Today I finally finished up the sound as well as implementing a hint system for The Flayed Man. That means the "base" version of The Flayed Man is now complete, although the next month will be spent implementing achievements for the Steam version, and getting into the nitty gritty of Linux and Android ports. Here's some thoughts on the two aspects of the game I mentioned at the beginning.

Sound

I think I've mentioned before that there's multiple, odd, and crappy adventure games I made for myself sitting on my hard disk which I created to develop my craft. With these games, I always stuck in a free downloaded song and never really gave much thought before to sound, so like the Rick & Morty meme, thought it'd be a quick in and out adventure.

It wasn't.

The actual writing of the music and the creation of tracks was relatively simple. But when it comes to levelling, ensuring that you can hear everything, avoiding pops and crackles, this has turned out to be the most brain-numbing and tedious task of all. I think this is because when I'm programming or writing, I can have music or the TV on and slip into the flow. With audio, you have sit there and listen, you can't fast forward or see if certain parts of the track works like you can with a programme (well you can but at some point you have to see if the whole track works). 

Yet the funny thing is getting the sound together really has made the game much better. I don't think I'll ever not see proper sound as a grind but it's a massive part of the game. Also the soundtrack is awesome (did I mention you can buy it as part of a supporters pack along with the artbook?)

Hint System

So a few folks who playtested the game found it hard. Now to be honest, that is part of the game (after all you are playing as a man who's been skinned alive) but I also realise some people just like the story, so I've implemented a hint system which is optional, you choose whether you want to play with it on.

This was surprisingly simple and those same playtesters have stated it improved the game for them. I think making it optional is a nice compromise for those wanting a pure experience. However, the hint system doesn't just tell you what to do, and you'll still need to put it together to solve the puzzles.

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