next »

[SharpCarlos]

I've always wanted to enter one of these, so, here we go.

Somebody already claimed this, but more than one person can use the same topic, right? Obviously, I chose

14. Hideous sound in the dark.

Yes, I got the name wrong, but I've been saying "sounds" (plural) all week, and don't have the heart to change it now. I also took inspiration from these two:

146 Ancient lamp found in tomb—when filled and used, its light reveals strange world.
220 Bell of some ancient church or castle rung by some unknown hand—a thing . . . or an invisible Presence.

Controlled with the mouse, you move around the pitch-black screen trying to find the Invisible Church, which you search for by listening as the sound of the bell gets louder or softer while you move. But there are invisible obstacles that ALSO make sounds, which you have to avoid.

Plus, monsters. They're silent, but you can see the ones nearest you by opening your lantern (hold down the left mouse button). But they can see the light from the lantern, and will charge you as long it's lit. Release the mouse button, and they'll go back to being dormant (but will still end your game if you bump into them).

There are five difficulty levels, which have to be tackled in order.

You might not want to play this loud if somebody's sleeping in the next room.

Download:
http://cid-34b04cad25f39723.skydrive.live.com/self.aspx/My%20Games/Hideous%20Sounds%20in%20the%20Dark.exe

[Melly]

More than one person can use Hideous, yes.

He gets around.

[Hideous]

 

[C418]

I like that game. It's what I would've made.

[scytos]

I've enjoyed this game. It gave me a few scares when I lit the lantern and saw a monster right beside me. The sound effects you chose give a nice atmosphere and guiding yourself through sound is fun. Nice job.

[mrfredman]

I really enjoyed this game, its a cool mechanic, and that tolling bell is really powerful when you have volume jacked up, which is really necessary for a proper experience.

I have one criticism, I mean for it to be constructive and friendly and all that; the sound that plays when you find the church and win the game is sooo disappointing. You've got all this tension built up with the bell and the dark and all, and the effect with the rays totally works. Its just that sound is way to happy and tinkly, you need something with more ooomph to give the player some closure. It has to be better than the sound for when you lose (which is really good), I mean its our reward for beating the game.

Again, really good game, I loved the journey, I just left it feeling a unfulfilled because of that one nitpicky detail.

[SharpCarlos]

Thanks to all for their comments, and to mrfredman for your constructive criticism. I'll have to think about that. How can I make it "win" music (and a contrast to the "lose" music) without it being "tinkly" (which really does describe how it sounds). Maybe big, victorious, and bombastic instead of happy?

[mrfredman]

Maybe big, victorious, and bombastic instead of happy?

Thats exactly what I was thinking, maybe like a different gong sound effect, or a gong and explosion at the same time. I dunno, just something strong and forceful.

[muku]

With the version in the torrent, AntiVir gives me a virus/trojan warning on the exe ("TR/Unpacked.Gen")... it's been giving me many false positives lately, but could someone double-check?

[SharpCarlos]

Yikes! Yeah, please, if anybody else is getting that, please let me know.

[mrfredman]

The version I played was the version in the torrent, I've scanned it with Avanti which doesn't detect anything wrong with it, and I've had no troubles or ill-effects from running it.

[muku]

Yup, after closer inspection, it was only AntiVir acting up again. That's what you get for using free anti-virus software. I'm sorry for stirring up trouble

[Soulliard]

I'm not a big fan of these 'find the hidden object' games, but the environment here was really nice. With the exception of the victory screen, which was far too cheerful.

[Pishtaco]

I could have done with a bit more character to the environment; maybe some tweaking of the control so that the player felt less like a mouse pointer, or a message saying what had killed you. But otherwise I thought this worked pretty well. Apprehension was created.

[JLJac]

Creepy! I really liked this one, it's simple but have a lot of atmosphere to it. I agree with Pishtaco on the player movement. If you somehow limited the player to a certain speed I think you would improve the sense of panic when chased by a monster, and also the mouse movement might be a little too fast and uncontrolled when it comes to avoiding those hideous sounds. If you could make the player move a bit more causiosly and controlled I think it would improve the gameplay. Also, have you thought of panning the sounds from the players location, making you able to hear if the source is to your left or to your right?

Great game, good job, wish you the best of luck in the compo

[SharpCarlos]

Thanks for your comments about the control scheme. You think keyboard would work better? Or just tweak the current mouse controls? I actually kind of like the overly sensitive controls, because sometimes a sound would startle me into twitching and losing the game. But I see what you're saying about the player feeling "like a mouse pointer". Keyboard control WOULD make you feel more like a person walking through an environment.

For a while I actually DID have the sounds spatially located across the left and right speakers, but it ruined the tension. If the loudest sound was coming from your left, then you knew it was safe to move right, and so on. You didn't get those moments where the sound was frightengly loud and you had no idea where to go.

[Pishtaco]

Thanks for your comments about the control scheme. You think keyboard would work better? Or just tweak the current mouse controls? I actually kind of like the overly sensitive controls, because sometimes a sound would startle me into twitching and losing the game. But I see what you're saying about the player feeling "like a mouse pointer". Keyboard control WOULD make you feel more like a person walking through an environment.

For a while I actually DID have the sounds spatially located across the left and right speakers, but it ruined the tension. If the loudest sound was coming from your left, then you knew it was safe to move right, and so on. You didn't get those moments where the sound was frightengly loud and you had no idea where to go.

I think the mouse is fine for this game, going to keyboard would be too much. My problem really is that, because of the way the mouse moves (and, I guess, the sketchiness of the backstory and the mixed selection of sounds), playing the game just doesn't feel different enough from doing normal tasks in windows; it doesn't feel like the game is creating its own world. It's possible that a speed tweak like JLJac suggested would be enough to fix this.

[SharpCarlos]

Control related side note: one idea I considered early on, that would have resulted in a very different game, was to have the lamp on all the time, but if you moved your character too quickly, it would start flickering. And if you moved even MORE quickly, it would go out. So you would be in these stressful "chase" situations where you didn't dare move as quickly as you really wanted to.