Minotaur [SciFi|Mystery][Adventure|Puzzle][KICKSTARTER|DEMO]

[LizardRobot]

[1] Is there any information about the game you would like us to add, or clear something up?
No! I think I glossed over the fact it was a point-and-click, so I was a little surprised by that, but that was just me being too enthused by the artwork to pay enough attention to read all the game details. It's just so good-looking!

[2] If you checked out our Kickstarter page, did you like the rewards? Would you consider supporting Minotaur... Or maybe you already did? (In which case let us know, so that we could thank you here!)
I haven't checked it out, but I wish you guys much success with it!

If you played the demo (thank you for taking the time!):

[3] Did you encounter any bugs? If you did and screenshot is applicable, we would really appreciate one. We also need to know your OS version!
No bugs, everything seemed to be working just fine.

[4] Did you like the VN aspect of the game: world, characters, dialogue, voice over?
I really liked exploring what I could of the world and reading about the setting. The setting was the most interesting aspect for me. Also, Nod's voice actor was excellent!

[5] Did you like the adventuring/puzzle part? How hard were the puzzles, and did Ollie's hints help?
That part I did not like so much. I got stuck trying to figure out where the key was for the panel, and Ollie's hints were no good for that aspect. I knew what general location the key was in, the game told me, but I couldn't figure out where in that location to click. I went to the walkthrough, which said to turn on a lamp, but I couldn't figure out how to make whatever lamp I needed turn on. I wish there were a button or something I could press that would show the active areas on a screen, and maybe highlight ones with unseen content. Then I could be sure I wasn't missing something, and spend less time clicking the same areas and getting the same dialogue over and over. It was just a very frustrating gameplay mechanic for me and it got in the way of me enjoying the game.

[6] What about the UI? Were you comfortable with navigating menus, exploring the world, solving puzzles?
Towards the beginning, a message popped up to to explain that clicking at the bottom of inspecting something would return me to the larger screen. While this makes perfect sense, I honestly wouldn't mind some subtle sort of return button instead of just clicking in an unmarked area. In general, I guess knowing where to click was by biggest issue -- even knowing where I needed to click, I wish it could be highlighted to make my job easier because I don't like searching for active clickable areas. It's not the clickability that annoys me, it's the time it takes to find the spots to click. The scenes are really nicely rendered, but there's a lot of stuff going on visually, which is probably compounding this issue for me. I prefer less cluttered or more obvious setups for click and point adventure games. Or a button or key that can highlight active areas. (My favorite P&C adventure games are the Land of Dream series, as a point of reference.)

It is a gorgeous-looking game, though, and I'm sure you'll see success with it! I'm just not sure it turned out to be the right game for me. I think it's one of those games I would put in my wishlist on Steam and buy regardless during a sale because of how good it looks.

[u7committee]

[1] Is there any information about the game you would like us to add, or clear something up?
No! I think I glossed over the fact it was a point-and-click, so I was a little surprised by that, but that was just me being too enthused by the artwork to pay enough attention to read all the game details. It's just so good-looking!

[2] If you checked out our Kickstarter page, did you like the rewards? Would you consider supporting Minotaur... Or maybe you already did? (In which case let us know, so that we could thank you here!)
I haven't checked it out, but I wish you guys much success with it!

If you played the demo (thank you for taking the time!):

[3] Did you encounter any bugs? If you did and screenshot is applicable, we would really appreciate one. We also need to know your OS version!
No bugs, everything seemed to be working just fine.

[4] Did you like the VN aspect of the game: world, characters, dialogue, voice over?
I really liked exploring what I could of the world and reading about the setting. The setting was the most interesting aspect for me. Also, Nod's voice actor was excellent!

[5] Did you like the adventuring/puzzle part? How hard were the puzzles, and did Ollie's hints help?
That part I did not like so much. I got stuck trying to figure out where the key was for the panel, and Ollie's hints were no good for that aspect. I knew what general location the key was in, the game told me, but I couldn't figure out where in that location to click. I went to the walkthrough, which said to turn on a lamp, but I couldn't figure out how to make whatever lamp I needed turn on. I wish there were a button or something I could press that would show the active areas on a screen, and maybe highlight ones with unseen content. Then I could be sure I wasn't missing something, and spend less time clicking the same areas and getting the same dialogue over and over. It was just a very frustrating gameplay mechanic for me and it got in the way of me enjoying the game.

[6] What about the UI? Were you comfortable with navigating menus, exploring the world, solving puzzles?
Towards the beginning, a message popped up to to explain that clicking at the bottom of inspecting something would return me to the larger screen. While this makes perfect sense, I honestly wouldn't mind some subtle sort of return button instead of just clicking in an unmarked area. In general, I guess knowing where to click was by biggest issue -- even knowing where I needed to click, I wish it could be highlighted to make my job easier because I don't like searching for active clickable areas. It's not the clickability that annoys me, it's the time it takes to find the spots to click. The scenes are really nicely rendered, but there's a lot of stuff going on visually, which is probably compounding this issue for me. I prefer less cluttered or more obvious setups for click and point adventure games. Or a button or key that can highlight active areas. (My favorite P&C adventure games are the Land of Dream series, as a point of reference.)

It is a gorgeous-looking game, though, and I'm sure you'll see success with it! I'm just not sure it turned out to be the right game for me. I think it's one of those games I would put in my wishlist on Steam and buy regardless during a sale because of how good it looks.

Hi LizardRobot! Thank you very much for your feedback! Sorry it took me some time to reply... Kickstarter takes up a lot of it!

Thank you for kind words about the game. We're happy that the things you mentioned were to your liking. Nod is voiced by Chris Niosi (he's the voice of Reigen Arataka from Mob Psycho 100) - I agree that he sounds great:-)

We're collecting all feedback to our Trello board, and I made a note about back button. I understand what you mean about a lot happening on screen and pixel hunting, too (and why you used Lands of Dream as reference). We've had a number of comments about that (and about lamp), so we're going to do exactly what you suggested and assign a key which highlights all objects on screen player can interact with. The highlight will also indicate status of an object. This will hopefully help with the problem!

PS: I downloaded a demo of A Town Called Shanty (v. 0.0.1a) and I promise to give it a go and provide feedback after our campaign ends. I did a quick check already, though, and I think that it looks great! Loved the mechanic with lanterns and wheel.

Cheers

Nick

[LeonDaydreamer]

This looks amazing! I'll have to check out the demo when I have the time, but great job guys! :)
I'm happy to see your KickStarter is doing well. Good luck with the final stretch!

[gensuta]

Started playing the demo and I haven't finished it yet but I'm definitely gonna support the game on Kickstarter next week when I get money to!! Really like it so far and god the art and music is just amazing!!

[u7committee]

This looks amazing! I'll have to check out the demo when I have the time, but great job guys!
I'm happy to see your KickStarter is doing well. Good luck with the final stretch!

Thank you, Leonid! We'll do our best :maximumeffort: Your projects look great, too. Presentation alone for Put A Sock In It made me laugh And that Seattle illustration from A Near Dawn has this retro feeling to it... Really cool. Best of luck with development!

[u7committee]

Started playing the demo and I haven't finished it yet but I'm definitely gonna support the game on Kickstarter next week when I get money to!! Really like it so far and god the art and music is just amazing!!

Thank you for checking out our demo, gensuta - I'm really glad you liked it! And for planning to support us on Kickstarter, of course We'll be looking forward to it. In the meantime, best of luck to your trio (did I get that right?) in all your creative endeavors!

[gensuta]

Started playing the demo and I haven't finished it yet but I'm definitely gonna support the game on Kickstarter next week when I get money to!! Really like it so far and god the art and music is just amazing!!

Thank you for checking out our demo, gensuta - I'm really glad you liked it! And for planning to support us on Kickstarter, of course We'll be looking forward to it. In the meantime, best of luck to your trio (did I get that right?) in all your creative endeavors!

Ahhhh thanks!! And we are a trio sorta? More of a duo now since the third member has been busy. I mean we started out making a game for fun, but now only one of my buds of our trio and I decided to keep working on more games on our free time.

Also I finished playing the demo just now and I did love it, but there's was one thing that bothered me a bit. I'm not that good with puzzles, but I've been trying to get better at it and tried my best not to use the walkthrough. However, when it came to the axis generator puzzle it was a little difficult for me to understand how it worked. I knew the negative sign was what connected the energy to where it needed to be, but since I couldn't see where the energy was while trying to make the path it was hard for me to understand what worked and what didn't.
Like the first time when I had to connect the PAC I eventually figured it out, but the second time I ended up searching the walkthrough since it was taking quite a while for me to figure it out. At the same time maybe letting the player see where the energy is going before it connects to a certain thing would make the puzzle to easy? Idk, just giving my two scents >->

Either way still really excited for this game! Really looking forward to looking through the digital artbook *-*

[u7committee]

Started playing the demo and I haven't finished it yet but I'm definitely gonna support the game on Kickstarter next week when I get money to!! Really like it so far and god the art and music is just amazing!!

Thank you for checking out our demo, gensuta - I'm really glad you liked it! And for planning to support us on Kickstarter, of course We'll be looking forward to it. In the meantime, best of luck to your trio (did I get that right?) in all your creative endeavors!

Ahhhh thanks!! And we are a trio sorta? More of a duo now since the third member has been busy. I mean we started out making a game for fun, but now only one of my buds of our trio and I decided to keep working on more games on our free time.

Also I finished playing the demo just now and I did love it, but there's was one thing that bothered me a bit. I'm not that good with puzzles, but I've been trying to get better at it and tried my best not to use the walkthrough. However, when it came to the axis generator puzzle it was a little difficult for me to understand how it worked. I knew the negative sign was what connected the energy to where it needed to be, but since I couldn't see where the energy was while trying to make the path it was hard for me to understand what worked and what didn't.
Like the first time when I had to connect the PAC I eventually figured it out, but the second time I ended up searching the walkthrough since it was taking quite a while for me to figure it out. At the same time maybe letting the player see where the energy is going before it connects to a certain thing would make the puzzle to easy? Idk, just giving my two scents >->

Either way still really excited for this game! Really looking forward to looking through the digital artbook *-*

Hi Gensuta!

I didn't know that you backed Minotaur... And you pledged for digital art book, too! Thank you

I see how things are with your team. If it's like that... good luck to your duo, then!

Your feedback is much appreciated, of course. And I agree with you! Axis puzzle design is not very intuitive, and making players see pieces of Axis current as they insert the nodes seems to be the best way to improve it. I'm pretty sure we're going to do it just like you said.

I'm looking forward to hearing your feedback on future betas for backers

Cheers!

Nick

[Lesleigh63]

Love that background art.