A Letter To Ed by zoglu

[raw]
made by zoglu for Ludum Dare 46 (JAM)

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Following your grandmother's death, you find yourself in her house. Before passing away, she asked you to send some final words to her best friend Ed, whom neither you nor other acquaintances ever heard about. Search for clues among the correspondence between Annabel and Ed, read postcards, old bills and poems, and gather enough information so you can send this farewell letter.

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Controls : click/tap papers to read them. You can also drag them to tidy things up.
Works on computers, tablets and phones !
Stuck ? After some time, a light bulb icon will appear. Click it to reveal some tips (and spoilers).

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We decided to interpret the theme as "keeping the memories alive". Most graphics are pictures taken in the house we made the game in or in the neighborhood. There are also some drawings and collages, and some made-up documents like bills or letters.

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The game was programmed with Construct 3 (source available), the graphics were made and the photos adjusted with Photoshop, the music was composed in FL Studio, and most importantly the letters were written with a pen, a big notebook, and a lot of time and dedication. :smile:
We hope you enjoy this little investigation game as much as we enjoyed working on it ! Play A Letter To Ed

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Ratings

Overall 31th 4.306⭐ 33🧑‍⚖️
Fun 538th 3.672⭐ 34🧑‍⚖️
Innovation 235th 3.871⭐ 33🧑‍⚖️
Theme 1147th 3.697⭐ 35🧑‍⚖️
Graphics 102th 4.5⭐ 35🧑‍⚖️
Audio 20th 4.387⭐ 33🧑‍⚖️
Humor 1343th 2.74⭐ 27🧑‍⚖️
Mood 28th 4.439⭐ 35🧑‍⚖️
Given 45🗳️ 36🗨️

Feedback

Owl_Skip
20. Apr 2020 · 18:01 UTC
What a lovely, lovely game. Full of feeling. Great feel, really enjoyed it.
Lepton
20. Apr 2020 · 18:08 UTC
Very nice atmosphere with that piano track in the background. I didnt finished the game unfortunately. That much text is not very motivating - at least for me. Maybe a narrator voice wouldve been a good idea.
mlkvr
20. Apr 2020 · 18:12 UTC
Lovely artwork and great storyline!
LocksmithArmy
20. Apr 2020 · 18:13 UTC
Holy cow. what a great idea. I truely enjoyed playing. It really put the investigative spirit in me as I tried to figure out how to send this letter.
Gonzako
20. Apr 2020 · 18:17 UTC
Greatly emotional game, sadly it couldnt keep me engaged that long
🎤 zoglu
20. Apr 2020 · 18:25 UTC
@gonzako Welp, too bad :) What could have we done to keep you engaged for a longer time ? Did you use the provided tips if you were stuck ?
Bredian
20. Apr 2020 · 18:28 UTC
Very nice and atmospheric game
Gaz_Ireland
20. Apr 2020 · 18:32 UTC
This was absolutely beautiful. I cannot find fault at all.
Gonzako
20. Apr 2020 · 18:35 UTC
@zoglu I'll be honest I just dont like walls of text and the tip system just felt like a copout. I just prefer more involved games where the action isnt just shuffling papers around and reading
🎤 zoglu
20. Apr 2020 · 18:40 UTC
@gonzako Well, you cannot please everyone !
Actually while making the game, we thought that submitting a visual novel for Ludum Dare could be risky as fellow jammers may like more action-oriented entries, but we went for it anyway :)
erkoply
20. Apr 2020 · 18:58 UTC
What a calm, beautiful game. Love the idea!
SarahWont
20. Apr 2020 · 19:05 UTC
Really loved this game! I wanted to play more of it! The atmosphere, art, and story were all really engaging. I didn't really have an issue with lots of text because I knew what I was looking for and felt like I could easily skim things if I didn't want to read it all (even though that did come back to bite me at one point. haha).
The only thing that I would change is the hint icon felt like it started flashing too soon. I thought I was making good progress towards completing it, so having it start flashing made me a little sad. I'm not sure what your logic is to trigger that, but I'd maybe suggest resetting the timer on that hint flashing every time the player fills in a field correctly?

Thanks for the game! Good job :)
🎤 zoglu
20. Apr 2020 · 19:12 UTC
@sarahwont Thanks a lot for your comprehensive feedback, glad you enjoyed our game !

Actually it flashes after 3 minutes or so, to kind of reassure the player. Anyway, you can just click it and close the menu and you won't get spoiled. We put enough warning messages so only players who really need tips can have them :)
Furfel
20. Apr 2020 · 19:17 UTC
The game is beautiful in terms of art - graphics and music and challenging. I couldn't do it without the clues :joy:
Sergei
20. Apr 2020 · 19:25 UTC
I liked the mood, music, art and narrative! Very atmospheric game!
MarcoMing
20. Apr 2020 · 19:28 UTC
Such a great concept, soundtrack and very good handwriting! so glad I found this game, well done to you, a great entry!
antomatti
20. Apr 2020 · 19:44 UTC
Absolutely amazing! Great idea!
Elvensham
20. Apr 2020 · 20:11 UTC
The piano music was paired perfectly with the beautiful visuals, could not fault any part of the game. A wonderful environment and a wonderful experience.
ZEN
20. Apr 2020 · 22:01 UTC
Wow... Just wow. What a heartwarming game with such a great link to the theme for this Ludum Dare. Loved the implementation of the hints system so you wouldn't get stuck but nudged you in the right direction. Great Job!
Lestat
20. Apr 2020 · 22:20 UTC
One of my favorites so far. Good job!
UndyingMoon
21. Apr 2020 · 18:11 UTC
A wonderful game and a really nice interpretation of the theme. It was a real pleasure to play it and search for every clue (the quantity of text didn't bother me at all, especially for the genre). The atmosphere is nice and we're easily immersed.
I could find everything without using the hints but was a little bit frustrated by not knowing where I was wrong.
The handwritting is beautiful but as a non-native English reader I had some difficulties to read sometimes, a transcript of the text next to it could be a nice aid to reading.
For the jam it's already a wonderful game, so thanks and well done! :)
Rigolus
21. Apr 2020 · 18:43 UTC
I liked the atmosphere a lot and art a lot ! Nicely done.
Max Louis
22. Apr 2020 · 10:40 UTC
I played this for a good 15 minutes! What an amazing idea, I didn't want to stop until I filled the blanks. I love how you unpuzzle each part. It's not easy, it's the perfect difficulty level. Amazing job, well done!
Lesslwo
22. Apr 2020 · 21:18 UTC
A lot of work went into this and it shows, good job! I do confess to using a couple of hints, though..
Enya454
23. Apr 2020 · 06:20 UTC
Bloody brilliant game. The mood was on point. The clues were definitely a necessary feature because I got stuck on many points, and the clues weren't too giving either. The writing was superb and the images were lovely. The detail of the mat moving in the background was great as well. This is the kind of content that I would pay for on steam. Keep up the good work.
EreHuc
23. Apr 2020 · 10:58 UTC
Not my kind of game but well realized. Good sound, good mood
AdonisDevs
26. Apr 2020 · 17:50 UTC
This is very good! The atmosphere and environment are perfect! My only recommendation would be to have an option to read the letters in a clearer font :)
Michael Gosling
26. Apr 2020 · 18:02 UTC
Interesting concept, very well done. I had a hard time solving the puzzles but I'm not too good at this stuff.
kristinamay
12. May 2020 · 04:24 UTC
I LOVE THIS GAME.

Seriously. You combined my love for investigation, my love for text-based games, and an actual challenging mystery! The atmosphere was wonderful, the controls were great, and the handwritten letters were amazing. I didn't use the hint system at all, either. :) I'm truly so impressed and I'd love to play more games like this from y'all. This is easily my favorite game that I've played this LD. Thank you for making it.