I have to admit, I'm somewhat disappointed. LoFi Hotel certainly has its charm, and I really do appreciate the look of the characters and in general, but I was very close to giving it a thumbs down. At this point, I can't help but be brutally honest, though in the end, it's just simply feedback and constructive criticism, also a small reflection of my gaming experience.
That being said, there are certain things players should keep in mind before diving in, cause some of the points I am about to mention made me feel relieved when I was finally done with it.
And dear Danton Freitas aka Enchant Games, since we've already spoken before, I want to make it clear that I bear no grudges against you. I will play Roofcats Band at some point, and I’m also looking forward to Zen Rogue Monks. However, there’s one piece of advice I’d like to give you already: anyone who tries to do too much by himself and doesn’t really accept help from others inevitably makes more mistakes - unnecessary mistakes that could have been avoided.
I've been through that myself.
At a certain point while playing, I had to grab a piece of paper to note down all the malfunctions and bugs I noticed.
Since there were quite a lot, I won’t list them all. Instead, I’ll give a few examples and highlight the aspects that genuinely annoyed me. So the music often just stopped playing. Despite multiple clicks, certain mechanics or commands frequently didn’t work. The whole screen/map would sometimes start to flicker. The turtle often got stuck in the map near the islands. A collected song wasn’t playable for quite a while. And occasionally, there were strange sound issues like stuttering and distortions. It might have been worth considering an additional movement speed or a dash for the owl and turtle, as they move quite slowly. While it's not a major issue, but it’s certainly not ideal either. The text windows didn’t appeal to me at all, I actually found them kinda uncomfortable, especially due to the strange spelling and phrasing errors. Unfortunately, the sound design also didn’t resonate with me; it felt a bit uninspired. For example I would have approached the owl’s wing flaps differently to make them sound more authentic. The music was also a bit too repetitive and could have been mixed more precisely, but that's just my opinion.
All the technical issues and malfunctions set aside, as well as questionable decisions, that's one thing but don’t get me wrong, they’re no small matter. But when you add what I’m about to describe, a thumbs-down would definitely be justified. I really wasn’t a fan of being able to move beyond the edge of the screen and behind certain objects, and I spent a long time searching for the last piece of music. Frustrated and unsure of what else to do, I scoured every hidden corner, which became incredibly annoying. I had really hoped that the final music piece wouldn’t be in an invisible area. And what happened in the end? The last music piece was on some island in the top right, completely hidden behind the edge of the screen, things like this should be avoided at all costs in any game.
After the short credits, there was a reference to Discord, and the game either froze or didn’t give me any option to return to the main menu, I have no idea. I forcibly closed the game and thought to myself: really, really unfortunate! What a pity!
So once again Enchant Games: keep going, but please learn from these mistakes. Maybe consider working with a few more people? Perhaps think about bringing in additional Quality Assurance Testers and Sound Designers? Oh and by the way, could you please clarify the age rating for Shy Cats Hidden Orchestra? It’s not a big deal you know, and a friend of mine would really like to play it and currently can't, since it’s no longer available in the store here in Germany due to the lack of an age rating.
