Info about 24 Solar Terms:

Official game description:
Introduction
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24 Solar Terms is a seek and find game based on the traditional Chinese twenty-four solar terms. Our game connects the climate and farming of solar terms through farming proverbs, myths and fables. Use sharp eyes and quick wit to help local farmers solve various problems. You will be guided through your journey with proverbial prompts and cultural clues. Let's experience the story of 24 solar terms together! (China is huge and has many vast ethnic groups, the content of this game is limited. The inspiration of the puzzles only comes from some areas and ethnic groups.)
Features
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*   Use traditional agricultural proverbs, and principles of farming and climate to solve puzzles. Discover the tranquility and calm of Chinese farming life through a gentle learning experience.
*   Observe and find out what the farmers need. When you are stuck, try to think outside of the box - 24 Solar Terms rewards creativity.
*   As you solve puzzles, see the world around you change. Enjoy subtle references to traditional Chinese myths as your actions affect the lives of your people.
*   Play mini games to relax your mind and eyes. Moreover, hidden objects and side quests are waiting for you. Don’t miss them!
*   Our illustration shows the changing of the four seasons in detail. Find relaxation in our small, peaceful villages, and their gentle passage of time.

Release date: 19 Apr, 2023

Categories: Hidden Object, Puzzle Solving, Mini-game Collection, Educational Game, Single-player Story


- Hardware Profile: No data
Feature extractions:
- Community Price: No data
- Playtime Metrics: No data
- Time-to-fun: No data
- Player Archetypes: No data


Below are summaries of things people say about the game per category.
Each point is assigned a weight that represents how often it is mentioned across all reviews.
What players like:
- Great for Educational Parent-Child Play (weight 0.93): The game is frequently recommended as an excellent educational and casual game, especially suitable for children and parent-child play. Its simple mechanics, engaging content, and cultural lessons make it a valuable learning tool.
- Charming and Beautiful Art Style (weight 0.78): Players consistently praise the game's art style, describing it as beautiful, cute, hand-drawn, and resembling a children's picture book. This visual aesthetic contributes significantly to the game's overall appeal and relaxing atmosphere.
- Pleasant and Fitting Music (weight 0.68): The game's music and sound design are highly praised for being pleasant, soothing, and perfectly complementing the visuals and gameplay. The background music enhances the relaxing and immersive experience.
- Relaxing and Healing Experience (weight 0.66): Many players found the game to be a relaxing, healing, and enjoyable experience. The calm pace, soothing music, and overall gentle atmosphere contribute to a stress-relieving and pleasant playtime, suitable for unwinding.
- Engaging and Accessible Gameplay (weight 0.6): The gameplay is described as simple yet engaging, with a good balance of hidden object puzzles and mini-games. The inclusion of a hint system and the option to skip difficult mini-games are appreciated features that enhance accessibility.
- Rich Cultural and Educational Content (weight 0.53): A core strength of the game is its successful integration and promotion of Chinese traditional culture, particularly the 24 Solar Terms. Players appreciate learning about folklore, poems, myths, and customs in an engaging and educational way.
- Bonus Content and Replayability (weight 0.46): The game offers additional content such as secrets, achievements, and side quests, which add to its replayability and provide more objectives for players to pursue beyond the main story.
- Responsive and Dedicated Developers (weight 0.11): Players commend the development team for their sincerity, active responsiveness to feedback, and consistent efforts in providing updates and improving the player experience.

Common complaints:
- Frustrating Hidden Object Gameplay (weight 0.99): Many players found the hidden object gameplay frustrating and visually taxing. Items are often too small, blend into the background, or are illogically placed, leading to eye strain, headaches, and a general feeling of being stuck or annoyed rather than relaxed.
- Poor Guidance and Hints (weight 0.76): Players frequently reported issues with unclear instructions, weak guidance, and unhelpful hints. This lack of clarity often left them confused about objectives or item locations, hindering progression and increasing frustration.
- Challenging Mini-Games (weight 0.69): Several mini-games were criticized for being overly difficult, poorly explained, or having unreasonable time limits. This often led to player frustration and a feeling that the mini-games detracted from the overall experience.
- Repetitive Music (weight 0.57): The game's music, often limited to one track per season, was described as repetitive and sometimes irritating, contributing to player fatigue rather than enhancing the relaxing atmosphere.
- Unfriendly Achievement System (weight 0.53): The game's auto-save system and lack of manual saves, combined with unskippable cutscenes and the need to replay entire seasons or solar terms for missed items/achievements, made the achievement hunting process tedious and punishing.
- Limited Content and Cultural Depth (weight 0.26): Some players felt the game lacked sufficient content or depth beyond the hidden object mechanics. Additionally, the cultural references were sometimes difficult for players without prior knowledge to fully appreciate.
- Technical Bugs and Crashes (weight 0.1): Players encountered various technical issues, including bugs that caused them to get stuck, game malfunctions, and crashes, which negatively impacted the playability and overall experience.

Gameplay feedback:
- Hidden Object Core Gameplay (weight 0.69): The core gameplay revolves around finding hidden objects within scenes, often requiring keen observation and careful clicking. Players interact with the environment by finding and using items to progress, with a simple 'find item -> use item' loop.
- Cultural Theme: Solar Terms (weight 0.57): The game is deeply rooted in Chinese traditional culture, specifically the 24 Solar Terms. Each season and solar term features unique challenges, activities, and related poetry, providing an educational and culturally rich experience.
- Diverse Mini-Game Integration (weight 0.54): The game incorporates various mini-games to break up the hidden object gameplay, ranging from simple puzzles to more complex ones like match-3 or Huarong Dao. While some mini-games can be challenging, players have the option to skip them.
- Visual Acuity Required (weight 0.47): The game primarily tests players' eyesight and attention to detail, as many items are subtly hidden within the scenes. Patience and careful observation are key to success.
- Varied Puzzle Clues & Player Suitability (weight 0.37): The game's puzzles sometimes incorporate agricultural proverbs as clues, adding another layer of cultural immersion. Players can also find external guides for assistance. The game is suitable for patient players who appreciate its art style and is inspired by titles like 'Hidden Folks'.

Performance notes:
- Startup issues resolved (weight 0.02): A recent update (v1.05) successfully resolved critical startup issues that were preventing players from launching the game. This shows responsiveness from the developers in addressing major bugs.
- Good Steam Deck performance (weight 0.02): Players report that the game performs well on the Steam Deck, indicating good optimization for portable play. This is a positive technical aspect for users of that platform.
- Improved hints and card issues (weight 0.02): The game's hints and card-stuck problems have been improved, making the gameplay experience smoother. This suggests a better user experience regarding in-game guidance and common frustrations.

Recommendations:
- Highly Recommended Relaxing Experience (weight 0.35): Many players highly recommend this game, especially for its relaxing nature, charming art, and cultural themes like traditional Chinese solar terms. It's seen as a good value, particularly for those seeking a casual, hidden-object puzzle experience.
- Potential for Discomfort and Frustration (weight 0.05): Players warn that the game may cause motion sickness or eye strain, and its unclear instructions or interface can lead to frustration. These issues could significantly impact the playability for some users.
- Consider Waiting for Sale/Improvements (weight 0.04): Some players suggest waiting for a sale or further improvements before purchasing, with one even requesting a refund. This indicates a segment of the audience feels the current price or state of the game isn't fully justified.
- Not for Poetry Haters (weight 0.02): One specific piece of feedback suggests that players who dislike poetry might not enjoy the game. This implies a strong narrative or thematic element involving poetry.

Other player notes:
- Short game duration (weight 0.09): Players report that the game's main story can be completed in a relatively short amount of time, typically ranging from 3 to 6 hours.
- Improve save and replay options (weight 0.05): Players desire more flexible progression options, such as the ability to re-read specific solar term nodes or save progress at the beginning of each season.
- Add mini-game rewards and skips (weight 0.03): Players suggest adding a reward mechanism for replaying mini-games to encourage engagement, and a skip function for mini-games if a player is stuck for an extended period.
- Impressive indie development (weight 0.03): Players are impressed by the game's quality, especially considering it was developed by a small team of three creators in their spare time, highlighting its indie nature.
- Art style resembles textbook (weight 0.02): One reviewer noted that the game's art style resembles that of a textbook.
- Suitable for iPad release (weight 0.02): A player suggested that the game would be well-suited for release on iPad, implying its touch-friendly nature.
- Request for zodiac-themed game (weight 0.01): A player expressed interest in a similar game concept focusing on the twelve Chinese zodiac signs.

Emotions:
- Satisfaction (weight 0.32): Players found satisfaction in the game's charming aesthetics, including cute characters, unique art style, and beautiful music, which contributed to a warm and relaxing atmosphere. The game's educational value, cultural integration, and overall quality, along with developer responsiveness to issues, also significantly enhanced player enjoyment and a sense of completeness. Many appreciated its suitability for children and its stress-relieving nature. 
- Frustration (weight 0.25): Frustration primarily stemmed from unclear instructions, weak guidance, and the difficulty of finding tiny, hidden objects, often leading to pixel hunting and eye strain. Players also expressed annoyance with unskippable cutscenes, lack of manual saves, and the repetitive or overly difficult nature of achievements and some mini-games. Technical issues like bugs and crashes further contributed to a negative experience.
- Disappointment (weight 0.09): Disappointment arose from the game not meeting expectations, particularly regarding its relaxing nature or perceived value for money due to its short length and simple puzzles. Players found the gameplay repetitive, the hints unhelpful, and the overall user experience poor despite good initial ideas. Some felt the game was too childish or boring, leading to a sense of unfulfillment.
- Joy (weight 0.09): Joy was frequently experienced due to the game's 'healing' and heartwarming qualities, which improved players' moods and provided a fulfilling experience. The beautiful art style, engaging music, and rich cultural depiction, combined with fun mini-games and the joy of discovery, contributed to a generally happy and positive emotional state.
- Appreciation (weight 0.05): Players showed appreciation for the developers' significant effort in integrating and promoting cultural themes through the game's art style and detailed visuals. The overall value and the developers' positive attitude and responsiveness were also key factors in fostering this emotion.
- Excitement (weight 0.02): Excitement was generated by the game's engaging nature, the satisfaction of seeing the village thrive, and its ability to evoke a sense of national pride. Players also expressed excitement for the potential of future games from the developers, indicating a positive outlook on their work.
- Confusion (weight 0.02): Confusion arose from unexpected elements like the presence of pinyin, unclear objectives, and poorly explained mini-game rules. Some instances of potential bugs also contributed to player bewilderment regarding game mechanics or progression.
- Discomfort (weight 0.02): Discomfort was primarily caused by physical symptoms such as eye strain, headaches, and motion sickness, often linked to the visual demands of puzzles or the overall game design. This indicates a need for better visual accessibility or design considerations.
- Hope (weight 0.02): Players expressed hope for future improvements and updates, specifically desiring features like per-season saving, better guidance, skip options for cutscenes, and a more robust hint system. This suggests a desire for quality-of-life improvements to enhance the overall gameplay experience.
- Challenge (weight 0.02): The game presented a challenge through difficult mini-games, the demanding task of finding hidden objects, and the overall effort required to achieve all achievements. This indicates that some players enjoyed the mental strain and difficulty presented by these aspects.
- Anger (weight 0.02): Anger was triggered by frustrating gameplay elements, particularly poorly designed timed mini-games and unhelpful hints. Players also felt anger when the game's casual tag was misleading, leading to an unexpectedly difficult or frustrating experience.
- Interest (weight 0.01): Interest was piqued by the game's unique cultural themes, such as the 24 Solar Terms, and its integration of cultural myths and phenomena. This suggests that the game's educational and cultural content was a strong draw for players.
- Nostalgia (weight 0.01): Nostalgia was evoked by the game's art style, which reminded some players of old textbooks, and its cultural themes. This connection to past experiences or cultural heritage created a sense of fond remembrance.
- Surprise (weight 0.01): Surprise occurred when players successfully solved puzzles or made unexpected discoveries within the game. In some cases, the game also led to a personal realization, such as discovering one's own color weakness, which was an unexpected outcome.
- Relief (weight 0.01): Relief was felt when significant bugs were fixed and overall gameplay improvements were implemented through updates. This indicates that players had experienced prior issues and were glad to see them resolved, leading to a more enjoyable experience.
- Advice (weight 0): Players offered advice, specifically recommending that the game be played on a large screen. This suggests that the visual details or hidden object mechanics benefit from a larger display for a better experience.
- Gratitude (weight 0): Gratitude was expressed towards the developers for their ongoing support of the game. This indicates that players appreciated the continued effort and commitment from the development team.
- Admiration (weight 0): Admiration was directed towards the game's innovative concept and its seamless integration of cultural elements. Players were impressed by the thoughtful design and execution of these aspects.
- Anxiety (weight 0): Anxiety was experienced due to the difficulty in finding hidden items and navigating certain mini-games. This suggests that some gameplay elements created a sense of stress or unease for players.
- Support (weight 0): Players expressed support for the game's cultural mission, indicating an appreciation for its role in promoting or preserving cultural heritage. This suggests a connection beyond just gameplay enjoyment.}