Grace's Christmas Preparation

Foreword

I suppose it is a bit out of season to be talking about this game now, but it's probably best to talk about this one while it's still fresh since I can only submit so many replays for this game before I probably get into trouble.

Intro

"Grace's Christmas Preparation" is a short puzzle game developed by Saffie using RPG Maker VX Ace and includes art assets created by Miosugi. Unfortunately this appears to be the only game Saffie ever submitted to this site and the only game Miosugi contributed to if their profile's are anything to go by. An unfortunate note since this game does look nice for a project completed in a handful of hours. Even this game itself is on the shorter side and can beaten in under ten minutes. At least if you take your time to solve one of the puzzles correctly instead of blindly guessing the correct solution through sheer brute force.

Story

You play as Grace whose been given a to-do list while her mother goes out to pick up her husband and son from an unspecified location. A to-do list that includes baking cookies, decorating the house, and wrapping everyone's presents. A to-do list that seems a little to advanced for Grace who looks like she's eight years old. I just question how responsible her parents are if they are willing to leave her alone for hours at a time.

Regardless the story is pretty basic and lacks the emotional heft of some other games on this site, but considering the time frame this game was made in and it's goal of being a last minute Christmas gift for the community. I'm willing to overlook it's lack of emotional weight.

Gameplay

The game mostly centers around searching the house for various objects you'll need to complete the to-do list from supplies to make chocolate chip cookies to knives for opening boxes full of decorations. Albeit the part of the game that will take up the most time is the logic puzzle where you need to match people to their gift's as well as select the appropriate wrapping paper and ribbon. A task that will likely require you to write down the clues in order to maul them over a bit. At least I wrote them down on a couple of notecards. Albeit the game doesn't punish you for selecting the wrong items in any fashion. So you can brute force your way through this challenge if you want. I just don't see why you'd want to waste time on blind guesses when it only takes a few minutes to work out the correct solution using the clues provided. Albeit one of the clues does date itself to our current time period.



After all, the perception of what constitutes as a manly color has truly changed over the years. Which is why pink used to be a boys color and blue was associated with girls. This associated was switched after World War II. Though why this change was made is unclear to me.

Graphics

The game uses entirely custom art assets from what I can tell and includes some adorable art work by Miosugi.



Sound

The game includes a few sound effects, but you'll probably pay more attention to the background music for the title screen and the game itself which are "Dance Of The Sugar Plum Fairy" and "Last Christmas". Albeit the game doesn't seamlessly loop "Last Christmas" while your playing. The sound will play all the way through and then there'll be a pause before the music starts up again. I imagine the same also holds true for the title screen, but I haven't tested that theory.

Conclusion

"Grace's Christmas Preparation" is a short puzzle game, but I'm not sure how to rate this one. On one hand the game's various puzzles really aren't that challenging so this project really doesn't succeed as a puzzle game in my opinion. At the same time this feels more like a present to the community to celebrate the holidays and thus it wasn't intended to be a serious project that makes players put on their thinking caps. If anything it was meant to be a short, but heart-warming experience for the player and I think the game does succeed in this regard. So while I may not be able to pin down an appropriate score for this game. I still think it's worth playing at least once.