Buy Into Blue Valley

Date: 12/26/2014

In this game's current state, and for the price ($9-$10), I cannot recommend it.

However, that being said I don't think this game is horrible.

First I want to start with the good things:

- It was very pretty
- Interesting idea to do a game in a "found footage" format
- Music was relaxing and interesting in the situation
- It was creepy, but not scary. Never tired to scare you to try and add "shock value"

Now I want to point out some of the issues I saw:

- Some trees not fully placed into the ground, they kinda float above it, this is actually visible on the path you are supposed to walk on. This applies to other objects in game as well such as tables. Go over the level with a fine toothed comb if you know what I mean.

- Some objects were missing collision models, allowing me to walk into them. (tables, trees, signs etc.)

- Audio transitions could be a bit smoother. Lower the wind volume in that blacksmith's house, it was killing my headphones.

- Knowing you used Unity, did you happen to use a "capsule" or "pill" collision for your player? If so then you may need to look into that, because I found myself slipping down stairs when standing still. That was my first clue to this. Try to not use Unity's default anything for your production games. They tend to not hold up well.

- Don't settle for "good enough" or "yeah they can get through that," really think like a brand new player who's never seen your game! They don't know that a little rock might stop them from walking forward and they need to finagle their way around it. Try and fix all the things that stop you from walking forward, even if it only clips you for a moment, make it smooth.

- Double check your invisible walls in between some of the fences on the path, because one I could walk right past and walk vertically almost to the top of the cliff face, broke the illusion for me.

- Try not to guide the player so much with the narration, nice idea to have people "watching" the player, but having them reveal things like where obtainable objects are takes the game out of the game for me.

- I could sort of figure out the story, but things felt a bit too scattered to really understand what's going on. Most of the time I just walked blindly until I found an item or something to read.

- I can clearly see trees and other items "pop" into existence due to the way Unity handles view distance, I'd look into this, it broke the immersion of the game a huge amount for me.

These are just things I would fix if I were on the development team for this game. I'm giving this review mostly to help out the developers, seeing as this is their first title I'm impressed with it. If you were to patch up the few issues listed above, I think I could recommend it to a few friends.

This game is what some have called a "walking simulator", but you don't even really get to do that without the game guiding your hand with voiceless narration from two dudes watching the "found footage". The game lasts 30 minutes tops, and tells a very short story with no beginining, no middle, but just a short build up to the end, with no conclusion.

If The Blair Witch Project, a broken graphics card, Outlast and a Skyrim had a love child that lost all it's gameplay limbs and just laid around and recited poetry, this would be it.

Watch a full playthrough with my thoughts below.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SqFNhBN0ZE0

Have been long anticipating this release as I do know personally the small team that has been behind it's development. First of all can I say a big well done on coming this far and persevering with this project, it's always refreshing to see new ideas come to the table and indie developers giving their spin on story telling or just pure gameplay at its core.

Into Blue Valley shows off one hell of a creative landscape and perspective which will have you building up your own suspense and in some cases have your eyes playing tricks on you. The atmoshpere is completely hammered home through its fantastic soundtrack to really give that lost wanderer feel.

The story is text based so prepare to read a little but manages to cover different styles of writing that you'd probaly find lying around... It is not a film award winning script but manages to do the job.

Honestly don't expect the longest amount of gameplay from Into Blue Valley however do keep in mind that this is a first for the developer (that consists of one coder might I add!) and that the magic is really in taking it in a slow pace allowing yourself to immerse a little! This immersion will be pushed a little further by an Occulus Rift version (free of charge) which is a bonus that I'd be willing to try out and does help to justify the game's price. I really will be trying this to see if my eyes end up tricking me even more.

Overall a good effort and would be interested in seeing where the developers go in the future.

Simply putt he game is a relaxing and at times creepy piece of work.

Although short I enjoyed it very much and especially around this time of year it really feels nice just to walk around the beautifull snow enviroments acompanied by some very beautifull music.

The vage story intrigued me quite a lot and it was fun to find out about what was going on.

It still is as many people would call it a walking simulator similar to Dear esther.
If you enjoy those kinds of games go for it, if you're neutral on te subject wait for a sale and if you hate them as games don't bother.

http://youtu.be/k99wQDqO33E

Title: Into Blue Valley
Developer: Kuchalu
Category: Walk-em-Up
Rating: NA (Not Rated)
Price: $10

Introduction:
Into Blue Valley is a First Person Walk-em-Up shown through the eyes of a video camera. The whole idea behind this is you controlling video footage; and this works well (most of the time), to
give a exotic game which shows that not all games need to be fast paced action or a gigantic world and can just be something to relax to but at the same time be creeped out.

Gameplay:
As the whole world is seen through a video camera and this is sent in somewhat olden times this game tries to make it as realistic as possible. And does it well. The world is a blue-ish feel of
a 70's camera. That means it does take some getting used to with movement but once you do get used to it you get a real feel of the environment. Now the actual gameplay as stated by the genre
is mainly walking. Don't expect any action sequences or choices. Just plain walking. The main objective of this game is to walk around and collect these magical objects scattered around this world.
Luckily this world looks beautiful, not beautiful as in graphics but how much this world captures the feel of the game. Relaxing yet creepy. I love the world and as this is a
walk-em-up it has to have a good world. And it does. The magical objects are found either outside in its beautiful environment or in houses which you can only enter a few ones chosen by the game.
I found this dissapointing as these houses were small and generic and had no use except for keeping the objects and these notes which were nothing to ride home about. Even with this setback the
gameplay was what a normal walk-em-up is: collecting stuff in its world. Luckily the world is wonderfully crafted so I had no problem doing that.

Controls & Smoothness:
The controls are simple but what I found was the camera was a little sensitive but there was no option to change this! Actually, there were not alot of options; other than changing graphic
settings, controls and resolution there was nothing else you could costumise. Which I think will be dissapointing to anybody who played differently (such as inverted mouse; etc). Luckily I
got used to the camera. I which I could say the same about the smoothness though, most parts were fine though some bumpy parts which you had to walk on were glitchy invisible walls to stop
from walking. I found this annoying as it stopped the feel of a game that your meant to walk in! Some of the invisible walls were so bad that I had to restart the game cause I just got stuck.
My advice would be to stick to the paths.

Music & Sound:
The music is your generic mysterious music with the piano and occasional guitar strums. But what I liked the most were the sound effects. They were generic also but input very well so
it made the game more creepy.

Story:
The story (without recking anything) is as follows: These two friends, brothers, I don't know watch some type one of them has found. He plays it so he can show his friend, brother,
I don't know. Anyway as you play the game these people talk and their talk is quite helpful and tells you when your on track or not which is good and can stop the walking around not
knowing what to do frustration which can happen alot in walk-em-ups. But it doesn't stop it completely (trust me, I've been there). While the talk is great it is text. I would've loved them
actually talking.

Conclusion:
This game tries to set out and do something different (like lots of Indie games do). Luckily, this one worked in the most part and made a solid game. This game is about an hour which
when I first saw this thought this was really bad as I payed $10 and has no replay value. But, if they had kept it going any longer it would have gotten repetitive so the 1 hour length
was perfect. This game is great.

The Good:

+ Something Different
+ Gives a Great Atmosphere
+ A Great World to Explore
+ Good Narration

The Bad:
- Generic Houses
- Not Much Options
- Invisible Walls & and Some Glitchy Walking
- Generic Music & Sound
- No Replay Value

8.9/10 (Great)




Rating Scale: (Must get a 7 or above to be recommended)
0-0.9: The Worst Piece of ♥♥♥♥ Ever
1-1.9: Absolutely Terrible
2-2.9: ♥♥♥♥
3-3.9: Poor
4-4.9: Bad
5-5.9: Meh
6-6.9: Okay
7-7.9: Good
8-8.9: Great
9-9.9: Excellent
10: Masterpiece

Like this for more!

I have been following Into Blue Valley since it was put up to be greenlit and I have not been disappointed.

Into Blue Valley has a very unique visual style. The game is played through found footage being narrated by two people "Matt" and "Ryan". You take control of the character Peter Abbotsfield who is documenting the disappearance of the townsfolk of Blue Valley with his video camera. Playing through the video camera adds to the creepiness of the game, as you explore more of Blue Valley the camera will start to bug out and glitch more. It's as if Peter is slowly losing his mind as the game progresses.

The snowy mountainous environment is beautiful and relaxing, it feels very skyrim-esque. From the outside the buildings of Blue Valley look interesting and almost make you want to go rooting through them. However on the inside the houses all look the same with very slight changes, I assume the townsfolk all shopped at the same furniture store.

The soundtrack to Into Blue Valley is stunning, with very relaxing piano music it makes you want to take a stroll through the valley. The music adds so much to the suspense of the game as it kept me so relaxed that whenever I saw a ghostly figure my heart would immeditaly race.

The story to Into Blue Valley is mainly found within notes scattered around the town and the two narrators. So if you don't like reading this is not a game for you. The notes are very interesting ranging for strange poems to adverts for the local blacksmith. The narration made me chuckle a few times when they noted I liked to stare at doors I couldn't open. The main downside to the narration however is that it seems to want to hold your hand and tell you what to do whether you like it or not. The ending was also very strange and didn't really explain a lot, I would've liked it to have lasted a bit longer as I wanted to know more about Blue Valley and its populace.

Overall Into Blue Valley took around 30 minutes to complete and lacked a fully fleshed out story but it more than made up for it with its beautiful terrain and soundtrack.

Into Blue Valley really epitomises what indie games are all about.

If you come into this game expecting something that you get from the major publishers and game developers then you should leave now. Into Blue Valley, as indie games should, tries something different and leaves you with a truly unique experience.

The gameplay is as basic as it gets, and as is to be expected of almost any games, whether indie or not, there are some bugs and imperfections, though none that I felt ruined the experience.

Where Into Blue Valley really shines is in the sensations and experiences you gain from it. The gameworld is beautiful and has it's own distinct feeling. You really feel like you are exploring a small abandoned town, battered by the winter weather. The presentation of the game through "found footage" in partnership with the mystery that underlies the plot and the subject of the footage gets your mind working, imagining what is going on and sensing a sort of calm yet creepy suspense (just about the best way I can describe the unique feeling it gives).

As I explored the world of Into Blue Valley, and particularly as I moved towards the games conclusion, I could feel my hairs stand on end and the unique feeling of 'calm yet creepy suspense' coursed through me. This is a different sort of gaming experience. One you should take your time with, allow yourself to be immersed and slowly explore the world and take in all it has to offer.

To conclude, you should buy this game if you want a unique gameplay experience. Particularly if you are a strong supporter of indie developers. Kuchalu have really used their imaginations and tried something different here with Into Blue Valley and I can't wait to see what they come up with next.

I really enjoyed playing this. The music was fantastic and it had a lot of original ideas. Maybe a little short, but the atmosphere really shines through, and leaves you wanting more. Being they're first game on Steam I'm really surprised how polished the product is, even though there might be a few objects without collision, overall the quality stands up throughout the whole game.

I found the narrative the most interesting aspect. You find your self watching the two narrators who have just put on an old VHS. One having seen half of it, thought his brother might find it interesting so they start watching it together from the beginning. You take control of the cameraman who's recording his journey, and the narrators comment on your actions as if it's already happened. But this is done as a way to guide the player. If you're stuck in a particular area the narrators might give you a clue. If it didn't already have amazing music and a really distinctive visual style, I'd recommend it for the narration alone, as I've not seen this idea in any other game. I'd love to see this idea explored further in another game, maybe have it tie in to the story more, but I think it worked well enough here.

Actually knowing how hard these guys worked on it, I must say I'm really impressed, and I think if you decide to pick this up, you won't be disappointed.

This game is worth no more than $1. You can finish it in about 20 minutes on your first try. Consider this a tech demo at most.

NWTTD= Not worth the ten dollars

I had really high hopes for this game, it looked really calming, The music is good and the graphics are decent. BUT HOLY ♥♥♥♥ HERE COMES THE BUGS. FLOATING TREES. OBJECTS THAT YOU CAN WALK THROUGHT, BUG AFTER BUG IT NEVER GETS OLD. But at the end of it all was a walking simulator where two guys direct the player while they watch found footage. It's creepy, not scary. The creepiest part about it is how boring it is. They should really lower the price to like 5 dollars. Not ♥♥♥♥ing ten. Waste of money. A really short game not worth buying. A worthy peice of crap!

Do I recommend this game? Hell no
4.5/10 for me

Good game