Demo is live!

We are happy to announce the demo is now live! You can go get it for free on the Schwarzwald steam page!

Demo Notes

There are some important things to keep in mind playing the demo as it is an alpha demo.

You are encouraged to use this as a good representation of the following:

• Game Mechanics

• Art Style

• Level Design

• Overall concept

• Sense of Horror

• Soundscape

Do expect the following:

• Bugs

• Less Polished Assets

• Limited Content

Ongoing Changes & Early Playtesting

Being a small and new indie studio, we know we have a lot to learn. We are constantly reviewing feedback and making changes so that we can make Schwarzwald the best horror experience possible.

If you would like to pass over feedback, we recommend joining our discord and adding feedback in our bugs and feedback forum channel. https://discord.gg/v5sXwn3ZvC

Some feedback we've already received:

• Trap/challenges activating can be unclear - We're looking into add a more clear indication of when these happen so the player can figure out that there is a death challenge going on.

• Can't bind arrow keys for movement - We are aware of this and will be putting in a fix for it soon.

• Unclear on how to use certain mechanics like doors - We are working on better tutorialization for mechanics to explain how they should be used. We are also gathering info from players on how they use mechanics so we can improve them as well.

Here are some improvements we have already made from our early playtest:

• Improved direction for one of the traps so its more noticeable when it activates.

• Added sound cues to kitchen and key hallways to help identify a couple of important moments.

• General sound improvements all around.

• Added ability to have a permanent reticle for aiming.

• Greatly improved aiming both with and without the reticle -- now you should have no issues aiming with no reticle as well.

• Removed the older school on-screen text in favor of indicator reticles.

• Removed some drawers/cabinets or made them "broken" so there is less to search through since there isn't a lot of stuff to find in the demo specifically.

• Doors now have two styles of opening available. You can swipe and drag to open/close them to "peek" in before entering OR you can move with the door to open/close them allowing you to "barge" into rooms without investigating as much. We'll probably add some gameplay around this for the full game.

• Adjusted color of the Panic heart indicator so it fits better with the color theme.

• Panic heart now has stages where it beats noticeably faster as your sanity gets worse.

• First bedroom door now opens after you read the flashlight manual with tutorial info instead of when you grab the flashlight.

• Fixed a number of gameplay impacting bugs found.

Death and Schwarzwald

One note we want to make clear is about death and its place in the game.

Death is an important part of the Schwarzwald experience. The idea being that periodically you may find yourself in death challenges that test your ability to fight your instincts during the overall spooky gameplay. Schwarzwald has smaller game loops all over so that you don't lose too much progress and can learn and try the challenges again OR go somewhere else instead.

The first death challenge happens right out of the gate to teach you that you need to fight your instincts or it results in death (If your instinct is to face the danger, then try running away for example). The choice is up to you in those situations so if you want to close a door that opened then close it, if you want to investigate then do so -- but be prepared for the consequences! :)

As mentioned above, we have some changes that we want to do to make death challenges more clear and will be introducing patches in the coming days and onward to improve that. Though larger changes will be reserved for the full game, we want the demo to better represent what the full game will be like.