than I expected. I hadn't heard of Knox's Commandments or Van Dine’s Rules before, so I’m definitely going to check those out! Also, thanks for mentioning Kinjo’s post/video—I’ll dig into that too, sounds super useful.

Regarding the matches: I totally get that! The clue in the storage room was a bit too subtle, and I didn’t guide the player well enough toward it. Your point about running out of time before being able to double back makes a lot of sense, and I’ll be more mindful of pacing and visual emphasis in the future.

And wow—I haven’t played Murder Most Misfortunate, but that sounds really cool! I’ll definitely check it out; it’s awesome to hear that The Suspect reminded you of that, even a little bit!

About the settings: thanks for confirming that I can upload additional builds! I actually didn’t realize at first that bugfixes should go in separate files. I did update the original jam build early on, but after learning the correct way to do it, I’ve reverted it and will upload all future fixes or changes as separate files (like “The Suspect v1.1.zip”), so that the original jam version remains unchanged for judging.

And yep—you’re totally right about the Itch page. 🙈 I didn’t test the text/background combo on different screens, so I’ll definitely brighten the text to make it easier to read.

Thanks again for playing and for all your awesome suggestions. Super helpful and motivating!

I'm really glad that you enjoyed my game, and as I mentioned, this was both my first game jam and the first full game I’ve managed to finish—so it was definitely a learning experience! Making a story-based game turned out to be trickier than I expected, especially when trying to balance surprise twists with a fair mystery.

About the technical part:

You're right about the lighting and camera sensitivity. I’ll definitely look into adding a settings menu in the future so players can adjust things like volume and mouse sensitivity to what feels best for them. Thanks for pointing that out!

Spoilers

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About the story and mystery:

I really appreciate your detailed feedback—it’s super helpful.

I actually noticed the issue with the first-letter name matching and did think about ways to fix it. I thought about adding a full name or signature to the debtor’s notice so it wouldn’t rely just on the first letter, but at the time I was worried that might feel too forced or take away from the mystery. I decided to leave it as it was, because I liked the idea of making the player feel unsure. But looking back, I can see how that might confuse players or feel unfair depending on the name they chose.

As for the matches: you're right again—I could’ve explained their importance better. There were matches in the player’s room and also in the storage room near one of the barrels, and my goal was to make players wonder if the matches in their room had been planted there. But I didn’t give enough clues or context for that idea to really come through, so that’s something I’ll try to do better in future games.

And I totally understand your point about the detective role. Having the MC as a guest or outsider might’ve made the twist feel more fair and created a clearer line between what the player expects and how the story plays out. My thinking at the time was pretty simple—why would a regular guest suddenly take on the role of solving a murder? But your idea makes a lot of sense, and I’ll definitely keep it in mind for future projects.

Thank you again for playing and leaving such thoughtful feedback—it really helps me improve, and I’m glad you still had fun with the game despite some of the rough parts!

Very good game with good art style and intersting gameplay though there were hard parts to guess the race from icon, but overall this is a very good game.