The mystery begins...
The first Mayfly demo was an amazing insight into how the game would be played, and how it would be received by you, the players. I took the opportunity to work the most prevalent feedback into a NEW demo build and I'm delighted to finally release it. It's a huge improvement over the first demo.
Average play time is now 32 minutes
One of the most common pieces of feedback was that Mayfly was simply too short and ended just as players were getting into it. This new demo's length has now nearly tripled over the first iteration.
Reality collapse mechanic
My absolute favourite feature of the new Mayfly demo is the reality collapse mechanic, which now punctuates the horror. One of the most exciting things from watching gameplay streams of the first demo was how the subtle changes really resonated with a large subset of players. Reality is now constantly shifting, meaning objects appear, disappear and move around every time reality collapses, as well as more obvious changes in the lighting and environment.
More puzzles and more challenge
Mayfly is my first ever game and so I really struggled managing the difficulty. I was initially afraid of players getting stuck so I perhaps hand-held players through the puzzles more than I should have. That's fixed now, and I've also added a few brand new puzzles.
As well as the above, there are also some other nice new features which make the new Mayfly demo even more immersive:
Notes and collectables are now fully inspectable both in-game and via the inventory
Story-pacing is on-point. The reality collapse mechanic has one major bonus, it allows the story time to breathe. By pacing the manifestation of certain items and collectables the natural lack of space is no longer a hindrance to the slow-burn narrative
Emotive 'Story interactions' pack in a tonne of background lore and add emotional intensity to various items and objects around the boat.
Music! A beautiful piano intro features during the first portion of gameplay
New cinematics added. A stack of new cinematics breathe life into the protagonist Caroline Miller, and make her reactions to the ongoing events more true to life.