Some things I noticed as I played:
You probably wouldn’t even notice it if you play the game like a normal human being, but if you are deliberately trying to find bugs, the movement keys behave a bit iffy.
If you press the down key, the character walks down. If I then press the up key while still holding the down key, the character walks up. If I then let go of the up key again while still holding the down key, the character doesn’t do anything anymore.
I guess there is no real answer to how it should behave because expectations will differ from person to person, but I’d personally expect that if i hold down an arrow key the character should move in that direction. It shouldn’t matter what I pressed before (like in the example). And if I hold down two opposing arrow keys (left and right, or up and down) it cancels out and the character doesn’t move.
Similarly, the striking with the axe. If my axe is swinging and I press the G key just a little too early (while it’s still swinging), it doesn’t swing again even though I’m pressing the G key. Would be great if the game recognizes that I’m pressing it and queue it for the next attack.
Might seem minuscule, but I think that something fundamental like the movement and combat which are used constantly, should work to perfection.
This is just my stupidity, but it took me like five minutes to open that first door. I just grabbed the first key, not realizing that there are others, walked up to the door and tried to open it. Of course that didn’t work, so I figured maybe I have to hold the key in my hand. So I opened the inventory and tried to unequip the axe, but it would not let me do that because “Cannot unequip item”. I got around that by dropping the axe instead, and I could put the key in my hand. Still didn’t work of course (wrong key) so I walked back to the room with the monsters in it because I thought maybe it would open that door (it didn’t). Back again to the room with the keys, I reread the tutorial message, and ah, “try to find the right key”. Sometimes when I watch livestreams and the streamer can’t figure out how to do something obvious despite there being a message telling them exactly what they have to do, I think to myself how on earth did they miss that. Well yeah…
Anyways, I grab the other two keys and of course the door opens. Now when I want to pick the axe up again and store it in the inventory, it says “No room in inventory (2.00L)”. Now that’s a better error message than the “Cannot unequip item” that I got earlier, because it actually tells me what’s wrong. But I still don’t understand why this is happening: The axe has 3.00kg weight and 2.00L volume, while my inventory can hold 50.00kg and 3.00L or even 6.00L if I put on the pants and shirt. What gives? After playing the actual game, I think I understand this now. The clothes I’m wearing have different volumes, with the biggest having 1.50L, so the axe doesn’t fit in any of them. Took me over an hour to figure this out, but maybe it’s more obvious to others.
Moving on. When I try to light the torch in my inventory it tells me “You need to equip the torch first”. That’s cool and all, but then it throws me back out and I have to reopen the inventory and find the torch again. Would be more intuitive if it sends me back to where I was -> in the inventory having the torch selected. Or if you want to do one better “You need to equip the torch first. Do this now? -Yes -Now”.
So I opened it back up, selected the torch and tried to equip it. “Cannot store the item in your hand”. I now know that I have to drop the axe first (because the game is trying to unequip it, which it can’t) but the error message doesn’t tell me that.
I also noticed that I can unequip the torch, and it will remain “on” in my inventory. So why couldn’t I light it in my inventory?
“There is a survivor guy living alone around 0 meters to the east” hah
I don’t know if this was supposed to happen but the barrels at the end killed me
Playthrough:
A spider attacks me right away. I try to defend myself but the fists… they do nothing. I run away in fear and grab a couple empty soda cans and a dead fly on my way. I enter a building and find a journal which reads “The president Mr. Kardof was filmed punching a journalist in the noize. …” I do not know what a “noize” is, so I figure the journalist must have been a mutant.
I raid the pantry and stuff my pockets with candy bars, cereal, and a burger. I also find a map which shows me that I am in Summerwick. What a lovely name. I stumble into what appears to be a class room. I conclude that I must be inside a school. There are two books on the floor, one teaches me how to make a rabbit trap, and the other how to make a timer dynamite. What a strange school.
After some looking around I leave the building. Big Mistake. A flock of spiders immediately chases after me. What is it about me that enrages spiders so very much? I run as fast as I can and make my escape into another building. I look through a window to check on the spiders outside, fearing they might be able to open the door, but am instead greeted by a green projectile flying towards me and breaking the window. Fuck. The spiders might not be able to open doors, but they sure enough can crawl through an open window. Once again I run away and find shelter in another building. This time what seems to be a liquor store. I take a swig of alcohol to calm my nerves, and manage to find two soda cans and a bottle of water. Stocked with food and drink, I decide to leave Summerwick. It’s been a pleasure.
I walk south through the woods and soon reach a road. A sign tells me that “Wellwood” is 1.5km west, so I make myself on my merry way. As I walk I hear the sound of what seem to be car engines, but there are none. Am I going insane? I see another sign that tells me that it’s only half a kilometer now. Almost there.
Before I reach my destination, I find a journal on the middle of the road. “Science confirms: Dolphins have assholes.” A last message to taunt me before I die. For darkness fell, and I never reached Wellwood. Only gleaming red eyes over venomous fangs that gnaw me to death.
The end
Overall you’ve got a solid game going! I didn’t find any actual bugs, all of the things I critiqued are usability related. The game is already worth checking out, but if you polish the usability aspects and interface so they make the players life easier instead of harder, it will be even more so.
You certainly inspired me to keep working on my game, so thank you very much for that