Chronophobia by Valkija
Chronophobia - The Descent Into Madness

An atmospheric horror game about a curious researcher caught in a time loop of his own creation. Discover clues to undoing the loop by exploring his lab, all while fighting off the madness that is rapidly overcoming you as the loop draws closer...


| Youtube | https://valkija.itch.io/chronophobia |
| Original URL | https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/47/chronophobia |
Ratings
| Overall | 397th | 3.79⭐ | 52🧑⚖️ |
| Fun | 988th | 3.19⭐ | 52🧑⚖️ |
| Innovation | 872th | 3.276⭐ | 51🧑⚖️ |
| Theme | 496th | 3.882⭐ | 53🧑⚖️ |
| Graphics | 169th | 4.288⭐ | 54🧑⚖️ |
| Mood | 69th | 4.269⭐ | 54🧑⚖️ |
| Given | 59🗳️ | 74🗨️ |
Really good graphics, sound and mood, anyway!
there are some small remarks I would like to give though, 1 the collision is missing on quite a lot of objects. 2 it would be great if there was some kind tutorial... I spent like 10 minutes wandering around not knowing you could read the books. and 3 I was able to completely block the game by reading a book while dying.
but as I said the game is still really great!
And a big thanks to everyone else for the lovely kind comments and for trying it out! :) I'd @ you all but that'd be big spam haha
Managed to get the machine working, for a long time I got confused as to why the bottle fits in the m3 pipe slot lol
I couldn't get what I had to do, but if I spent more time with this one I'd be able to understand it.
Some kind of menu would be also a good addition, turning game off by ALT+F4 is a little bit weird after all.
Visually is nice, I like low poly style, but maybe it was all a bit too confusing and dark, I also had vertical sync issues.
I really like the loop mechanic as learn through repetition, and I like overall this kind of games where you have to always learn a bit more of a tiny space. It makes it more believable.
The painting are pretty scary, if u made them good job!
That said, the game is a bit too unbalanced.
The text are not clear as supposed to, but maybe a bit too much with all the other confusing stuff.
You have pot over the library, a magazine with a lot of stuff but only 1-2 thing visible that are hard to see, and those that are above the shelf are too hidden.
There are the levers to activate the lights, but I saw the other lever to pull when you set the code (just next to the others) just when I had discovered all the other things and was wondering what was missing.
The purple thing is cool, but too precise, I counted 5 drops but it was not enough, so the text was also not correct =/
Time is also maybe too short, and I wanted like a reset button, because if I failed just one thing I had to wait the end knowing I wouldn't been able to do it in time.
There is really to many things that adds to the confusion and makes it too much. I'm with you with disorienting the player, but if you exaggerate it ends up in frustration and lack of immersion as it did to me.
At first I, was immersed and scared searching for a way out, a last I was just running up and down not even knowing anymore I was in a horror game.
It's an issue I've felt into too, that is making the game too hard thinking that "harder is funnier/better" but it's totally not. Especially for a game like this that heavily relies on immersion!
Of course, being your game, you must follow what you feel is right, but try to keep this in mind and see if it seems meaningful to you.
I don't want to sound harsh, I really liked this (and think I've completed it?), those are just suggestions! Great work =)
As already mentioned above, if the player is reading the book before starting a new loop the game freezes.
I made a short video for those who stuck but wanted to see the end of the game.
https://youtu.be/fANPSmhZ1KM
**Spoiler-Start**
*Do I correctly understand that there is no way to exit from the time loop?*
**Spoiler-End**
@uchiro I'm incredibly flattered and thankful you made an awesome playthrough video for those who got stuck! A huge concern of ours was whether people would figure it out given the features we didnt manage to get in, so im glad some people are (even though its very obvious some QOL changes are needed to facilitate that, and a bit of a better push for people to start from.)
As for your spoiler text - yes, that is correct :) during the devtober continuation of this project we'll be elaborating more on that rather than just leaving you in the dark!
https://www.twitch.tv/videos/765179109
Some fine tuning but a great entry overall !