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Episode 2: Feedback and Thoughts

Started by KatieHal, January 30, 2013, 11:49:27 AM

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tessspoon

Loved it as always! :)

Favorite parts: me (thanks, so awesome! :D), seeing Kelsey also in, suffer :suffer:, the take everything not nailed down line, ending puzzle.

The thing that trips me up the most is I'm dumb and keep forgetting about the cognition powers. [spoiler]"How am I supposed to know the name of the song?" *kills Sully repeatedly* "Oooh, I forgot again" :P[/spoiler]

KatieHal

Yay! Glad you liked your character, Tess :)

LOL, well, at least you got to see that Death sequence. It was awesomely put together, I love how that one came out!

Katie Hallahan
~Designer, PR Director~

"Change is the constant, the signal for rebirth, the egg of the phoenix." Christina Baldwin

I have a blog!

stika

Quote from: KatieHal on February 03, 2013, 09:31:48 AM
It remains a sight too glorious (or horrifying) for the human eye to behold.  :o
yeah it'd probably require an 18+ rating  :rofl:

FuzzyPuffin

I think I'm going to go against the grain here and say that overall, I think I liked episode one better than two, although it was close. They were better at different things.

+ The pacing of this episode was far improved, but..
–...that came at the expense of exploration. I agree with the previous poster that it had an "on rails" feeling.
+Character relationships are getting better/more interesting (especially w/ the Dad), but...
–...to echo a few others, the new director is just awful. He's just a stereotypical hardass who had me rolling my eyes whenever he opened his mouth. We are told that he's more complex (he was close with Davies) but we never actually see it. He just yells at Erica the entire time. Boring.
–The puzzles were not as interesting. I actually enjoyed piecing together the memory in Episode 1, if not the gallivanting everywhere to get the clues. Simply putting events in order was not as satisfying. The secret box could have been a neat opportunity to have a The Room-style (go play that game if you have an iOS device, it's fantastic) puzzle, but Erica just solves it for you. The voice-activated door was pretty ridiculous, and I know that ridiculous logic comes with the territory for these kinds of games...I just thought that one stood out in its riduculousness for some reason. :) And the quiz...sorry, I thought it was silly, and a very direct and lazy way of getting some puzzles in the game. It would have been far more satisfying and immersive to have to rely on that knowledge in a more natural way with the environment.
–A minor thing, some really awkward animations made me laugh out loud, especially Erica's fist. The way the dean sat at his desk made his left arm look enormous.
–Why did John just sit at his desk the entire game, especially during a time when one of their own has been captured?

Sorry if this sounds overly negative. The plot was definitely less predictable this time around and had me guessing (except for maybe the dean character) and I'm excited to see where this goes. And the art/music is still  as amazing as ever.



stika

Quote from: FuzzyPuffin on February 03, 2013, 12:15:29 PM


Sorry if his sounds overly negative.
don't worry about it, negative feedback is as important as positive feedback, it tells the creators where the game needs improvement :)

KatieHal

As Stika said--it helps for us to hear what didn't work for people in addition to what did work. Thanks for the feedback!

Poor John. We never meant him to look lazy, lol. He actually mentions earlier on in the episode that he's still assigned to Davies' case, that's why he's not working with Erica in this episode.

Katie Hallahan
~Designer, PR Director~

"Change is the constant, the signal for rebirth, the egg of the phoenix." Christina Baldwin

I have a blog!

dougieboi

My favorite part was the Into The Woods reference... I'm a huge Sondheim fan!

KatieHal

Glad you enjoyed it! :) And welcome to the forums.

Katie Hallahan
~Designer, PR Director~

"Change is the constant, the signal for rebirth, the egg of the phoenix." Christina Baldwin

I have a blog!

jen

I will say, one of my favorite lines is Sully's Sam Adams/Sam McAdams line at the beginning.  Every time I play, it makes me chuckle

snabbott

Quote from: jen on February 04, 2013, 11:37:07 PM
Sam Adams/Sam McAdams
This is the first thing I thought when I heard the character's name. :P

Steve Abbott | Beta Tester | The Silver Lining

jen

Me too!  In ep one, when Erica just referred to him as McAdams, I was like, 'what, is his first name Sam, so needless to say, I was super amused to learn it is.  The way he's designed, he reminds me of someone, but I can't quite place who

Big C from Cauney island

All I have to say is well done! Good pace, logical puzzles. Enjoyable.

KatieHal

Thanks guys!

Haha, yeah, as soon as McAdams name became Samuel McAdams, I knew I had to get in a joke about the beer in there :)

Katie Hallahan
~Designer, PR Director~

"Change is the constant, the signal for rebirth, the egg of the phoenix." Christina Baldwin

I have a blog!

grin

#33
Great story and thanks for all those animations in-game where larger companies wouldn't bother.

So imagine one big plus sign here and let's have a look at the things that could have been better:

  • make the cursor disappear during cutscenes, it's distracting since ep 1.
  • introduce left/right click in the inventory to examine/use/combine. Just anything to reduce unwanted inventory manipulation.
  • Make cutscenes skipable for replay
[spoiler]Also I wondered why the heck you need to find a screwdriver in a p.o. box. I felt stupid knowing  that I needed to open something with a screwdriver and there was simply no basic tools available. I mean, I would even go to a shop and buy one in that case.  ::)[/spoiler]

stika

#34
Quote from: grin on February 05, 2013, 06:43:56 PM
Great story and thanks for all those animations in-game where larger companies wouldn't bother.

So imagine one big plus sign here and let's have a look at the things that could have been better:

  • make the cursor disappear during cutscenes, it's distracting since ep 1.
  • introduce left/right click in the inventory to examine/use/combine. Just anything to reduce unwanted inventory manipulation.
  • Make cutscenes skipable for replay
[spoiler]Also I wondered why the heck you need to find a screwdriver in a p.o. box. I felt stupid knowing  that I needed to open something with a screwdriver and there was simply no basic tools available. I mean, I would even go to a shop and buy one in that case.  ::)[/spoiler]
I believe the reason for the current setup has to do with the Mac version as not all macs use  a two-buttoned mouse

Also, welcome to the forums, I hope you'll enjoy it here :)

Oldbushie

It's also because we designed the interface to work in (mostly) the same way on tablets as for desktops. You don't have right-click on tablets.

It's strange that the cursor is still showing up in some cutscenes, I thought I fixed all of that. For the most part the busy cursor should only show up for fade events or walking events.
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Mr_Nabby

Strange as it may sound, one of the biggest mysteries in this episode that I wanted an answer to was why the clock at Melissa's place has been reset to 12:00. Do we ever find out!?  :D
There's so many movies/games/books/comics that I don't know where to start!

Well, better start with the classics and work my way forward...

stika

glitch or on purpose? place your bets now!

KatieHal

Melissa will not be held up by such concepts as time!

Turns out she prefers the blinking clock. Finds it soothing. When she saw someone else had set the time, she unplugged it to reset the thing in a fit of pique.

Katie Hallahan
~Designer, PR Director~

"Change is the constant, the signal for rebirth, the egg of the phoenix." Christina Baldwin

I have a blog!

snabbott

#39
Her power went out shortly before Erica got there. :P

Something I found odd:
[spoiler]
At the crime scene, Erica says "Wow, that's a lot of blood." She had just been there a day or two earlier - wouldn't it have been noticed then? This murder took place months earlier. ???[/spoiler]

Steve Abbott | Beta Tester | The Silver Lining