itch.io

Wow, I am seriously blown away! This feels more like an early access release for a complete game than just a simple game jam. This is such a cool and creative idea - the environment, the voice acting, the gameplay and puzzle system... Did I already say the part where I was blown away? I admit, I'm not  usually a huge fan of puzzle games (mostly because I am very bad at them), so this might have been a bit of a hard sell for me - but the voice acting and theme very quickly won me over.

I admit, one thing that did initially throw me off was the voice of the protagonist. It wasn't bad, whatsoever, to be clear - the voice-acting was all great. Just from the game's advertising and the initial title sequence,  I was expecting a bit more of a spooky, mysterious, slow-burn experience, and I did have one guilty moment early on where I wasn't sure if I was supposed be laughing or not. Obviously, it soon became clear that the sarcastic delivery was intentional, and I could fully lean in and embrace this game's great humor and charm, and I really ended up liking it. Not exactly a criticism,  just thought you might like to hear what my thought process was like as someone going in completely blind with no context to any of the creators' previous work. 

I did have one small bug where sometimes, my Quest 2 controllers would unexpectedly disappear and stop receiving input mid-playthrough, despite me being in the middle of actively using them. I'm about 90% sure that it might have been an issue with my headset, but did want to make a note of it just in case.

But seriously, I'm so impressed by everything you accomplished with this project. I almost wish I could have been there to look behind the scenes and watch how the three of you all came together. It seems like you had a ton of fun working on this project, and I had a ton of fun playing it. I'll definitely be looking forward to the next one!

I cannot believe I overlooked such a critical bug, 0/10 game. (Half-joking, but petting the animals was a part of my original plan. I even had created a bunch of original animations that would allow you to feed/pet the dragon, just ran out of time.)

And the cat was indeed 3D scan! It is called"sleepy comfy cat", you can find it here, alongside the assets I used to create the turtle-dragon. Bucket was actually the one who came up with the idea of the turtle dragon. I'm just the one who found the parts and stitched it together  :) Thanks for the feedback, I hope you've had a great game jam!

Thank you so much for the feedback! Your tutorials were how I taught myself how to make VR games in the first place, so this comment seriously made my day.

I will clarify however, that while I have created several of my own original monster models, I did not create this one completely from scratch. It's what I call one of my "Frankenstein originals" - where I take several different assets, cut them into pieces, and then stitch them back together. For example, in this case, I took the head/neck of one dragon model, the body of a turtle, and a tail from a third dragon.

You can see a list of the models I used here, right at the top of the page - just so the original authors can get full credit for their work! 

I see it as a kind of fun challenge, where I take elements from several authors and very different art styles, and try to find a way to turn it into something that works as a cohesive whole, while still maintaining a little bit of that surreal mismatched quality. I did do all the retopology, rigging, weight painting, and animation myself though, so I'll at least take credit for that part. :') 

I 100% agree on the lighting and audio, and I'll definitely be taking this feedback into consideration if I ever have a go at this project again. Thanks so much for the feedback, and for hosting such an awesome game jam. Looking forward to the next one!

What a cool idea! I agree with Shrimp below, that having the chance to be "safe" with the exchange of time is a very cool mechanic. The top-down view is admittedly not what I expected from a VR game, but it was really interesting.  It almost felt a bit like a virtual board game or something, it was very cool to get to walk around in a physical space and look down on the game from above in order to strategize. 

Unfortunately, I did have a few nits to pick:

• I similarly had some pathing issues with the ghosts - though in my case, they seemed to get locked up around trees. One particular ghost seemed to get stuck in place, despite there being no obstacles, so might be possible there is a pesky rogue collider or navmesh hole that snuck in somewhere
• One of the red lollipops looked like it still had a box collider / wasn't set as a trigger, so it couldn't be picked up (I believe it was on the bottom right, near one of the apple trees)
• I had a little bit of difficulty with the controls in the beginning during the "bird's eye view" mode - I am not sure if it was an issue because I was using a Quest 2, but I found if I rotated the map all the way around, the controls would be reversed (ex: moving forward moved the character backwards), which was a little disorienting

Also, this is not so much a problem, but just that popped into my head while playing, if you ever expanded on this game in the future. But it would be cool if there could be some kind of "night mode" mechanic or something. Where ghosts would become more aggressive towards the player, but there would be more candy / it would be worth more points, which would expand more on that risk/reward mechanic you introduced earlier. 

Over all though, I think this is such a cute idea, and I think kids especially could be really hooked on this "virtual trick-or-treating". I'm also seriously impressed you managed to get a proper gameplay loop done in such a short time period too! Great work. 

I posted a longer review on the game page itself, but I want to at least leave my first paragraph here too:

"A haunting, and absolutely delightful experience. The  visuals create a great atmosphere, and are surprisingly detailed and beautiful too, even with a retro style. When the ghost first appeared, I am embarassed to admit I got so caught up in admiring the art, that I forgot to run away and immediately got killed (worth it)."

(Seriously, just play it already)

A haunting, and absolutely delightful experience. The  visuals create a great atmosphere, and are surprisingly detailed and beautiful too, even with a retro style. When the ghost first appeared, I am embarassed to admit I got so caught up in admiring the art, that I forgot to run away and immediately got killed (worth it).

Unfortunately, I did experience some pretty signicant motion sickness during my second play session - which was honestly very surprising, as I can usually play VR games even with continuous locomotion for upwards of an hour or more and not experience any issues.

I would say the movement speed is slightly higher than what I'm used to - though I admit I was also very excited when playing this, and spent a lot of time whipping my head around and running in circles trying to dodge the ghost for as long as possible. So this is definitely, at least part, influenced by user error  :')

There were also a few items on the floor or higher places that I was unable to reach in a seated playthough. In the future, it might be cool to have a small range where the user could pick up items, for those who are playing in confined spaces or may not be able to bend over all the way to the ground. 

Overall however, this was an absolutely delightful experience, and none of the small issues above were deal breakers for me.  I could definitely see this becoming the next trendy horror game on YouTube or something like that. As it is both visually stunning, and very fun and addictive to play through each loop. 

I haven't figured out all the game's secrets yet, but I feel I'm on the right track. It's hardly required, but I would also love to see more if there are any plans to expand on the game's content in the future. Like can I put something in the microwave? Or what if I could play a different tape or music track to temporarily distract the ghost while I explore.

Maybe some of those things do exist, and I just haven't found them yet. Either way, will definitely playing through this one again!