Jawbreaker

First played the demo and was immediately hooked on the concept of survival horror like an OG Resident Evil mixed in with some Manhunt repressed memories. The artistic design was both attractive but also felt retro in a way, like a nod to the past. The gameplay overall wasn't too bad (lots of stealth) but I did have some issues with the second-to-last boss but did eventually get past after maybe 10 attempts. Really looking forward to what comes next!

This was a good game! The style of the game is definitely on track with the other games made by Vincent...which is a good thing! Though the story is pretty mediocre, the atmosphere is fantastic. I was on edge a good portion of the game...only time i wasn't was when i was in the general stores haha. The graphics are pretty good, sounds are great and the music is great. The loud metal music playing on the radio in some levels really fit the theme and made it difficult to hear footsteps. Could use a bit more voice lines, but the voice acting is good. The boss fights are slightly challenging but were easy to learn what to do after a few tries, which is great because some games are pretty vague on what to do. IMO there could be a bit more shotgun ammo laying around..seeing as the two shells count as one. I think i only shot a good 3 or 4 shells in the whole game and couldn't find anymore, but you could def go the whole game without using the shotty, so not a huge deal. Possibly the enemy pathing could be a bit more complex...learning where they patrol was wayyy too easy.
Overall i'd give this game a 7/10!

I'm about halfway through the game at the time of writing this, but I really like it, it requires you to take your time and pay attention to your surroundings, but the checkpoints are frequent enough that dying isn't frustrating. The atmosphere, art style, and worldbuilding are top notch and very immersive, the controls are intuitive and it has full controller support (that can sometimes disable itself and you have to re-enable it in the options after moving to a new area, but that's the only negative thing I have to say).

The gameplay is pretty difficult, but if you take your time to look around for enemies and things that cna distract them, and use the motion detector you get at the start to look out for them, you can get past them easily enough once you memorize their patrol paths, it's a puzzle/stealth game for most sections, with you trying to sneak past enemies to collect and interact with things that'll unlock the next section, with the boss battles revolving around using their weaknesses against them.

If you want a game that makes you plan ahead and think, and doesn't let you just rush through, you'll like it a lot.

very cool, fun, lil indie stealth game. gives outlast & early res evil vibes. voice acting is engaging & fits the characters really well. art style is super fckn neat. i like looking at the evil dudes & the dystopia, even though it gives me innate "ick." Only an hour-ish in currently but haven't hit any bugs and game runs smooth as can be. fun, creepy and really hits on those claustrophobic, being hunted down feels. only thing i dont dig is there are some signs around that seem to be AI and i fucking hate that. i hope im wrong, its just that classic garbled letter vomit thaTs very reminiscent of last years LLM outputs. still, v cool overall and that was only a tiny, insignificant portion of what ive seen. totally worth a purchase.

Incredible game! One of my top games of 2024, and hands down best soundtrack. I REALLY hope the soundtrack gets released as a DLC on Steam. I'd love to add it to my collection. Can't wait to see what Vincent Lade does next.

I've played through all of Vincent Lade's Steam games and, while Jawbreaker is the most ambitious and deep, it's also definitely the most flawed, obtuse and broken. The game is trying to be like a minimalist Fallout with stealth and puzzle sections. The puzzles are easy but fun. Like most of his games you are doing things like finding keys and hitting switches. They're always intuitive and I never got stuck. The stealth sections are just horrendous. Enemies will immediately spot you from anywhere on the map (There is no "cone of vision" like in Metal Gear Solid) and will chase you down empty corridors and hack you until you're forced to restart. The developer clearly doesn't understand that the key to a game like Metal Gear Solid or Splinter Cell is the "hide and seek" aspect. The only thing that makes these parts manageable is the fact that enemies follow strict movement patterns, so it becomes a memorization game.

The game does have weapons, but the ammo is so limited you will probably only kill five or six enemies the entire game. There is one enemy you need to kill to get the true ending, and if you used up all your ammo, it's not possible. There are also quite a few collectibles, but all the achievements can be done on a normal run. The boss fights are a mix of creative and genius and horribly busted. The problem I had was that I was conserving my medkits so i was playing most of the game on 1 health. This made the three main bosses much harder than they needed to be. There is a puzzle element, for example, using a grid to figure out where to place a bomb, which makes it a cut above most action games. Sadly, the game's enemy coding is so strict and rigid that if you're in the line of sight you're dead, and since there's a survival element of course you don't want to use the healing items unless it's totally necessary, so this made these bosses way more frustrating than they needed to be. The second boss is a true stroke of inspiration, as you are dodging different attacks while flipping switches to reveal explosive canisters that you shoot to kill him. I wish there was more to this sort of game play design since it was by far the best part of the game.

I recommend this more as a curiosity than a great game you should play through because there is so much broken about it that there's a good chance you will be too frustrated to proceed, and it definitely isn't a casual game despite the tag. The best thing to do would be to use the guide on the Neoseeker website and follow along to get a rough idea of what you are doing. I didn't use it for the puzzles, but I used it for the stealth sections because the trial and error of getting caught constantly and starting over is absolutely miserable. I overall enjoyed playing it, though.

Really enjoying Jawbreaker so far. Graphics, voice acting and game-play are all very polished for an indie game. The stealth and enemy difficulty creates a lot of atmosphere and keeps you on edge. Definitely recommended for fans of the survival/horror genre. Will be checking out other titles by this developer once I'm finished this one.