Project Homecoming Haven

Cute little demo with a simple and sweet story. I look forward to the finished game, but in it's current state it also has a few hard to ignore issues.

Positives:

• The concept is unique, trauma cleaners aren't often explored and the nature of the profession provides for some interesting directions you could take a game.
• It was interesting looking into Adam's life through his belongings.
• I like how what you choose to give his sister at the end actually completely changes what she thinks of the circumstances surrounding his death and how you can make her impression of what happened more or less accurate. He felt pressured and was grieving, wanting to honour his father and driving himself of the edge because of it. Meanwhile, I gave her the trophy and his plans for the sequel to his game in one of my runs, which leads her to believe he lost himself chasing fame.
• The art style of the game is cute, I especially like the almost dreamy imagery of meeting the sister at the end.

Negatives:

• The walk speed is agonisingly slow.
• The auto progressing intro text goes by way too fast to read it completely, I hope in future the text speed can be adjusted and/or switched to manual progression like it is in the rest of the game.
• The camera angles were annoying to work with. If you zoom in and walk as low as you can, half of the screen is empty black space and if you walk as high as you can the upper half of the wall is not visible because the player character is also noticeably uncentred and placed towards the top of the screen. It wouldn't be an issue playing the game on a large screen, but I would prefer to have the camera be placed higher for better visibility. I'm also not a fan of "snapping" style rotation because it limits the control.
• It's a little tedious having to pick up every small item individually like the paper balls and stacks of ramen pots. I'd prefer if tiny things like clusters of paper or bottles counted as one item all together and picking up an item in a stack, or at the bottom of a stack, got rid of the whole thing, like how the piles of dirty dishes work.
• The range at which you can pick items up is a little finnicky, especially with the aforementioned paper balls. I was practically right on top of one at one point and couldn't pick it up. It felt like I had to get further away from some things to be able to grab them.
• I noticed in the item descriptions when you clicked on them in the inventory that one or more seemed to cut off before finishing, or read awkwardly like there was meant to be more said but there wasn't. There are also minor issues like spelling and grammar mistakes dotted throughout all of the game's text, but those can be attributed to the game not yet being complete, and so I do not count them as real marks against the game.
• I wish the 3 item limit was more explicitly clear. It wasn't hard to figure out, but the "family box" section doesn't need to be so large if there are only 3 things you can put in. You could also use slots in the family box to make it more clear.

Suggestions/Things I may have done differently:

[These are not necessarily criticisms of the game, just other ideas]

• While I understand it and there's nothing actually wrong with it, I do not think the 3 item limit on what you can put in the family box is necessary to achieve the outcomes intended, since the player is choosing what to include and omit regardless. Personally, since the family only gets one box, I would have made the limit based on item size. A lot of what you can give Adam's sister are things that don't take up much space like books, posters, pictures, etc., but there are also the large consoles and trophy, yet since the limit is amount of items and not size, giving her something like the 2 biggest consoles and the trophy is seen as the exact same as giving her 3 pieces of paper. It feels a little more realistic and still provides limitations to work in if the box can only hold a certain amount of items based on size instead of number, and the player still isn't required to fill the box and gets to chose what is most important for the family to have.
• There are comments in the game about cleaning the carpet and the tv stand is visibly dirty. I'd love if you could actually clean these things up.
• I'd add an incentive to clean the room more instead of just grabbing the significant items and getting out. Like, since you are running a business here, cleaning more earns you more money that you can use for... something. That's your problem to figure out lmao.
• It would be cool if what you gave the family affected the scenery after they look in the box. Adam's sister's reaction varies greatly depending on what you give her, it would be an interesting artistic choice if it affected the surroundings visually after that flash of light too.

Cool concept! :O

Wishes

I hope there's a scoring system or something that also prompted me to keep cleaning (picking up the trash) instead of just personal items to give to the family.

Gameplay

• The text at the start of the game was a bit too fast for me. I hope I could control the speed or something.
• I didn't know I could walk until I couldn't pick some things up. I also didn't know I could rotate the room. Didn't read the manual btw
• Some things wasn't white-outlined on hover, but could be picked up anyway. Wondering why this happens
• The dialogue box for furnitures... why? I thought there'd be a story or extra action for each (e.g. use some handkerchief to wipe the table, etc).
• I was wondering if there's a story behind each personal item I picked up. Turns out there is, but I just needed to go to inventory. I only knew this when I finished cleaning and it prompted me to choose items to give to the family (whose max. value wasn't explicitly stated btw)

Looking forward to the release!

ITSS SOOO COOL BUT TOO SHORT :cccc

I loved the demo for this! Such a beautiful and emotional game. Can't wait for the full release <3