First of all, very impressive! Really liked the twist at the end, got me intrigued :D
Anyways, heres my thoughts:
- Its been said already, but it was really confusing not being able to see the password... if its at all possible it would be great to see what ur typing. I remember being able to do a very simple password input function in flash a few years ago which should be able to be incorporated. I got the code from the tutorials section in
www.flashkit.com
- At the beginning I didnt really have a clue what was going on, or what I was supposed to do... it took quite a while to realise my main objective was to cure the sick woman. Maybe some sort of 'I wonder can I help her' dialogue when she collapsed would have made it clearer?
- Some 'reaction dialogue' might really hint to the player what way they should be thinking... like when you picked up the log and she said it was heavy it gave me an idea of how big the log was and made it easier for me to make the connection between it and it's use? Even a small, supposedly innocent, comment every time she picks up an object or does something, might just help the player think the same way you were thinking when you made the puzzle? (Dunno if that makes any sense, it did in my head :D )
- Even when the log was used, it was still in the inventory
- I agree with bigmac, i couldnt see the branch at all until i read about it in the hint guide. Maybe it fits in wiv the background environment a little
too well?
- When i tried to click the arrows at the side of the inventory to scroll through it, I kept accidently clicking the rooms exit arrow, got kind of annoying after a while! Can the inventory arrows be moved in a bit more, or the exit area at the edge of each room reduced so the two dont overlap? Maybe the room edge hit areas shouldnt reach down as far as where the inventory rises up to?
- Sometimes it was hard to realise where you could or couldnt go in rooms, or where you should and shouldnt go. Like in the bug area in the heart of the jungle, the path carries on at the bottom of the screen, and thers no real reason for not going farther, you just cant. It may be better to have an arrow as if you can, but when you click it she says 'No, i dont want to get lost' or something? I saw the stairs in the temple maze, but like bigmac said didnt really realise they were important till there was nowhere else to go. And it wasnt clear how to get to them because all the columns kind of obstructed my view. I know the room design is maybe harder when you are using photographs, but the composition of rooms makes a big difference to how easy it is for the player to find their way around, and perceive what is important. Maybe you could exaggerate the main aspects of a room, and use natural obstructions like rocks or cliffs or something to block off exits so the player can see why they cant exit right (for example)... rather than there simply not being an arrow there to be able to do it.
- Before I got the compass, when I went into the jungle, there were arrows going north, south, east and west, but when i clicked them they went nowhere, with no explanation, and because i couldnt see Alice I wasnt sure whether it had broken or not. When I clicked the bottom arrow she went back to the room with the map.
- At the very end I clicked to leave the last room, then changed my mid and decided to try talking to the woman... the screen went black but nothing else happened... not sure whether i broke it or not!
But those are the only problems I could think of. The puzzles were great, and I had to turn to the hint guide quite a few times! I also liked the way you slipped in a few 'red herrings'. And the graphics are still brilliant, its obvious you really put a lot of work into them. Overall, it was fun to play while still challenging, and the story is really getting me hooked! Btw, my load times wer long the first time i tried to load the game, for the first room and gorilla room only. After that everything went fast enough, and revisiting rooms was always fine.
Great job, thanks!
