Horror Game Feedback

Hi there, I would love some feedback on my horror game. Alongside another developer, I have been working on this game for a few months. In “Graveyard Shift”, you, the player, are teleported back to the 1950s, where you play as a security guard working the graveyard shift.

I hope you enjoy it! In your feedback, I would love to hear things like: Did you enjoy it? Was it fun? How was the game from a developer’s standpoint? What improvements do you think could be made? And anything else that might help. Thank you so much! Graveyard Shift [Horror] - Roblox

3 Likes

~ Pre-Playthrough | Lobby

- Map & Atmosphere

Personally, it feels extremely empty, everything out of bounds is extremely spacious and anyone with low brightness settings would most likely accidently miss what’s going on in the background as it’s not upfront and all over the place due to the fact it’s also extremely dark, and even with a fair amount of brightness you can barely make out that there’s any kind of trees.

You should lessen the gap between the bounds and the outside areas, or change out the lighting for something that’s more visible regarding the background’s visibility.

- UI

Based on the lack of any kind of setting awareness, the UI looks extremely out of place just like the map itself, and doesn’t seem to make sense regarding what’s going on around it, for a UI to work, it has to fit the theme of the game.

And rather the sound effects, seem unfitting for the UI at hand, as the buttons look like their either “torn paper”, or “smoke”, which would neither fit the heavy button sound going on when clicking.

You should add some animation instead of still UI visibility when clicking, and make the buttons sound like how they look regarding their theme.

~ Gameplay

- Initial Intro UI

Regarding the UI, if the game is meant to be set around the 1950s, the UI itself should’ve been set as a “VHS” or a “TV” effect in the background instead of blank tweening texts on a black background, this makes the story telling feel off as the game is meant to be set around a specific time period where there would most likely not be less grainy Televisions, but still color regarding the UI itself, as the 1950s is when color came to Television.

Based on this video of a 1952 TV show you can see that there’s grain, and the intro itself looks shaken and has a distinct “white noise” sound, this should be possibly implemented if what the intro sequence is supposed to be all about, or just overall make the feeling of the game have an effect of it’s current era.

- Map & Atmosphere

The map itself looks extremely rushed, the trees are randomly placed around and this doesn’t feel like it should be the case for an actual forest area which would have trees basically all around instead of in specific slots.

The key for the Graveyard is sort of hard to look for and a possibility for this should’ve been that they drove up in their car, and it was the players objective to get the key from the glove compartment/pocket and to investigate the noise in the Graveyard.

The Graveyard looks alright, but the fact it needs objectively unlocked when it has no sign of a chain w/ a lock on it is off and kind of ruins the immersion, especially inside where the graves are extremely randomly placed despite the genuine need for people to be buried in specific rows as to not be buried on-top of someone else’s body, as well as the lack of path and general atmospheric sounds to hint where the player is supposed to be going.

The darkness itself already presents a scary atmosphere, but the sounds give a hint of modernity as it relays way too clearly, and should have some kind of “1950s” muffle to it such as how the video previously sent is sounding, if it’s meant to be a “body camera”, which would be overall flawed due to the fact that these were not invented until 2005, though the sounds themselves are fine, the flashlight’s one sounds obnoxiously loud.

(You Should Really Add Wind!)

- Investigation Area & Ghost

It feels extremely strange that someone would rob a grave and then leave evidence for the police to come get them, I do applaud the entire design of the “ghost” (?) but with the actual lack of sounds regarding any kind of footsteps, or sounds pertaining to it’s location, it’s kind of hard to tell if it’s coming after you or not, I also don’t see how the gate could be locked as the player did unlock the gate, and there isn’t necessarily a key hole in these type of gates which it could be re-locked.

The jump-scare was just a still camera shot of the ghost, I’m unaware if there was any sound to this, but I overall think there should’ve been a death animation with the fictional body camera’s screen going to static instead of a blank black background for “you died”.

The ghost itself also had a hard time getting me as it basically just walked into me for 10 seconds until triggering the jump-scare, which should be fixed regarding it’s hit-box.

I had a hard time trying to navigate the Graveyard just as I did the first time I entered, it should be more clear where the player should have to find a specific object inside of an extremely messy Graveyard.

- UI

Not really much I could’ve said about the misc UI, I’m unaware what the whole grain is supposed to mean if body cameras weren’t invented at that point, but if it’s meant to be a general camera then it would’ve been cool to see the ghost coming for the player during specific flashes within the cameras view.

The text appearing at the bottom of the screen seemed like a cheap story game tecnique that most games use which shouldn’t be the case, and there should be a different way that the player’s speech is portrayed, such as voice acting, or a fake reflection in the chat. “[Security Guard]: Blah”

The death screen seems kind of cheap as well, based on the setting it just feels cartoony instead of horror-esque, it should feel like the player died, or overall the fictional body camera was broken followed with vintage static.

~ Overall

Lobby | Other

The lobby needs to look nicer and less spacious, it’s hard to tell what’s going on in the background to get a feel for what the player might be getting into, and it’s way too dark, or too spaced (again) to see what might be going on out of bounds.

Lobby | UI

The UI feels unfitting for the setting of the actual game-play and just overall empty, though the opened UI looks way nicer than the buttons do.

The UI should’ve been the main event as that should’ve been where you find queues or make you’re lobby for people to join, instead of generic teleporters on the map that look out of place.

Map | Other

The map feels way too spaced out and the bounds feel way too far away, or less explained, if the player goes out of bounds, it should stop them and say, “Maybe I Shouldn’t Go There”, or something along the lines of not wandering off for no reason.

There should be more trees and a clearer more organized Graveyard as it was a mess to find where to go for the objectives. (Disable The Leaves Collision On The Trees!!!)

Add more atmospheric sounds such as wind, footsteps for the ghost, or a jumpscare sound or death animation as these fields feel very lacked in immersion.

Map | UI

The UI itself seems kind of empty, even if slightly grainy there wouldn’t have been actual body cameras in that time period so it doesn’t really make sense, the death and story telling UI seem generic as many. many story games use the typewriter text to portray speaking, and it should be different for a game like this as it’s not meant to be cartoony. (as is the death screen)

-

I feel like I got too off with it, but I hope it’s understandable within some aspect.

5 Likes

Can you tell me what you specifically look at within a game to do something like this? If you respond please do it in a bulleted list.

1 Like

What exactly are you asking, what I looked at to write this list, or what to do to improve.

2 Likes

For example, when you said this, you gave a few reasons why you felt the way you did. I was just wondering what stuff you looked at. The stuff you included was either things the game excels at or doesn’t do so well, so if I ask for which stuff you look at, then I can get a list of things I can look at for my games, even if it was a neutral thing in this inspection.

Sorry for the confusion a bit much to ask.

1 Like

Well I played the game… let me say, good job! It does need work, but a very solid start!
Let’s just hop into some of the things that I noticed (that LYK didn’t mention)
The ghost lady’s kill jumpscare is kinda – bland. It just stared at me and I lost (like how LYK mentioned how there needs work on the death screen). Another thing, I was playing with another person, and they got jumped, and the ghost’s AI broke and it didn’t chase me.

I personally don’t like when games don’t let you pick up tools that would be obviously useful - such is the case by the robbed grave, when there is an ax and a shovel, both viable weapons.

Another thing - you could add FPS arms for the player, as it doesn’t feel very immersive when there’s just a floating (very loud and flickery) flashlight.

I also noticed (as did LYK) how the terrain felt very bland and empty (plus you can collide with trees’ leaves, which is always annoying to me). More work needed there.

The map is a tad too dark for my liking, though that could just be me.

The cemetery walls weren’t connected very well, there were places where the wall wasn’t connected to the pillars very well.

Finally, and possibly my biggest complaint:

the intro is way too long

It kinda just takes away any immersiveness, just staring at a black screen for ages. Either shorten some delays, or take away menus entirely. Especially that entire paragraph at the end of the intro: I’m not reading all that in a ROBLOX game, sorry.

But overall, great start to a game! I thought it was really impressive, and I also thought the flashlight ambience adds to the atmosphere. Add wind though, or some other underlying sound effect.

1 Like

Can I finally post, this place is really laggy today.

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Lobby

The lobby was just way too dark to see how things were in the background, first time playing I attempted to see what was going on in the back and I was met with the boundaries, everything in the back is very far away and hard to see if you don’t really look, even on full brightness like I have, it’s very hard to make out what’s going on back there, and I’m assuming anyone with a lower device and smaller brightness wouldn’t see anything at all, and if I’m being truly honest the song itself sounded pretty off-key and not what the game was looking for.

  • Building & Decoration
  • Sound Design

Game

The trees look strategically placed, not like a natural forest might look, there’s extreme gaps within where the trees are placed on the map, it doesn’t feel like it’s natural, I walked around and saw that there were trees, but even then few of them and placed very randomly instead of how a forest might grow out.

  • Lack Of Natural Placement

I found it very hard to find the key after the objective was presented, there’s no direction in where I should look for it, as the map is very, very dark and seems sort of open before you randomly meet the bounds when you wander off, I also found it a strange place to leave a key, as why would they have left the key at the near back, instead of the player initially having it on a key ring, or in their pocket.

  • Navigation
  • Location Of Objects

The Graveyard’s outside was fine, but it was still off that the player had to unlock it when there was no chains at all wrapped around the door with a lock actually on it, and I don’t see how there would’ve been a grave robbery if the gate was still locked and not broken through which really made the realism tank.

  • Building & Decoration
  • Location Of Objects
  • Navigation

The inside was sort of worse, it had graves just placed literally anywhere like it was copy and pasted, Graveyards are specifically in rows so that bodies can be buried without intersecting someone else’s body, which made the entire inside make no sense, when I was trying to find where the objective was (which also made no sense since there was no sound playing when the general objective was to find the source of the sound (I think))

Also looking back, there is a very extreme lack of awareness on the player’s part as it doesn’t recognize the very clear “grave robbery” through the gate when you get the key, as you can see it when your at the key.

  • Building & Decoration
  • Realistic Awareness
  • Navigation

There was also an extreme lack of general “atmosphere”, the trees were still and the leaves weren’t moving at all, there was no hint of wind (not even any sound) and rather an extreme lack of sound regarding the original “objective” as I still didn’t really hear this “sound” that they needed to investigate, the most scary part of the game was the randomized light flicker because it was extremely unexpected, there’s no other sound always going on so you don’t expect something to happen, which shouldn’t be the case, I truly believe if you’re outside there should be some sound.

  • Sound Design
  • Decoration

Unsure if I wrote this in a correct manner in-which you would understand. (Would’ve had images if the Devforum wasn’t denying my uploads due to lag)

2 Likes

This is epic, thanks.
(Length)

1 Like

Hey, thank you for the feedback. Will definitely keep this in mind. This helps a ton!

1 Like

Thank you so much for the reply. I completely agree with the jumpscare suggestion and will definitely work on improving that aspect. I love the idea of using FPS arms it’s something I hadn’t thought of and I’ll be working to implement it for sure. It’s funny with the intro most players think the time is not enough to read it, though I completely see where you’re coming from regarding that paragraph at the end.

If you have any more feedback or suggestions, I would love to hear them. Once again, thank you!