The Earth Has Teeth by Harris Powell-Smith (Chapters 1-2, updated 4th July)

[HarrisPS]

June update: Chapters 1-2 expansions!

This update to the demo adds major expansions to both chapters, along with tweaks to stats and lots of polish. Play on cogdemos or itchio now!

You’ll need to restart the game to replay, but you can skip to Chapter 2 if you’d like (although Chapter 1 has expanded too, so I’d recommend playing both if you’re in the mood!)

I read all the feedback given to me and all of it comes together to help me improve the game as I write. Please post positive/negative/anything else comments here, on my Tumblr if you’re on there, or answer some questions through the feedback form.

I’m especially interested in thoughts about early impressions of the setting and characters, and the pacing as the game gets started - but I’m keen to hear any and all comments you have.

Among other changes and additions, in the game you can now:

• play through your first meeting with Issi and Nikita onscreen
• flirt with Nikita more overtly again
• kill someone

Click for the full changelog - it's a big one

Expanded sections

• Major expansion to Chapter 1 tunnel sequence and added a new item to pick up
• Major expansion and rework to the start of Chapter 2 and large reduction of timeskip
• Expanded initial library scene to clarify the sense of numbers of people living in Tulara

General polish, tweaks, and fixes

• Instead of Vastan’s tooth boosting Discover, you can now take her ear for the same effect
• Moved medical transition character customisation to follow directly from the gender/pronouns section for flow reasons; gave hormone-stimulating herbs names; added option for once-blessed characters to have had surgery or be on hormones
• Restored Chapter 2 opportunity to ogle Nikita; it felt more appropriate now that they’ve had more screentime earlier in the chapter!
• Lots of polish throughout, including more clarifying detail when deciding what to do with what’s found in the woods in Chapter 2, the Ven Lake festival name being a little more different, additional options for playing as nonbinary, wording changes, etc
• Corrected bug in which choosing not to specify body details still led to questions about hormones/surgery in some cases

Stats/supplies/equipment

• Added stat guide to the stats page and expanded glossary to include uses of herbs
• Idealistic stat is now named Compassionate, and the wording of a number of choices that increase that stat, and tests involving it, has been tweaked. There was some muddying of the waters about what Idealistic meant due to the stat going through a couple of different iterations; this should be clearer and more consistent now
• Obedient stat is now named Dutiful
• Stat changes when you take a part of Vastan’s body are now always visible, as they’re not as intuitive as doing something like training a skill and are very large boosts
• The first stat change is now always visible as it’s the first one players will encounter and includes large changes
• Supplies are now tracked in half-day portions to make rationing choices more flexible

[Haflaen]

Sounds like a lot of nice changes; I’ll have a look later today. For now the only thing I don’t like is the change from tooth to ear. I played a high Discovery character as it felt the most appropriate for a scout; a superficial level a tooth feels like a more interesting thing to carry around (it’s not called The Earth Has Ears, after all), but more than that I liked the sense of a deeper symbolic meaning - with the way the stats are presented as “virtues” that the guardians are encouraged to cultivate in themselves (which is a really nice way of doing it, by the way), it implies deeper associations that might not be immediately obvious to outsiders. However, I do totally understand the reason for the change.

[HarrisPS]

I get what you mean! What I initially wanted for that stat was actually whiskers because of their use in sensing surroundings, but I wanted the body parts to feel more visceral than that for the PC to take. I’ll have a think, it might be something I end up tweaking down the line!

[Haflaen]

Ok, after playing through the new version, most of the changes are big improvements. It’s a bit of a shame that we no longer encounter those kind farmers at the start of chapter 2; that was nice as a reminder that human compassion is still alive and well outside the monastery. However I do like how Issi stumbles upon us in the trading post, and having the option to react like a startled wild animal; it does a good job of conveying how we must come across to her and Nikita in that first encounter. Also, it feels like there were fewer opportunities for stat increases this time around - maybe it’s just that they’re more widely spaced due to the additional scenes, but I do think my stats were lower at the end this time. One other thing, regarding the new gender transition options in chapter 1: hope it’s not insensitive to say this, but as a cis person I’d generally prefer not to think about having those sorts of things done to my body. Could those options possibly be hidden behind another choice (i.e. “I’ve undergone changes to my body/I haven’t undergone changes to my body”) so that it’s less immediately graphic?

[HarrisPS]

I might include the farmer characters later on in the game for the player to encounter, as I liked them too

I didn’t remove any stat increases but there is a fair stretch at the start of Chapter 2 in which there aren’t any chances to boost them - I’ll have another look at that and see how it feels.

And yes I’ll alter the surgery choices - that’s an oversight, I intended to frame it more in the way you suggest and clearly forgot!

Thanks so much for your thoughts!

[Haflaen]

Well if the farmers do show up later it’ll be a nice little easter egg for those of us who were here from the start! Another thing I forgot to mention is that the new version gives a much stronger impression of Nikita’s personality and of the dynamic between them, Issi and the player, which I think is something the story really needed. There’s much more of a sense of “this is going to be an important character”, which is kind of necessary with such a withdrawn individual. Also, fighting the soldier and choosing how to react to your first kill was quite a powerful inclusion; makes me wonder how much of a role combat will have in the game alongside environmental and supernatural obstacles.

I understand it might be a while before the next update what with your secret project, but I’m eagerly awaiting it all the same!

[JBento]

I hear the Earth has teeth. Well, open up, sucker, THE DENTIST IS IN!!!

It's DRILLING TIME, MWAHAHAHAHAHAHA

@HarrisPS

the pacing as the game gets started

It’s very grabby, starting with the attack, like starting a DnD session with “roll for initiative”. It does cost you contrast, though: players don’t know what Monastery life was like, so losing it to go wilderness trekking isn’t really a hit. But if you did THAT, it’d be less grabby. It’s a whole thing.

Yes, well, what does management know of REAL work, eh?

Ngl, I have no idea how this translates to “Passionate”. If I had to make a guess without the indicators, “rushing” would be Passionate. In general (not all the time), I have difficulties distinguishing Passionate options from Improviser ones - I would NOT be able to do so with any degree of regularity without the indicators.

Something missing at the start.

I think these would flow better reversed.

Just checking if intended: both middle options lead to the same set of stat checks (the text of the options is different, but they test the same stats):

Alright, so I literally could not have a higher Recall (49%) stat value at this point, unless I never even ran into the choices, and I still failed the check. Is that intended?

What? Everybody’s gotta eat.

This “her” should probably be “Vastan’s”, as she doesn’t show up in this screen prior.

Cut off mid-sentence:

My brain is still irked that “+ and ++” and “+++” doesn’t give me the same result, btw. “That’s not how math works”, it screams.

Oh, chapter1->2 is no longer a timeskip, sweet!

Sorry, are you saying that the river flows below the valley, or is there a “through” missing here? (also, at the end of the paragraph it’s “cacophOny”)

I suggest putting the “Supplies” bit of stats close to the top (maybe right after Health, since they’re so closely connected): it SOUNDS like it’d be consulted with a certain frequency, and since it’s just one line it doesn’t push stats et al. down meaningfully.

I’m not sure what the MC’s plan is at the trading post. It’s obviously not a sustainable situation. Are they taking all those days there because it’s taking them that long to scavenge the place before moving on? As a single person, they can’t carry all that much; shouldn’t they be moving to the nearest village to find some Vastan blood after the first day or two?

Doubled up.

Btw, succeeding on the scavenging check (with Reason) doesn’t increase supplies. Was this a case of having to spend more supplies if you fail?

Confused. If I had a fire going outside, why did Issi apparently did not expect to find anyone in the post? (also, that bit at the end should be “open air”, I think)

Oh, wow, ok, so passing the “way to help” check with Nikita requires a total of FOUR plusses choices? Harsh. Considering that you only have +++, ++, and + boosts by now, I’m not sure how many people are ever going to pass it. There’s only two combinations that let you do so (+++ plus one of the others going to the same skill), and that sounds like putting too many eggs on one basket this early in the game.

“is”

“more herbs”, surely?

(btw, the knife wound you get from the attacker is still there at this point, which is weird considering I’ve been lugging a medkit all this time: feels like the sort of thing that it would’ve been sorted out during the week at the outpost)

“watches”

Never not funny.

I still think it’s weird that Issi is the one that doesn’t care if you don’t do the burial but supposedly-practical, professional waste-wanderer Nikita takes a relationship hit if you don’t waste an hour in a bear’s feeding grounds.

This seems… an unlikely amount of food.

Aaaaand it’s the end again.

[Haflaen]

One other thing I’ve thought of since playing the new version: much as I like the option to have grown/cut your hair since the fall of Tulara, it made more sense in the earlier version where there was an indeterminate length of time between the two chapters. In the new version, it’s only about a week after the fall when you meet Nikita and Issi - unless Vastan’s blessing bestows incredible hair-growth powers, that seems like a very short time in which to have grown your hair long.

[JBento]

@Haflaen

that seems like a very short time in which to have grown your hair long.

It’s not just that time, though - the MC has just come back from an outing of indeterminate length.

[Haflaen]

Yeah, but it specifically says “after the fall”. Unless there’s another time-skip in there that I didn’t notice, which is possible.

[JBento]

Honestly I’m already weirded out enough that MC just spends one week camping out at the outpost for no reason I can discern instead of actively looking for Vastan blood that increasing that time to “a month traipsing around in the wilds” just makes it worse.

[Haflaen]

Fair point. I assumed it was the lack of supplies for the journey that forces you to stay put - you were planning on stocking up at the outpost but found it abandoned. Then again, you’re a scout, so presumably you’d know how to sustain yourself in the wilderness.

[JBento]

@Haflaen

I assumed it was the lack of supplies for the journey that forces you to stay put - you were planning on stocking up at the outpost but found it abandoned.

If there’s food around you can pack it and go, and if there isn’t you’re definitely better off moving and finding some. The only hamper to that is fresh water access - which I presume the trading post has, whether from the river or a well or whatever, because if it doesn’t you don’t have much of a trading post to start with - and the MC possibly not having a way to cart around much of it (if it’s not a river), but that just means they starve in the short term.

[HarrisPS]

I’m immensely grateful for all the feedback as always, thank you so much!

@Haflaen I’m really pleased that Nikita and Issi give a more solid impression this time around. Once I started writing that section I was like “aha! This feels a lot better” - I do enjoy non-linearity but I don’t think there was enough breathing room to make it work fully well before.

Combat is going to be a thing here and there; it’s not going to be something that comes up every chapter/situation, but it’s going to be a possibility at various points. (And will come with risks in terms of physical harm and in how other characters perceive the PC.) I’d say the supernatural and environmental hazards will be more common overall.

@JBento

It’s very grabby, starting with the attack, like starting a DnD session with “roll for initiative”. It does cost you contrast, though: players don’t know what Monastery life was like, so losing it to go wilderness trekking isn’t really a hit. But if you did THAT, it’d be less grabby. It’s a whole thing.

Yeah, I did some thinking about where to begin the story (at one point I considered starting it right after you get out for a full in-the-moment feel, but didn’t want to have that little context for the PC’s situation). I think it’s inevitable that some players will think “but I haven’t had loads of time with these people so why do I care”, but I currently feel OK with the pre- and during-attack interactions and the characters who are onscreen. Will see how it feels once more is written!

I’m tweaking/fixing most of the other bits and pieces that you mentioned including lowering difficulty levels for early stat tests - your eagle eye is much appreciated! (I’m not changing the same stats getting tested in the fight at the moment, but it’s on my to-do list to take another look at down the line.)

@JBento

I still think it’s weird that Issi is the one that doesn’t care if you don’t do the burial but supposedly-practical, professional waste-wanderer Nikita takes a relationship hit if you don’t waste an hour in a bear’s feeding grounds.

You are right, it is weird! I’m tweaking that moment so that it lingers a little longer on the weirdness and it will hopefully seem deliberate rather than an author-being-weird moment. (I mean I am weird, but you know what I mean.)

@JBento

This seems… an unlikely amount of food.

Quantum… food amounts? Fixing that! As much as I’d enjoy breaking the laws of reality in the PC’s backpack.

Speaking of laws of reality, what you’ve both mentioned about the time spent in the trading post makes a lot of sense. Looking at it again, the timeframe is too long and I needed to make it clear that the PC is Not Well and is suffering from some mental confusion. So, I’m reducing the amount of time that they’re salvaging - it’s more like a couple of days of scraping together what they can find - and giving a bit more focus to their Not Well-ness.

(In an alternate universe where Nikita and Issi didn’t show up, the PC would head out onto the plains within the next day or so and would have struggled a lot because Vastan’s not in shape to guide, is having problems of her own, and is accidentally sharing her bad vibes with the PC.)

All of which to say, RIP to the Chapter 2 hair-growing option - certainly there wouldn’t be time to grow hair significantly at that point, as much as I enjoy the idea of great hair being a perk of being a Tulara Guardian. (Heh, it probably actually is to an extent because of the general good health gained from living there… but not to a supernatural giant-hair degree ) The PC will probably be able to make some hairstyle decisions later in the game if they feel like it.

[JBento]

@HarrisPS

The PC will probably be able to make some hairstyle decisions later in the game if they feel like it.

Alternatively, put it EARLIER in the game, before the fall. We start after an undetermined time out in the wilds, so the hair might have had the opportunity to grow longer then, or the MC might have taken the care to keep it… at whatever length.

[HarrisPS]

Added to the to-do list to think about!

I’ve just updated the demo with lots of little clarifications and tweaks including what I mentioned above, typo fixes, and a fix to the gender-affirming surgery choice (which turned out to be a bug once I looked into it properly).

[Haflaen]

I’ve talked about my thoughts on visual customisation in other threads, how I prefer the ones that focus on creating a “vibe” for the character rather than defining every aspect of their appearance. I think that would be especially nice to have here since each of the main characters has such a distinct aesthetic - whether it’s Nikita scowling moodily from under their wide-brimmed hat, Armell hiding all sorts of knick-knicks in their many pockets, Kiriyak swishing about in their dandyish attire etc. I’d love to have the option to choose whether our character has the appearance of, say, a seasoned hunter dressed for outdoor survival, or a shrewd trader looking to easily mingle with the people they encounter, or a warrior always ready for a brawl.

[HarrisPS]

I really like that! I love encountering evocative descriptions for PCs as well and being able to have expressive choices rather than “here is a list of appearance options” which I tend to fall back on but don’t find very inspiring. I think it’d help illustrate aspects of how people commonly dress in the setting as well. I will have a think about adding something like that in!

[LiliArch]

@HarrisPS

Will see how it feels once more is written!

Isn’t that how it always is.

I got my paperwork done and read a couple other WIPs to reset my brain, and I’m going to dive in the updated version now. Do you want the new stats at the end?

[HarrisPS]

The stats would be useful, so yes please! (And well done on the paperwork! )