Yes, the combat is kind of, well, same style as a blind legend. It should be an open world type combat.

Hey everybody!

Thanks so much for your feedback! And thanks so much for picking up the game! It means the world to us and it's been our most successful release so far.

Regarding updates for PC users: We'll be sending out e-mails to let those who have bought that version of the game be able to get the update. For those who want a Mac version, we're looking into uploading directly to the app store this time to stop some compatibility issues we've faced with previous MacOS releases.

The next update for the game will be improving a lot of behind-the-scenes structural stuff to let those with older devices be able to play the game as intended.

After watching a large number of streams and reading every comment. We've got a couple of key areas we're going to work on for the next release, which we may update this game with too if it's works within the systems in place.

1. Complex mechanics, the fighting mechanic in this release is fairly simple, some people really like that, some people don't. We've got a number of more complex fighting mechanic designs we're going to be trying out in the next few weeks. We've also got the exposure and stealth mechanics as shown in concept mechanic videos.

2. Game length, this game was very character focused, which we wanted to do as Audio Pong and Sounds of Eden aren't. It's very dense in terms of voice acting and world building audio sources. What this means is that every minute of game play takes a long time/costs money to make and so if you're very good at navigation this experience may be over quite quickly. With more system or mechanic driven games, this isn't the case.

Both these issues can be solved by having more complex mechanics, that stand up to more repetition, that repetition will efficiently increase the game length without adding months of dev time.

Thanks again for all of your support.
Harry, Connor and Jordan

P.S
Our company is called Purple Jam.

I picked this up yesterday and played through it and it is a really nice concept demo game for bigger things to come. You've definitely demonstrated that you can put together a great team of voice actors and even write entertaining dialogue. I highly recommend for those who can spare 4 bucks, to do so, so the team is motivated to put togehter a longer game.

At the credits I was actually very impressed by just how many different voice actors there were. My favorite were the detective and the scientist guy at the beginning!

The sound design and immersion is very rich. I love how there are all these mini encounters with various characters and dialogues and various other things, like even just knocking aside a bottle on the ground. This little game really reminds me of the beginning part of Half Life 2, Bioshock Infinite, and Dishonored. So if you were going for that, then you've done a pretty good job

as to the combat system. yeah I wished there was some feedback that I am beating them up, since right now it just sounds like I am dodging stuff and suddenly at the end they are beat up. One thing that might be a bug is that if I dodge in the wrong direction I don't immediatly fail, but when I press the right one, I immediatly pass. so essentially when I hear the start of needing to doge I can just press both keys in quick succession and am guaranteed to dodge. at the very least I would want that if I press the wrong key, that I immediatly fail.

also just to provide a differing opinion. I actually don't really want an open world combat system, cause in every audiogame I tried it so far, I was just super confused. the main game I am thinking of right now is survive the wild, but that game has other major usability problems that could have been designed better, so maybe you guys could pull it off. but honestly I am just fine with a combat system where I dont need to manage my movement like in a blind legend.

in terms of navigation. It took me quite a while to find the two objectives, but not so long that I got frustrated enough to quit. probably the main problem was having hard time figuring out when I was walking up to a wall and how to turn away from it. this was particularly a problem when through the enhanced sound device I could hear where the objective was, but going straight for it I would reach a wall and then need to figure out how to walk around it.

I have some ideas with audio how this could be improved.

In real life when a wall or large object like a car isin my way I can feel it coming up even without sight, because the presence of a large sound blocker has a major effect on the overall acoustics. so for example when I am looking to cross a small road with no crosswalk, I can find an empty space where there isn't a car parked without having to tap the road with my cane, but instead by walking down the sidewalk and listening when the space "opens up". I also used this sensation to feel when the end of the swimming pool was coming up since nearing it the acoustics made me feel like the space is closing up around me. I even managed to miss this and smack my face into the pool wall only a few times

I think it probably has to do with reverb, so it might be worth experimenting with modulating reverb as the character walks up to a wall. even this might be too subtle as it is in real life as well. so maybe instead you culd start playing some sort of white noise as the character approaches a wall and ramp it up as they reach it. this modulation would be useful if it was binaural as well, so then when I start turning around when facing a wall I can know if I am not just walking into another wall because it is a corner and also I could track the wall and purposefully walk beside it as a guiding landmark as I do in real life.

is the game CPU intensive?
I'm running windows 7 64bit on my laptop and if I buy this game will my CPU fan ramp up and will my memory decrease and slow down my system?

Hi there everybody! Thanks for continuing the discussion, thought I'd drop in and answer some questions.

@lemm, firstly, thanks so much for your lovely feedback and picking up the game! As well as your continued support. In answer to your questions, adding controller support isn't something we've looked into but it's certainly viable. Is there anyone else who would like that as a feature? And A Detective's Demise has plans to be a series, Connor has ideas about RPG style multiple dialogue options, to fit in well with the Detective theme. With that being said, next in our pipeline is getting the first level of the main game ready for release (more on this later).

@Dragonlee, thanks for getting the game! Super pleased you had a good time with it. As regards walking into walls, this is an ever present issue, we actually tried an early reflection system exactly like the one you're mentioning but it didn't sound quite right when exaggerated, and when subtle it wasn't particularly apparent and therefore not useful. It's something we're definitely experimenting with. We could use some sort of subtle beeping system based on distance when you're getting too close, but that seems heavy handed. Would love to hear any other thoughts you have on it.

@queenslight, thanks for letting the community know how to sort VoiceOver, much appreciated and thank you very much for picking up the game!

@defender, thanks for getting the game and your critique! As we've mentioned before, we're experimenting with more complex mechanics for the next release, you can see some of the concept mechanic videos over on our YouTube. As regards plot we were going for some sense of mystery and more subtle world building, rather than a whole bunch of exposition right at the start. If you're interested in knowing some more of the details of the world, head to our YouTube channel and check out the videos of Connor describing it. Hopefully the world will become a bit more defined for you with episode two! Thanks again for your feedback my man!

Thanks again for your support and interest everybody!

All the best
Harry

@186 the more games have controller support, especially if you can get haptic/force feedback into play, the better. So +1 to that.

@183,  what is direct touch? WHere do i activate it? i have screen  recognition  Active, but i don't know anything about direct touch.

Yeah. Dirrect touch.  You gotta turn of screen recegnition for that, is a rotter command as well. But anyway yeah, you don't have to turn of voiceover to play the game

Hi Harry.
I played the tutorial, but when the game loads again to start the adventure the problem of choking sounds returns.
I have the latest update

Man that would be cool indeed, having to move quickly away from enemy windup sounds, then run back in to strike when you heard a sound indicating that their guard was down would be great.  Creating unique timing and repetition patterns for different enemies, and scaling up difficulty as the game progresses would really make things feel more like a mainstream game.
You'd obviously need to be able to move faster in combat, but limiting the player by causing an exhaustion cooldown timer if you move that way for an extended period of time could help make it even more interesting.
And this wouldn't necessitate getting rid of the peripheral enhancer either, as you could still use it to dodge projectiles by throwing your self quickly to one side, with enemies adjusting to your new position after a couple seconds so that if you did it too early or dodged the wrong way, you'd still be hit.
I'd also love to see an HP and or limited lives system, even if the latter is only in a hardcore mode.

This would likely require allot of combat code rewriting and a ton of AI expansion though so it's probably a pipedream, but I really think this would be one of those things that would separate the upcoming Dusklight from most of the other audio games that have come before it.  I think even a less ambitious idea like a fast paced rhythm game type system without actual movement but where dodges, blocks, and counters are used would be great, or some kind of mini arena based system where entering into a battle puts the player and enemy on a 10 by 10 grid to move within or something..

Because when I think of Tripple A I don't just imagine production quality from the writing and cinematics point of view, but also from a mechanical one.  So when I hear "the first Triple A audio game" this current combat system is not what comes to mind at all.
And while this is obviously not the main game, the Pitch Black team has said that many of these concepts will make it into A Dusklight Story in some form, and that worries me because I've seen this type of thing before.

That said , I also realize that the main focus is on story and setting, not combat, but mainstream narrative driven games tend to either go turn based or use one of the types of combat I'm talking about.
If this requires another funding drive or extra time to even be considered, I'm personally all for it.  I would hate to see such an ambitious project get hamstrung by something like this when the passion is clearly there.

the game crashes after the projectile dodging part in the tutorial, and closes.  my phone is not so good, but never with games containing graphics it closes like this