Pretext: I'm really enjoying the game so far! The UI, the camera movements, the sprite work, the voice acting — amazing job! I really can't believe you all pulled this off in 30 (31?) days... like wtf, get some sleep! D:<
I've already mentioned this to Kigyo on Discord, but on behalf of myself and fellow colourblind players, I do want to mention how frustrating the Tutorial puzzle was to solve. 😞
I had no problems figuring out what had to be done, i.e.
.
.
but then I massively struggled to figure out which colours on the actual lock itself corresponded to these, as well as which colours the teardrop (navy blue? dark purple?) and '0' shapes (light green? bright yellow? some sorta orange?) were supposed to be.
So even though I "solved" the puzzle, getting from this stage to the actual answer was an exercise in frustration (especially since the colours used on the lock itself were different hues...I wasn't sure if that Purple was actually Navy Blue, or if the Cyan Blue was a Light Purple. Ditto w/ Yellow/Light Green.)
Someone in Kigyo's Discord was kind enough to provide this for me, which was massively helpful, so I recommended including some sort of "Colour Dictionary/Alphabet" like this in-game, to help fellow players like me, who struggle with colour puzzles in games. 😢
Anyway, I appreciate y'alls efforts to make the game more accessible in general (why are you even considering accessibility during your 1 month grind?! shouldn't that be a post-release stretch goal? insanity! xD), so even though this puzzle was a strugglebus for me, I'm still enjoying the game overall, and I'm happy to see other forms of accessibility being included. So thank you all for that! ♥
Thank you for the kind words on malViolence - I really appreciate it! Accessibility was something me and my team wanted to include from the get-go, so that as many people as possible could enjoy this title on release.
I also appreciate your critique of the tutorial puzzle. It's actually one of the puzzles that the upcoming puzzle update will rework. We're gonna try and find a way to make the puzzle more accessible so that colorblind players can enjoy it to the fullest.
Again, thank you so much! I hope the next version of malViolence can be even more enjoyable!
For anyone struggling with the Panopticon puzzle, I've made a solution video with what I believe to be the fewest possible moves. (Yes, I know there's new "Skip" tech now. ;p)
I’m currently working on a solution document for all of the puzzles - but this is easily one of the hardest ones. Thank you for providing it for everyone to see!
Just started playing through this! I've been loving the game so far, but some of the puzzles are basically impossible to solve - setups where if you know the solution you can solve them, but if you don't there's no way to make actual progress.
Specifically, the hacking puzzle in the lab is one of these: there's not any 'clean' way of doing it deductively that I can see, and every move affects what future moves are available pretty drastically.
The 'panopticon' is another; the only way I can think of to solve this is to make a spreadsheet, find the correct final configuration, and then use linear algebra (the branch of math, not "y=mx+b") to find the correct set of inputs.
As a very experienced puzzle solver, I get the impression that these puzzles might not have actually been testsolved. Am I just missing hints, or some other method of 'cleanly' solving them? Or is brute force intended - and if so, do you realize how large the state spaces are?
---
Edit: In the third room, you can softlock on the plushie puzzle, and you can't skip the sewing puzzle.
Thank you so much for the very thorough comment - I really appreciate it!
I apologize for the state of the puzzlea. I did intend for this to be a difficult, but rewarding experience, but you're absolutely right. We did rush through the beta-testing/test-solving part of puzzle-making so that we could make the jam deadline in time. The puzzles are in a state where they are solvable (one of my friends is already on Room 3) - but also really hard.
In the near future (possibly next week - but unsure right now...), me and my team have plans to neaten them up so that they can be solved more "cleanly", instead of being brute-forced. That way, there's a neat balance between the puzzles in terms of difficulty and solvability.
Yeah, I definitely agree, especially for these two puzzles in particular.
Because of the complexity, trial and error will most likely get you nowhere. And yet the alternatives, in order to intentionally and meaningfully work towards an actual solution, are wayyyy too involved, and most likely not even "satisfying" for players.
And yeah, that's more or less what I did to solve the Panopticon puzzle. ^^;
Personally, I had fun spreadsheeting it all out, but I suspect that the large majority of players will give up out of frustration and just skip it entirely (which is what I did w/ the Hacking puzzle, b/c of the current difficulty).
I understand that y'all had a tight deadline to make, which is why you ended up releasing the impossible "harder" version of the Hacking puzzle, so I'm appreciative that the team is working on things like a puzzle difficulty revisit in a future patch! ♥ (although I'd enjoy having a choice between the current difficulties, and a toned down version for those 2 puzzles in particular, rather than completely gutting them in future version updates).
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Another puzzle solution video, this time for the "Connect 4"(ish) Puzzle:
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i.e. the Plushie Puzzle
Thank you!! Will definitely consider this for the puzzle guide document.
Pretext: I'm really enjoying the game so far! The UI, the camera movements, the sprite work, the voice acting — amazing job! I really can't believe you all pulled this off in 30 (31?) days... like wtf, get some sleep! D:<
I've already mentioned this to Kigyo on Discord, but on behalf of myself and fellow colourblind players, I do want to mention how frustrating the Tutorial puzzle was to solve. 😞
I had no problems figuring out what had to be done, i.e.
.
.
but then I massively struggled to figure out which colours on the actual lock itself corresponded to these, as well as which colours the teardrop (navy blue? dark purple?) and '0' shapes (light green? bright yellow? some sorta orange?) were supposed to be.
So even though I "solved" the puzzle, getting from this stage to the actual answer was an exercise in frustration (especially since the colours used on the lock itself were different hues...I wasn't sure if that Purple was actually Navy Blue, or if the Cyan Blue was a Light Purple. Ditto w/ Yellow/Light Green.)
Someone in Kigyo's Discord was kind enough to provide this for me, which was massively helpful, so I recommended including some sort of "Colour Dictionary/Alphabet" like this in-game, to help fellow players like me, who struggle with colour puzzles in games. 😢
Anyway, I appreciate y'alls efforts to make the game more accessible in general (why are you even considering accessibility during your 1 month grind?! shouldn't that be a post-release stretch goal? insanity! xD), so even though this puzzle was a strugglebus for me, I'm still enjoying the game overall, and I'm happy to see other forms of accessibility being included. So thank you all for that! ♥
Thank you for the kind words on malViolence - I really appreciate it! Accessibility was something me and my team wanted to include from the get-go, so that as many people as possible could enjoy this title on release.
I also appreciate your critique of the tutorial puzzle. It's actually one of the puzzles that the upcoming puzzle update will rework. We're gonna try and find a way to make the puzzle more accessible so that colorblind players can enjoy it to the fullest.
Again, thank you so much! I hope the next version of malViolence can be even more enjoyable!
For anyone struggling with the Panopticon puzzle, I've made a solution video with what I believe to be the fewest possible moves. (Yes, I know there's new "Skip" tech now. ;p)
(Go go Gadget Spreadsheet lol)
.
.
.
.
Awesome, thank you so much!!
I’m currently working on a solution document for all of the puzzles - but this is easily one of the hardest ones. Thank you for providing it for everyone to see!
Got here from Reddit just now, love the way this is presented, visuals and aesthetic both. Can't wait to give it a shot!
Thank you, thank you! I'd love to hear your thoughts on the game as a whole once you're done. :>
It took me time for the puzzles but overall it was good
Thank you - I'm glad you enjoyed the game!
so good! some puzzles are very challenging (but I've been given word that the difficulty is being tweaked)
love the design of cautionne!
Thank you so much!! Very glad you enjoyed. :3c
Just started playing through this! I've been loving the game so far, but some of the puzzles are basically impossible to solve - setups where if you know the solution you can solve them, but if you don't there's no way to make actual progress.
Specifically, the hacking puzzle in the lab is one of these: there's not any 'clean' way of doing it deductively that I can see, and every move affects what future moves are available pretty drastically.
The 'panopticon' is another; the only way I can think of to solve this is to make a spreadsheet, find the correct final configuration, and then use linear algebra (the branch of math, not "y=mx+b") to find the correct set of inputs.
As a very experienced puzzle solver, I get the impression that these puzzles might not have actually been testsolved. Am I just missing hints, or some other method of 'cleanly' solving them? Or is brute force intended - and if so, do you realize how large the state spaces are?
---
Edit: In the third room, you can softlock on the plushie puzzle, and you can't skip the sewing puzzle.
Thank you so much for the very thorough comment - I really appreciate it!
I apologize for the state of the puzzlea. I did intend for this to be a difficult, but rewarding experience, but you're absolutely right. We did rush through the beta-testing/test-solving part of puzzle-making so that we could make the jam deadline in time. The puzzles are in a state where they are solvable (one of my friends is already on Room 3) - but also really hard.
In the near future (possibly next week - but unsure right now...), me and my team have plans to neaten them up so that they can be solved more "cleanly", instead of being brute-forced. That way, there's a neat balance between the puzzles in terms of difficulty and solvability.
Yeah, I definitely agree, especially for these two puzzles in particular.
Because of the complexity, trial and error will most likely get you nowhere. And yet the alternatives, in order to intentionally and meaningfully work towards an actual solution, are wayyyy too involved, and most likely not even "satisfying" for players.
And yeah, that's more or less what I did to solve the Panopticon puzzle. ^^;
Personally, I had fun spreadsheeting it all out, but I suspect that the large majority of players will give up out of frustration and just skip it entirely (which is what I did w/ the Hacking puzzle, b/c of the current difficulty).
I understand that y'all had a tight deadline to make, which is why you ended up releasing the
impossible"harder" version of the Hacking puzzle, so I'm appreciative that the team is working on things like a puzzle difficulty revisit in a future patch! ♥ (although I'd enjoy having a choice between the current difficulties, and a toned down version for those 2 puzzles in particular, rather than completely gutting them in future version updates).