Skaramazuzu Demo Issues and Feedback

[Iphigames]

Hi everyone! First of all, thank you for playing the Demo!

This thread is about:

•Bugs
•Performance Issues
•Feedback
•General recommendations
•Requests (Localization, Setting Options etc.)

If you have any other questions, please comment in this thread, or get in touch with us on Twitter or on the support email: [e-mail]

---

Also here is a list of useful links:

Website: https://www.skaramazuzu.com
Twitter: https://twitter.com/skaramazuzu
FB: https://www.facebook.com/skaramazuzu

Thank you <3

[swingline]

Hi, just wanted to say thanks for making the demo available. I'm trying out alot of the demos. I enjoyed the artwork in Skaramazuzu, but unfortunately can tell the game just isn't for me. This isn't something I normally play, so not sure if this comment applies to fans of this genre - I agree with another comment that the verbosity seemed high - but maybe that's just how these type games are. I could tell you were using the language to set a playful mood and it came through - but what seemed like the initial gameplay of needing to do favors for characters in the game doesn't appeal. Maybe there's more puzzley aspects later on (which I do like), but I kept encountering characters who needed help and felt like fetch quests were piling up. Hope this feedback is helpful, but do keep in mind - I'm probably not the target audience. Thanks again for putting the demo out there.

[jinny]

Thank you for this demo!

The atmosphere and tone of the story is really well done, and I personally thought that all of the dialogue and interactions were charming. Dragon is super cute.

The initial walking around and gathering tasks from all the characters was a little overwhelming at first, but the demo definitely ended on a high note for me. I think the full game will be a really interesting experience. Looking forward to seeing this release!

[Zesc]

I did not experienced any technical issues with the demo, so that's good. The exclamation marks of Creature 1 thru 3 are upside down, but this may be intentional, though it doesn apply to 4&5?

In terms of feature/setting requests, I'd suggest a fully rebindable control scheme (there is no reason not to ever feature one; especially in such slow-paced games that might be played by people with physical disabilities.)
I also agree with the other forum thread (although i'm not as overtly agressive) regarding the textspeed: if you insist on this style, make it adjustable, or just allow to hit confirm during the typing to skip it like in most other games.

Now, I really enjoy the setting; it is both desolate yet wholesome. It reminds me of games like Sysiphus Reborn or Tormentum: Dark Sorrow, which is great.

However, I see great weakness both in writing and gameplay.

Writting first, most of the dialogues in this game are veiled monologues; Zuzu is seldomly advancing conversations in any meaningfull way, instead just prompting the characters to further. A very good example is the very first conversation with Master: Zuzu is repeating Master like a parrot to advance the exposition. The only meaningful initiative from Zuzu's side is asking if they might be called Zuzu.
Which leads to another point - instead of just introducing themselves as Zuzu, the played has to endure the whole "Skaramazuzu but call me Zuzu" thing again and again, with every character we met.
This game is verbose already (which i don't mind ... see the length of this very post ^^) but there is a lot of extraneous dialogue and bad literary devices used here; i know that even Triple-A games have bad writting in spades, but with such a little indie gem here, it's much more important to polish the plot, tone, style and the whole shebang of creative writing.

Gameplay second, swingline's comment regarding fetch quests is point on - not just are we playing delivery boy for a multitude of characters in order to get their favours (which is quite common in adventure games), the problem is that we are getting told almost exactly what to do, even with a handy journal documenting it as a flow-chart for us.
All the player has to do is following instructions, quite literally working instead of playing. I am afraid that this absence of puzzle mechanics will turn away most of your audience, even if it gets better later in the game.

Art and music and overall mood are wonderful, and the story is intriguing, but the delivery in terms of gameplay and writing is lacking, and i hope this game will be released in early access or with another demo so you folks can get more feedback on these topics.

[Iphigames]

Originally posted by swingline:

Hi, just wanted to say thanks for making the demo available. I'm trying out alot of the demos. I enjoyed the artwork in Skaramazuzu, but unfortunately can tell the game just isn't for me. This isn't something I normally play, so not sure if this comment applies to fans of this genre - I agree with another comment that the verbosity seemed high - but maybe that's just how these type games are. I could tell you were using the language to set a playful mood and it came through - but what seemed like the initial gameplay of needing to do favors for characters in the game doesn't appeal. Maybe there's more puzzley aspects later on (which I do like), but I kept encountering characters who needed help and felt like fetch quests were piling up. Hope this feedback is helpful, but do keep in mind - I'm probably not the target audience. Thanks again for putting the demo out there.

Thanks for playing the demo and for your feedback! The game is going to feature a lot more puzzles on the full release, the demo is focusing mostly on the aesthetics elements. Also, the editing of the dialogues is a high priority for us!

[Iphigames]

Originally posted by jinny:

Thank you for this demo!

The atmosphere and tone of the story is really well done, and I personally thought that all of the dialogue and interactions were charming. Dragon is super cute.

The initial walking around and gathering tasks from all the characters was a little overwhelming at first, but the demo definitely ended on a high note for me. I think the full game will be a really interesting experience. Looking forward to seeing this release!

Thanks for the kind words! We are in the process of reworking the initial 30 mins experience in order to feel less overwhelming.

We agree, Dragon is super cute <3

[Iphigames]

Originally posted by Zesc:

I did not experience any technical issues with the demo, so that's good. The exclamation marks of Creature 1 thru 3 are upside down, but this may be intentional, though it doesn apply to 4&5?

In terms of feature/setting requests, I'd suggest a fully rebindable control scheme (there is no reason not to ever feature one; especially in such slow-paced games that might be played by people with physical disabilities.)
I also agree with the other forum thread (although i'm not as overtly agressive) regarding the textspeed: if you insist on this style, make it adjustable, or just allow to hit confirm during the typing to skip it like in most other games.

Now, I really enjoy the setting; it is both desolate yet wholesome. It reminds me of games like Sysiphus Reborn or Tormentum: Dark Sorrow, which is great.

However, I see great weakness both in writing and gameplay.

Writting first, most of the dialogues in this game are veiled monologues; Zuzu is seldomly advancing conversations in any meaningfull way, instead just prompting the characters to further. A very good example is the very first conversation with Master: Zuzu is repeating Master like a parrot to advance the exposition. The only meaningful initiative from Zuzu's side is asking if they might be called Zuzu.
Which leads to another point - instead of just introducing themselves as Zuzu, the played has to endure the whole "Skaramazuzu but call me Zuzu" thing again and again, with every character we met.
This game is verbose already (which i don't mind ... see the length of this very post ^^) but there is a lot of extraneous dialogue and bad literary devices used here; i know that even Triple-A games have bad writting in spades, but with such a little indie gem here, it's much more important to polish the plot, tone, style and the whole shebang of creative writing.

Gameplay second, swingline's comment regarding fetch quests is point on - not just are we playing delivery boy for a multitude of characters in order to get their favours (which is quite common in adventure games), the problem is that we are getting told almost exactly what to do, even with a handy journal documenting it as a flow-chart for us.
All the player has to do is following instructions, quite literally working instead of playing. I am afraid that this absence of puzzle mechanics will turn away most of your audience, even if it gets better later in the game.

Art and music and overall mood are wonderful, and the story is intriguing, but the delivery in terms of gameplay and writing is lacking, and i hope this game will be released in early access or with another demo so you folks can get more feedback on these topics.

Wow, a lot of text and feedback. You should come and work together with our writer :D

1) We are still evaluating if we are going to keep the indicators for the creatures upside down. Our artist prefers them in the correct orientation, but our programmer prefers them like 2 and 3 :D
2) Noted about the rebinding. Another task on Trello!
3) We are going to add an option about the text speed. Also, if you press 2 times the confirm button it skips the dialogue line. We added a safety because a lot of people missclick.
4) We agree that we have a lot of work to do! We are in the process of editing and polishing all the dialogues for the full release but when you have over 100k words that takes a lot of time! Also, I need to take a note and put a leash on our writer :D
5) The demo is focusing only on the aesthetics elements of the world. Our world is a circle and we wanted the players to explore and meet all of the NPCs. In the final release, you will have to unlock all the sections of the world with a lot of puzzles and interactions!

Thank you for your detailed feedback, we really appreciated it!

[Zesc]

Originally posted by Iphigames:

3) We are going to add an option about the text speed. Also, if you press 2 times the confirm button it skips the dialogue line. We added a safety because a lot of people missclick.

In that case, have you considered having an dialogue history/replay that can be opened during a conversation? Many visual novels have these to allow to scroll back and re-read what has happened so far. It's a handy-dandy feature, not just in case you accidentially skipped.

[Murder is Meat]

Any chance of further optimization down the line?

My computer is admittedly underspecced, but rather than stuttering it just random freezes in places while otherwise running smoothly other animations. Not holding this against you, you clearly specify the minimum and I was under it, just comparing experiences with other stylised sidescrollers.