This was really a beautiful, emotive experience. I'm new to the liminal spaces community, but Passage of Grief sparked a new interest for me, so thank you for that.
I haven't experienced anything quite like this before - without spoiling anything for new players, the story ties really nicely into the idea of "liminality" - of those moments spent in passing, of the time lost between life experiences. At the same time, a lot of the game feels familiar, somehow, like unexpectedly wandering into a place I haven't been since childhood. The atmosphere you've created with the visuals and soundtrack works in concert with the game design to communicate a real sense of melancholy - that speaks to the power of the narrative, at least in my view. This game makes you feel something, and that's something I wasn't expecting when I started playing it.
This is clearly a real labor of love, and there's real emotion in the storytelling here. A sincere well done from me; this is one of those games you just keep thinking about even after you've finished it. Thanks for uploading!
Thank you so much for the kind words! I’m really glad you found the game to be a good intro to the world of liminal spaces, and it means a lot that the narrative kept you thinking after you finished!
Hey :) So sorry I can't rate your game, because my Windows comp is apparently too old and low spec to run it. Even after I changed the video settings to the lowest, it keeps crashing/hanging, the furthest I ever got is picking the key. And I didn't succeed to run it on my main comp with Linux, neither via Steam Play nor any other emulator. Such a pity, was really looking forward to playing it. Hopefully you publish it on Steam someday, then I suppose they'll take care of the compatibility...
I appreciate your feedback, and my apologies that it’s not able to run smoothly on your computer! Since this was done for a game jam in a short period of time it’s still lacking in optimizations and I’ll be implementing those improvements as soon as I’m able to.
Would you be willing to share your computer specs so I have a data point regarding compatibility with specific hardware? Every bit of info helps and I appreciate it!
Sure, Windows 10: i7-4770 CPU @ 3.40GHz, 8Gb RAM, NVidia GeForce GTX 680
and Linux Ubuntu 20.04: i7-10875H CPU @ 2.30GHz, 32Gb RAM, NVidia GeForce RTX 2060. The Linux one can run Hogwarts Legacy through Steam Play, so it should be able to handle games of similar complexity.
Thank you so much for the info! The primary issue is that the game relies on randomly spawned level instances as its core mechanic, making it difficult to bake lighting. Having real-time lights for everything is computationally heavy, in particular with the starting apartment level.
There are fixes which I’m working on and hope to have in soon! I’ll keep you posted when they’re implemented so you can hopefully give it another shot :)
This was a good story, and a good message. I liked the environments and themes. My only complain is that the doors were really jank, but other than that, I had a good experience
Edit: I just tried changing the door opening/closing to use a vector interpolation to be smoother, just in case the movement may have been jerky for you. It should hopefully help a bit!
------------------------------
Thanks for the feedback! What about the doors was a problem? I made some adjustments to help compatibility with some playtesters, but it sounds like those fixes may have negatively affected you.
Would you be willing to share your PC specs so I have them as a reference?
The problem with the doors was mostly just control consistency. Like I'd be moving the mouse left to open one, and then suddenly I'm closing it again in the same movement. Sometimes they'd just freak out or wiggle. I think the doors needed a hard rule on operation, like "left is always open" and "right is always close", basically making their operation consistent instead of very dependent on your positioning
Ah, that makes sense! Thanks for the clarification. That’s definitely something I can fix! I did resolve the occasional jittering with yesterday’s update, but I can get this fix implemented as well today or tomorrow :)
EDIT: As a heads up - all of the major issues with Passage of Grief should be patched now! I addressed every bug I’ve had reported and it seems to be working smoothly. If you played Passage of Grief before the patch on 8-15-24 and ran into issues, it’d mean a lot to have you try it again with everything major fixed up! No pressure at all, but it’s significantly more pleasant to play now!
———————————————
Thank you so much for giving this project a look!
I'm doing live patches and bug fixes as new issues crop up, but the latest version (21) should be fully playable.
Bug fixes performed so far include:
Issues with opening sliding doors
Some interactables not functioning
Volume tweaks to dialog
Key item occasionally not being detected until being picked up twice
Keys being clicked while unlocking doors toggling their visibility on inappropriately
Made vents easier to open/close to improve compatibility with AMD PCs
Improved music volume
Updated credits
Added a hint to an environmental puzzle
Fixed soft locks that occasionally happen on a staircase and in a curved hall
Fixed a soft lock where the final door in the game collided with a light, preventing entry to last area
Made door opening/closing smoother using vector interpolation instead of discrete inputs
Reduced frequency of duplicate halls appearing in a row
Added hints to three areas based on playtester feedback
Changed set point angle for door open/close to make operation smoother
Fixed an issue where videos were not properly packaged and didn't display on TV screens in game
Fixed occasional bug where player could clip through the ground when loading the first level
Fixed issue with locker widget visibility staying on despite being out of range of interaction
Improved level randomization to eliminate repetition and make key areas more frequent
If you downloaded an earlier version and ran into issues, please give the updated version a shot!
← Return to liminal experience
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This was really a beautiful, emotive experience. I'm new to the liminal spaces community, but Passage of Grief sparked a new interest for me, so thank you for that.
I haven't experienced anything quite like this before - without spoiling anything for new players, the story ties really nicely into the idea of "liminality" - of those moments spent in passing, of the time lost between life experiences. At the same time, a lot of the game feels familiar, somehow, like unexpectedly wandering into a place I haven't been since childhood. The atmosphere you've created with the visuals and soundtrack works in concert with the game design to communicate a real sense of melancholy - that speaks to the power of the narrative, at least in my view. This game makes you feel something, and that's something I wasn't expecting when I started playing it.
This is clearly a real labor of love, and there's real emotion in the storytelling here. A sincere well done from me; this is one of those games you just keep thinking about even after you've finished it. Thanks for uploading!
Thank you so much for the kind words! I’m really glad you found the game to be a good intro to the world of liminal spaces, and it means a lot that the narrative kept you thinking after you finished!
Hey :) So sorry I can't rate your game, because my Windows comp is apparently too old and low spec to run it. Even after I changed the video settings to the lowest, it keeps crashing/hanging, the furthest I ever got is picking the key. And I didn't succeed to run it on my main comp with Linux, neither via Steam Play nor any other emulator. Such a pity, was really looking forward to playing it. Hopefully you publish it on Steam someday, then I suppose they'll take care of the compatibility...
I appreciate your feedback, and my apologies that it’s not able to run smoothly on your computer! Since this was done for a game jam in a short period of time it’s still lacking in optimizations and I’ll be implementing those improvements as soon as I’m able to.
Would you be willing to share your computer specs so I have a data point regarding compatibility with specific hardware? Every bit of info helps and I appreciate it!
Sure, Windows 10: i7-4770 CPU @ 3.40GHz, 8Gb RAM, NVidia GeForce GTX 680
and Linux Ubuntu 20.04: i7-10875H CPU @ 2.30GHz, 32Gb RAM, NVidia GeForce RTX 2060. The Linux one can run Hogwarts Legacy through Steam Play, so it should be able to handle games of similar complexity.
Thank you and good luck!
Thank you so much for the info! The primary issue is that the game relies on randomly spawned level instances as its core mechanic, making it difficult to bake lighting. Having real-time lights for everything is computationally heavy, in particular with the starting apartment level.
There are fixes which I’m working on and hope to have in soon! I’ll keep you posted when they’re implemented so you can hopefully give it another shot :)
This was a good story, and a good message. I liked the environments and themes. My only complain is that the doors were really jank, but other than that, I had a good experience
Edit: I just tried changing the door opening/closing to use a vector interpolation to be smoother, just in case the movement may have been jerky for you. It should hopefully help a bit!
------------------------------
Thanks for the feedback! What about the doors was a problem? I made some adjustments to help compatibility with some playtesters, but it sounds like those fixes may have negatively affected you.
Would you be willing to share your PC specs so I have them as a reference?
The problem with the doors was mostly just control consistency. Like I'd be moving the mouse left to open one, and then suddenly I'm closing it again in the same movement. Sometimes they'd just freak out or wiggle. I think the doors needed a hard rule on operation, like "left is always open" and "right is always close", basically making their operation consistent instead of very dependent on your positioning
Ah, that makes sense! Thanks for the clarification. That’s definitely something I can fix! I did resolve the occasional jittering with yesterday’s update, but I can get this fix implemented as well today or tomorrow :)
Handle on the right, opens left. Handle on the left, opens right. This will feel very intuitive and should help future game builds with doors. :D
EDIT: As a heads up - all of the major issues with Passage of Grief should be patched now! I addressed every bug I’ve had reported and it seems to be working smoothly. If you played Passage of Grief before the patch on 8-15-24 and ran into issues, it’d mean a lot to have you try it again with everything major fixed up! No pressure at all, but it’s significantly more pleasant to play now!
———————————————
Thank you so much for giving this project a look!
I'm doing live patches and bug fixes as new issues crop up, but the latest version (21) should be fully playable.
Bug fixes performed so far include:
If you downloaded an earlier version and ran into issues, please give the updated version a shot!
Thanks again!
-James