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Despite small grammatical errors, I enjoyed the writing very much.  Many people will be able to relate to the feelings of being broken and disenfranchised with the world.  I especially enjoyed the dialogue by the first man in despair on the bottom floor, however I would recommend allowing the player to press space to continue the reading, as it was difficult to read all the dialogue in time.  I ended up just using Win + Shift + S to freeze the screen and read the dialogue before it disappeared.  The other bug I encountered was when leaving our room and moving upwards, you can become trapped out of bounds of the hallway.  Talking with James on the second day was another time when there was too much dialogue going by too quickly.   Overall the experience is an interesting venture through various outlooks on life that have been affected by people's personal situations in the pandemic.  I think if the dialogue was easier to navigate, it would help a lot.  Keep up the good work

Truly a haunting and beautiful piece of art that must be experienced!

How did I forget to mention the art!  What a beautiful style it is!  It reminds me of don't starve, but applied to more realistically proportional humans.  I absolutely adore it!  

Also I am realizing Clarence never got to comfort Samuel and make him feel less alone, so heartbreaking.

Good work again <3

Please make more beautiful, terrifying things.  <3 

I am not sure why there are no comments on this page, are all the players that have found your game not from the jam?  Regardless I want to show love here as well so great job!  Keep it up!

Wow.  You struck every nerve.  What a horrifying and beautiful experience this was!  The religious aspects made me feel existential dread, and the struggles of the protagonist were very relatable.  The ending was truly horrifying in a beautifully powerful way.  The idea of forgetting the one I love fills me with so much fear.  I will remember this game for a long time.  I hope you can find success and make more beautiful, terrifying things.  <3

I also forgot to credit Gaming Reverend for his awesome shader tutorials: www.youtube.com/@gamingreverends-devcorner1379/

What a charming art style.  I love that you used its simplicity as a way to emphasize the things being embraced.  Very well done and positive too!

well played sir, looks like the submission was disqualified.  which is a relief.  this always felt out of place here.

that sucks. thanks for telling us

I did my best using a translator app on the dialogue to try to understand what was going on, but it was difficult.  I liked the repeating, unnerving dialogue in the top right.  I also enjoy the simple 2-bit art style very much.   The picture caught my eye as it was very unique.  I hope you can find a translator in the future!  <3

I enjoyed that it had a positive outlook while not shying away from the darker subject matter.  I feel for this character's pain

I'm glad you enjoyed it! 

Thank you for playing <3 I'm sorry it was so laggy for you! I'll try to see about fixing that

What a fantastic experience this was.  Very well crafted puzzles (I was a little dense on the first room).  I enjoyed the slow unravelling of the narrative.  And man, that third room.  Very unsettling in the best possible way.   Definitely my favorite part of the experience.  The constant banging with the soundtrack was so anxiety inducing and crafted that feeling perfectly.  I think it will give people who haven't had personal experience with these types of trauma an accurate window into what it feels like.  I hope you expand on the parts you felt like you rushed.  I look forward to a future iteration or any other future projects you work on :) <3

As others have pointed out the closing vision and heartbeat was a compelling way to depict a panic attack.  Very well written and concise.  Effectively pulls us into Leonard's headspace immediately.  I can't wait to see what yall make next

Haha, yeah i get it.  I had to do the same thing with my game too.  It is hard to get it all exactly where you wanted.  Either way it is still amazing <3

They were my inspirations so I am glad that I was able to replicate their feeling in some way! <3

The heartbeat was effective for creating tension and I thought the game worked well even if you didn't make it as expanded as you wanted.  I think a lot of people procrastinated so you aren't alone there haha.  Good work <3

I liked the collage style of art.  The relaxing music mixed with the small bits of narration made for a very relaxing experience.  I am glad that creating this gave you some sense of relief, and I can also relate to that feeling.  Keep making stuff! <3

OH MY GOSH!  The art style is sooooo cute.  I love the look of the characters.  The scale of everything inside is also super unique and gives the game a very whimsical feel.  I'm just a lil guy!

The models are beautiful, they remind me of Disco Elysium, while the backgrounds remind me of the scene with Gwen and her dad in Spiderverse.  Like beautiful melting paintings.  The writing really hit home with the quiet protagonist.  Keeping quiet is always easier.  The visual novel part seemed a little confusing,  I assume some of them were meant to only be read after interacting with certain objects not as back to back messages.  Regardless, it was all beautiful and I'd love to see the later half of the game with the 3d models.  Keep up the good work <3

you should go into detail on your process for the art.  i really enjoy the style.

I loved the hazy painted look of everything.  The purple colors gave perfect contrast to those unsettling moments.  I know many people will relate to hearing only negative things from people and thinking they all hate you.  The ending is very comforting and gives us hope that we are wrong.

I'm happy to hear it.  I have a lot more written that just needs to be polished and added.  If you enjoyed the music definitely check out 'milk inside a bag of milk inside a bag of milk' and 'milk outside a bag of milk outside a bag of milk' by Nikita!

I'm glad it was unnerving (in a good way)!  That is exactly what i was going for.  I definitely want to explore it further and make more quality animations.  I have lots of ideas :)

I love the art style.  Yet another game with dithering that looks great.  I was able to relate to Gus a lot, especially with not wanting to go outside, haha.  It was simple and contained but compelling.  Keep making cool stuff <3

In terms of gameplay the jump can be a little floaty and theres a spot on the second level near the start where you can get stuck on the sideways lego.  I still enjoyed my time with the paper man.  I think we can all feel like a paper man being torn to pieces some times.  I wonder if that was intentional dark symbolism in going towards the ceiling fan?  I may be overthinking it.  I love the Paper Man <3 Keep up the good work

Interesting using the impossibility of the game to represent the impossible feeling of overcoming your mental health.  Very cute experience and a positive message too  <3

Despite it's simplicity on the outside, I think this perfectly emulated the experience so many of us can feel, trapped on the internet.  Where we feel like it's the only place we can talk to people, but that it also holds us back from those people.  I especially related with the irrational thoughts and anxiety about the person being hurt or not responding for a reason.  All that overthinking.  Very nice, condensed experience.

Absolutely!  I really like the visuals of the distorted hands and I think that some added visuals to the rest of the experience could be neat.  Especially since most of the experience is  on a black screen, it could allow for some extra hard hitting moments with some subtle visuals.  Going from black to heavy text and a disturbing image.  But I do like the atmosphere with the black screen, it feels very claustrophobic. <3

LETS GOOOOO

I made the experience above playable in HTML! I still recommend the download as you get some cool screen effects and shaders, but now mac can play! (I hope! i can't test safari so let me know ;-;)

https://danobleknight.itch.io/nothing-html

The pallete is 'Bastille-8' by Antho 24

https://lospec.com/palette-list/bastille-8

The glitch effects used are from 'bktGlitch' by odditica

https://odditica.itch.io/bktglitch

Thanks :) I plan to delve into some deeper and darker things.  I had to cut the conversation in the mirror short because I wasn't confident on what I had written so far, but I will definitely expand it in the future.  I also probably need to add a way to easily go back to parts like renpy games.  

also i dont know what it is about dithering in pixel art, but i love it so much as a shading/depth of field technique.  i like your art a lot!

Yes, I could relate to many of the feelings expressed.  It seems that many people's games are unfinished concepts (including my own) so I don't think you should regret that at all.  If you have more to say just keep pushing and take the idea even further.  I would love to see where you can take it. <3

The art style is great and some of the images and lines hit right at home.

I havent had a chance to go through all the endings but I enjoyed the writing and I especially enjoyed my secret message (no spoilers)