Castle Paradox

[Onlyoneinall]

Get it here: http://www.castleparadox.com/gamelist-display.php?game=750

Comments and suggestions are welcome. I have slaved away long nights to get this to the point it is at now, so any constructive feedback is greatly appreciated. I've also done my best to ensure there are absolutely no bugs or errors as far as the game itself goes, but if you find anything that's messed up, let me know.

Also if you have any trouble with the puzzles or don't understand what to do next, let me know. Hopefully though this isn't an issue.

If you have trouble seeing the screenshots, your monitor's gamma level or brightness is probably too low (the ones that can be adjusted in Control Panel). Hopefully, the game's new brightness settings menu offsets any issues you may have with that.

So show me some love and give the game a try.

You can also see some additional screenshots or alternatively download it here: http://www.slimesalad.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=202
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http://www.castleparadox.com/gamelist-display.php?game=750 Bloodlust Demo 1.00

[Rya.Reisender]

I'm playing this game right now, I'm at the school now.

This game has really a good atmosphere, especially the music and sound effects are very fitting.


In case you want to hear some improvement points (if not the just stop reading now):

- the design of the hero walkabout could be improved, especially the head/face and the left/right walk animations could need some improvement (doesn't look very natural), your maptiles / battles show that you have some skill, so use it for the hero sprite too

- the hero has a really excessive use of the phrase "my god", although it fits into the situation, at some points he says it so often in a single dialogue that I actual had to laugh because of that (which kinda kills the atmosphere a bit in a horror game)

- sometimes the way you made the maptiles seems to be a bit confusing, for example I can walk into / through certain objects at some points, but can't do that with other objects of the same type sometimes, also the "hide behind the wall" layout could be a little improved, so it doesn't look like the beds were just drawn on the floor and he walks over it

- I strongly suggest the lock the instant death scene at home until you checked the save point at least once, for new players it's not very obvious that this is a save point, so they might rather go to the instant death location and if they die there they'd have to start all over because they never ever saved before, this could piss some new / outsider players off and they might not want to retry it and miss the rest of your game

- during play I found some items (diary and a map) that didn't display in my inventory, is this a bug? if they are not supposed to be displayed in the inventory and have to be used otherwise I suggest you add a small tutorial when picking up the first 'quest item'

- you often switch the narration between "I" and "you", it's weird when some doors say "I can't open it because it's locked" and some say "You can't open it because it's locked", I suggest settling with one type of narration unless there's a major plot change (different hero or something)

- also I wondered what this fatique level means, it seems to make me weaker when I level up, is there any way to level down again? maybe add a tutorial for this after the first battle as well...

[Rya.Reisender]

Also I found two bugs:

- you can see the bloody diary dialogue twice and thus get the blood diary two times when you go back the other route after getting one

- you can't survive that dark wall, I'm totally stuck there now, for some reason the dark wall comes from the left although I'm almost sure it's supposed to come from the right side, in fact the dark wall always seems to be different every time I try but there's no chance to get to the path that leads down in time

[Moogle1]

I get the feeling you didn't Read The Sliming Manual for this game or SOJ. While I haven't even played Bloodlust, I still know that gaining levels decreases your stats to represent fatigue. Your SOJ stats were probably so low because you never rested -- there's fatigue in that game, too, but you can get rid of it by resting.
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Slime Salad :: Independent Game Design

[Onlyoneinall]

The game doesn't really require a Sliming Manual. The controls are really basic, and the topics that one might not be sure about can be found if you open up the menu and go to 'Help'. If you're playing with the version of game included in the zip, the diary option should appear in the main menu, not the inventory. Since this should be relatively easy to notice, I don't plan on adding any extra help for it, since information you might need for it can be found again, in the game in the help topics. I will however, add a topic about the fatigue levels, as it's not entirely clear you can't regain lost stats, and players outside of our community won't be puzzled.

The dark wall isn't defeatable, but if you run (hold Z), and stay near the bottom half of the map and go down the path that leads into the forest (I'll make this more obvious in the next update), you should be able to get away from it relatively easy. I had before where you had to be exact or else you die, but I figured that was too much of a frustration and made it so you have more room for error, plus being able to run means you're running the same speed as the shadow.

As for the dark wall coming from the LEFT, that sounds like a bug due to the engine. It definitely should never come from that side. Does this happen when you die, and restore your game without quitting Game.exe? I assume this may be what is causing it.

As for all your other suggestions, I'll definitely take them into consideration, although it would be nice if you could elaborate on the point of the hero's walkabout and the one about the maptiles going behind bit.
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http://www.castleparadox.com/gamelist-display.php?game=750 Bloodlust Demo 1.00

[Rya.Reisender]

Gah, I wrote a really long post, but it got deleted because the forum logged me out before I clicked on posting (I hate this forum engine I should remember to save all the stuff I write in a txt file before clicking submit here >_>).

I'll add my main points again by editing.


I indeed usually don't read manuals. I personally think it's part of good game design that the most important aspects of a game are explaining within the game, although they are already in the manual.

[TMC]

Click the back button on your browser when that happens! Works every time for me. Yeah, phpbb is really awful with randomly logging people out.

[Rya.Reisender]

[The Wobbler]

[Rya.Reisender]

The trick is not to use uppercase letters.

He already says something along the lines "Maybe if I can read the road to the south I can get away" why not just add a "(press z to run)" at the end? Many horror games have a small explanation the first time a control pops up and I never had the feeling that it ruins the atmosphere.

Oh well, it's the creators decision in the end.


Edit: I guess you're thinking of larger tutorial with separate screens while I'm just thinking about adding a one-liner in the dialogue.

Of course a whole tutorial page which is held like "Bloodlust's educational corner" would suck and destroy the atmosphere. But there are also clever ways to solve it. It's possible to make a tutorial without losing the atmosphere.

Edit2: But I admit it's my fault for being too lazy to read the manual.

[The Wobbler]

[msw188]

I had a thread about this a while ago. I feel that if there is a manual, the player should be expected to read it. Why else make it? Putting explanations and tutorials in games is horrible to me. First of all, it often forces the player to 'leave the game-world' (in this example, ruining atmosphere as Surlaw puts it; I feel that any breaking of the fourth wall at any time in this sense should be avoided). Second, when used in puzzles, it often implies the solution.

If there are going to be in-game explanations for things, I prefer them to be separated from their use, and hopefully not separated from the game-world. Also, they should be optional. The best example would be the house of scholars in in Narshe in FF III (VI). I tried to follow that example for Tales II to some degree. But I remember the first time playing Link to the Past, where there were button commands inserted into signs and speech. I hated this, and I still do.
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My first completed OHR game, Tales of the New World:
http://castleparadox.com/gamelist-display.php?game=161

This website link is for my funk/rock band, Euphonic Brew:
www.euphonicbrew.com

[Rya.Reisender]

Um there's a difference between telling the player what to do next and telling the player about the controls. Telling the controls is okay (especially on easy mode), telling the player every single step is wrong.

Otherwise you might as well complain why the controls are explained in the manual if that treats the player like an idiot. ^^'

[msw188]

I agree that there is a difference, but I don't enjoy either:

[Rya.Reisender]

This thread makes me realize why some games have a config option "Hint: on / off".


Edit: Duh!, I just figured out why I had so much problems. It's because I ran the game with the default game exe that comes with the OHRRPGCE and there it always shows the default menu. Now that I started it with the Bloodlust.exe it makes so much more sense. Sorry. ^^'