itch.io

I totally get that, our web build is currently stuck on "loading forever" so we're also download only :)

absolutely amazing work for a first game, and in 30 days too!! actual feedback below, but first I just wanna say this is something you should be proud of, no matter how "fun" it is, it's really well done

Things I liked a lot:

Your atmosphere was genuinely unsettling, the breathing and the emptiness and the fog all added up to me being pretty unnerved while I was looking for the outpost

Your scene composition was great, with the signs pointing off into the fog and things just barely visible, the farm with the single lamp post -- really good stuff

The 3D terrain and textures were really well done

The character controller was very smooth and worked well

that procedural (I assume?) animation for the crop I got to plant was pretty brilliant

Things I suggest:

Raycast3D on your player camera for item interactions 

put a flashlight on your player if you keep doing horror themed stuff, it adds so much

but seriously you're just starting and you're doing awesome, excited to see what you do in the future bc you really have a knack for scary atmosphere

I know this is very incomplete due to no fault of your own, so I wish I could give more helpful feedback, but here's what I've got so far:

The controls feel nice and responsive, I like how the fish drags around the camera deadzone, it gives a feeling of movement even with a flat background

I hung around to watch the clock go past midnight and change days, so I can confirm that's fully functional, and I also like how you increment the minutes by thirty min intervals -- I might have to borrow that ;)

I tried build mode, but after I pressed R and the UI popped up, I couldn't figure out what to do next.

I read through your premise, and it sounds very fun! Excited to play more when it's more fully developed

The aesthetics in this are fantastic! I really love your color palette and the overall art design is has a very distinct style, especially the characters -- detailed yet identifiable, and it gives the game a great edge.

The farming itself was a bit tedious, specifically going back and forth to get water can get kind of frustrating with the time limit, because the character moves so slowly. I also didn't realize until the third day or so that I had only been planting potatoes, so perhaps a different mechanic would be to have different plots grow different crops instead of switching seeds with 1 and 2, which I only knew because I checked the controls in the main menu before I hit play.

One other thing is that your .exe file felt a little sketchy to me because it requires full application installation instead of just running, but I'm happy to report to anyone reading this that my computer is okay so far, so try this cool game out!

I think the strongest portion of this game is the nighttime stealth portion, the music, colors, and stealth game play all come together really well and the player has a single, clear goal, and the line of sight being displayed for the guards was a great mechanic. It was really fun to play with actually, and there the player's movement speed added to the suspense levels.

so from player feedback, our soundwave puzzle and the rhythm game are definitely difficult lol

we would really appreciate feedback on how difficult it is to progress!

https://itch.io/jam/game-off-2025/rate/4085369

I've downloaded your game, and plan to play it later tonight

is there any area you'd like me to focus my feedback? visuals, music, gamplay, etc?

we had the same problem, so I completely understand

After receiving almost all positive reviews and then our rating (and now reading through other community posts) I'm left wondering if anyone left genuine reviews that reflected the scores they gave, or if it was just me....?

It's my first jam, so I guess I didn't realize how competitive ppl would get :\

is there anyone willing to give our game some genuine feedback? we would really like to improve it and do better next time: 

https://fallen-starling.itch.io/howling-isle

UPDATE: I have gotten all the items and the 2/2 secret ending!!! awesome game and very cool lore

really cool idea! my browser super struggled to handle the 3d physics though, and it crashed/froze a few times before I had to close the game to save my fans, so maybe it'd be better as an exe? Love the connection to the theme

We have a story game that's different every time you play! (and has multiple endings) -- should be good for stream ;)

and it's on a haunted island with wolf spirits..... and lighting effect that I put wayyy too much effort into (the vhs filter toggles off)

https://fallen-starling.itch.io/howling-isle

ours is a story game with immersive visuals!! (and multiple endings) 

looked out for the wolf spirits!!

https://fallen-starling.itch.io/howling-isle

fun to explore, i hope!

lol! thank you, I'm glad you enjoyed the wolf

very cool setup!! the movement was a little weird, and I never felt like I had enough time, but I think that's part of the experience! overall great job with the theme!

ours is an interactive story game is multiple endings! should be fun to play on stream ;)

https://fallen-starling.itch.io/howling-isle

okay, so this ABSOLUTELY made me cry (just a bit)

beautiful game :')

extremely cool interpretation of theme!!! and very creative level design as well!!

definitely! it's on my list :D

I'm pretty sure I know the exact bottle you're talking about lol

but I really appreciate you took the time to find them all! hopefully you saw a wolf or two along the way, they're my favorite part :D

thank you so much for playing, and I'm so glad you liked the aesthetics!!!

I definitely can't take all the credit for this, it was totally a small team effort to get all the models, music/sound, and writing done (I'm just the programmer!)

I'm so happy you liked the visuals, they were definitely the thing we spent the most time on, and I feel like the end credit scenes are the part that connect with the theme, so I'm not sure if you got that far? thank you for all the feedback on mechanics though, that's very constructive!

the escape button problem is absolutely something that came up in testing, unfortunately just a few hours before deadline, so there wasn't time to implement a solution before upload, but we will roll out a patch after the jam is over!

thank you so much!!! I can't even begin to say how much time we spent on lighting alone, so I'm glad it worked out!! I hope you got to see a wolf, they're my favorite thing in the game :D

ooh! I like your art style :D

here's our game if you want to check it out, it's a story game with multiple endings and a mystery to explore!

https://fallen-starling.itch.io/howling-isle

our game is a story game based on classic indies like presentable liberty! it has multiple endings and a big mystery to explore, plus some really nice visuals if you want to check it out!

https://fallen-starling.itch.io/howling-isle

happy birthday!!! I hope you get lots of feedback for your birthday ;)

if you're looking for a story game kinda like classic indies (presentable liberty, etc) with cool visuals, then check out our game!

https://fallen-starling.itch.io/howling-isle

will definitely check out your game! here's mine if you have time:

https://fallen-starling.itch.io/howling-isle

will definitely check out your game if you check out mine :D

https://fallen-starling.itch.io/howling-isle

our game is an immersive story game with multiple endings, really proud of how the visuals came out! (our main is issue is that the escape key will reset your progress, oops!) 

you can play it here:

https://fallen-starling.itch.io/howling-isle

ours is a story game like presentable liberty, but with multiple endings! it would be great if you checked it out!

https://fallen-starling.itch.io/howling-isle

our game is a story game with multiple endings!! you're a castaway on a deserted island that seems to be haunted

https://fallen-starling.itch.io/howling-isle

you're a castaway on a deserted island said to be haunted. it's a story game with multiple endings! (and the vhs filter toggles off)

https://fallen-starling.itch.io/howling-isle

hello! ours is a story game with multiple endings! my discord and twitch are both @commaclear if you want to chat while you play it!

https://fallen-starling.itch.io/howling-isle

So double-edged review!

first and most importantly, this is an extremely cool concept, the lidar looks amazing and is very well executed, the level design is also awesome and all around very visually interesting

second, when I was playing, I couldn't find the key to the gate, and I ended up glitching myself into the next area which bugged something with the lights, and then I could see the whole time, I couldn't progress and never saw Popeye, so my overall experience is mixed

it definitely is finicky to pick up the bottles, I think they have to be dead-center of the screen for the collision to register... unfortunately one of those things we didn't have time to iron out between testing and uploading for the jam

UPDATE: We've fixed this

hi! it won't load for me at all, here's the error code I'm getting:

Error: Couldn't load project data at path ".". Is the .pck file missing?

If you've renamed the executable, the associated .pck file should also be renamed to match the executable's name (without the extension).

very cool concept! I definitely should have pulled out an actual notebook, lol. I think that could be cool gui to include, like a little detective notebook or something! I really enjoyed the dialogue, it was very funny

incredible art and sound design (so eerie!), absolutely loved the movement tech, and it's very well polished!! overall very well done!

you're a castaway on a deserted island, and it's haunted by wolf spirits. you collect and read bottled messages, and there are multiple endings.

https://fallen-starling.itch.io/howling-isle

I really enjoyed the music! and the retro visuals were very well executed. the gameplay does get a bit repetitive after the first few levels, but overall very creative concept!!