Hi everyone! 

It’s a new year and I haven’t given any updates on A Home in Darkness for a while. At least on Itch.

I do most of my devlogs on Youtube, as I prefer the video format to give updates on my game. It’s just easier to show the actual changes. Nevertheless, I think it’s time to give an update in text form, just to show that the game isn’t dead.

I’m currently reworking a lot of elements in my game. During development I’ve struggled to find the right balance between too much and too little content. For a while the game was too ambitious, so I decided to scope down the game. However the game currently has too little content, so I need to correct the scope again a bit.

The best example I can give for this is the layout of the house. At first it was too spacious, then I made it smaller. But now there are too few rooms, to get multiple hours of playtime out of it.

Because making 3D level is a lot of work, I spent some time on improving my overall workflow. See this video:

I also had to spent a lot of time figuring out the core gameplay loop. The main aspect of “A Home in Darkness” revolves around performing rituals to banish or defeat supernatural beings. However what does this imply exactly? Other Survival Horror games rely on an actual combat system for most of their enemies. But performing rituals to me seems more in line with solving puzzles. After all setting up a proper ritual requires knowledge and attention. Doing something wrong can have dramatic consequences.

I believe I’ve found a good solution to make performing rituals an interesting core mechanic of the game. I’ll talk more about this another time, when I’ve done enough playtests.

Of course if you want to stay up to date on everything "A Home in Darkness"-related, I recommend subrscribing to my Youtube channel.

Anyway thank you for reading and a happy 2022.