damn, how did you managed to jump into the hole? I restarted the game after I finished it just to try that and cleanse my soul, cause i felt nasty af for playing along w the game, but there was an invisible wall around the flesh pit.
i think if i worked on this i would have hid an ending down there, but my guess is that players would prob just immediately jump down there (was that the first thing you tried btw?) to test it out and defeat the whole purpose of making the player commit these heinous acts or at least lessen the impact of them.
My first instinct was also to not do anything to the folks and it felt weird that the women screamed "please don't shoot me" while i was just holding a phone in my hand. Games like this really only work if you "play along" it seems
Nice catch on the gun bug lmao. I only got the NPC models to glitch out one time and in a weird way their unnaturally contorted bodies made the game even scarier lol

sry for spamming your review w my random thoughts lol. i guess i just now realised that i would rather engage in random convos w other users on this site or like, contribute to "active discourse" about the games i just played than write a full review myself and throw it down the void, u feel me.

@ThinkingFella I'm not 100% sure how I accomplished it but it might have been due to the gun bug? First I got the gun to float really far away and then I dropped it in the hole before jumping down. There's also a chance it was an older build and has been fixed since then. It's been a while haha but I'll give it another try when I get a chance. I think I tried it after the gas station segment? Contorting body glitches are always fun too haha.

I also think it would've been cool to hide another ending down there because really just as you said games like this only work if you're willing to play along and this is a game that was pretty freaking hard to play along to so an option to play differently would've been appreciated. Don't apologize at all for sharing your thoughts! They're very apt and contribute really well in my opinion!

"First I got the gun to float really far away and then I dropped it in the hole before jumping down. "lol you really tried every goofy shit possible just to not play by billy's repugnant rules huh? I'll have to try this rn. finished the full compilation in this very moment. I played this one before the "Night Shift" and something about seeing a gas station almost identical to the one in billy's first act felt unnerving in a very intentional way idk. maybe more unnerving than the actual content and very expected payoff in the gas station game lol. I like that they went for an open structure a lot tho

Yea it is kinda hard to play along w and I also believe some of the message can too easily fall flat if there is no other option for the player.. like.. puppet games y'all created these fucked up and singular systems, am I really complicit in their violence if can't not do it? is it really a gotcha if i have to play along for it to 'work' or are yall just kinda fucked up? (maybe both and we all are) lol
maybe closing the game is the only right one, the only canonically good ending. just like Haneke suggests with his "funny games" films. and even if those films don't work for the viewer that medium at least has the excuse for no real intended interactivity to be there.