Murder, Mob Bosses, Spies, and Students (WIP) (Demo fixed as of 12/24!)

This is really great so far! It kept me interesting and I really liked Morgan and Lise

AND NOW IT SHOULD ACTUALLY WORK. Unless TextEdit decides my quote marks are dashes and my brackets are spaces again?? :angry:

You’ve got a variable broken here:

{Mary} was awake as well, curled on her bed with a book in the poor lighting. She looked up when I sat up and made a face.

Right! That’ll be fixed by tomorrow. Are there any other errors that you could find?

I recall a case of a correctly spelled wrong word and a sentence that looked like you changed your mind while writing it in the new stuff. Will need another play through to find it. Both were early on in the first two paragraphs of a page though.

why is "sir"morgan suddenly a woman? when before he was a man?

there seem too be a lot of that going around “the man closed the blinds(do not remember the word) too hid herself” are there a lot of shapechangers in this story or is that just a mistake somewhere?

That’s a variable-related glitch that I still need to fix. The ‘default’ setting of the story is with female characters, and some of the ${pronoun} variables aren’t working right. I thought I got the last of them last time, but I guess not. Mind telling me where sir Morgan randomly swapped genders?

its not just him it all over the place
the students change sex,
brother whats his name is sometime female
the mother of james got called a he ?
its all over the place

Wasn’t that bad last time I played through.

well apparently it is now, it some time males are male other times they are female or the other way around its really bothersome

It may be in some of the choice responses, then? I’m going through the code again, and I can’t find the issues so far. It would really help if you could specify the sentences/scenes, because I have over 35k words of code in the files that have been uploaded and specific missed brackets are rather tough to find.

You’ve been asking for specific details, so I took a shot at an actual beta test tonight. I got about as far as the MC reading Morgan’s contract before I ran out of time. (I am slow. They don’t get much slower than me.)

I found a couple of minor bugs, a missing line, some grammar/style thingies, and some “high level” stuff. I’ll pm you a link to what I have so far.

This is pretty fantastic. I’ll go through it more thoroughly soon, but I really like what I’ve seen so far.

I understand changing the students genders becomes you seem to be going to a one-gender school
But was it really necessary to change Morgan and the Sibling? To me, they seem just fine as female no matter which you’re playing

Would be odd to have boys at a girls school and vice versa unless they were visiting guests.

if your going too divine charaters as say brother this or sir that would not male pro-noun`s be good stranded?

look if you want to have ether girl or boy school that fine but make sure that whatever variable you have for that is set when you do so?

right not i have ppl with male names spoken to with her or she and a mother called he when “he is helping her son unpack”
its a weird switch.

anyway good luck with getting the bugs out of that. apart from that from what i seen so far it looks like an interesting setting at least even if i am not sure what the gameplay is at this point

The story was originally all-girls, therefore male default is wrong. Not quite how you came to a conclusion otherwise.

That said, without reporting each occurrence with surrounding text as context to help locate the bug, your ranting about the issues is unhelpful.

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From the first scene:

Am I the only one to find this sentence confusing?

That part they were getting wrong pretty consistently while talking about me.

I reread it twice until my brain started moving the words around. I’d have comprehended it faster if it was like this:

“They got that part consistently wrong when they’re talking about me.”

(I would say another alternative form, that “They got that part wrong pretty consistently when they’re talking about me.” was easier for me to understand too until I noticed that it mostly relied on intonation as well. When in text form, it’s not better than the original).

Another typo spotted:

That was not what being a devil’s advocate was, but those who opposed Sir Morgan did think of him a a devil.

I think that was supposed to be “as a devil.”

Next typo:

“Hardly,” said Sir Morgan with a smile. “Everything is taken care of. All I need of you is your presence and your reports. Weekly, by the way, would be best. You shall have an address to write to.” He was, I thought, a very efficient woman.

The ‘woman’ should be adjusted to switch with the gender.

Current Impressions:

The MC’s incomprehension of the older sibling’s concern was gold. I like that glimpse into how different his/her mind is.

Some style comments:

The paragraph that describes the dorms and starts with the sentence “Actually, it was not, really, my room.” is huge. It would be easier to read (certainly when on mobile phones, as someone else had noted) if it’s broken up into two or three paragraphs.

Chose ‘exploring’ from that page. The first paragraph of the next page (starts with “So, what could I find that was the truth, rather than a half-formed concern?”) is also on the long side.

Typo spotted:

I littered my bed with crumpled papers, and at half-past-nine, the first of my roommates arrived, carting with his six different suitcases, his mother, and a little brother who looked more like a muffin than a human being.

It uses ‘his’ when it should be ‘him’. I supposed the use of hisher there should be changed to himher.

Some style comments:

“Oh,” I said, feeling as though I was saying oh a lot more than I was saying anything sensible recently."

I felt the ‘oh’ would’ve been better served with single quotation marks like I just did or italicised? It’s just the odd, incongruous feeling that I get.

More typos near there:

“It’s my fifth year here. Mom wants me finished to a full shine and all that.” Him mother made an expression that looked like he was sucking on something sour, and the boy who looked like a muffin made an unpleasant noise.

Himher use versus hisher use again. And I think the pronoun for his mother should be ‘she’? The same type of typo exists in the next sentence:

James’s mother left as quickly as he could.

Style comments:

The paragraph that begins with “I’ll just go get the Sportsmaster!” feels too long to me. That might be relative for other people, but that’s the feeling I get.

More pronoun issue here:

The first boy had taken him younger brothers along, and one of them had picked a fight…

Mistaken himher usage when it should be hisher. Same as with this one:

“– a life full of regrets, you see,” he said. him friend with the eyebrows hummed assent but kept looking past me.

And that should be capitalised too after ‘him’ is exchanged with ‘his’.

Another style comment:

On the far side of the tennis courts, one of the boys who had been there before hurried back to collect a bag he had left.

This sentence is clear when in spoken form, with the emphasis put on “who had been there before” to show its appended to “one of the boys”.

More typos:

Onyx seemed like the sort of person who was difficult to miss regardless of what he was doing, but his brother was harder to pin down– I didn’t, couldn’t forget faces, but hers seemed like the sort people forgot.

hers? Since I’m playing as a guy, I think that should be his.

There’s a loose double quotation mark here:

And then he turned and hurried off to catch up to"him friend with the high-pitched voice, who was walking by as if he was on a mission.

…as well as a himher when it should be hisher.

More pronoun issues:

But the boy who stepped out, the boy they called Bloody Peter Morgan, was not a princess or a vampire bride. He was small and slight, with his mother’s sharp nose and a tousled mop of auburn curls. I didn’t know much about fashion, but his clothes looked expensive and … different from the norm.

I’m pretty sure Peter Morgan would find it insulting to know the MC had expected him to look like a vampire bride, and would like to express his disageement eloquently in the form of the MCs broken nose. Or leg.

More blocky paragrahs:

The one that starts with this sentence,

At the other end of the long table, the boys I had seen at the tennis court were sitting together again, whispering behind their hands.

could definitely stand to be divided into two or three smaller ones. Also, I’ve just noticed that you prefer using long sentences with multiple clauses? My two pence on that is that it’s alright for books but unwieldy for interactive fiction. Especially if one is reading on the go, on the phone.

Another typo:

I wondered if Alphonse Cambert had his cousin’s beautiful eyes and if he knew who him future classmates were.

himher usage when it should be hisher. Same as this one:

David could call me a child, adults could call me a child, but Alphonse Cambert could not, no matter how radiant his smile was or how all-knowing – that was the thing, the thing he and Brother Orpheus seemed to share – him gaze

Style comment + programming error:

Anne’s friends from the other dormitories arrived that day, and he went off with them after some quick introductions, because Jean, Seamus, and Sam all wanted to play doubles tennis, and Peter went off on his own and I didn’t much want to follow, so I holed myself up in the library with Alphonse.

Who’s Anne? Also, I didn’t realise that was a single sentence until I reread it. Felt a bit on the too-long side for me.

Another genderflip issue:

“Yes, sorry.” A long pause, wherein he did not move the knight or any other piece. “That girl…” he began.

Since I’m playing as a guy, I think that should be ‘that boy’.

More of the same typo:

“… I suppose. My father’s brother’s boy. He doesn’t count." He said that part with finality. At my questioning look, he rolled"him eyes.

First for the himher vs. hisher use, and second for the stray double quotation mark.

When asking Peter about Wiliam Blake:

“Him parents died in a fire, right? And people thought he wouldn’t come back to Saint Dominic’s.”

Another example of wrong-gendered nouns:

Alphonse seemed to be as well– though I could only see the back of his head, he was facing the headmistress and sitting much more still than he had before.

Maybe you should try searching the text files for words like ‘headmistress’, ‘woman’, ‘girl’ and the like that is preceded by a space or that is followed by a space? It would flag a lot of those words that are baked into the text as opposed to being variables that can switch.

Name typo:

Alphonse looked baffled for a moment. Anne gestured over him shoulder in what I assumed was a questioning manner.

Wait, so James is the reverse-gender version of Anne? Anne comes up again a bit further in the scene here. There’s the familiar himher vs hisher typo again there:

“You’re being foolish,” said Michael loudly. Alphonse frowned and returned him gaze forward. Anne made a face.

Another Oddity:

Further speculation on the matter was cut off, however, when a teacher breezed into the room, high-heeled shoes clacking.

I’m pretty sure I’d notice if guys started wearing high-heels too. You could mention the sound of heels clacking against the floor and it would be gender-neutral, though.

The mysterious Mary drops in yet again:

a) in Peter and the MC’s search for Blake

We pulled him from the water– Mary tried to make him breathe again while I yelled for a teacher, an adult, anyone– I almost yelled for David , honestly.

b) The chapel:

Mary’s hand closed on mine again, and I shifted closer to him. James had said he had minions.

Another stranger pops up:

Though in all fairness I haven’t seen her before. Who’s Ruby?

They didn’t say his name for a long time, because they had to take the Collins twins away– Ruby to the infirmary, Onyx somewhere else, away – and take charge of William’s body and his, but eventually, before anyone hustled me and Peter away, I managed to ask my police officer, the one who had talked to me before.

Also, that’s one heck of a long sentence. Maybe split it up? Also wrong mention of a mother here:

Peter only stopped clinging to me to demand information from his mother’s men, but they had nothing much to tell him or any of us, except that Special Agent Eriman was probably allowed to do what he was doing.

…

There’s probably more, but I think I just got a bit crosseyed at this point so this is it for now. Hope it’s useful.

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And now I have internet again, so there’s an update! I think I maybe possibly have gotten all the random his/him glitches this time. Hopefully. (Please let me know if I haven’t as usual.)

Also, there’s more plot! :smiley: Somewhat. The comprehension stat is starting to be useful, unless I’ve lost a chunk of code again.

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Just finished my first playthrough since this was originally posted

So yea…all that happened
Have to say, you really cranked up the intensity. I expected murders to start occurring mid or late game, but not after the third day of school. Kinda took me by surprise, especially when the murders just…kept happening. Like, so many murders in such a short time…
Ok, so on to the criticisms (that is the point of a beta tester, after all)

While I did enjoy being shocked, as that rarely happens, in all seriousness you should probably work on the pacing a bit. Maybe it was intentional for you to go from 5 to 100 in a short time frame, but it’s hard to keep going at 100 for the entire story. If a story isn’t building up, it’s slowing down.

I still don’t like the “terror” meter as I don’t like games telling me how scared I am. If you want me to feel “terrified,” then give me a reason to feel terrified. I’ll admit, you did this pretty well; when the murders started happening, I was legitimately fearful for the lives of all the characters because at that point, you established pretty much everyone can die. I was slightly less scared when I looked at the stat screen and the game told me “you are 30% scared, assume the scared face.”
And of course, I also still feel like the “comprehension” meter doesn’t do a good job of gauging how well the mc comprehends everything. That still needs some tweaking

Also, while at the beginning we’re told that the mc is going to be some sort of spy, I’m not entirely sure what exactly we’re supposed to be doing. I mean, who are we spying on, exactly? Did she just want us to report the school as a whole? Why would she want “a day in the life of a schoolgirl” and not give us a bit more specific instructions like “keep an eye on this group of people” or “find out what all the families are up to” or “on the off chance everyone starts dropping like flies, find out why.” It feels weird that Morgan would drop us off without any specific instructions beyond “be a spy”

More about the mc; it feels like after the murders start, she loses a bit of her awkward, semi-insane personality and comes across as more of a dolt. I can understand if this is what other people think of her as it’s stated pretty early on that she has trouble getting her words across, but the player should know how smart the mc is and feel smart while playing as her; let the mc make a few deductions without someone telling it to her, or let us go through her mental reasoning when she figures stuff out, or just have her know a lot more than what she verbally tells people. Just, convince me that she’s “a genius”
Also, a consequence of losing her personality, was a lot of the things we learned about the mc at the beginning lose all importance. We’re told that she has eidetic memory, and we see it in action a few times in the beginning, but after the murders it just ceases to be important. Sure it’s still there, but because we never see the mc make big deductions or explain things to other people, it doesn’t have any impact on the story and might as well have not been there at all. Same with her awkward personality, since she rarely contributes to conversations or give input we don’t get to see the amazing personality established in the beginning shine. You have a good thing in the story; show more of it cause at a certain point, I wasn’t even convinced she was all that smart. That’s the real crime

And my biggest complaint has to be that after the murders start happening (things just really went downhill when everyone started dying), it kind of feels like the mc losses all will of her own as well as any impact she made on the story. She just starts going along with everything people are doing, and agreeing with the last thing that had just been said (with a few exceptions). I felt a lot of relief when the option to “do my job” came up, but then that led to just another instance of the mc listening to other people tell her stuff and her not being able to do much with it. This isn’t even a matter of lack of character choice (which is also a really big problem, please fix), it’s just the mc seeming completely pointless in this whole scenario. At a certain point, I thought to myself “would this be playing out any differently if the mc wasn’t in the story?” and tragically, the answer was mostly no, the mc has little impact on anything that’s going on. She doesn’t make any big deductions, she doesn’t advance the investigation all that much, she doesn’t appear to be giving Morgan any insight into what’s going on, the fact that she’s a spy pretty much never plays a part that couldn’t be filled with “she’s just nosy”, her relationship with other characters never change them or her, she’s never asked to fill a role that only she can fill. There’s never any point in which the main character makes a difference; we would have been just important if we played as a goldfish one of the actual characters carried around

So, in summery; fix pacing, fix or scrap the comprehension/terror bars, explain our job a bit better, and make the mc more impactful that a goldfish

If I seem like a bit of a bully, it’s because I see a lot of potential in this game and don’t want it to go to waste. You’ve got a good idea here and I think it should get the attention it deserves. That attention being ruthless criticisms until it becomes the best it can possibly be

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