Ravenhaul

Great game! Simple, yet engaging. And has enough plannning/difficulty to pose some challenge. And I love the ambience. One of my favourites I found so far.

Just a few comments of things that you could want to look into. Hoping to be constructive here. Im ranking them in a (subjective) loose order of relevance:

- Regarding bugs I only found one. Playing mainly in the Windows version, sometimes when starting a new game time won't advance. The first raven will fly out but nothing will progress. Not too bad as you restart without having lost but a minute.

- A save functionality missing its clearly felt. The game is long enough to be difficult to complete in one sitting as it is (in fact I havent done it yet). And it would be very much needed for any potential further expansion.

- When you are selling birds it would be a great QoL improvement if the details of the bird you are selling would pop up. Both to allow to compare with birds in the store more directly, and also to make sure you sell the right one and that you will get enough money to get what you want. Mistakes during that phase have ruined some saves in my case (ooops).

- Knowing more details of what contracts will future patrons offer to you would improve the ability of been able to plan what birds you want or how do you want to improve them. In my very first few playthroughs I often found myself unable to deliver any contract of a new patron for days, and it alsocan be a bit frustrating if you see that some investments aren't going to amount to anything. Knowing the contracts from previous plays gives a huge advantage.

- Bird balance feels a bit off, although maybe its intentional.  I do feel it detracts depth from the planning and limits viable strategies a bit. Pigeons are simply OP, due to been by far the fastest while having great range and also having low maintenance (space and kernel wise) with their only weakness been they can't deliver parcels. But for anything else it simply doesnt make sense to use other birds. Ravens, even if they use that extra improvement pigeons need to deliver letters in speed or range are still going to be far behind in both categories even compared to a "low quality" pigeon. And Herons only seling point its their massive range, but it pairs terribly with them been the slowest, as range and speed work best together. So they are nearly useless. I feel like any strategy pales in comparison to having a few ravens specialized in parcel delivery and using pigeons for everything else. Herons as they are now would require having the longer deliveries have bigger time windows to complete them, though even then it would arguably not be a great option as the process would take so long given their speed that you would need several birds just to complete one contract every day, and they have the highest maintenance to boot. Versatility is just not that valuable besides the very early game, when you have few birds, due to pigeons been that much superior.

- Last, I feel like streamlining the ranges the birds can fly would make the game a bit better. I feel like the granularity is a bit too much as it adds "false" sense of choice/strategy which can be a bit frustrating for newer players, feeling like a bit of a trap. It kind of combines with the previous points a bit to exarcebate the issue. When you know what contracts you are looking ahead to, you are able to recognise the "better ranges" some birds have are meaningless. There are a few cutoff points that define all. To put a few examples for context drawing from prior points, if you know that ravens are meant for parcel delivery after you get yourself a few pigeons, anything above 600 becomes pointless. And most ravens will have that. Also, for pigeons, you know you are going to need to cover a 2200 km, a 1800km and a 1400 km contract. Anything else can be done with 1000km that every pigeon has. I think gameplay wise it would be better if any jump in range (either that the brid has naturally or that you can get through imrpovement) always means its going to be able to deliver something it coudn't before. That may be a stretch with combined with the different bird types and all, but at least I feel like the aim should be to minimize options that are not worth it at all. The granularity in rnage makes it so there are many right now and arent that easy to recognize.

I absolutely adore this game. Would it be possible for there to be save feature?

I had a crash on Day 19 in the browser version. I never moved or sold any birds. This was my second attempt, I restarted on Day 9 after playing poorly the first time. I think this happened after accepting new contracts. Also the feeder did charge 500 more for each level. I read that skipping Silvermane may work[*and I did and finished the game]. I was having a lot of fun otherwise, very good project.

No particular trigger for the main crashes I knew of, happened a few times long ago but had beaten the game - might just be a lot of inputs and happening when a bird delivers or a package to deliver arrives or payment comes in, something like that
Didn't seem to happen in the first half of the game much

Oh, and is the storage price still wrong? It would always charge you for the next level
Like it asks you for 5k, and takes 7.5k or whatever the next level is

Alongside the saves if it was going to happen- why not add some debug logs to help track down the crashes?

Was a good game from what I remember, a bit much having to do it all in one sitting, but good elsewise

I really enjoyed this game with how much detail has been put into the building and general environment. It feels like it has a lot of potential to expand, both mechanically with the weather and upgrades, or just visually with decorations and settings.
If you were to add anything though, I would really recommend a save feature first.

Unfortunately, I have the same issue a lot of others have had with the game crashing. I figured it has something to do with owning 11-12 birds that causes the issue, since I've managed to unlock all patrons (on my second run), but owning enough birds to complete the final contract ends up freezing the game soon after.

I really hope to see more from this and thank you for sharing it.

my game froze :( and i was almost ready to accept the queen's patronage too D:

PS this has happened a few times, and my progress doesn't save when i reload or close the tab

Is there a list of known bugs somewhere? Because like... I'm very charmed by this game, and I'd like to try to finish it, but I've had to start over a couple times now because it froze or crashed, both times pretty late in the game.

The first time, it froze right after I accepted Silvermane Trading as a patron, while playing it in the browser.

The second time, it crashed right after I accepted the Silvermane Trading parcel contract for the first time. I'd already done their letter contract a few times at that point, and I was playing the Windows desktop post-jam version.

I kind of still want to try to get to the end, but like.. It'd be nice to have a list of common causes of crashes so I know what actions to either avoid, or try to get out of the way early so if it is going to crash, it'll at least do it early in a playthrough.

EDIT: Ok, I've had the game crash out on me 5 times now.

I'm not sure it's worth trying again until the next build release, but I think I'm at least *starting* to notice a pattern; it only ever happens after I unlock Silvermane Trading as a client. It doesn't happen *every* time I unlock them or sign contracts with them, but every time it's happened, it's been a fraction of a second after I close the contract window; it lets me move for a couple frames, then I hear the squeaky pulley sound, and it freezes. And I *think* it might have to do with the parcel contract specifically.

EDIT 2: Ok, I tried a seventh time and I just decided to skip out on Silvermane Trading as a client entirely; this time I got a lot farther, but I'd accepted Queen Isadora as a patron, and I was gearing up to finally accept Queen Isadora's contract when it crashed AGAIN when I accepted a variety of contracts from other clients.

I was looking for unique management games and this one became one of my favorite ! It's simple yet fascinating, I've been playing at my own pace for 2 hours now ! 

I'm on the browser version for now, and I just wanted to ask if it was normal that I can't move the birds ? I wanted to make some space for more nests, so I waited for the merchant to come and I clicked the "move for 50 currencies" button. But my cursor highlights the tiles on the wall and not the nests, and clicking on them does nothing. Do I have to wait for the birds to be in them first or is this a bug ?

how do you load the saved game instead of starting all again?

This seems to be a hidden gem after scrolling through thousand horror games here. I love this game, the design, the music, the game play, everything. Thank you for creating this.

Btw, somehow my character kicked parcels and letters into the contract room or departure hall, I couldn't pick up these parcels to deliver so I had to pay the penalties many times. Hopefully the developers will take note of this point

do the birds die if you dont feed them

the game have save?

i don't know how to carry two letters, pls someone teaches me how to do it

New comment for new version! :)

I installed the PostJam version (dated: 2023-05-23) using the itch.io app on Windows 10.

First general comments: WOW, this is way different from the previous version... a lot more streamlined and with some information management made significantly easier, though I will note that the extra information and how some of the old information now matters more means the information handling load is pretty heavy, though due to the extended play time (WITH NO SAVE) caused by the need to get each patron on the list rather than skipping some is useful for teaching more about how the system work and working on that muscle memory but also makes it less likely that I have a play session long enough to finish the game... so the end game will not get play tested or only one or twice I'm afraid.

I'll also add that the absolute need to get the range numbers right due to tightening up the speed and distance requirements make it possible to stuff yourself going onto a new patron... I couldn't deliver anything for the smiths for ages because I had to save up for birds that could do the work and the fastest apothecary note was also a long term saving project (made worse because I over committed due to not realising that one of my crows didn't have the range and not correctly sequencing things).

I appreciate being able to see how my birds are flying as well as being given times for sleep and return though the jump in speed of sleeping between minimal and short is rather big, no? It definitely makes getting some birds to minimal or just not bothering to upgrade that at all and going for speed as long as they have enough range. I think overall this part of the game is the hardest as I've already had to sell one bird (and extend my playthrough) because the upgrades I made didn't match what I later needed from said bird - I like that it was feasible to do this but maybe not the reason (a lack of information about what ranges are actually needed - can I suggest that either the birds' and delivery items' range be listed in the same way as sleep and not to require exact numbers (do these birds really count the exact kms they fly?? or change the patron list to include a maximum range in numbers for them?) Also see below...

Bugs:

I can no longer get trapped in the shop thanks to every overlay screen properly pausing the action and time and note being able to click on the shop once it is leaving *yay* but I did get trapped in the shop when I went to sell a bird, then hit cancel without selecting a nest (I planned and then decided against selling a bird right then) the overlay screen went away but I could not click on anything or us keys when later started causing beeping, as if they were being queued? However I accidentally pressed right click and everything started working again... so not a soft lock unless you don't know to press a button never used in the game! ;)

The predicted arrived time for one note said I would be late but my bird made it anyway... I sent it just after it ticked over from being unlikely to arrive in time but never-the-less it made it just fine... so the predictor is inaccurate despite having three possible outcomes; arrives in time, might arrive in time, definitely won't - I didn't have a choice with that one as I had a spare bird and it would be late with any other I might send it with hence sending it anyway...

I went into debt by almost a 100 credits when I bought the kernel silo upgrade for 500 credits when I had over 850 credits... it looks like it charged me for the grain I already had in the silo as well as the silo upgrade?

I ran out of time to test more but I am worried that I will have to sink a lot of time in to discover why herons have such long ranges even though so far that is useless as the only long range deliver is a note that has to go super fast (and therefore by pigeon).

Anyway, the PostJam version is way better overall even though it might have become worse in one or two ways and also exacerbated the lack of saving quite a bit!

Best wishes and although I hope for more updates to this I am just happy that you appear to enjoy your work here enough to stay in contact with your players! :) - it seems to be a little rare and unfortunately a lot of those who do also don't seem to have the time to do much about bugs (especially in anything but their most recent game *sigh*).

<3