41 Comments

• 

  Jasper de Bock

  Jan 9, 2014 -

  Dear Glitch Team,

  I would not like to see any major alterations to the Forever lost gameconcept. What I would like is a two step hint system. If you get stuck and realy do not know how to continu, you made the hint section avaiable. But going there is no fun because it reveals to much imidiatly (even if you don open the hints and only look at the colours). I sugest a two step hint system. What I mean:

  When you open the hint window (abslutely desperate) you get a button which reveals a single general clue: for instance only the locatie where an open task is still waiting, or an acitvity you can perform (like: “bedroom” or “go back outside” or “you missed a room” or “frustrated? go break something”).

  Only if the player is realy stuck and gave up, he/she can go on to the eleborate hint system you now use.

  Jasper

  • 

    Graham

    Jan 9, 2014 -

    Hey Jasper, that sounds like a smart/dynamic hint system of sorts where it knows what puzzle you’re currently trying to solve and works out which part in particular you’re stuck on, is that right?

    That would be really nice to have and we have discussed it in the office a couple of times when developing Ferris Mueller. Currently we’ve come to the conclusion that it would be quite tricky to develop due to the non-linear nature of the games.

    We have developed a new hint system for Ferris and future games though that will allow for hints to be nice and vague so as to not give too much away but also have a hidden bit which has the actual solution that can be displayed at the press of the button. We’re hoping this is a nice upgrade to the Forever Lost system that will help us get to the point where we can develop a system much like what you have described.

    • 

      Jasper

      Jan 9, 2014 -

      Thanks for the reply, yes indeed, gently guiding the player into a direction instead of giving an instant solution and spoiling the fun of puzzling.

      I do understand this is technically challenging, but it would add an extra dimension to the game. Great to read you are already working on something like this.

      Jasper

      • 

        Graham

        Jan 9, 2014 -

        When Ferris is released I’d love to get your thoughts on the new layout and spoiler-free feature of it.

        • 

          Jasper

          Jan 10, 2014 -

          Will do…

        • 

          Jasper

          Jan 19, 2014 -

          This is hint system is far better (in The Ferris) game. It made playing the game more fun. But still this is a little bit to concrete. I think I would even prefer a more vague first hint.

          Congrats on the game, lot of fun again….

        • 

          Graham

          Jan 23, 2014 -

          We’re getting there 🙂 It’s very hard to write the hints in such a way that they are perfect for everyone, or at least a majority, however with each subsequent game we’ll get closer.

• 

  Jeff L.

  Jan 9, 2014 -

  That’s a tough question because Forever Lost is by far one of my favorite games out there. From a technical perspective I’m not sure if you changed anything between part 1 and part 2, but I enjoyed part 2 more for whatever reason. What I loved most is how long the game was, how perfectly challenging the puzzles were, how the “world” was so big with so many rooms and areas to explore, and the story behind the game.

  I love the game The Room by Fireproof, but as much as I enjoy it I enjoy Forever Lost much more because it took so much longer to defeat and because the puzzles and story were so immersive. Typically I don’t pay attention to the story in point and click games, however your story, especially on part 2, just pulled me in and made me part of it. I remember actually getting goosebumps once feeling frightened from a scene, which is crazy because it’s just a game, but that’s how much part 2 pulled me in to the experience.

  So while this may not answer the question of what to change, I hope this helps reiterate what not to change. Looking forward to the great new games!

  • 

    Simon

    Jan 9, 2014 -

    Hi Jeff, thanks for taking the time to reply. We love hearing positive experiences of our games regardless of the topic.

    There were many factors that differed between the creation process of the first two episodes. For Episode 1, we were not only designating time to game design, story development and puzzle creation, but we were also trying to finalise art styles, build the game engine, incorporate a working camera and so on. All of these things had already been established for Episode 2, so we could focus a lot more time towards the actual game-play element of Forever Lost.

    I think touch-screen devices are perfect vessels for adventures games, which is why games like The Room have been so successful. Although neither of us had played The Room prior to creating Forever Lost, we can understand why some people may draw comparisons.

    I think as far as the story goes, less is more. We wanted to drip bits of information into the game rather than force-feed the user with massive blocks of text and last minute story decisions.

• 

  SC resident

  Jan 9, 2014 -

  Dear Forever Lost team,

  I think forever lost is a great game, I would not like to see that many changes, however I feel that Simon one of the creators has fallen the f@%k off at the gym. He was slowly and steady making many gains alongside the creation of forever lost part two, starting to look swollen and vascular until he gave in to his partners chocolate and sweet coffee addiction. This has caused him to become lazy and neglect certain life achievements such as benching the 50kg dumbbells for reps. More importantly his gym buddy has lost a good spotter, whilst he isn’t in the mirror imitating Justin Bieber and taking selfies. I am worried that this lack of motivation will rub off on forever lost part three when it could be such an awesome trilogy. I know you like to have cameo’s of yourselves in some of your games whether it be pictures on the wall etc, and I would love to see a true picture of the creator Simon diced to the socks in the next installment from glitch games.

  Yours Truly,

  Snap City resident

• 

  Gianmichele

  Jan 9, 2014 -

  Hey guys, have you thought about a more traditional Lucas style 3rd person adventure? Would it be feasible with your current toolchain?

  • 

    Graham

    Jan 9, 2014 -

    We actually discussed this idea when initially planning Ferris as we would absolutely love to make a 3rd person game.

    In the end it was decided that as we were developing the new engine for Ferris it was best if we could stick to 1st person because we knew how to do that, otherwise the development cycle for the game would just be too long.

    That being said though, the majority of the systems required for that sort of game would be the same that a 1st person adventure needs so we would still be able to use the Serenity engine, we’d just need some modifications added.

    The big feature that would be needed would be some form of path finding system much like the one described here.

    In the future we plan on trying our hand at this however right now we are very much in our Myst phase of games 🙂

• 

  Jake

  Jan 9, 2014 -

  Forever lost is my favorite adventure game of all time, possibly even my favorite game period. Therefore there isn’t much I would have liked to changed to make it better, but one thing would be to make the first chapter have more backstory. And in the second chapter make the hints more specific, I had to go to a seperate walk through three times just to finish the second chapter. You also said you would have liked to have voice narration but I would prefer to have the eerie ambience with the creepy music in the background. Overall it is a great game, I love all the references, and cool puzzles, keep it up glitch

  • 

    Simon

    Jan 10, 2014 -

    Hi Jake, thanks for the feedback.

    It’s interesting to read that you think the game would be better without voice narration. The trouble was our lack of a budget, we literally had £0, in fact it was well below £0 when we were making Episode 1. So, we could have added more back story, voice narration and better cinematics, but, as you mentioned above, this could potentially have decreased some peoples enjoyment of the game. The hints were actually a last minute addition which admittedly are not as smooth as we had hoped. We have been working on a new hint system which will be part of the Ferris Mueller’s Day Off game, so test them out when it is released and let us know if they are any better.

    Regardless of what we wish we had done better or differently, we are so happy people like yourself enjoyed the game so much and take the time to help us improve and get better.

• 

  MissMagicPiano

  Jan 9, 2014 -

  Dear Glitch Games,
  Forever Lost is perfection at its best. I played the both episodes many many times and I failed to find something that could be changed. In my opinion, adding misleading rather than useful hints around the setting could make the game trickier. I am sure many people won’t agree on that, but it could add to that feeling of being lost and stuck. Also, it would add to the frustration one feels trying different ways that don’t work until finding the one that works. I am sorry, I just love the game as is, and I cannot find anything that should be altered. My patience is becoming weak as I wait for the third episode; I cannot contain the excitement.
  Keep the great work going, and I will do the job of spreading the word. I have made everyone I know play the game and they all love it!

  Thank you,
  Rachel (MissMagicPiano)
  **Is the person above making negative comments about Simon, or is he/she just joking?? If that’s a joke then fine, if not then NO PERSON SHALL TALK BADLY ABOUT SIMON! NO ONE!!

  • 

    Graham

    Jan 10, 2014 -

    There are a number of red herrings in the games currently, most were never meant to act as that though but they’ve just ended up like that. I really like the idea that adding them in would push the feeling of being lost even further, a very interesting thought!

    Regarding SC Resident’s, he is indeed a friend who is just messing with Simon 🙂

• Glitch Games | Weekly Roundup – 6th to 10th Jan 2014

  Jan 10, 2014 -

  […] On Thursday we introduced our new weekly feature Thursday Question Time which has gone pretty well so far with some great responses, check it out here. […]

• 

  Peter Orr

  Jan 11, 2014 -

  Hey guys, just finished Episode 1 and loved it. I thought that the camera was an absolutely brilliant addition, which really cut down on the frustration of running back and forth to recall crucial information.

  The only nitpick I had relates to the turning-concentric-circles puzzle: Without spoiling it for anyone who hasn’t played, the solution is found on a particular wall, and on my screen it was pretty much impossible to spot it (I had to resort to a guide).

  Other than that, I thought it was a brilliant experience and I’ll be playing Episode 2 soon!

  • 

    Graham

    Jan 12, 2014 -

    Hi Peter,

    Very glad to hear that you liked it! The camera is one of our favourite things, it’s now got to the point that when playing other adventure games we continually forget that they don’t have cameras 🙂

    I agree, that clue is probably too faded. We actually upped the contrast dramatically specifically for that image but it’s still a little too unclear. Glad you were able to get past though!

    Good luck with episode 2! Hope you like it!

    Thanks,

    Graham

    • 

      Peter Orr

      Jan 16, 2014 -

      I did indeed enjoy Ep 2. It looked amazing, even more impressive than the last thanks to the gorgeous outdoor scenes. I love how relentlessly logical it all is, with clues to (almost) all of the obscure things you need to do (the cracked pipe being one of the few exceptions). I think I know what’s going on now, but I’m looking forward to Ep 3 to find out if I’m right…

      You asked for what we’d change, so here are my niggles:
      * That freaking doll! After a game and a half of lulling me into believing that this was not supposed to be scary, just atmospheric, I swear that stopped my heart for a second.
      * I know you need a way to bring everything together for the finale, but requiring the collection of 16 identical puzzle pieces was a bit much, I thought. Especially when one of them required the use of four identical stone discs! Puzzles like the hieroglyphs and the dice numbers do this well as you have to figure out how to put them together, but the puzzle pieces felt a bit uninspired.
      * My phone (HTC Desire S) had absolutely no problem with any other bits of the games, but cannot play the ending cinematic for love nor money. Please don’t make Ep 3 reliant on cutscenes, or I just won’t be able to get through it!

      But again, excellent job guys. Now to track down Ferris Mueller…

      • 

        Peter Orr

        Jan 16, 2014 -

        I’ve just remembered one other niggle: When you use the UV torch and take a photo, the result isn’t particularly clear. I struggled to get the correct sequence from a photo of the angry birds until I went back to the actual piece of paper and memorised it.

        • 

          Graham

          Jan 23, 2014 -

          You could always have used the note writing features to write down the sequence 🙂 But yea we totally agree that it can be tricky because of the UV light.

      • 

        Graham

        Jan 23, 2014 -

        With Forever Lost, logic was and is important to us, we wanted the puzzles to be hard but completely fair. We wanted people to kick themselves after completing one for not completing it sooner but not feel like the game just tricked them and the only way to solve something would be to use brute force. Ferris is still logical but it uses its own world logic, it’s a lot wackier than FL so be warned 🙂

        Would love to know what you’ve managed to figure out about the story so far! We obviously have our own idea of what is going on but once the game is in someone else’s hands there is no ‘correct’ story. If you think something else is happening then something else is happening. To quote Joss Whedon:

        All worthy work is open to interpretations the author did not intend. Art isn’t your pet — it’s your kid. It grows up and talks back to you.

        To your niggles:

        1. The Doll – Haha, and the lulling is why that doll worked so well 🙂

        2. The Puzzle Pieces – We completely agree with you there, that needed to be better. The reason it was like that is that after episode 1 we realised that we needed the final items to be ‘physical’. In episode 1 they were just book titles and that allowed you to finish the game with just a small amount of knowledge. Rather than necessarily finding things out for yourself you may have been told one of the book titles by a friend which would allow/cause you to miss entire sections of the game. By requiring physical items we knew that players would absolutely have to solve all those puzzles. This is something that we hope to improve in our future games though.

        3. The Ending – Yea, videos on Android phones can be tricky as lots don’t support certain codecs etc. We found this out too late though but have put the video up on YouTube unlisted so that we can send it to people when they have issues – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ic_wJssQlvk

        Good luck finding Mueller!

• 

  Mark Birdsall

  Jan 16, 2014 -

  Hi,

  I would first like to say that you have put together the finest puzzle adventures I have ever played. I enjoy your sense of humor and the puzzles are exactly the right difficulty. I cheated once, as it didn’t occur to me to break open pipes to find a coin.

  In regards to having narration for Jason, I think it would be a mistake. More cut scenes could be fine, as the story is compelling, but I think having an actor’s voice in my ear frequently would detract from the puzzles and make it harder to feel immersed. I prefer putting myself in the role. Actually, I think you hit the perfect balance of story and puzzles as it is. Especially, if the story continues to evolve and poor Jason actually figures some things out.

  I would love to see what you guys can do with a fully 3d world, but I have to say I didn’t think Myst was improved by it. To the contrary, I think it made the game more difficult just because the navigating was clunky on a touch screen.

  I anxiously await the third installment. If you change anything, make it so that I don’t need to randomly vandalize things with a hammer in order to solve puzzles.

  Cheers,
  Mark

  • 

    Simon

    Jan 16, 2014 -

    Hi Mark,

    Thank you for the kind words. As always, we are surprised to hear people talk so highly of our game. We’d expect a few “yeah, it’s quite good” responses but never did we expect people to be regarding it as the “finest puzzle game” or in some cases their favourite game of all time.

    Balancing the humour and puzzles was more of a self judgement than a precise formula. Some people dislike the humour because they say it detracts from their immersion in the game. Other people love the humour because it offers a temporary break from the bleak and hopeless nature of the game. It is a similar story for the puzzles; although most people find the balance just right, a minority of people find the puzzles either too hard or too easy.

    We hope to develop some 3D games in the future, but for now we will retreat to the comfort of our 2D game engine and hopefully make even better games with that before we decide to branch out.

    We aim to never put illogical or random puzzles into our games, so maybe you missed something in the room under the stairs? The pipe was suspiciously cracked and had a piece that looked like it had been glued down. This was more of a subtle clue but I suppose it could be easily missed because of the dark environments.

    Anyway, we are so happy that you enjoyed the games and that you took the time to post this.

    P.S. Our latest adventure game “Ferris Mueller’s Day Off” was released today, so check it out and let us know what you think.

    • 

      Mark Birdsall

      Jan 16, 2014 -

      Simon,
      Thanks for responding. I know you are right about the pipe. If I were more methodical I wouldn’t have missed it. I was just being pissy. Your puzzles are damn fine.

• Glitch Games | Thursday Question Time: What was your favourite puzzle in Forever Lost?

  Jan 16, 2014 -

  […] that time of the week again where we get to ask you a question! Last week we asked what you’d like to change about Forever Lost and the general consensus was that there wouldn’t really be much to change at all so […]

• 

  Lisa

  Jan 31, 2014 -

  Firstly, I really enjoyed both games and cannot wait for the third. The only niggle I had was the photobook. Would be great if it remembered the last photo i was looking at. Would save a lot of hassle going back into the photobook and finding the picture again just so I could finish of the puzzle i started.

  • 

    Graham

    Feb 4, 2014 -

    You’ll be pleased to hear that our new engine, Serenity, includes that feature. You’ll see this in our new game Ferris Mueller’s Day Off as well as our upcoming games which includes Forever Lost: Episode 3.

• 

  Karen

  Nov 9, 2014 -

  Two things: first, at the end after the puzzle door, there are two ways to go, and I happened to take the door that ended the game. I want to know what was behind the other door. Same at the end of the first game, there were things I wanted to look at but I couldn’t go back after the game ended. Second, in the library in the instant messenger program on the computer, on the iPhone the keyboard for typing comes up and obscures the entry line. It makes it hard to enter the right password even when you know what it is.

• 

  Lillie

  Jul 30, 2015 -

  Hey crew,
  I must say I absolutely loved the games. My mother suggested them and in less then twenty four hours I had beat them all. I had fun coming up with theories as to what was happening while I went a long, but my mum disagrees with me about the ending. It would be wonderful if someone from the project would give us some perspective. Was Hugo in on what was being done to Alice? Is Alice the one setting everything back up when Jason takes the blue pill?
  Side note: we loved all of the pop culture references in the games. I currently have the magnets on my moms fridge set up like in the 3rd game.

  • 

    Graham

    Aug 10, 2015 -

    Hey Lillie,

    Thank you for playing the games and thanks to your mother for suggesting them!

    Currently we’re being deliberately vague about the ending as we wanted it to be ambiguous and open to interpretation. We’re really enjoying all the theories and ideas people are coming up with. One day we may sit down and answer all these questions however for now, we’re going to leave it open 🙂

    Haha, that’s awesome about the fridge! However please don’t spray them with anything, we can’t be held responsible for that 🙂

    Graham

• 

  Dmitry

  Sep 5, 2015 -

  Did anybody take a red pill in the end?

  • 

    Graham

    Sep 23, 2015 -

    I know that some people have, and some have played again just to take the pill they didn’t take the first time.

• 

  Chris

  Nov 28, 2015 -

  What i would change? Nothing. What i want you to change? Make a fourth part! Fast! Please…

  I cannot remember enjoying a game that much. (Ok, more than 30 years of playing computer games, some memories might be lost, still your game definitely one i will remember for a very long time.)

  • 

    Graham

    Dec 2, 2015 -

    Forever Lost was always meant to be a trilogy and we feel the story is now told, however that leaves us free to start new stories 🙂

    Thank you very much for the kind words and accolades, really couldn’t be happier!

• 

  Devorah

  Jan 14, 2016 -

  I LOVED the games as well! More then the room even, and I loved the room! I enjoyed the humor a lot, it felt like the creators winking at me as I was playing. I think what drew me in more then the room, was indeed the story line, and I played this hours at a time just to know what happened!
  I took the red pill in the end, cause the blue seemed obvious (meaning, it looked like that was the pill Jason was taking over and over and getting him no where) and after looked up online what happens when you take the blue pill. It would have been nice to have an option to go back to just that final scene and do the other ending, I’m probably not the only one who thought that…
  If you guys do put a story line together closing all the lose ends, a sequel would be much welcome!

  • 

    Graham

    Jan 14, 2016 -

    Wow, putting it up there with The Room is awesome 🙂 Thank you!

    Yea I agree about being able to see the second ending easier would be a good thing, hopefully at some point we’ll have the time to add that in.

• 

  Crystal

  Feb 24, 2016 -

  HELP! I am trying to unlock the red bedroom door in Forever Lost episode 2, chapter 5. This is the bedroom door in the red game. I have tried it about 50 times and no matter what I do it won’t work. I know that I have the correct code and have tried to find other blogs to see if there are any issues that I am unaware of that but I can’t seem to find anything. Are there any glitches that are causing this?

  • 

    Graham

    Feb 25, 2016 -

    Is this the door behind the fireplace?

• 

  Danny

  Dec 16, 2016 -

  I’m late to this game, but I’m a cheap guy so I waited for the sale.

  First, wow! What a game. Polish, good puzzles, immersive world. This is by far the pinnacle of this genre.

  Comments:
  1. For episode 3, I played a lot of it in one go. The game slowed down. It was gradual so I didn’t notice it, but eventually it was taking 3 seconds between every click to get to the next screen. I thought this was a feature (it came on gradually) to make the world feel more immersive. But, traversing the forest at three seconds a click took a long time. Eventually I experimented and completely closed the app and restarted it – much better! Not sure what makes it bog down like this, perhaps it’s something you can check into. Playing on iPad Air 2.

  2. Your “pun” puzzles, which is what I will call all the insanely clever, outside the box, ones (“rubber seal” being the ultimate example). It’s clever, and they make sense. It can be difficult, however, when they come out of nowhere, When you have a series of code-and-key puzzles or other things that follow a line of thought, you start to think that these are the rules of the game. Then you get something that is playing by such different rules… it runs the risk of feeling like a breach of contract between the programmer and player.

  Generally, you did ok at this. Usually I get there, and there are enough hints or nudges or loose ends left hanging in the game that I switch tracks and think it through. “Check the small print” was brilliant, and the fact that there are all these pictures on the wall but I’ve never figured out what they are there for gave me the push I needed. Tap the left key 5 times was ok because you are in such a constrained space at that point, there are only so many paths you can go down. The one that bothers me is the puzzle to retrieve the lighter from the card game. Again, brilliant puzzle, but the fact that the game suggests “I guess the winner of the game gets what’s inside” and the fact that I have a King of Spades in my inventory sets me thinking down one path, when the actual solution is in a wildly different direction.

  I guess my comment is “be very careful about red herring clues, even if unintentional, when you play with puzzles that are way outside the box”. And, since your games are not largely outside the box exercises, it’s nice to have a subtle cue that I need to think differently. The heart of a king and the small print puzzles were excellent, as you had other pieces of the puzzle in hand that eventually might turn the light on for you.

  All in all, excellent, and the games only got better the farther we got into them!