Fablewood is an rpg puzzle game that has a strong emphasis on exploration. Players are given simple options for gameplay, and make decisions that alter the outcome of the game in various ways. The ending will be decided by the choices the player makes.
The game is inspired heavily from the first game I wrote, Castle Escape, along with some of Goopy's puzzle titles and classic 'Escape' type games that is. Here you're trying to find someone rather than escape however, progressing further to rescue your friend. Straightforward Twinning and MC flavor kinks and magical changes. There are 12 endings to unlock and it shouldn't take you too long to figure them all out and beat the game.
For those who didn't know, there is a very brief story before the game starts - about a boy or a girl going on a journey to find his/her best friend, and trying to get her out of the castle where the game starts. It's a bit surrealist and has lots of little jokes in it.
Alex/Protagonist - They're the one looking for their lifelong friend, someone so special they traveled all this way to find them.
Cecelia - She was locked in a castle by the Tower Master and you are her only hope.
Alice - A ditzy gothic lolita whose always daydreaming.
The Clown - Alice crushes on him HARD.
Fairy - Misses all her peeps.
Julia - Mischevious witch
The Alchemist - Keeps losing all their stuff!
The Maid - Will do any task, no matter how severe.
Onno Yoko - Spooky goth chick who talks to graveyards!
The Noblelady - Ohohohoh.
Gary the Skeleton - He returned back from the war all dirt and bones.
Vanessa - The Tower Master's loyal guard, she has tales tall enough to reach the moon.
The Dragon - Gotta fight it!
Candi - Bunnygirl. Surprisingly not being eaten by Alice.
Check out the forum thread for tips and tricks!
1.1 - Added changeable player sprites per gender, some small tips thrown in and fixed up Dream switch-puzzle abit.
1.0 - Completed game. 12 Endings, standard exploration.
A puzzle oriented game.
The game is gameplay oriented.
Overal, its okay. It's not good, but okay and the reason is mainly the misleading hints. If you get stuck for a few playthroughs (without walkthrough) the 'fun' quickly drops.
(Spoiler warning)
I am going to address some of the aspects I find flawed.
Some aspects in game undoubtfully require better clarification. One of them is the dream puzzle hint, the other being the room on the right. Both of these are, difficult to get due to misleading hints.
The problem with the dream's hint is that the idea it creates, is that all of the switches there are important, and so you can mess with them for hours and not get anywhere.
The problem with the room on the right is that it is a map hint. It's the only one of a kind map hinted thing, and the hint you get from a fairy leads to a tile investigation elsewhere, causing you to think it is just meant for that. There are only two obvious places where keys can be used and so, due to this as well, it is assumed every key is basically for one of these two places. It is entirely possible you will miss the map hint at a third door, because there is no mention of this at all anywhere. The map doesn't scroll either. The only 'hint' is the carpet, but I mean, look at the tower or other map areas, there is a lot of stuff on the ground that has no meaning. And so you can go through several playthroughs not understanding what you're doing wrong.
There is also a chance you lock yourself out of the good ending. There is also a questionable window that, honestly doesn't make sense as to why they can crawl out only after the fire happened. There are parts in the game where something happens, but nothing is done with (wedding dress for example, person in the hut for another example), like it... seems important. At least more than a carpet on the floor.
Most characters are there for no reason. Like, there is no background. They have a distinct personality, but it’s honestly... a puzzle trying to figure out why they are there, or why the main character reacts towards these characters in the way he/she does. No one is surprised to see a new intruder either. (story is minimal)
Personally I think this could use improvement. I'd like to suggest making the hints 'read' better. A fairy could for example hint that there is a third door. The window could use some lore as to why the character is unable to climb out before fire. Maybe you can add a hint to make the user actually use water from the inventory, since normally an item use menu pops up when an item can be used, but this is a requirement for a key. Rewrite the hint in the dream. Also, make alice stay where she is after walking there instead of respawn in front of the door; because this seems like a bug (so people may unnessecarily start over just because they realized alice doesn't walk anymore).
Considering characters:... Just why is there a bunny girl (etc) at that tower?
Maybe you can add more 'examinable spots', so that the tuxedo/wedding dress doesn't stand out as 'something weird that seems important', if you don't want to change that.
Transformations in the game:
Twinning.
You only transform if you get a gameover sequence. (like, there is no playing basically and the story after is extremely minimalistic, with the exception of one transformation. So, upon triggering a twinning sequence you will be gameovered.)
It's a good attempt at a game.
It is diffidently a game as well. Its interesting as long as you can go through with it and not get mindlessly stuck like I said before, so yeah-.
I hope this review is helpful
I love these types of games; however, this one has fallen into some general issues that can easily happen when doing puzzle games (which is why I sucked are trying to do it).
Puzzles in games need good build on how they work and making sure to give good hints that allow the person to solve it. Solving puzzles isn't just to progress the story, but to also allow the player to feel a sense of accomplishment. If you are just going around guessing all the time, and getting an answer because you tried over and over again to do the same thing, it doesn't really give a great feeling at the end.
Unfortunate in this game, you are left with a LOT of just clicking around trying to make things work. Now there is probably references to the way to do the puzzles, but those are either out of context for the situation at the time you are given them, or just don't make sense, or the build of the environment just doesn't give anything away as to how things work.
So, this game play is very much trail and error, clicking the action button on every single tile, and saving and reloading when you try things out.
Another thing I feel that was missing from this is potential other "game overs" that could have happened. For example, getting stuck with the fairy, trapped in the dream, getting pulled into the candy house. There are a lot of areas you could have added more game overs; however, you did so in a way that is only really related to the keys and using them.
Overall, the idea and concept it is great, I do love how you have put it all together. I like the characters, and like the way you are trying to tell a little story. What would make this an A+ piece of work, however, is giving me context to your hints, probably a few redesigns of some areas (for example, hidden doors make no use, unless you have some hint to them, and the rust key location was just... really frustrating).
The thing is - you have pretty much completed a game, and with some tweaking and adjusting you have made a fun game which (once fixed with the puzzle issues) would be a nice 20-30 minutes of time doing random game overs, and (hopefully) well structures puzzles.
Thank you for sharing this with us.
Not terrible, not great. You spend most of the game blindly groping around and looking for things with little to no helpful guidance, often to a frustrating point. It's cute, but it could use some work.