I apologize for the bug, it's never happened to me and I thought I had prevented it from being a possiblity. I'll try to fix it post-jam.
To be honest, I thought the exploration section wasn't enough of a maze when I made it: every path will lead to the next checkpoint as long as you stick to the path of most resistance (e.g. if a door can be activated with a switch, choose it instead of the other doors in the room). You can go in circles, but if you remember and avoid paths you've already taken, it's not very likely. Looking back on it, I think that making the exploration section as much of a maze as it is actually contributes nicely to the puzzle aspect of the game, because you're forced to think about where you're going instead of blindly following the author's cues. And in the context of the story, it also makes sense: the structure wasn't designed with Key's pleasure in mind, and the boss is using the puzzles to weed out small fry. The goal of the game isn't just to keep you constantly entertained, I'd like it to challenge you as well.
That said, I'll grant that the game has a slow start with the exploration stage. The interesting mechanics begin to be introduced after that, which is why it's unfortunate that you didn't want to keep going. I expect it could probably also use some improvement to make it less likely to go in a circle on the first try.
Yes, that's the end; because the final part of the game was thrown together at the last second, there's no real indication that the game is actually over. I thought about just kicking the player, but didn't end up implementing that.
That seems to be the case: the glass is actually a forcefield, and you're expected to turn it off, so as to free the other character. It could probably use some better hinting.
Thanks for the feedback. The formspec suggestion is interesting, I'll have to try that. For the rest, I agree that the pace needs work, since long hallways are at best an atmospheric element and more likely an annoyance. The original idea was actually to have the puzzles split not into discrete rooms, but 'regions', which in theory could make the hallways serve some further purpose than a delay, or even largely eliminate hallways in favor of wider spaces. The first cutscene was intended to have a slow start for suspense, though I may have overdone it slightly. The rest were essentially a rush job, so I mostly just strung the dialogue together with reasonable guesses for how long it would take to say (I was planning to have voice acting, but that fell through at the last minute) and worked off of that. They'll definitely be reworked later.
Where did you softlock? I know of one point (the room after the blackrod) where it's possible to trigger a minor wire update bug, but that's fixable by replacing a wire segment.
I'll grant that the game could probably use some clarification as to where to go in the first stage. However, the ambiguity is mostly intentional, as the first stage is intended to be mostly exploration-based since the player doesn't have any abilities at first. That said, the general rule is that down is further in, though it can take some perseverence to find out which doors actually lead 'down'. Eventually you'll trigger another cutscene, and from there the path gets much simpler. I doubt you softlocked yourself, because there are only two switches in the first stage, and only (at least) one of them is necessary to get to the cutscene.
I apologize for the bug, it's never happened to me and I thought I had prevented it from being a possiblity. I'll try to fix it post-jam.
To be honest, I thought the exploration section wasn't enough of a maze when I made it: every path will lead to the next checkpoint as long as you stick to the path of most resistance (e.g. if a door can be activated with a switch, choose it instead of the other doors in the room). You can go in circles, but if you remember and avoid paths you've already taken, it's not very likely. Looking back on it, I think that making the exploration section as much of a maze as it is actually contributes nicely to the puzzle aspect of the game, because you're forced to think about where you're going instead of blindly following the author's cues. And in the context of the story, it also makes sense: the structure wasn't designed with Key's pleasure in mind, and the boss is using the puzzles to weed out small fry. The goal of the game isn't just to keep you constantly entertained, I'd like it to challenge you as well.
That said, I'll grant that the game has a slow start with the exploration stage. The interesting mechanics begin to be introduced after that, which is why it's unfortunate that you didn't want to keep going. I expect it could probably also use some improvement to make it less likely to go in a circle on the first try.
Yes, that's the end; because the final part of the game was thrown together at the last second, there's no real indication that the game is actually over. I thought about just kicking the player, but didn't end up implementing that.
That seems to be the case: the glass is actually a forcefield, and you're expected to turn it off, so as to free the other character. It could probably use some better hinting.
Thanks for the feedback. The formspec suggestion is interesting, I'll have to try that. For the rest, I agree that the pace needs work, since long hallways are at best an atmospheric element and more likely an annoyance. The original idea was actually to have the puzzles split not into discrete rooms, but 'regions', which in theory could make the hallways serve some further purpose than a delay, or even largely eliminate hallways in favor of wider spaces. The first cutscene was intended to have a slow start for suspense, though I may have overdone it slightly. The rest were essentially a rush job, so I mostly just strung the dialogue together with reasonable guesses for how long it would take to say (I was planning to have voice acting, but that fell through at the last minute) and worked off of that. They'll definitely be reworked later.
Where did you softlock? I know of one point (the room after the blackrod) where it's possible to trigger a minor wire update bug, but that's fixable by replacing a wire segment.
I'll grant that the game could probably use some clarification as to where to go in the first stage. However, the ambiguity is mostly intentional, as the first stage is intended to be mostly exploration-based since the player doesn't have any abilities at first. That said, the general rule is that down is further in, though it can take some perseverence to find out which doors actually lead 'down'. Eventually you'll trigger another cutscene, and from there the path gets much simpler. I doubt you softlocked yourself, because there are only two switches in the first stage, and only (at least) one of them is necessary to get to the cutscene.