Infinitap Games

I liked most of the changes to the older levels. The paintings are starting to have more variety. The jump scares were effective. I jumped a bit from both the hand coming out of the door and the hand coming up from the stairs. The story elements are definitely creepy and disturbing, and seem to thematically fit together--pulling out your veins, stabbing yourself with the knife from Gabby, having your Achilles tendons sliced. You're giving new meaning to the term 'cutscene', haha. I'm glad that you added some glass to the asylum level before the the enemy encounter where you have to distract it. It makes sure that the player isn't completely unfamiliar with the mechanic when they get to that point.

Here are a few suggestions/criticisms. I'm a little surprised that I just now noticed this, because I don't think it's actually changed, but when the player or an enemy is walking through a partly shadowy area, the shadows appear on them exactly as they were in the background, and it can have the effect of making the character appear translucent. I first noticed when the baby monster was walking in front of one of the cabinets. Maybe it's because the shadows kind of looked like wood grain. But once I saw it that way, I kind of kept noticing it, almost like one of the optical illusions that you can see as either a face or a vase. I'd be interested to hear if anyone else has ever had this thought. I suppose that, physically speaking, the shadows should look different on foreground and background objects, but this might be way too much trouble to change at this point.

I think someone already mentioned some of these, but I found three doors in the asylum level that weren't obstructed, but couldn't be looked through. The first one is near the first straightjacked enemy that moves in a diagonal patrol. It was kind of tricky to get to this window without being attacked, but I did manage it, and no cool Easter egg for my trouble. Someone already mentioned at some point that the bars should be colored. I definitely agree there. If I hadn't read it on the forums, I'd never have thought to look into the cells. The other two were the first two cells in Block A. Also, there are still a couple of colored doorknobs that can't be opened. I might be in the minority here, but I do miss the part from the last build where you had two enemies moving in a diagonal patrol near each other. I thought that was a good challenge of observing their pattern and timing your approach just right.

I loved the atmosphere of the last level. The darkness was very oppressive, and it's great how everything looks practically normal on your way to the kitchen, but things start changing on your way back--subtly at first, then dramatically. And the flashes in the darkness were super creepy. I've already talked about the enemy and the candle in the other thread, so I won't go into it that here. As always, the art and music are top-notch.

Let's speculate about what role Gabby will play in the next level. I call Thomas's mother.

I'm glad that you added some glass to the asylum level before the the enemy encounter where you have to distract it. It makes sure that the player isn't completely unfamiliar with the mechanic when they get to that point.

We actually had the glass there, but it was just really hard to notice without any player reaction as well as poor lighting. I’m glad it was noticeable now!

I'm a little surprised that I just now noticed this, because I don't think it's actually changed, but when the player or an enemy is walking through a partly shadowy area, the shadows appear on them exactly as they were in the background, and it can have the effect of making the character appear translucent.

The lighting is in 2D with the exception of the projected light frustums and the player shadows, so there is really no way of changing the lighting based on the depth of the characters.

There were a few doors we explicitly didn’t put a closer look because we thought it’d be too challenging to get a look. I guess we can put it in if people really want to look closer…

I believe we fixed the colored door knobs, but I’m not sure if it made it into this build. If you could take screen shots of them, that would be helpful, so I can make sure we got them all.

I might be in the minority here, but I do miss the part from the last build where you had two enemies moving in a diagonal patrol near each other. I thought that was a good challenge of observing their pattern and timing your approach just right.

I actually changed the enemy to move into a pattern instead of randomly wandering. I liked the idea of randomly wandering and you having to wait to find the “right” time to get past him. (In the previous build, it wasn't completely random to try and make it easier) Unfortunately, there wasn’t any clear indicator of when the right time was to get by, so even though I knew how it worked, I couldn’t get past it 100% of the time. That’s usually the sign of bad design, but I really liked the idea, so I figured I’d release it and see how it was received. A lot of people had trouble with it, so I had to admit to myself that it wasn’t a very good idea. Now he wanders is a boxy pattern, which makes it easier to understand when to walk by.

I’m glad to hear you liked the new level! I am pleased with how it turned out!