missed messages. by Angela He

[raw]
made by Angela He for LD 44 (JAM)

title.gif room.gif computer.gif dream.gif

"goth gf's iPhone" airdrops you a photo.

Accept or decline?

A romance / horror story about life, death, and memes.

A shift in perspective can change everything.

*Warning: contains mentions of suicide and self-harm.

Features:

  • 3 endings
  • 10 - 30 minutes each play-through
  • Original art and story
  • Wholesome maymays
  • Available for Mac, Windows, Linux

・ 。・。・ 。 *

Credits:

Find me on twitter or tumblr; find the music/fonts/tools in "About" on the title screen.

~~~

Notes on theme:

I highkey spent half a day thinking about the theme because I didn't want to make a finance/resource management game and came up with this idea because your choices mean life or death => your life is valuable? But also it's so tangential that I completely understand if the game seems unthematic LOL

Ratings

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Feedback

cnnmon
01. May 2019 · 02:11 UTC
this is gorgeous and i love how you have to replay the game to proceed in the story! also very heartbreaking, i cried a lot
voidfishing
01. May 2019 · 15:35 UTC
wow, i really loved this - you've struck such a great balance between how sad the story really is and the light-hearted little memes and notes around the room, the art is gorgeous, and the music always fits the tone so well. the interface on the laptop is really nice to use too, changing the music on spotify is a great touch! this is really good, super re-playable!! :)
Cameron Taylor
01. May 2019 · 17:03 UTC
Overall game is pretty great. Lovely style and music. The meme bits got me chucklin at first. The game kinda whiplashes you into the I guess second part of the game. It's a bit jarring going from light hearted e-flirting with goth gf, sending memes and whatnot, to seeing that note on the door (and then the aftermath of that). But maybe that was intentional to get me more into the game. Make it feel REAL. Like stuff like this can really come out of nowhere if you don't pay attention.

I got the ending where she was in the bathroom, and the ending where they were hangin out on the bed or whatever. The endings had the same name so I can't tell if these were two separate endings, or just slight variations of the same ending.

Sometimes there were a few little bugs in the choices, where I chose something, and then it'd repeat dialogue and I was presented with the exact same set of choices. I thought I was gonna be in an endless loop but I got to a different path. It was one of the first few choices on the bed, some combination of them if you want to look into it. Speaking of choices, sometimes I would accidentally press choices as I was going through the story since they popped up immediately. Although that could come down to me being dumb and going too fast.

Theme was sorta fitting I suppose. At least fitting enough where its down to personal interpretation or whatever.
TheMikina
01. May 2019 · 17:08 UTC
Beautiful, I really enjoyed it. The interface and controls are really nice, the game has a really cool atmosphere, and the story is pretty strong one! Thank you, great job!
Drauthius
01. May 2019 · 17:26 UTC
Amazing art, mood, and story! I couldn't figure out the third ending though.
MiracL
01. May 2019 · 19:26 UTC
Amazing ambiance, art and story as always. Loved it, your games never fails to transcend me !
zchen
01. May 2019 · 23:17 UTC
Great job as always, Angela! The mood created by the art, tiny interactions and music really pulled me in. From there I just felt compelled to replay and discover more about the game. The writing really brought it home for me. It just resonates with me and interactions I've had with loved ones.

You're right though, a tad unthematic haha, I too struggled to do something different with the theme. I'm really glad you created what you did though. Thank you
Matthew Hrehirchuk
02. May 2019 · 01:27 UTC
i really enjoyed the different approach you took to the theme, and i think it worked really well. the stories were really moving, and the dialogue was really well written. the game looks and sounds great, and has a lot of potential for further development. wonderful job!
chelC
02. May 2019 · 04:07 UTC
Really impressed with your work, you have a strong sense of style and you're great at programming. Amazing!! This was chilling, I think I'll feel this for a while.
yojammerjammer
02. May 2019 · 04:45 UTC
Hey! We went with a similar theme!
sunnray
02. May 2019 · 08:36 UTC
It's a really enjoyable game, I like the atmosphere you created and the theme approach. I discovered two out of three endings only.
randomphantom
02. May 2019 · 14:43 UTC
Its a dreamy mood. I somehow came across the happy end first though, which immediately led me to playing again to discover the "edgy" story choice. I think the theme was a little hard to gel with your usual stories of love and loss, but I still enjoyed it tons anyway. Great artwork, great choice of music to fit the mood, and loved the memes.
NandoN
02. May 2019 · 17:11 UTC
Really nice art, storytelling, and dialogue.
Nekorio
02. May 2019 · 19:31 UTC
all illustrations and color choices are very good ! Nice work ^^
Mika la Grand
02. May 2019 · 21:07 UTC
It's an immersive story and the art is very beautiful. There were some bugs with the laptop though. Some of the icons in the dockbar at the bottom of the laptop screen are in the wrong render layer, so they appear in front of the windows. You can also accidentally drag the windows to far off screen so that they disappear.
IvanPavlov
03. May 2019 · 04:35 UTC
Wow, i can't believe somebody could do somethink like this within only 3 days! Great
AtillaGallio
03. May 2019 · 05:49 UTC
I think I'm in love with this????
Really immersive, and hearing shiloh while playing was soo good!

Lo-fi + good art + immersive story, that's all I wanted for a game and now I have it.
Thanks for this.
randomhuman
03. May 2019 · 12:48 UTC
Beautiful game and story. So much art and mood and small character building details packed in for such a short space of time, I don't know how you do it. I initially thought the end of the first day was an ending and thought things came a little out of the blue, but after playing on I realise that you incorporated the idea of replaying into the game itself, which is something I really appreciate. Another thing I really like is the small degree of movement of the art with the mouse, it really adds a lot of life.

Great game overall!
mediyaz
03. May 2019 · 21:38 UTC
Beautiful Wonderful Masterful Excellent and Brilliant
zuzupd
04. May 2019 · 09:21 UTC
Well, I think you're super talented. Art is amazing, the story is interesting and exciting, the atmosphere is well established.

As you wrote yourself, the game seems to be out of theme, but I don't care. It's great and I'm a big fan of your work.
RocketRaccoons
04. May 2019 · 12:40 UTC
Best graphics ive seen so far in this ld! Very good! I think the story ends way too fast. But overall, its a really nice game with great music and ambiente. Great work!
Joror
04. May 2019 · 14:39 UTC
Wonderful art, and great writing. Love exploring the surrounding with descriptions - it created a background for the character to live in & for us to connect!
Local Minimum
04. May 2019 · 17:41 UTC
I really loved this game. Fantastic graphics, great story building. And that panning camera was very nice way of giving life to the scenes. I didn't find all the ends but what I found was great. On one of the later play-throughs I think I fell out of the dialogue tree on the bed on the topic of seeking help there seemed to be nothing happening after I clicked one of the options.
Arqcenick
04. May 2019 · 21:08 UTC
The colors of the graphics were really relaxing and nice. I enjoyed the music throughout the game, it never bothered me. It is a really impressive game. Great work!
miltage
04. May 2019 · 22:26 UTC
This made me feel things. Very well put together. The art is stunning and the presentation of the story works incredibly well. If I had to nitpick, I would say make an effort to keep all the material on the screen - sometimes I had to pan to read things as they'd be clipped by the screen border. Otherwise, beautiful work!
superpokeunicorn
05. May 2019 · 08:03 UTC
This is really great! I especially like how the game changes with multiple playthroughs, sorta like Doki Doki Literature Club. And the game really did warrant multiple playthroughs. I appreciate how much is left up to the player's initiative to actually discover and interact with the plot. You aren't just shoving the main plot down the player's throat, and the elements that you do draw attention to are actually misdirection to distract the player from what's important. In that way, the game really uses interactivity and gameplay to its advantage in a way that a lot of narrative focused games miss. Excellent work!
Franklins Ghost
05. May 2019 · 08:28 UTC
The art in this is so polished, really well done and helps set the mood. Liked that the player is able to explore the room and learn about the person.
antvelm
05. May 2019 · 20:07 UTC
Kinda like Life is Strange, good job!
zanagi
05. May 2019 · 21:09 UTC
Beautiful visuals paired with emotional storytelling, really great job with the game!
Unfortunately, I got stuck in a dialogue on my second playthrough, but was a great experience nonetheless.
zondarg
06. May 2019 · 01:07 UTC
Beautiful, polished, great art style. (And the music matches the mood and everything) Very moving, I played several times, and with all theree endings. Reminds me much of "Life is strange", too. But this might be because of the dreamy autumn mood, the art style and setting, together with the music (..and I also think LiS is one of the best story based games I ever played, so this is a good thing :grin:).
Very well done! :thumbsup:
FranVadillo
06. May 2019 · 09:52 UTC
Nice work, as always. I hope you get a good position in the jam. Awesome art and I fucking love the music you use in your games, that genre has any name? I think this game have better gameplay than the others games of you I played, so well done. Waiting for the making of if you make one. Good luck and good job.