Thinking about that picture puzzle some more, there's really no way I would have gotten it on my own. The idea was supposed to be to show you where the key was, but it's one of those cheap puzzles where the key doesn't actually appear in that spot until you get the clue about where it's supposed to be.
I was trying to copy a walkthrough video at that point, so I had it easier although it was tough to follow the walkthrough since it was a video and everything looks similar in the school. I had no idea the picture was the room with the key. All the classrooms look the same. hahaha
While help messages aren't the worst idea, they take you out of the fiction of the game. The messages were pretty terrible. "Winners don't do drugs". Really? REALLY? I mean, my Golden Axe arcade machine says that because it's 20 years old, but that is a terrible joke for a horror game. The mocking remarks were the worst though. "You've been playing too long" is like every 3DS game ever. hahaha
Also the Scissor Phantom, was there any trick that you could tell with that? I just kept taking pictures and eventually I beat it. At first I thought you had to make it stab something in the room with the scissors by standing in a certain place when you take a picture, but that didn't seem to be the case.
Well, I wouldn't say the tricks work really well, but here's what I learned:
1) If you turn off your flashlight, it's slightly easier to see its face.
2) The developers said something cryptic about using headphones and audio queues. I have no idea what the deal is with that.
3) The first mode (5 hits for me, but maybe I didn't have al the upgrade items), is pretty straight forward, I run back and forth with the camera facing back through the room, so I could see him coming. I got the hang of that one pretty easily.
4) The second mode is where he moves really fast and stabs the crap out of you even after you flash him. The best trick I read for this is counterintuitive. You hide in the corner and EXPECT him to get you from behind. Once, he does, then you run all the way across the room and flash him once you are on the completely opposite side of the room. I kept trying to beat him without allowing the hits, but pretty much every time, I would get stuck in corner and he would get a bunch of cheap shots on me killing me without any way of escape.
I was kind of worried about making it "death count dependent". Exploration and - even hidden - choices sounds much better. I'm sad you had to remove the thing with the hole in the wall, because that was what I first thought was going to happen, but I'm looking forward to what else it may be.
Yeah, that was an idea I had early on, but as the game takes shape, you realize your earlier ideas were bad. hahah I am a bit bummed about that as well, but I think the game will be better with less content, but a higher quality.
